Zenon of Elea

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Zenon of Elea

Zeno of Elea ( Greek Ζήνων Zḗnōn , Latinized Zeno , also Zeno the Elder ; * around 490 BC in Elea ; † around 430 BC probably in Elea or Syracuse ) was an ancient Greek philosopher . He is counted among the pre-Socratics . There is strong evidence that he was a friend and student of Parmenides de Elea. However, this has not been clarified beyond doubt.

Teaching

Zeno saw his main task in defending the teaching of Parmenides against critical objections. In doing so, he achieved an extremely astute and convincing art of demonstration. He is named by Aristotle as the inventor of the art of reasoning, which Aristotle calls dialectics . Plutarch reports that Zeno had developed a special ability to refute others and press them with objections until they could no longer put forward arguments. After Plutarch, Timon von Phleius also commented on this art: “Zenon's enormous strength is insurmountable. Nobody escapes him, the duplicitous man [...]. "

Zeno was primarily concerned with the problem of the continuum , in particular the relationship between space , time and movement . This was reflected in at least ten - Proclus reports 40 - fallacies , ten of which are indirectly passed down. The best known are the paradoxes of movement, the fallacy of Achilles and the turtle , according to which a fast runner cannot overtake a slow runner if he gives them a head start, as well as the related fallacies of not being able to get there ( Paradox of division ) and the inability to run away as well as the arrow paradox and the stadium paradox . Others are Zeno's paradoxes of multiplicity and the paradox of fuder millet .

The structure of the paradoxes follows the principle of indirect proof . They are designed in such a way that the point of view to be refuted is accepted at the beginning. An infinite regress is then constructed from the assumptions . For example, in the case of the paradox of division, the route that has yet to be covered is divided in order to argue that the second part has to be covered again. This also applies to this part. This is mentally infinitely repeatable.

Zenon's argument revolves around the question of whether the world can be broken down into discrete units, i.e. whether there is divisibility, or whether the world actually forms a continuous unit. The assumption of divisibility leads to the problem that either everything is infinitely divisible or there must be last elementary quanta of space and time. The majority of the paradoxes now presuppose one of both and deduce from this the impossibility of things and processes that are experienced as possible in everyday life. So you know from experience that every runner can achieve his goal. Zeno discusses both space and movement in this way.

Some interpreters assume that Zenon wanted to defend the philosophy of his teacher Parmenides ("There is only the infinitely one and all movement is only an illusion ") with his train of thought . Plato lets Zeno report (in his dialogue “ Parmenides ” 128d) that he wanted to defend Parmenides against the accusation that his rejection of multiplicity and movement led to nonsensical consequences by proving that clinging to movement and multiplicity lead to even more nonsensical conclusions. However, Zeno also says there that this work is a youth work that, stolen from him, was distributed to the people without his consent. At least it can be said with certainty that Zeno's philosophy is directed against the assumption of certain basic philosophical positions to explain the world. Parmenides also argues against these positions. However, some of the paradoxes contradict Parmenides' spherical worldview. Strictly speaking, one can only deduce from Zeno's arguments that the assumption of space and movement under the assumptions made in the respective paradox leads to absurd consequences, i.e. the assumptions cannot be met.

A wide variety of arguments have been put forward against the paradoxes, which is why they are considered refuted. For measurements in the quantum world, however, they could be confirmed in 1994 at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich : The movement of a quantum system was demonstrably brought to a standstill by a series of dense measurements alone, which led to the theoretical modeling of the quantum Zeno effect .

Source collections

  • Laura Gemelli Marciano (Ed.): The pre-Socratics . Volume 2, Artemis & Winkler, Düsseldorf 2009, ISBN 978-3-538-03500-3 , pp. 96-137 (Greek source texts with German translation, explanations and an introduction to life and work)

literature

  • Hermann Fränkel : Ways and forms of early Greek thought . Beck, Munich 1968, pp. 198-236.
  • Kurt von Fritz : Zenon von Elea. In: Pauly-Wissowa RE Volume 34/1, Stuttgart 1972, pp. 53-83.
  • Richard Goulet, Daniel de Smet: Zénon d'Élée. In: Richard Goulet (ed.): Dictionnaire des philosophes antiques. Volume 7, CNRS Éditions, Paris 2018, ISBN 978-2-271-09024-9 , pp. 346–363
  • Gerhard Köhler: Zenon of Elea. Studies on the 'arguments against multiplicity' and on the so-called 'argument of place' . (= Contributions to antiquity. 330). De Gruyter, Berlin / Boston 2014, ISBN 978-3-11-036292-3 .
  • Christof Rapp : Zenon from Elea. In: Hellmut Flashar et al. (Ed.): Early Greek Philosophy (= Outline of the History of Philosophy . The Philosophy of Antiquity. Volume 1), Half Volume 2, Schwabe, Basel 2013, ISBN 978-3-7965-2598-8 , p. 531-572.
  • William D. Ross : Aristotle's Physics . Clarendon, Oxford 1936, pp. XI f. (Bibliography of older literature on the paradoxes of movement), 70–85 u. a. (Commentary on the sections in Aristotle)

Web links

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Footnotes

  1. ↑ Cf. Plutarch: Great Greeks and Romans. 3rd rev. Edition. Artemis & Winkler, Mannheim 2010, Volume 2, p. 111.
  2. ↑ See e.g. B. Otfried Höffe: Small history of philosophy. 2nd Edition. Beck, Munich 2008, p. 29: "Aristotle solves the paradoxes by distinguishing two meanings of" infinite "- an infinite extension and infinite divisibility - so that one of the extension towards finite, the divisibility towards infinite (space or time -) route can be traversed in a finite time. "
personal data
SURNAME Zenon of Elea
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Zeno; Zenon; the older
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Greek philosopher
DATE OF BIRTH around 490 BC Chr.
PLACE OF BIRTH Elea
DATE OF DEATH around 430 BC Chr.
Place of death Elea or Syracuse