[lit-ideas] Re: "the Greek philosophy borrowed from the Egyptians"?
- From: Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 9 Apr 2004 00:36:16 -0700 (PDT)
--- Scribe1865@xxxxxxx wrote:
I don't think your
> first sentence above is true, but would be glad to
> be convinced that it is.
> What do you mean by "the Greek philosophy"? Do you
> mean empiricism?
Primarily natural philosophy and mathematics, and also
metaphysics. It's well-known that most of the
Pythagoraean mathematics, including his Theorem, was
gotten from the Egyptians and/or Babylonians.
(Egyptians are the usual candidate for direct
borrowing because there is evidence from Thales that
Pythagoras visited Egypt and studied their
mathematics.) See for example:
http://www.sourcetext.com/pythagoras/
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/002820.html
The idea of immortal soul was probably imported into
Greek thought from Egypt as well. See:
http://www.bulfinch.org/fables/bull34.html
Plato, too, was influenced by Egyptian ideas, and his
Timaeus is even said to have been based on an Egyptian
manuscript. Mike Chase can probably elaborate on this
further. The Egyptian influence is hardly problematic;
more controversial are the Zoroastrian and Chaldean
influences, about which I will try to provide more
information later. Many of the early philosophers -
viz. Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes, Heraclitus and
others - were born in the Asia Minor. Another major
place of origin were the colonies in Sicily and
Southern Italy. It was later that philosophy made its
way to the Greek mainland.
O.K.
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