Presocratics

Η διδακτική αυτή προσέγγιση αφορά στο σχεδιασμό και την υλοποίηση της διδασκαλίας στο πλαίσιο ενός μαθήματος φιλοσοφίας σχετικά με τις θεωρίες της γνώσης στη Β΄ Γενικού Λυκείου,  με  βάση  το διδακτικό  βιβλίο  Αρχές  Φιλοσοφίας  στο  πλαίσιο  του  αναλυτικού προγράμματος.  Πιο  συγκεκριμένα,  θα  προσπαθήσουμε  να  προτείνουμε  τον  εμπλουτισμό του κεφαλαίου 3: Αναζητώντας τη γνώση, ενότητα τρίτη: Θεωρίες για την πηγή της γνώσης, χρησιμοποιώντας  στοιχεία  θεωρίας  της  γνώσης  και  της  αντίληψης  των  Προσωκρατικών.  Στόχος  μας  είναι  να  εμπλουτίσουμε  το  κεφάλαιο  αυτό  με  στοιχεία  προσωκρατικής  φιλοσοφίας ως παλαιότερης χρονολογικά και προϋπάρχουσας εκείνης της Κλασικής εποχής  και των Νεοτέρων χρόνων.

This article presents a strategy for introducing Presocratic thought to students in a manner that is both engaging and relevant. The first section addresses students' reactions to the claim that the Presocratics were the first philosophers. The second section considers how the fragmentary state of Presocratic thought does not hinder its comprehension. The third section proposes a classroom exercise for testing the scientific merits of each of the Presocratic theories. The final section proposes the use of a mock trial as a means of applying the materialist approach introduced by the Presocratics to contemporary debates about free will and determinism.

Aristotle introduced in the history of the reception of Anaxagoras the term “homoiomerous.” This word refers to substances whose parts are similar to each other and to the whole. Although Aristotle’s explanations can be puzzling, the term “homoiomerous” may explain an authentic aspect of Anaxagoras’ doctrine reflected in the fragments of his work. Perhaps one should find a specific meaning for the term “homoiomerous” in Anaxagoras, somewhat different from the one present in Aristotle. This requires a review of the sense of the two terms involved in it: “homoios” and “moira.” In other words, the following questions should be answered: what realities are named parts and to what whole do they belong? On the other hand, which similarity do they have to each another and to the whole? The author concludes that the parts are “all things,” which resemble each other and the universe as a whole because, according to Anaxagoras, they are all composed of all things.

Most historians of science credit the traditional players (Aristotle, Galileo, Copernicus, Newton) for gifting us Moderns with a scientific outlook on nature and the cosmos. Few go back as far as the Presocratics (6th and 5th c. BCE), acknowledging that their cosmologies made a lasting impact on what we nowadays know as science.

Il principale obiettivo dei Milesi, lungi dall’essere un’insensata reductio
ad unum di tutte le sostanze, è stato in effetti un primo tentativo d’interpretare razionalmente il mondo intorno a noi, spiegando cosa costringa i corpi celesti a girare intorno alla terra e quale sia l’origine dei fuochi astrali. Forse però il loro più importante contributo è stato di natura epistemologica. Essi hanno mostrato che i fenomeni fisici devono essere spiegati in termini fisici e quelli biologici in termini biologici, valorizzando così l’osservazione scientifica e favorendo il perfezionamento dei metodi di misura che ha portato al grande sviluppo della scienza greca

Si bien la historia de la filosofía es también filosofía, no por ello puede pasar de largo sobre la necesidad de ser también una historia. Los textos que exponen lo que se considera como el conjunto de argumentos del pasado dentro del contexto donde se exhibió su noción de lo que deba integrarnos en nuestra historia, de ubicamos dentro del horizonte mismo donde se haga significativo dialogar filosóficamente. Estos textos son los manuales, introducciones y exposiciones de lo que otros consideraron un asunto digno de la actividad filosófica. .

The Philosophy of Parmenides as a system of idealistic monism (immaterialism). The Pythagorean background of Parmenides' metaphysics. The origin of the mistaken positivist interpretation of Parmenides. Plato's date of Parmenides' birth (circa 515 BC) is a literary fiction, Apollodorus' date (c. 544/541 BC) is to be preferred.

In the National Undergraduate Classical Studies Honorary's biannual publication, Nuntius.  Summer 2014 Issue.

http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Presocratics-Thematic-Approach-Philosophy/dp/0470655038/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1411509649&sr=8-3&keywords=stamatellos

were the two major founders of "new quantum theory" in the period 1925-1927. Their formulations were very different, and neither of them liked the other's formulation. Heisenberg, in a letter, called Schrödinger's formulation "repulsive," and characterized the physical interpretation as "crap."1 Schrödinger, without obscenity but in print, returned the compliment, saying he was "repelled" by Heisenberg's formulation and that it was "monstrous." 2 The two formulations were later proved to be equivalent. (Some qualifications must be added. Dirac, over three decades later, while recording his version of the equivalence proof to Thomas Kuhn, who was collecting interviews with the founders, claim that in systems with an infinite number of dimensions a term in the exponent did not carry over.)3 Despite their differences, both Heisenberg and Schrödinger were well-aware of the novelties and apparent paradoxes of the new quantum mechanics. complex valued terms, multidimensional character, was novel and counterintuitive. Heisenberg, allying himself with Bohr accepted these features as intrinsic to the subatomic world, while Schrödinger unsuccessfully attempted initially and successfully tried to further retrieve features of classical mechanics and to formulate wave mechanics in a continuous and deterministic form without quantum jumps, in "Are There Quantum Jumps?"4 Because of Schrödinger's continued support of the Law of Continuity and criticism of superposition he did not find the new quantum mechanics as radical a change from classical physics as much as Heisenberg. This may account of Schrödinger's interest not so much in the metaphysics of the Presocratics as was Heisenberg's, but in objectivity and knowledge common to all. But despite their differences in attitude toward the canonical form of the theory, both felt that quantum mechanics upset classical physics required new approaches to understanding different from those of classical particle physics such as atomism of particles. Schrödinger in a chapter titled "The Motives for Returning to Ancient Thought" states that in modern physics "The very foundations are shaken," and that "Quantum theory while extending atomism almost limitlessly, has plunged into a crisis more severe than most people are prepared to admit.5

Bien que les notions de φιλία et δίκη n’apparaissent pas conjointement dans les fragments présocratiques, elles relèvent de champs similaires, qu’il s’agisse de la nécessité cosmique ou d’une forme conditionnelle de nécessité. Mais, tandis que l’amitié cosmique d’Empédocle (la Φιλότης) est conçue comme une force d’unification et d’homogénéisation des contrariétés, le modèle développé par Démocrite des rapports entre amis se fonde sur l’attraction des semblables – contrairement à ce qui pouvait d’abord sembler ressortir des analyses aristotéliciennes. Le concept de justice, initialement relatif aux lois de l’univers et de l’être (avec Anaximandre, Héraclite et Parménide), s’élabore progressivement via la question de la rétribution proportionnelle et de la mesure, mais sans s’élever jusqu’à une dimension vraiment délibérative, puisque le choix se restreint à consentir ou non à la nécessité.

This paper is about the history of a question in ancient Greek philosophy and medicine: what holds the parts of a whole together? The idea that there is a single cause responsible for cohesion is usually associated with the Stoics. They refer to it as the synectic cause (αἴτιον συνεκτικόν), a term variously translated as 'cohesive cause,' 'containing cause' or 'sustaining cause.' The Stoics, however, are neither the first nor the only thinkers to raise this question or to propose a single answer. Many earlier thinkers offer their own candidates for what actively binds parts together, with differing implications not only for why we are wholes rather than heaps, but also why our bodies inevitably become diseased and fall apart. This paper assembles, up to the time of the Stoics, one part of the history of such a cause: what is called 'the synechon' (τὸ συνέχον): that which holds things together.

Starting with our earliest evidence from Anaximenes (sixth century BCE), the paper looks at the candidates, models and metaphors for thinking about causes of cohesion which were proposed by different philosophers and doctors including Empedocles, early Greek doctors, Diogenes of Apollonia, Plato, Aristotle and Athenaeus of Attalia. My goal is to explore why these candidates and models were proposed and how later philosophical objections to them led to changes in how causes of cohesion were understood.

In the analysis of Anaxagoras' physics in view of the relation between his teachings on multitude and heterogeneity, two central questions emerge: 1) How can the structure of the universe considered purely mereo-topologically help us explain that at the first cosmic stage no qualitative difference is manifest in spite of the fact that the entire qualitative heterogeneity is supposedly already present there? 2) How can heterogeneity become manifest at the second stage, resulting from the noûs intervention, if according to fragment B 6 such a possibility requires the existence of "the smallest", while according to the general principle stated in fragment B 3 there is not "the smallest" but always only "a smaller"? This paper showcases the perplexity of these two questions but deals only with the former. The answer follows from Anaxagoras' being a thoroughgoing infinitist in the way in which no Greek physicist was: the principle of space isotropy operative in geometry is extended to physics as well. So any two parts of the original mixture are similar to each other not only in view of the smaller-larger relation but also because each contains everything that the other one contains. This in effect means that at the stage of maximal possible heterogeneity each part of any part contains infinitely many heterogeneous parts of any kind whatsoever. So, neither can there be homogeneous parts in view of any qualitative property, nor can there be predominance in quantity of parts of any kind that would make some property manifest.

ANAXAGOREAN NOUS AND ΙTS ΑNALOGΙES
ΙN ORPHΙC COSMOLOGY
Ι. Ιntroduction. The Anaxagorean Thesis on Norrs. Anaxagoras argues that matter initially consisted of a mixture of inνisible materials, infinite in size and number. These materials werΘ the seed of all things; of al1 the natural things (animals and humans), of the various forces, and of the natural substances that were going to be produced. These sperms
were condensed to a united and solid mass, which preexisted i.e. before the formation of the cosmos. Everything that exists today is rooted in that preexisting mass, since, according to
Anaxagoras and Ρarmenid, <nothing iS born and nothing is Ιost>. The sperms ofthis mass, the sperms of all things οontain within themselγes the pοιentiαl (Εν δυναμει) of all material substances of the cosmos, because, <everything contains paπ of everything>. Αristotle later
named these speΙΙns as homoeomeri 6μoιoμερη = similar kinds), implying that they are fundamental, consisting of similar parts. This is the physical unit from which cosmogony started. Ιn a few things, however, Αnaxagoras introduces another factor; the mind = noιιs=Nous is a signifiοant factor in the cosmologic theory of Anaxagoras. Ιt is something ιvith self_sufficiency and independence, unmixed, thin and pure, omniscient and goveming all beings (οντα). Ιt acts upon eνerything and proνides the moving power. Ιt is responsible for the separation of things in cosmos, their hierarchy and order. But, aΙthough it penetrates (gets through) everything' does not coexist with everything' but onΙy in some, especially the beings.
The Anaxagorean notion of Νous needs further cΙarification. Questions which emerge include: a) has ly'oas a spiritual and transcendant meaning or is it a purely mechanistic quality,
b) where has Nous οomΘ from? As a consequence of the materialistic cosmos, or from outside the closed system of material mixture? Taking his exact wording, he states that <all things were initially together, then Noas came and ordered them>>. An observation immediately arises: does Αnaxagoras mean the beginning oftime? Ιn this case, by some unexplained' but automatic and dogmatic way, it sets an axiom: in the beginning everything tνvas one, a closed system. But what
existed outside this system? Or does <<outside> mean an unimaginable space exterior to the area where <eνerything was mixed in infinitive fundamental particles>? Αlthough Nous is brought in as a universal power without any explanation regarding its origin, it may imply either the theistic presence, or a rational explanation emerging from manifestations of matter.

C. Cengiz Çevik, “Herakleitos’un Doğa Üzerine Kitabıyla İlgili Kaynaklar ve Yorumlar,” Felsefi Düşün 13 (2019): 121-133.

ÖZ

Presokratik filozoflar da kitaplar yazmıştır, ancak ne yazık ki bu kitapların hiçbiri günümüze tam olarak ulaşmamıştır. Sonraki yazarların eserlerinde, doksografi ve ansiklopedi metinlerinde bu kitapların bazılarından yapılan alıntılara ve bu kitaplara ait olduğu düşünülen veciz sözlere rastlamaktayız. Bununla birlikte bazı eserler de bu kitapların adı, içeriği ve dolaşıma geçip geçmediğiyle ilgili bilgiler vermektedir. Bu çalışmada antik kaynaklarda Herakleitos’a atfedilen ve yaygın olarak Περὶ φύσεως (Doğa Üzerine) adıyla anılan eserle ilgili tartışmalara yer verilmektedir. Bu kapsamda Antikçağ ile Ortaçağ’a ait tüm kaynaklar taranmıştır. Bunlar arasında Diogenes Laertius, Platon, Aristoteles, Sextus Empiricus, Strabon, Stobaios, Simplicius gibi önemli yazarlar bulunmaktadır. Ayrıca gerek Herakleitos’u, gerekse ondan sonraki felsefe geleneğinde bıraktığı izleri inceleyen saygın modern kaynaklardaki yorumlar gözden geçirilmiştir. Bu çalışmanın temel amacı, Herakleitos’a atfedilen tek eserle ilgili dağınık haldeki tüm kaynakları ve yapılan tüm tartışmaları bir bütün halinde sunup ele almaktır. Konusu itibariyle bir ilk olan bu çalışma, batı felsefe geleneğini derinden etkilemiş olan Herakleitos’un ünlü deyişlerinin olası kaynağıyla ilgili bundan sonra yapılacak olan başka kapsamlı çalışmalara da katkı sunacaktır.

Nous nous efforçons de présenter ce que, à partir d'éléments positivement donnés dans des textes présocratiques, nous pouvons considérer comme un problème ayant été soulevé et ayant donné lieu à une procédure intellectuelle nouvelle permettant de le traiter, selon une démarche susceptible d’être rétrospectivement qualifiée de philosophique.

Resumen: El presente artículo intenta acercarse al pensamiento de Heráclito a partir de la crítica que realiza el efesio a la tradición, principalmente literaria (Homero, Hesíodo, Arquíloco) y filosófica (Jenófanes y Pitágoras). Esto con el objetivo de mostrar: (i) el tono crítico con que Heráclito se refiere a la tradición cultural anterior a él, aunque no disociándose completamente de ella, (ii) cuál sería la causa probable de tales invectivas, y (iii) cómo esta causa muestra la " novedad " del pensamiento heraclíteo respecto de los ideales y valores anteriores. Abstract: This article attempts to approach the thought of Heraclitus from the critical review conducted by the Ephesian to previous tradition, mainly literary (Homer, Hesiod, Archilochus) and philosophical (Xenophanes and Pythagoras). This aims to show: (i) the critical tone that Heraclitus refers to the cultural tradition before him, though not completely dissociate from it, (ii) what would be the probable cause of such invective, and (iii) how this cause shows the " newness " of heraclitean thought to the ideals and previous values.

Da secoli siamo abituati a pensare alla nascita della filosofia solo con la sua prima comparsa sul terreno, in Grecia, nel vi secolo a.C. È verosimile, invece, che il suo albero abbia radici molto più antiche, da ritrovare nella Creta minoica del xx secolo a.C. A partire da quel momento, grazie a un lungo processo che coinvolse la cultura micenea, l'epoca omerica e le prime fondazioni di poleis dell'VIII secolo a.C. in Magna Grecia e in Sicilia, la filosofia iniziò a radicarsi sino a fiorire, in forma scritta, in epoca presocratica. A differenza di quanto a lungo si è creduto, infatti, verosimilmente i palazzi della Creta minoica non furono sede di un potere imperiale dinastico, bensì dei veri e propri centri di coordinamento politico, economico e culturale: in questi aggregati urbani, per la prima volta nel mondo greco, si costituì una delle civiltà più armoniche della storia. Da questa esperienza originaria attinse continuamente il pensiero greco, sino a favorire nel tempo la nascita della polis, luogo in cui la philosophia trovò la propria prima espressione scritta a noi rimasta.

El presente trabajo se titula Areté y el ideal práctico del conocimiento; partimos del hecho de que el pensar filosófico tuvo como fundamento inicial en el sentido de la areté en la cultura griega, trasfondo que nos servirá para introducir la comprensión del modo del conocimiento, sobre la base de los argumentos que tanto Werner, Heidegger y Gadamer refieren al descubrimiento de los aspectos formales que subyacen en el lenguaje como elemento esencial para el pensar del hombre y la naturaleza.

Les chants d’exhortation des poètes grecs Tyrtée et Kallinos eurent une fonction rassembleuse dont l’efficacité inégalée s’explique ici pour la première fois grâce à une enquête philologique de leurs fragments rendus à la lettre des manuscrits et à la fluidité de leur rythme et de leur langue.

The songs of exhortation by the Greek poets Tyrtaeus and Callinus had a rallying function of unparalleled effectiveness, which is explained here for the first time thanks to a philological investigation of the songs’ fragments that follows them to the letter and also preserves the fluidity of their rhythm and language

Nell’arco di un cinquantennio, l’itinerario di ricerca di Néstor Cordero ha ruotato prevalentemente intorno al pensiero di Parmenide di Elea. Oltre ad alcuni libri capitali, Cordero ha dedicato all’Eleate numerose pubblicazioni, alcune delle quali oggi non più facilmente reperibili. Questo volume raccoglie venti scritti di Cordero (tra articoli, contributi a volumi collettivi e conferenze) nelle versioni originali in francese e in spagnolo, dedicati sia alla ricostruzione del testo del poema di Parmenide, sia all’interpretazione del suo pensiero e di quello dei suoi cosiddetti “eredi”. Ritornando su questi testi, sarà possibile misurare quanto la storia della tradizione testuale abbia compromesso la comprensione del pensiero parmenideo, e scoprire non solo come sia necessaria una messa in discussione dell’interpretazione classica di Parmenide, ma anche come sia in fondo scorretto ritenere che sia effettivamente esistita una “scuola” eleatica.

Thr reconstructor of the latest version of the Greek text (2011) divided its French translarion en regard into seven parts subdivided each according to its various themes. The other translations into modern languages followed suit giving the wrong impression that Heraclitus had had recourse to a preliminary plan. The first translation into English is free from this defect and meant to show that Heraclitus' text had rather been continuous throughout just as his subject matter. His book does fall indeed into parts and themes but this is not due to deliberate composition but must rather have come spontaneously as a reflextion of the very structure of his vision of the world. Since this structure would be a part of his message, it also deserves being shown. Here it consists of an Introduction and nine parts:
Sphragis and Proem about Justice and Logos (0-9);
Α’  Against Human Stupidity (10-50)
B'  About the City (51-66)
Γ'  About Knowledge (67--105)
Δ’  About the Divine Law (106-141)
E'  Against Unlawful Rites (142-153)
Z'  About the Fiery World (154-174)
H'  About the Pathis of the Elements (175-186)
Θ'  About the Ambient and the Souls (187-214)
I'  About Heaven and the Meteors.

In German. Topics include: Meanings of physis (ch. 2), physis before Early Greek Philosophy (ch. 3), physis in Early Greek philosophy (ch. 4), peri physeôs as book title in philosophia? (ch. 5), physis and kosmos (ch. 6), Aristotle's account of physis in Phys. II (ch. 7). Preceeding is an outline of the history of the concept until Aristotle (ch. 1).
This update replaces the version posted in 2015 (which, however, is retained on Academia for reference).
There are innumerous additions, corrections, and changes. Major changes pertain to the Derveni Papyrus (sections 4.12.4 and 5.4.1.6.). As regards terminology, "dispositionelles Profil" replaces "dynamische Konstitution" (section 2.4.1. and passim). 
Two pieces concerning Aristotle are added: section 6.6 on Met. XII 10 and ch. 7 on Phys. II 1 (both not yet adapted to the present format). Section on 6.5 on the Timaeus is still missing.
Further, the order of sections has changed: what was ch. 1 is now, in part, ch. 8; what was section 2.5 is now ch. 1.

Empedocles-the-scientist got a minoritarian attention, and this paper was meant to do something in order to redress the situation.
Two  preliminary questions are addressed here at the beginning: (1) how folklore, speculation and 'science' do coexist in his verses? (2) what to thing of the seemingly secundary doxai, esp. when they show no clear connection with the leading ideas of an ancient student of nature? My remarks on these topics include a note on virtual disciplines and polumathia.
Then some minor topics are examined: thermal waters; eyes as lanterns; why earth remains immobile despite the cosmic vortex.
My final (and larger) section is devoted to B31.100 (the klepsudra simile) and the possibility that Emp. has in mind the secondary branches of the bronchial tubes

The late Antique mosaic of Orpheus decorated a small room, approximately 18 m2 in area, connected with two even smaller ones, in 4 m2 and the other 2 m2 in area, belonging most likely to a small funerary chapel (or tomb) discovered in the ancient necropolis by the Damascene Gate in Jerusalem; it was discovered in 1901 by H. Vincent.
The author proposes a new interpretation of the iconographic program of the Orpheus myth used by wealthy Christians in a sepulchral context (see Olszewski M.T. «Orphée endeuillé de la mosaïque funéraire de Jérusalem», in Rey Mimoso-Ruiz, B. ed., Actes du colloque «Orphée entre Soleil et ombre», à l’Institut Catholique de Toulouse du 16 au 17 novembre 2007, Inter Lignes, numéros spécial – mars 2008, pp. 205-214, 226). He also proposes a new interpretation of the role Orpheus played in Roman funerary art, concentrating on the importance of the play on words and the visual and textual punning that was popular in ancient art and especially in funerary art. He rejects the popular interpretation of Orpheus as Christ in the Roman catacombs and proposes to interpret the image as that of Orpheus, bard of the departed souls, without any ahistorical connection with Christ. The program of the mosaic from Jerusalem is thus explained as a play on the words Orpheus-orphanos and Chiron (Chi-Rho) and Pan [Παν(τοκράτωρ)].The frequently used Christian funerary formula of resting in peace, Christ or the Lord corresponds
perfectly with the mood created around the mythical bard.
Orpheus’ universal role as singer and musician moving even the most stony of hearts, extolling the beloved departed, is absolutely justified in the context of a 6th-century Christian tomb. Orpheus is a popular and neutral figure, meaning that in effect it does not constitute a threat to Christian theology and can be tolerated by the educated Christians of Jerusalem.

Scholars typically discount Nietzsche's value for contemporary studies of Greek antiquity and this is done from both the perspective of Classics as of Ancient Philosophy. At the same time, such denigrations have been challenged again anCleved again, rather in the way that the whiteness of ancient statues could be cited by Nietzsche himself as a well-known fallacy in one of his public lectures in Basel — known since the 18th century and even earlier to have been richly, brightly coloured. Following the efforts of Vinzenz Brinkmann, the former director of the Munich Glyptothek, popular museum exhibitions of colorful deities — Bünte Götter — have gone on tour seemingly around the world. But no sooner do we note the colours overlaying classical statues than we revert to Winckelmann's comfortingly white clichés. The same fate seems destined to attend any effort to revisit Nietzsche and classical philology. As Jonathan Barnes has reflected along with Hugh Lloyd-Jones and David Lachterman among others in an older tradition, including Karl Reinhardt and, more recently, as Gherardo Ugolini and, in the broader tradition of philology, as Christian Benne has argued, it is worth questioning the convention that Nietzsche was 'not really' a classical philologist. Yet scholarly reception of Nietzsche continues to be conducted (even for exceptions such James Porter, Glenn Most, John Hamilton, even André Laks) on the same terms that informed Wilamowitz' juvenile critique. As Nietzsche reproaches himself in his own " Versuch einer Selbstkritik " written to accompany the republication (unaltered) of his first book, the " ears " for his reading of antiquity seem not to have existed — as they do not seem to exist today. Nietzsche — the Anti-Aristotle par excellence — insisted that Diogenes Laërtius, as Barnes explains, " is in fact night-porter to the history of Greek philosophy: no-one can enter unless Diogenes has given him the key. " Nietzsche explicates, contra what can seem simply a pell-mell account of this and that, that the anecdotal is essential just owing to the lack of primary and secondary sources. Given the state of the doxa that happen to remain, our only access is via the person: " The only thing of interest in a refuted system is the personal element. That alone is what is forever irrefutable. " Barnes notes this claim but without considering it, going on to track the promised number of anecdotes (Nietzsche promises to offer three in each case) although Nietzsche no more keeps to his count than does Diogenes Laërtius. Of the Preplatonic thinkers Nietzsche writes: " It is a veritable misfortune that we have so little extant of the works of the ancient masters and that not a single one of their works was handed down to us complete. " For Nietzsche, we cannot but err: offering scholarly judgments rather as one searches for one's keys under the lamppost owing more to the sheer abundance of light than for any likelihood of finding them in just that spot, ranking " with false standards, letting ourselves be disposed more favorably toward Plato and Aristotle by the sheer accident that they never lacked connoisseurs and copyists. " This happenstance inclines us to measure the rest of philosophy by their standards, unideal given their own efforts to eclipse those aspects of the past not seeming to culminate in themselves. Nietzsche's hermeneutic emphasis highlights the difference between our tastes (what seems right to us) by contrast with the effort to read the ancients on their own terms: " what philosophy was for them. " By describing Plato as a " mix't type, " utterly " unoriginal, " Nietzsche emphasizes the purity of thinkers before him such that philosophy in Greek antiquity is not estranged from itself whereas, beginning with Plato, philosophy goes into self-exile. Thus Nietzsche's reading of such 'Preplatonics' (hence including Socrates) by contrast with those Diels traditionally names the 'Presocratics' yields a range of useful insights beginning with a radical liberation from the Aristotelian-cum-Hegelian strictures of the doxographic tradition and not less the opportunity for critical historiography. Most informative can be Nietzsche's proto-structuralist hermeneutics of the tripod (coincidentally relevant as we find ourselves in Delphi), his discussion of the 'person' (Homer, Archilochus) and his reading of Anaximander (as ethical thinker) and perhaps his (to this day still) pathbreaking discussion of Anaxagoras as leading Athenian philosopher [Hauptphilosoph] foregrounding his noble traits (especially for Pericles), and not less as model for Aristophanes' Socrates, and, arguably, for Plato's cosmology as such. Also of interest is the divine or useless character of philosophy, a reflection on Die mythische Vorstufe der Philosophie, and on the morphology of the aphorism.

The Theogony of Epimenides of Crete and the origin of the Orphic-Pythagorean doctrine of reincarnation
It is commonly believed that the epic Theogony of Epimenides of Crete derives from the corpus of pseudepigrapha under his name and that it was composed by anonymous author (with Pythagorean background) after 500 B.C. We demonstrate (mainly on the basis the reconstruction of the proem of the Theogony) that such influences do not exist and we arrive at the conclusion that the Theogony was written by Epimenides himself around 600 B.C. Aristotle who was sceptical about the authorship of the poems attributed to Orpheus and Musaeus, cites Epimenides without reservations as the real author of the verses he cites. Therefore the common elements between Epimenides on the one hand, and the Orphics and Pythagoreans on the other (Night as the first principle, the cosmic egg, the immortality and reincarnation of the soul), should be interpreted as borrowings by the latter from Epimenides, not vice versa. As a “priest of Zeus and Rhea” Epimenides belongs to the ancient Cretan hieratic clan that claimed discendance from Aiakos, son of Zeus; in view of the extreme conservatism of Cretan cultural, political and religious traditions, the sources of Epimenides’ divine wisdom should be sought not in the hypothetical “northern” or eastern quarters, but in the local oral traditions that go back the Late Minoan times and are closely tied to the cults and myths of the region around Mount Ida and similar oracular caves. The discussion of Epimendes’ herbal medicine shows that it is connected both with therapeutuc use of herbs and with cathartic rituals; Indian Ayurveda provides a close typological parallel to this, so common Indo-European roots are possible. After this we address the problem of the origin and the
sources of the Orphic Theogony and propose a new solution. Taking at its face value Aristotle’s information on Onomacritus as the author of the Orphic epic Theogony, we discuss the “Cretan connections” of Onomacritus and adduce in favour of our hypothesis numerous literary and epigraphical- archeological pieces of evidence that connect early Orphism and the belief in the reincarnation with the Idaean cave and the region around it (Orphic golden plates and epistomia from Eleuphtherna and Sfakaki near Rethymno collected and studied by Tzifopoulos). Inter alia, we also propose a new interpretation of the Orphic graffiti written on bone plates from Olbia as divinatory devices (mantic cards, the oldest known ancestor of the cards Tarot) that probably belonged to the “diviner of Hermes” Pharnabazos of Olbia and were connected with the dice divination (astragalomanteia), the proper art of Hermes. The divinatory dodecahedron found in the Idaean cave seems to be connected with astragalomanteia, as well.
Keywords: Epimenides of Crete, Theogony, early Greek philosophy, divination, oniromancy, epic poetry, ritual slendering, rite de passage, Orphism, Orphic gold plates, pythagoreism, Pythagoras, soul, immortality, longevity, reincarnation, metempsychosis, Onomacritus, Aristotle, Euripides, Theopompus, Lion of Nemea, liar’s paradox, phytotherapy, history of herbal medicine, Ayurveda, Crete, Idaean cave, Eleutherna, Sfakaki, origin of the cards Tarot, astragalomancy (dice divination), Hermes, Apollo, Zeus.

This is full text of the first part of my monograph "The logos of Heraclitus",  published by Academic publishers "Nauka" in Saint-Petersburg in 2014, in English translation which contains all five chapters of the Introduction on Heraclitus' life, work and philosophy, as well a reconstruction of his lost work,  the Greek text of the fragments with apparatus criticus and English translation.  The second part contains commentary on fragments and is available in the original Russian edition on this personal page. This edition contains 160 fragments in the main corpus and 15 "Probabilia", i.e. probable fragments that are quoted without explicit mention of Heraclitus' name, but supported verbal coincidences and by parallels. Most of "Probabilia", including anonymous quotations in Plato, are based on new attributions. More than 20 fragments of the main corpus are not included in Diels-Kranz and other editions. Some of these fragments are new, some have been known before, but their status of authenticity has been reassessed and upgraded, e.g. from a doxographicum to a paraphrase of a verbatim quotation that contains a unique authentic tenet. In some other cases fragments considered authentic in DK, have been downgraded to interpretive paraphrase (B7, partly B91 DK) or to spuria (e.g. B105, B115 DK). In this edition we understand «fragment» not in Diels' formal sense as a verbatim quotation distinguished from «doxography» (an ill-defined category that we have criticised on our article "The origin and transmiision of the doxographical tradition... 2016), but as any ancient text that contains a unique piece of information on the philosophical content of a lost Preplatonic work, that cannot be reduced to other texts, an elementary «atom» of information.  The status of authenticity may be variable starting from a flawless verbatim quotation in Ionian dialect and descending down to a mixed verbatim quotation with paraphrase, to a good paraphrase close to original text, to a free paraphrase, to an interpretive paraphrase, to a polemical paraphrase that seriously distorts the original, to a mere reminiscence of term or a topos. We usually restrict the admission to the main corpus of fragments by first three categories. Some fragments in our edition are reconstructed on the ground of ancient summary that after quoting a verbatim fragment points to the existence of «other, similar» sayings of Heraclitus (such are 6 hypothetical fragments in 44A and 45A in our edition). Some «fragments» in our edition are «thought-fragments» rather than «text-fragments», i.e. a doctrinal (rather than lexical) convergence of several independent sources that does not allow to establish the exact wording of the lost original, but makes more ol less certain the existence of a certain analogy, idea or other tenet, since the name of Heraclitus appears in one or more contexts. Such cases are found especially in the reconstruction of the section on krafts (τέχναι) imitating nature, fr.106-124 Leb.