Ancient philosophy
This page lists some links to ancient philosophy. In Europe, the spread of Christianity through the Roman world marked the end of Hellenistic philosophy and ushered in the beginnings of Mediaeval Philosophy.
The pre-Socratic Greek philosophers rejected traditional mythological explanations for the phenomena they saw around them in favor of more rational explanations. They asked the following questions:
- Where does everything come from?
- What is it really made out of?
- How do we explain the plurality things found in nature?
- And why are we able to describe them with a singular mathematics?
While most of these thinkers produced significant texts, no complete versions survive of any of them. What remains are quotations by later philosophers and historians, and the occasional textual fragment.
Thales
Anaximander
Pythagoras
Heraclitus of Ephesus
Xenophanes, Parmenides, and the other Eleatic philosophers
Leucippus, Democritus and the other Atomists
Protagoras and the Sophists
Classical Greece
Socrates
Plato
Aristotle
Cicero
Zeno of Citium, Epictetus
Epicurus, Lucretius
Empedocles
The Neo-Platonists: Ammonius Saccas, Plotinus, Porphyry, Proclus, Iamblichus)
Marcus Aurelius
Schools of thought in the Hellenistic period
Cynicism
Hedonism
Eclecticism
Neo-Platonism
Skepticism
Stoicism
Vedic philosophy
In the east, Indian philosophy begins with the Vedas where questions related to laws of nature, the origin of the universe and the place of man in it are asked. In the famous Rigvedic Hymn of Creation the poet says:
"Whence all creation had its origin,
he, whether he fashioned it or whether he did not,
he, who surveys it all from highest heaven,
he knows--or maybe even he does not know."
In the Vedic view, creation is ascribed to the self-consciousness of the primeval being (Purusha). This leads to the inquiry into the one being that underlies the diversity of empirical phenomena and the origin of all things. Cosmic order is termed rta and causal law by karma. Nature (prakriti) is taken to have three qualities (sattva, rajas, and tamas).
Vedas
Upanishads
Hinduism
Classical Indian philosophy
In classical times, these inquiries were systematized in six schools of philosophy. The questions asked were:
What is the ontological nature of consciousness?
How is cognition itself experienced?
Is mind (chit) intentional or not?
Does cognition have its own structure?
The six schools of Indian philosophy are:
Chinese philosophy
In China, less emphasis was put upon materialism as a basis for reflecting upon the world and more on conduct, manners and social behaviour, as evidenced by Taoism and Confucianism.
Chinese philosophy -- Confucianism, Taoism, Legalism
Buddhist philosophy arose in India but contributions to it were made in China, Japan, and Korea also.
Eastern philosophy
Referenced By
Ancient History | Ancient civilization | Aristoteles | Aristotelian | Aristotelianism | Aristotelis | Aristotle | Greek philosophy | List of philosophical topics | List of philosophical topics (A-C) | The Philosopher
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