Parmenides

Parmenides of Elea (fl. 500 B.C.) was an Ancient Greek philosopher and an early logician of sorts, with some spectacularly counter-intuitive views on our universe. In this video, Dr. Foxwede outlines his extraordinary denial of our physical reality, and his reasoning that all that exists is in fact a changeless, indivisible cosmic billiard ball. (In Parmenides' original Greek, all of this is argued in metrically correct but rather unpleasant dactylic hexameter!)
If you would like to learn more about the early Greek philosophers, please like and subscribe!

[@MsWonderBunny]

My brain hurts.

[@jbricklin1]

Nice graphics. Peter Kingsley's book Reality gives us a deeper interpretation of what Parmenides was about.

[@illusus_aten]

Parmenides was the Master of the Day at understanding and fully comprehending and encompassing the Universal Law of Duality ☯

[@kimsecherandersen1085]

Parmenides of Elea from Magna Graecia, raised profound questions of existence in his ontology. Axiomatic, deductive reasoning, his methodology. Reductionism and logical fatalism underpinning his epistemology. An eternal, never changing, finite universe his cosmology. “Whatever is is - and what is not cannot be”. The arche of the cosmos is entirely filled by Being. Indivisible - with no end or beginning. Everything that exists - indestructible. Coming into being and ceasing to exist - impossible. Real change, free will, and time but mere illusions. Seek the Way of Truth to avoid delusions! Truth cannot be known through sensory perception. Only through pure reason can we evade deception. For is the Sun the size it may look - simply the size of a human foot?

[@samsinghr.539]

currently slogging through online self taught philosophy classes for uni and im this channel has so much good content, and good production value. honestly very in shock when i looked down and saw 1.5k subs, you deserve far more. keep up the good work!

[@thequantumguy5067]

what did you expect this kind of content to find a big following on the hell hole that is the internet?

[@rosary6521]

Thank you for making these videos. As someone who is studying philosophy, these help me a lot!

[@bats_y8283]

One might consider how even after one has stopped thinking of this "Round Square", it may merely lay in a dormant state in the context of abstract ideas until it is thought of again.

[@FoxwedeHistory]

Sounds very Platonic! That could very well be Parmenides' view on his necessary being - i.e. that all he wants to demonstrate is that an entity can be thought about, at least has the potential to do so. But that is surely begging the question that we have an eternal entity to begin with, and I don't think the argument ever proves such a thing.

[@bats_y8283]

Another great video. I always feel like I am a student in your classroom and that's a great feeling. I do hope you may someday do an episode on the Gordian Knot, as the topic fairly fascinates me. Regardless of you doing that or not, I will watch every video. Nice job!

[@FoxwedeHistory]

Thanks very much! I would love to do a series on Alexander one day. One fascinating tale after another.

[@NikoHermogenes]

everyone reading this, YOU have a purpose.

[@somesaykosm8081]

Quite informative! Thank you, sir! I've an objection and a question. The objecting is this: one can't think about a round square; it's conceptually incoherent. One can think about the words "round square" and about the properties of squares and round things, but you can't think about both of them existing in the same thing, at the same time, in the same way. Conceptually incoherent things can't be thought about. The question is this: did Parmenides assert that ideas exist outside of our inquiries or meditations on them?

[@FoxwedeHistory]

I've been thinking about this some more, and I can see your perspective. Perhaps, however, one could say that a "round square" is an idea, but a non-visualisable one. You can think about it, but it doesn't lend itself to being pictured in your mind. The idea is incoherent, but it seems to me that if we can think about and discuss something, and give it both a name and properties, there needs to be a "thing" that our speculations are "about". In this case, a "round square" what David Hume called a "compound idea," i.e. a composite of two or more elements. A square and a circle, both condensed into a silly idea. Just my thoughts on this recently. Re. your second question, I think it is more implied in P.'s reasoning than directly stated. On any interpretation of his thought, P. is a rather difficult and cryptic philosopher that leaves many gaps for his readers to fill. Hope this answers your question!

[@XxXjuan96carlosXxX]

The closest philosophy to truth, not to be understood intellectually, but felt.

[@atamuratkalkan3140]

Hello Foxwede, It is a great channel, very informing. I am writing from Turkey İstanbul. All of my friends use your video to study for lectures. We all know english with different levels. But as a non native english speaker I can say that your videos need english subtitles. Your english is very fluent and understandable but since we deal with philosophy some of the terms must be visiually seen. And only adding english subtitles might help other non-native speakers, which means more suscribers :) Have a good one! .... and sorry for my bad english

[@scubybluebrown]

Could anyone please clarify what is said at 5:08: "a ??? entity is frozen in time." I've listened umpteen times, but I can't pick it up. Thanks.

[@monicalangeveld1280]

You can't have something emerging from nothing, and you can't have something dissolving into nothing, so it must be eternal

[@WillBC23]

I believe it's "so our" where the accent makes the "our" sound strange

[@scubybluebrown]

@@WillBC23 Thanks for your reply. I'll listen again.

[@scubybluebrown]

@@WillBC23 That can't be right - as "... a so our entity is frozen in time" is neither grammatically nor semantically correct. Thanks anyway.

[@scubybluebrown]

@@monicalangeveld1280 Thanks, but I wasn't looking for a conceptual clarification; I just can't pick up the words.

[@jmcbarrera]

You can’t actually think about a round square...that’s his point....

[@leetannock5613]

Perhaps I’m being stupid but I got lost around 4:40. I don’t understand what the “Necessary Being” is. I thought the necessary being was anything that COULD necessarily exist, even merely as and idea. Surely then there are an infinite number of necessary beings. Therefore how could “a” (single) necessary being compose the whole universe? I’m baffled, can anyone clarify please?

[@alexswedenborg1856]

δροσερός

[@sethhiles7830]

One could also say that, though we bring about new entities through the natural course of existence, those things that become will eventually leave as that which was always intended to be, as it is no longer shakeable from the bounds of having existed in the past. From this, one might reason that all that came before was all that ever could have been, and all other things we could possibly idealize as potentialities, are not real as the never came to pass

[@amandafarley6469]

"Truly thoughts are things, and powerful ones at that" Napoleon Hill

[@walmenreis]

A 'round square' exists, at least nominally, I.e., as a combination of terms and their meanings, so being an idea of that, however absurd it is. For Parmenides the ideas exist, and by their very nature each stands for anything except itself. Therefore, inquiring about a 'round square' isn't the same as entertaining its idea, which exists outside the contexts of the inquiry itself, although also inside the mind. For him the ideas are only the exclusive means of knowing, and, again, since no idea is about itself, they certainly represent something else. This is the meaning of his verse "to think is the same as to be" - in the senses of both Descartes' 'cogito' and Berkeley's 'esse is percipi'.

[@mike-0451]

You totallty missed the part where he asserts the principle of non-contradiction. A round square is a set o linguistic referents that mean something only by themselves. Obviously a round square is a logical impossibility, but this is accounted for already, as their is no contradiction in the one.

[@trueneese8080]

Are you sure when Parmenides is saying that something must exist for him to be able to consider anything, he isn’t thinking of any specific thing, per say, only the foundation of existence itself, that which allows him to think or to consider. So it isn’t regulated to thinking of a concrete object like something that can or can’t exist, it implies that Something* must exist for him to be able to consider it- even if that thing is a mystery and he cannot even begin to consider it in form, so it doesn’t exist because of Him considering It, rather He exists because of It which allows him to and is a requirement for his ability to consider at all.

[@MichaelTebeleMusic]

Either it is, or is-not, That is the question to ponder. What is not cannot be known, For it cannot be that what-is-not is shown. Either it is, or is-not, That is the question to ponder. What is-not cannot be pointed out, For in thinking and being, what-is is about. Either it is, or is-not, That is the question to ponder. It is as it comes and it does not cease, Nor does it move top beyond or before, For that which is will always be, for right now forever more.

[@Gealamusic]

that greek accent though

[@verytrue9]

U made a big error over there, he said that if we can think about something then it exists, and that if something doesn't exists then we can't think about it, this doesn't mean that if no one can think about something then it doesn't exists.Do u understand this now?

[@yvonnegonzales2973]

Par said illusion

[@DrewJackson]

If you can draw a square circle or even envision it in your mind then it would exist. Just being able to put the words square and circle next to each other isn’t the same. Like many before, you have missed the point.

[@watermelonlalala]

Parmenides got it exactly correct. I never heard of his name until today, but I have thought these same things for decades. Good video except for your OPINIONS.

[@HikiWaltz]

Your interpretation of the word 'exists' in the case of a round square is flawed. Is no leap to presume that if an idea is capable of being instantiated in your thought, this possibility is preexisting of your act of instantiation... It exists as a possible idea to be instantiated.... It only means that is not possible to think in something you can`t think... But then again, one`s inability to instantiate does not exclude the idea from existing, since it may be possible for another one to think it... And if it`s possible to anyone, it must exist, at least a thinkable idea... Round Squares are thinkable and related to the idea of paradoxes... When you think in a round square, you`re not thinking in a object, but an language/conceptual construct that inhabits the Ent near the ideas of paradoxes and contradictions...

[@HorkPorkler]

God. So off.

[@straightastudent683]

A round square negates its self so you do not defeat anyone by bringing it up because you're talking about another form of nothing.

[@FoxwedeHistory]

I don't think a self-contradictory idea means that the idea is negated out of existence. If we can refer to such a concept composed of two properties - an entity with 'roundness' and 'squareness' - our discussion must be about 'something,' and contains more semantic content than if we had simply said nothing at all. The idea could exist as a contradictory one, not as an abstract object in a world of ideas (i.e. in Platonism) but simply as a shared fiction among many minds - which still exists in one sense if not in others.

[@straightastudent683]

@@FoxwedeHistory Yes I agree Plato is more wrong than No Change Man but Fire Man Heraclitus allows for all these concepts/ideas to exist in one infinite fire of change without omitting silly things such as no change which would be a self evident falsehood if not for the unjust/incorrect assertion that all ideas are real when in fact what makes them real is changing and therefore up for questioning but what cannot be questioned is the infinite fire of change which allows for eternity to exist. It allows for the forgetting of change by way of sleep and active denial of logos or fire by way of lying.

[@trashstack]

lmao edgelord