Sign in with Facebook
Loading...
40th out of 105 books
—
60 voters
Early Greek Philosophy
by
Jonathan Barnes ,
Various
This anthology presents the early sages of Western philosophy and science who paved the way for Plato and Aristotle and their successors. Democritus's atomic theory of matter, Zeno's dazzling "proofs" that motion is impossible, Pythagorean insights into mathematics, Heraclitus's haunting and enigmatic epigrams-all form part of a revolution in human thought that relied on r...more
Paperback, 336 pages
Published
November 26th 2002
by Penguin Classics
(first published 1987)
Friend Reviews
To see what your friends thought of this book,
please sign up.
Community Reviews
(showing
1-30
of
843)
Here is the situation - there were a whole lot of pre-socratic philosophers and we only have fragments of their writings. In some cases, we don't have any of the originals, only people commenting on the originals or even people commenting on others' comments on the originals - and many of those commentaries are a couple of thousand years old. The texts were in ancient Greek, and using a style and references that will be difficult to understand even with the best translator. The result is subject...more
Early Greek philosophy comes to us mostly as disconnected fragments. These includes quotations or paraphrases by authors writing many centuries later. Consequently, it is essential to appreciate the context in which the fragments appear as well as the purposes of these later authors.
Of the many books on Early Greek philosophy, Barnes's Early Greek Philosophy is my favorite. He nicely integrates each fragment and its context. In reading a fragment, you also immediately get the context as well. F...more
Of the many books on Early Greek philosophy, Barnes's Early Greek Philosophy is my favorite. He nicely integrates each fragment and its context. In reading a fragment, you also immediately get the context as well. F...more
I read this book in a class on Early Greek Philosophy, and this book was hard to digest at the time. This book is an excellent reference for philosophy students and maybe classics scholars, but not so much for the general public. This book is focused on the Pre-Socratics (philosophers before Socrates) and therefore does not contain anything by Socrates, Plato or Aristotle. However, I think they added in some Greek philosophers that came after Socrates but were outside his teaching and influence....more
Western philosophy often appears to be dominated by Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. Preceding these thinkers are the "Presocratics" whose writings come to us more or less in fragments that preview the primary themes that Plato and Aristotle later systematized in their philosophy: change-stasis, oneness-many, form-matter, mind-passions, appearance-reality. Giants as they were, perhaps Socrates, Plato and Aristotle themselves stood on the shoulders of giants. This book provides a good overview of e...more
Barnes, a British professor of ancient philosophy, writes about the pre-Socratics, men like Democritus, Heraclitus, Anaxagoras, and Parmenides, who led the way to ideas of philosophy espoused by more famous names, like Socrates. Reading this in a class, with a professor like Barnes, or a professor of ancient Greece, would have been helpful, as I was left with many unanswered questions. Nevertheless, for anyone interested in philosophy, I would recommend.
Can't speak much to the ideas presented here; much of them seemed very mystical, nonsensical, or made egregious assumptions and went from there. But then again, these guys were working with very, very little (although probably not nothing), and it's nonetheless interesting to see some of these guys explore territory that will come up later, sometimes much later, in more systematic thinkers' works.
The presentation I can speak to: it is first and foremost minimal and nonintrusive. Aside from a bri...more
The presentation I can speak to: it is first and foremost minimal and nonintrusive. Aside from a bri...more
view 1 comment
An excellent foundational book for anyone studying the Western tradition before Socrates. Good commentary, but most important, all the known texts of key writers such as Pythagoras, Parmenides, Empedocles, Heraclitus and others. A good companion to have while reading any other history of the times.
I feel like I'm not really expert enough to rate this book. Obviously, one can't really downgrade the content (this book sucked because Heraclitus was WRONG when he said that the world was made of fire). I found that my reaction to it was the same as my reaction to most non-historical ancient texts; some of it was brilliant, some of it was a fascinating look at where our ideas came from, but most of it was deadly boring. The only thing you can really comment on then, is translation, selection of...more
As usual, they were very hung up on air, water, earth, and fire.
Barnes, the editor and translator, offers an insightful and engaging introduction as well as commentary (though, I should note, this is limited enough not to be distracting) throughout the book. It is what it promised to be: an assemblage of the surviving fragments from the writings of the Presocratic Greek philosophers, filled with wit, wisdom, and more than a little quackery. I recommend this book for anyone interested in the history of philosophy, ancient Greece, and/or the pursuit of wisdom.
You've read surveys of western philosophy, and you think you know something coherent about Parmenides, Zeno, and Heraclitus, and then you actually read what we have left of what they wrote, and it's like a Sappho poem, all half-finished sentences and ellipses.
Mar 01, 2010
Erik Graff
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
philosophers
Recommended to Erik by:
Karen Engdahl
Shelves:
philosophy
I read this while visiting Walter Wallace and Karen Engdahl in Springfield, Vermont, focusing primarily on the critical apparatus and commentary as I'd already read other translations of the texts.
A marvelous thing to read ... I imagine Thales looking up up the starry sky and trying to make sense of the world. It is the position that serious metaphysicians begin from.
Insightful, Profound and Quotable.
A useful collection of fragments.
May 22, 2013
David
marked it as to-read
May 22, 2013
Kelly
marked it as to-read
May 21, 2013
Rovie Salvatierra
marked it as to-read
May 20, 2013
Corpsy
marked it as to-read
May 19, 2013
Rebel Peppers
marked it as to-read
May 19, 2013
Shree Nahata
marked it as to-read
May 18, 2013
Guilherme Amorim
marked it as to-read
May 16, 2013
Bill
marked it as to-read
There are no discussion topics on this book yet.
Be the first to start one »
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
More about Jonathan Barnes...
Share This Book
No trivia or quizzes yet. Add some now »
