This is a general Presocratics thread. Post your thoughts, questions, requests, or anything having to do with the Presocratics.
I have a couple of questions:
1. Is there an English translation for the PS of the same quality as DK?
2. Is there anything to be gained from articles about PS? I have read about ten articles on how (and if) Thales predicted the eclipse of 585BC and have ended up confused, rather than enlightened.
3. What the fuck is Heraclitus talking about?
Bumping for interest and dubs
>>7601509
>translation
Where should I start with the presocratics? I'm ready to start reading philosophy.
>>7601540
Early Greek Philosophy (Penguin)
The First Philosophers (Oxford)
Philosophy Before Socrates, McKirahan
The Presocratics, Kirk, Raven, Schofield
Just work your way up from these. It will be obvious what you should read next.
Bumo because I need to know.
Has anyone read pic related? I'm looking for a comprehensive guide to the pre-socratics and have been learning Greek for a year, so the dual translation is appealing. Is this copy what I'm looking for?
>>7601509
> What the fuck is Heraclitus talking about?
Just outed yourself as a redditor my friend. Either read Parmenides and accept eleatic doctrine as the way of truth or don't bother reading philosophy at all
>>7601690
Yes.
Heraclitus is talking about how unity arises out of the clash of opposites.
>>7602526
That part I understood. What about all the other stuff, like calling the universe both generated and ungenerated, or God willing and unwilling to be called by the name of Zeus? If it is all exposition of le its only your perspective meme, I am done.
>>7602544
I'll quote a few passages from Hegel that myabe wil make things a little clearer for you:
>This universal principle is better characterized as Becoming, the truth of Being; since everything is and is not, Heraclitus hereby expressed that everything is Becoming. Not merely does origination belong to it, but passing away as well; both are not independent, but identical.
> The recognition of the fact that Being and non-being are abstractions devoid of truth, that the first truth is to be found in Becoming, forms a great advance. The understanding comprehends both as having truth and value in isolation; reason, on the other hand, recognizes the one in the other, and sees that in the one its “other” is contained. If we do not take the conception of existence as complete, the pure Being of simple thought in which everything definite is denied, is the absolute negative; but nothing is the same, or just this self-identity.
> Each particular only is, in so far as its opposite is implicitly contained in its Notion. Subjectivity is thus the “other” of objectivity and not of a piece of paper, which would be meaningless; since each is the “other” of the “other” as its “other,” we here have their identity. This is Heraclitus’ great principle; it may seem obscure, but it is speculative. And this to the understanding which maintains the independence of Being and non-being, the subjective and objective, the real and the ideal, is always difficult and dim.
>>7602576
It's also useful to always have in mind when reading Heraclitus is the distinction between potentiality and actuality.
