Presocratic Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction

by Catherine Osborne

Overview

Generations of philosophers, both ancient and modern, have traced their inspiration back to the Presocratics. Part of the fascination stems from the fact that little of what they wrote survives. Here Osborne invites her readers to dip their toes into the fragmentary remains of thinkers from Thales to Pythagoras, Heraclitus to Protagoras, and to try to reconstruct the moves that they were making, to support stories that Western philosophers and historians of philosophy like to tell about their past.

This book covers the invention of western philosophy: introducing to us the first thinkers to explore ideas about the nature of reality, time, and the origin of the universe.

About the Series: Combining authority with wit, accessibility, and style, Very Short Introductions offer an introduction to some of life's most interesting topics. Written by experts for the newcomer, they demonstrate the finest contemporary thinking about the central problems and issues in hundreds of key topics, from philosophy to Freud, quantum theory to Islam.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780192840943
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	09/16/2004
Series:	Very Short Introductions
Pages:	176
Product dimensions:	6.90(w) x 4.36(h) x 0.41(d)
Lexile:	1230L (what's this?)

About the Author

Catherine Osborne has been a Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of East Anglia, Norwich (since 2003), Reader in the School of Archaeology, Classics, and Oriental Studies at the University of Liverpool from 2000 to 2003, and before that Reader in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Wales, Swansea. Her publications include Rethinking Early Greek Philosophy (1987) and Eros Unveiled: Plato and the God of Love (1994), as well as the chapter on Heraclitus in the Routledge History of Philosophy, Volume 1 and many articles on a wide range of issues in Ancient Philosophy from the Presocratics to the Early Christian period.

Table of Contents

	List of illustrations	viii
	Map	xi
	Timelines	xii
	A note on the pronunciation	xiv
	Introduction	xv
1	Lost words, forgotten worlds	1
2	Puzzles about first principles	29
3	Zeno's tortoise	51
4	Reality and appearance: more adventures in metaphysics	61
5	Heraclitus	80
6	Pythagoras and other mysteries	97
7	Spin doctors of the 5th century	112
	Epilogue	133
	Further reading	136
	Index	141