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True, you have never taught that nor anything else because you are not a teacher, much less a professor, nor any kind of professional educator at all. Newbies should know we outted your false claims to academia years ago.
quote:Originally posted by TheAmericanPatriot: wizdom, I have never taught that Columbus was the first to set foot here nor do I know anyone who has. Your last to lines sounded bizare.
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^ Well perhaps, as another poster mentioned, he taught a woodshop class! LMAOPosts: 26249 | From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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More on the stoics and the roots of stoic thought in Egyptian cosmology:
quote: An examination of Stoic ontology might profitably begin with a passage from Plato's Sophist. There (247d-e), Plato asks for a mark or indication of what is real or what has being. One answer which is mooted is that the capacity to act or be acted upon is the distinctive mark of real existence or ‘that which is.’ The Stoics accept this criterion and add the rider that only bodies can act or be acted upon. Thus, only bodies exist. However, they allow that there are other ways of being part of nature than by virtue of existing. Incorporeal things like time, place or sayables (lekta, see below) are ‘subsistent’ (huphestos, Galen 27G)—as are imaginary things like centaurs. Moreover, all existent things are particular. The Stoics call universals ‘figments of the mind’ and seem to offer a conceptualist treatment akin to Locke's, treating an apparent predication like "man is a rational, mortal animal" as the disguised conditional, "if something is a man, then it is a rational mortal animal" (Sextus Empiricus, 30I).
In accord with this ontology, the Stoics, like the Epicureans, make God material. But while the Epicureans think the gods are too busy being blessed and happy to be bothered with the governance of the universe (Epicurus, Letter to Menoeceus 123–4), the Stoic God is immanent throughout the whole of creation and directs its development down to the smallest detail. God is identical with one of the two ungenerated and indestructible first principles (archai) of the universe. One principle is matter which they regard as utterly unqualified and inert. It is that which is acted upon. God is identified with an eternal reason (logos, Diog. Laert. 44B ) or intelligent designing fire (Aetius, 46A) which structures matter in accordance with Its plan. This plan is enacted time and time again, beginning from a state in which all is fire, through the generation of the elements, to the creation of the world we are familiar with, and eventually back to fire in a cycle of endless recurrence. The designing fire of the conflagration is likened to a sperm which contains the principles or stories of all the things which will subsequently develop (Aristocles in Eusebius, 46G). Under this guise, God is also called ‘fate.’ It is important to realise that the Stoic God does not craft its world in accordance with its plan from the outside, as the demiurge in Plato's Timaeus is described as doing. Rather, the history of the universe is determined by God's activity internal to it, shaping it with its differentiated characteristics. The biological conception of God as a kind of living heat or seed from which things grow seems to be fully intended. The further identification of God with pneuma or breath may have its origins in medical theories of the Hellenistic period. See Baltzly (2003).
The first thing to develop from the conflagration are the elements. Of the four elements, the Stoics identify two as active (fire and air) and two as passive (water and earth). The active elements, or at least the principles of hot and cold, combine to form breath or pneuma. Pneuma, in turn, is the ‘sustaining cause’ (causa continens, synektikon aition) of all existing bodies and guides the growth and development of animate bodies. What is a sustaining cause? The Stoics think that the universe is a plenum. Like Aristotle, they reject the existence of empty space or void (except that the universe as a whole is surrounded by it). Thus, one might reasonably ask, ‘What marks any one object off from others surrounding it?’ or, ‘What keeps an object from constantly falling apart as it rubs elbows with other things in the crowd?’ The answer is: pneuma. Pneuma, by its nature, has a simultaneous movement inward and outward which constitutes its inherent ‘tensility.’ (Perhaps this was suggested by the expansion and contraction associated with heat and cold.) Pneuma passes through all (other) bodies; in its outward motion it gives them the qualities that they have, and in its inward motion makes them unified objects (Nemesius, 47J). In this respect, pneuma plays something of the role of substantial form in Aristotle for this too makes the thing of which it is the form both ‘some this,’ i.e. an individual, and ‘what it is’ (Metaph. VII, 17). Because pneuma acts, it must be a body and it appears that the Stoics stressed the fact that its blending with matter is ‘through and through’ (Galen 47H, Alex. Aph. 48C). Perhaps as a result of this, they developed a theory of mixture which allowed for two bodies to be in the same place at the same time. It should be noted, however, that some scholars (e.g. Richard Sorabji) think that the claim that pneuma is blended through the totality of matter is a conclusion that the Stoics' critics adversely drew about what some of their statements committed them to. Perhaps instead they proposed merely that pneuma is the matter of a body at a different level of description.
Pneuma comes in gradations and endows the bodies which it pervades with different qualities as a result. The pneuma which sustains an inanimate object is called (LS) a ‘tenor’ (hexis, lit. a holding). Pneuma in plants is, in addition, (LS) physique (phusis, lit. ‘nature’). In animals, pneuma gets called also soul (psychê) and in rational animals pneuma is, besides, the commanding faculty (hêgemonikon) (Diog. Laert. 47O, Philo 47P)—that responsible for thinking, planning, deciding. The Stoics assign to ‘physique’ or ‘nature’ all the purely physiological life functions of a human animal (such as digestion, breathing, growth etc.)—self-movement from place to place is due to soul. Their account of the human soul (mind) is strongly monistic. Though they speak of the soul's faculties, these are parts of the commanding faculty associated with the physical sense organs (Aetius, 53H). Unlike the Platonic tri-partite soul, all impulses or desires are direct functions of the rational, commanding faculty. This strongly monistic conception of the human soul has serious implications for Stoic epistemology and ethics. In the first case, our impressions of sense are affections of the commanding faculty. In mature rational animals, these impressions are thoughts, or representations with propositional content. Though a person may have no choice about whether she has a particular rational impression, there is another power of the commanding faculty which the Stoics call ‘assent’ and whether one assents to a rational impression is a matter of volition. To assent to an impression is to take its content as true. To withhold assent is to suspend judgement about whether it is true. Because both impression and assent are part of one and the same commanding faculty, there can be no conflict between separate and distinct rational and nonrational elements within oneself—a fight which reason might lose. Compare this situation with Plato's description of the conflict between the inferior soul within us which is taken in by sensory illusions and the calculating part which is not (Rep. X, 602e). There is no reason to think that the calculating part can always win the epistemological civil war which Plato imagines to take place within us. But because the impression and assent are both aspects of one and the same commanding faculty according to the Stoics, they think that we can always avoid falling into error if only our reason is sufficiently disciplined. In a similar fashion, impulses or desires are movements of the soul toward something. In a rational creature, these are exercises of the rational faculty which do not arise without assent. Thus, a movement of the soul toward X is not automatically consequent upon the impression that X is desirable. This is what the Stoics' opponents, the Academic Skeptics, argue against them is possible (Plutarch, 69A.) The Stoics, however, claim that there will be no impulse toward X—much less an action—unless one assents to the impression (Plutarch, 53S). The upshot of this is that all desires are not only (at least potentially) under the control of reason, they are acts of reason. Thus there could be no gap between forming the decisive judgement that one ought to do X and an effective impulse to do X.
Since pneuma is a body, there is a sense in which the Stoics have a materialist theory of mind. The pneuma which is a person's soul is subject to generation and destruction (Plutarch 53 C, Eusebius 53W). Unlike for the Epicureans, however, it does not follow from this that my soul will be destroyed at the time at which my body dies. Chrysippus alleged that the souls of the wise would not perish until the next conflagration (Diog. Laert. 7.157=SVF 2.811, not in LS). Is this simply a failure of nerve on the part of an otherwise thorough-going materialist? Recall that the distinctive movement of pneuma is its simultaneous inward and outward motion. It is this which makes it tensile and capable of preserving, organising and, in some cases, animating the bodies which it interpenetrates. The Stoics equate virtue with wisdom and both with a kind of firmness or tensile strength within the commanding faculty of the soul (Arius Didymus 41H, Plutarch 61B, Galen 65T). Perhaps the thought was that the souls of the wise had a sufficient tensile strength that they could subsist as a distinct body on their own. Later Stoics like Panaetius (2nd c. BCE) and Posidonius (first half 1st c. BCE) may have abandoned this view of Chrysippus'.
All of these concepts are seen in Egyptian cosmology, both in the identities of dualities in the various neter (elements of nature) and the gods themselves: Ptah the word, mind and consciousness (Greek logos), Ra: the sun fire and strength, Osiris: the seed, life and the material universe (Greek fire or primordial first cause), Nut: the universe, the sky and the heavens (Greek ether or universe), Maat: balance and truth between opposites or opposing factions, and opposing speech(justice) (Greek ethics and a/not a logic). Ka, ba and other elements of the soul of the individual (Greek elements of the soul), Horus and Set, good/evil, higher self/lower self (Greek warring opposites of the soul).
Excerpt from the book of coming forth by day (book of the day) extolling the values of living righteously (ethically) as evidenced by the right speech (righteous speech/truth) of the deceased.
quote: I am Pure. I am pure. I am pure. I am pure. My purity is the purity of this great Phoenix that is in Heracleopolis, because I am indeed the nose of the Lord of Wind who made all men live on that day of completing the Sacred Eye in Heliopolis in the 2nd month of winter last day, in the presence of the lord of this land. I am he who saw the completion of the Sacred Eye in Heliopolis, and nothing evil shall come into being against me in this land in this Hall of Justice, because I know the names of these gods who are in it.
quote: NEKHT, THE CAPTAIN OF SOLDIERS, THE ROYAL SCRIBE, SINGETH A HYMN OF PRAISE TO RA, and saith:- Homage to thee, O thou glorious Being, thou who art dowered [with all sovereignty]. O Tem-Heru-Khuti (Tem- Harmakhis), when thou risest in the horizon of heaven a cry of joy goeth forth to thee from all people. O thou beautiful Being, thou dost renew thyself in thy season in the form of the Disk, within thy mother Hathor. Therefore in every place every heart swelleth with joy at thy rising for ever. The regions of the South and the North come to thee with homage, and send forth acclamations at thy rising on the horizon of heaven, and thou illuminest the Two Lands with rays of turquoise-[coloured] light. O Ra, who art Heru-Khuti, the divine man-child, the heir of eternity, self-begotten and self-born, king of the earth, prince of the Tuat (the Other World), governor of Aukert, thou didst come from the Water-god, thou didst spring from the Sky-god Nu, who doth cherish thee and order thy members. O thou god of life, thou lord of love, all men live when thou shinest; thou art crowned king of the gods. The goddess Nut embraceth thee, and the goddess Mut enfoldeth thee at all seasons. Those who are in thy following sing unto thee with joy, and they bow down their foreheads to the earth when they meet thee, the lord of heaven, the lord of the earth, the King of Truth, the lord of eternity, the prince of everlastingness, thou sovereign of all the gods, thou god of life, thou creator of eternity, thou maker of heaven wherin thou art firmly stablished.
The Company of the Gods rejoice at thy rising, the earth is glad when it beholdeth thy rays; the people who have been long dead come forth with cries of joy to behold thy beauties every day. Thou goest forth each day over heaven and earth, and thou art made strong each day be thy mother Nut. Thou passest over the heights of heaven, thy heart swelleth with joy; and the Lake of Testes (the Great Oasis) is content thereat. The Serpent-fiend hath fallen, his arms are hewn off, the Knife hath severed his joints. Ra liveth by Maat (Law), the beautiful! The Sektet Boat advanceth and cometh into port. The South and the North, and the West and East, turn to praise thee. O thou First, Great God (PAUTA), who didst come into being of thine own accord, Isis and Nephthys salute thee, they sing unto thee songs of joy at thy rising in the boat, they stretch out their hands unto thee. The Souls of the East follow thee, and the Souls of the West praise thee. Thou art the Ruler of all the gods. Thou in thy shrine hast joy, for the Serpent-fiend Nak hath been judged by the fire, and thy heart shall rejoice for ever. Thy mother Nut is esteemed by thy father Nu.
Righteous living, proper speech, ethical living and a balanced life were a very important part of the wisdom of the Egyptians. This is way of living is what is being referred to as the stoic system of philosophy in Greece. And the stoic system of right speech and terminology can only be said to be nothing more than an introduction to the teachings of ancient Egyptian scribes, which were the domains of Ptah and Djehuti(thoth) reflecting the value of thought and proper speech as well as counting and wisdom.
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You have not outed anything Takruri. If you had a way to really check you would choke on your chicken. Your problem is you understand zippo about hitorical method. All you have managed to do is post garbage on this board year after year.
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^ You seem to have a knack for pretending as if you know something about a topic and not producing one shred of evidence or citation for any of your assertions. You end up blowing alot of "hot air" or all talk and no "substance".
It kinda doesn't help your case.
For example a quotation from an ancient roman writer:
quote:Lycurgus also and Plato and Solon, they say, incorporated many Egyptian customs into their own legislation. And Pythagoras learned from Egyptians his teachings about the gods, his geometrical propositions and theory of numbers, as well as the transmigration of souls into every living thing.
Diodorus Siculus Library of History, Book I, 96-98
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What you offer is even less than mental masturbation. If you could that you'd at least make a contribution worth consideration but anything relevant requiring any research listing author, title, city, publisher, date, and page number is far above and beyond your stilted pinioned lack of ability.
Having never produced a quote or reference with citation is all the proof even an imbecil needs to see your claims of academia are grossy fraudulent flights of fancy full of flatulence.
Now back to the topic with pro or con contributions by forum members qualified to discourse on the subject.
quote:Originally posted by TheAmericanPatriot: You have not outed anything Takruri. If you had a way to really check you would choke on your chicken. Your problem is you understand zippo about hitorical method. All you have managed to do is post garbage on this board year after year.
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Now to further how "western" minds overlook and downplay Egyptian influence on Greek philosophy, again I go back to stoics and logic. Logic was the domain of the scribes as symbolized by Maat, who was the Neter or (nature) of THE balance or the IDEA of balance in nature. The balance was the symbol of reckoning and determining the truth or falsehood of a thing. This can be said to be determining the existence or non existence of a thing. This determination of the existence or non existence of a thing is symbolized by the Hall of Maat or literally the hall of TWO TRUTHS, where the soul of the deceased was judged, again symbolized by the balance and either allowed to live or die. Therefore, the balance is the reckoning between being and non being and the determination of truth or falsehood. In Egyptian cosmology, all of this was the domain Ptah, or mind and speech, where right speech was symbolic of speaking truth and not falsehoods. Right speech is based on the idea of language itself and how words and forms are put together to convey ideas and "the law". All of this is symbolized by the scribes and their deities Djehuti and Ptah. And Ptah, Ra, Atum and Min all represent the concepts of the UNIVERSAL substance, the form and substance that is the basis of all things.
All of these concepts in Greeks are seen in the writings of Aristotle. More specifically the Organon and his work on Metaphysics. When one reads these works, if one understands the meaning and what is being conveyed, you will surely see the Egyptian influence.
Examples of how the Egyptian concepts described above can be found in Aristotle's metaphysics:
quote: Aristotle himself described his subject matter in a variety of ways: as ‘first philosophy’, or ‘the study of being qua being’, or ‘wisdom’, or ‘theology’. A comment on these descriptions will help to clarify Aristotle's topic.
In Metaphysics A.1, Aristotle says that "all men suppose what is called wisdom (sophia) to deal with the first causes (aitia) and the principles (archai) of things" (981b28), and it is these causes and principles that he proposes to study in this work. It is his customary practice to begin an inquiry by reviewing the opinions previously held by others, and that is what he does here, as Book A continues with a history of the thought of his predecessors about causes and principles.
These causes and principles are clearly the subject matter of what he calls ‘first philosophy’. But this does not mean the branch of philosophy that should be studied first. Rather, it concerns issues that are in some sense the most fundamental or at the highest level of generality. Aristotle distinguished between things that are "better known to us" and things that are "better known in themselves,"[1] and maintained that we should begin our study of a given topic with things better known to us and arrive ultimately at an understanding of things better known in themselves. The principles studied by ‘first philosophy’ may seem very general and abstract, but they are, according to Aristotle, better known in themselves, however remote they may seem from the world of ordinary experience. Still, since they are to be studied only by one who has already studied nature (which is the subject matter of the Physics), they are quite appropriately described as coming "after the Physics."
But these first causes is exactly what is the domain of Egyptian cosmology. Therefore, even Aristotle understands that philosophy originates in the search of man for the meaning and origin of life.
It continues with the concept of the universal concepts of the form and substance:
quote: The role of form in this hylomorphic context is the topic of ?.7-9. (Although these chapters were almost certainly not originally included in Book ? " there is no reference to them, for example, in the summary of ? given in ?.1, which skips directly from ?.6 to ?.10 " they provide a link between substance and form and thus fill what would otherwise be a gap in the argument.) Since individual substances are seen as hylomorphic compounds, the role of matter and form in their generation must be accounted for. Whether we are thinking of natural objects, such as plants and animals, or artifacts, such as houses, the requirements for generation are the same. We do not produce the matter (to suppose that we do leads to an infinite regress) nor do we produce the form (what could we make it out of?); rather, we put the form into the matter, and produce the compound (Z.8, 1033a30-b9). Both the matter and the form must pre-exist (Z.9, 1034b12). But the source of motion in both cases what Aristotle calls the "moving cause" of the coming to be is the form.
In artistic production, the form is found in the soul of the artisan, for "the art of building is the form of the house" (1034a24) and "the form is in the soul" (1032b23) of the artisan. For example, the builder has in mind the plan or design for a house and he knows how to build; he then "enmatters" that plan or design by putting it into the materials out of which he builds the house. In natural production, the form is found in the parent, where "the begetter is the same in kind as the begotten, not one in number but one in form for man begets man" (1033b30-2). But in either case, the form pre-exists and is not produced (1033b18).
As for what is produced in such hylomorphic productions, it is correctly described by the name of its form, not by that of its matter. What is produced is a house or a man, not bricks or flesh. Of course, what is made of gold may still be described in terms of its material components, but we should call it not "gold" but "golden" (1033a7). For if gold is the matter out of which a statue is made, there was gold present at the start, and so it was not gold that came into being. It was a statue that came into being, and although the statue is golden " i.e., made of gold " it cannot be identified with the gold of which it was made.
The essence of such a hylomorphic compound is evidently its form, not its matter. As Aristotle says "by form I mean the essence of each thing, and its primary substance" (1032b1), and "when I speak of substance without matter I mean the essence" (1032b14). It is the form of a substance that makes it the kind of thing that it is, and hence it is form that satisfies the condition initially required for being the substance of something. The substance of a thing is its form.
Again much of this concept of the firs form and essence of the universe is found in the concepts of Ptah, Min, Geb, Osiris, Atum, Ra, Khnum and so forth. They symbolize the substance or essence of the universe from which all forms derive, including the soul. Thus, metaphysics is the FIRST philosophy, as stated by Aristotle and Egyptian cosmology can very clearly be called metaphysics and first philosophy.
But of course, "western" minds cannot understand the simplicity of this truth.
And this can be easily seen here:
quote: The problem of logic:
Some people have looked to theories about the ancient mind here which I find essentially unacceptable, for instance, The Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, by Jaymes. The thesis of this work is essentially that the reason why the ancient Hebrews and other early religions claimed to hear the word of God or the gods, was that their brains were fundamentally different. Some people strangely believe that the ancients lived in a pre-logical state of being. However, bear in mind that the Egyptians built the pyramids and ran
a most efficient bureaucratic state. The Greeks, those very "logical" people did not remark on the Egyptians as being illogical or idiotic - just different, with odd customs they preferred, and stubbornly so. They may have not understood the Egyptians, but they certainly did not find them to be fools - read Herodotos, for instance. We might should stress here the obvious fact that the Greeks were the contemporaries of the Egyptians.
One of the most important statements about Eg. religion in Hornung’s book: "Any application of a two-valued logic, which is based on an a/not-a distinctions and on the law of the excluded middle, to Egyptian philosophical and theological thought leads at once to insoluble contradictions. We cannot avoid this fact, and common sense is no help here. We must choose between two alternatives. Either we equate truly logical thought with two-valued logic, in which case Egyptian thought is undeniably illogical or prelogical; or we admit the possibility of a different type of logic which is not self-contradictory, which can only be a many valued logic."
I would like to point out that our view of logic in ancient Egypt has been excessively colored by the mortuary literature, The Book of the Dead, and similar works. I think that people often overlook two important points here. First, Egyptian mortuary literature represents a compilation of many sources, all of which are part of a multifaceted polytheism/religious writing was not informed by the desire to pursue and promote and single viewpoint to the exclusion of all others. Secondly, the Egyptian afterlife was conceived as a preeminently irrational place. For logic and order to exist in this world, Maat must prevail, but, by contrast, the next world was a place in which disorder was the prevalent condition. Even the gods had to fight against Apophis during Re’s night journey. Sometimes, strikingly enough, the god Seth had a preeminent role as the protector of Re fighting fire with fire, so to speak.
Takruri, I would be glad to do all that if I could get you guys past 10th grade World history. I have given you two excellent books to read. My guess is that none of you have bothered to read them.
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The problem with you is you have failed 10th grade history because if you didn't you wouldn't keep making the absurd statements you make. 10th grade history books agree with a lot of what has been said here and a lot of the rest is above a tenth grade level to begin with. But of course, you are unable to participate in debates that require independent thinking...
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quote:Originally posted by TheAmericanPatriot: Classic scholars dismiss all of that Doug.
Takruri, I would be glad to do all that if I could get you guys past 10th grade World history. I have given you two excellent books to read. My guess is that none of you have bothered to read them.
Why do you keep appealing to (mistaken) authority? Stop making blanket claims and properly prove the following:
1) That the ancient Egyptians had little to no influence on Greek philosophy and knowledge
2) That Greek philosophy and knowledge was "homegrown"
3) That "every scholar that ever lived" agrees with the above (chuckle).
Do so, or simply "shut up". Simple enough. No more of this nonsense about high school history books.
^ Though I realize its probably asking too much of you. We'll see if you can.
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The farce of "western" civilization and history can be seen that 'western' civilization is a broad topic category under which falls Mesopotamia, Egypt and Greece as sub elements. The fact that "western civilization" starts with the study of Mesopotamia and Egypt in many schools, tells you that civilization isn't really "western" and that the term really doesn't describe anything to begin with. It also shows clearly that MOST historians acknowledge that civilization in Greece owed a great debt to Egypt, Mesopotamia and Babylon, as opposed to the nonsense Mr. Patriot keeps claiming.
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Mmmkay, that is like asking someone to prove the world is not flat. If you do not even have a high school education in history then the burden to read needs to be on you. This is all basic stuff.
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quote:Originally posted by TheAmericanPatriot: Classic scholars dismiss all of that Doug.
Takruri, I would be glad to do all that if I could get you guys past 10th grade World history. I have given you two excellent books to read. My guess is that none of you have bothered to read them.
quote:Originally posted by Mmmkay: Why do you keep appealing to (mistaken) authority?
More like a fabricated, imaginary, non-existant authority which is why most of the time most of us ignore Hore (except for when we think he's either serious or a credible/formidable).
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quote:Originally posted by TheAmericanPatriot: Mmmkay, that is like asking someone to prove the world is not flat. If you do not even have a high school education in history then the burden to read needs to be on you. This is all basic stuff.
If its so easy to prove you should have no problem re-stating that proof in response to what was outlined above. You should be able to present the evidence in a way that self-evidently affirms your position.
^ If not then you essentially don't have a *position*. And as noted above by Alive, not worth anyones attention.
quote:Originally posted by TheAmericanPatriot: I have given you the sources. ANY history text book will do.
No you have *not*. You have not proven anything. *You* have cited *nothing*. I asked *you* to provide proof for your own assertions and I will even restate it for you:
quote:Why do you keep appealing to (mistaken) authority? Stop making blanket claims and properly prove the following:
1) That the ancient Egyptians had little to no influence on Greek philosophy and knowledge
2) That Greek philosophy and knowledge was "homegrown"
3) That "every scholar that ever lived" agrees with the above (chuckle).
Do so, or simply "shut up". Simple enough. No more of this nonsense about high school history books.
^ Though I realize its probably asking too much of you. We'll see if you can.
^ Answer the above. Here. Very simple.
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Outline of the national history standards in the U.S grades 5-12:
quote: * Era 1: The Beginnings of Human Society * Era 2: Early Civilizations and the Emergence of Pastoral Peoples, 4000-1000 BCE * Era 3 Classical Traditions, Major Religions, and Giant Empires, 1000 BCE-300 CE * Era 4: Expanding Zones of Exchange and Encounter, 300-1000 CE * Era 5: Intensified Hemispheric Interactions, 1000-1500 CE * Era 6: The Emergence of the First Global Age, 1450-1770 * Era 7: An Age of Revolutions, 1750-1914 * Era 8: A Half-Century of Crisis and Achievement, 1900-1945 * Era 9: The 20th Century Since 1945: Promises and Paradoxes * World History Across the Eras
Again, nothing there about western civilization. But there is everything there about the growth and development of civilization in the Asia and Africa and spreading to Europe.
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quote:In the past you [Mary] have commented in a thread like this implying that similar diffusionist ideas were without good merit - Aliveboy
quote:But for sure if Aristotle put his name on books already written by Egyptians, then it is a Stolen Legacy that Aristotle bequeathed us. – great sage
quote:James explains why stolen and who's the thief….Accurate or faulty? Why or why not? – great sage
Mary mumbles her usual no answer in response.
quote:^ "Accurate or faulty? Why or why not?" Wow, even with rare spoon feeding moment from great sage, notice again that Mary the flying nun (just as she did here with Nay-Sayer) still refuses to answer simple questions. Notice too she still has not refuted James' book (i.e. merits of the word "stolen", accusations of a "cultural theft" etc) that she casually dismissed without reading - in typical racist fashion. Only flip flopping from one position to another: agrees that "there are Egyptian and Asian roots to [sic] Greece's philosophic and other origin[sic]" while at the same time maintaining that "GREEK philosophy developed in Greece" Notice he never engages the book and pin points exactly where James is wrong in saying that classical Greek philosophy is Egyptian.This is because – like Lefkowitz - she is going off pure prejudice not research.
^ Mary replies with another non-answer
quote:Instead of tagging the observations of another poster you were required to address specific issues raised "Accurate or faulty? Why or why not?" It's a rare moment when great sage spoon feeds, so he must really want you to try and defend your stance against James book! But it seems you are indeed a f**king troll as you still flee from your responsibilities. Have you no shame? LOL
- still has not refuted James' book (i.e. merits of the word "stolen", accusations of a "cultural theft") - never engages the book and pin points exactly where James is wrong in saying that classical Greek philosophy is Egyptian.
quote:Is it clear yet that there is a STOLEN LEGACY and it is perfectly valid, legal, moral and dutiful to declare, "**** stinks." – great sage
quote:I doubt you've studied James. Until you start citing him in your refutations I'm not bothering to respond after this post. – great sage
Mary reveals her comprehension problems again, this thread which explicitly shows that there was NO STOLEN LEGACY
Evidently then, Great sage's posts went straight over her head.
Page two and Mary still has yet to support her bigoted dismissal of Dr. James.
Even the forum Show Girl mmmkay demands:
quote:Stop making blanket claims and properly prove the following: 2) That Greek philosophy and knowledge was "homegrown" Do so, or simply "shut up".
quote: Even the forum Show Girl mmmkay demands: Stop making blanket claims and properly prove the following: 2) That Greek philosophy and knowledge was "homegrown" Do so, or simply "shut up".
^ Don't use any of my quotes for your idiotic purposes and/or agendas.
Posts: 426 | From: Cali-for-nia | Registered: Jan 2006
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quote:Originally posted by AmericanFluffer: Basically I'm all bluff lacking any stuff.
What you offer is even less than mental masturbation. If you could do that you'd at least make a contribution worth consideration but anything relevant requiring any research listing - author, - title, - city, - publisher, - date, and - page number is far above and beyond your stilted pinioned lack of even secondary school ability.
Having never produced a quote or reference with citation is all the proof even an imbecil needs to see your claims of academia are grossy fraudulent flights of fancy full of flatulence.
Now back to the topic with pro or con contributions by forum members qualified to discourse on the subject.
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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posted
The Greek philosophy was Greek, and its development well documented. Egyptians texts do not have any of that philosophy in the numerous writings they left. The Egyptians did invent plenty of things, there's still buildings left to prove what a great civilisation they built, they also took many other ideas from the surrounding countries and from that developed their own ideas. Every civilisation did that since the first man watched his neighbour do something new. The Greeks did the same, build onto the discoveries of previous civilisation and from there developed their own ideas. Philosophy is one of those things they developed.
Besides, how do you steal ideas and thought? Even if you do, don't more ideas simply return to those who thought of them in the first place?
How would Aristotle- or anyone else, for that matter- go about "stealing their wisdom"? What precisely did he do? Steal their books, and then surgically lobotomize the whole population? And how does a wise, mighty people just stand there and watch some inferior dolt "steal their wisdom"?
Afrocentrism is generally rejected in the academic community because it is generally not regarded as an academic theory or idea but rather a social and political one, teaching invented history for the sake of the individual and the political rather than the historical. Afrocentric historical claims are grounded in identity politics and myth rather than sound scholarship.It seeks to supplant and counter one form of racism with another, rather than attempt to arrive at the truth.
This form of "scientific" racism is sick and dangerous, and I hope people will not be duped by it.
Posts: 504 | Registered: Sep 2008
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posted
Actually, philosophy did not start with the Greeks, period. That is simply the arrogance of modern European scholarship.
If you read the works of the Greeks they make no such claims. The problem is that many scholars simply disregard 3,000 year old Egyptian cosmology and wisdom literature as simply superstitious, without even trying to understand it. By understanding this tradition and the depth and complexity of it, you will see that it is indeed the precursor and basis of Greek philosophy.
Anyone who has studied Greek philosophy and understood it, would know that it has many elements from Egypt and elsewhere.
quote: Our western philosophical tradition began in ancient Greece in the 6th century BCE. The first philosophers are called "Presocratics" which designates that they came before Socrates. The Presocratics were from either the eastern or western regions of the Greek world. Athens -- home of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle -- is in the central Greek region and was late in joining the philosophical game. The Presocratic's most distinguishing feature is emphasis on questions of physics; indeed, Aristotle refers to them as "Investigators of Nature". Their scientific interests included mathematics, astronomy, and biology. As the first philosophers, though, they emphasized the rational unity of things, and rejected mythological explanations of the world. Only fragments of the original writings of the presocratics survive, in some cases merely a single sentence. The knowledge we have of them derives from accounts of early philosophers, such as Aristotle's Physics and Metaphysics, The Opinions of the Physicists by Aristotle's pupil Theophratus, and Simplicius, a Neoplatonist who compiled existing quotes.
The first group of Presocratic philosophers were from Ionia. [b]The Ionian philosophers sought the material principle (archê) of things, and the mode of their origin and disappearance. Thales of Miletus (about 640 BCE) is reputed the father of Greek philosophy. He declared water to be the basis of all things. Next came Anaximander of Miletus (about 611-547 BCE), the first writer on philosophy. He assumed as the first principle an undefined, unlimited substance (to apeiron) itself without qualities, out of which the primary opposites, hot and cold, moist and dry, became differentiated. His countryman and younger contemporary, Anaximenes, took for his principle air, conceiving it as modified, by thickening and thinning, into fire, wind, clouds, water, and earth. Heraclitus of Ephesus (about 535-475 BCE) assumed as the principle of substance aetherial fire. From fire all things originate, and return to it again by a never-resting process of development. All things, therefore, are in a perpetual flux. However, this perpetual flux is structured by logos-- which most basically means 'word,' but can also designate 'argument,' 'logic,' or 'reason' more generally. The logos which structures the human soul mirrors the logos which structures the ever-changing processes of the universe.[b]
Anyone who knows anything about Greek philosophy would know that these concepts of the first substance of the universe, whether air, fire or water that are permeated by the logos are all found in Egyptian cosmology. Ra symbolizes fire. Nun is the sacred ocean and waters of creation. Air is symbolized by various neters, but Nut, Shu and Tefnut are but a few. And all of these deities were part of a complex cosmology that described how the universe was created and man was formed. And at the basis of all this creation, in some schools of Egyptian thought, was Ptah, which is the divine word or thought principle, referred to by the Greeks as the logos.
And this is just a simple example of the parallels. Reading Greek work and just as importantly, reading Egyptian cosmology and understanding it, will show you clear parallels between the two.
Like I said earlier, a large part of the works of the Stoics was in determining parts of speech and how they reflected the ideas of being and determination. But since Greece NEVER invented any language and never invented any writing, how can these concepts be said to originate with them? And how can someone seriously look at ancient Egypt and deities such as Ptah and Djehuti and not understand that there was a lot of very deep philosophical thought behind these deities that had been developed from a very early time?
posted
I do not disregard Egyptian philosophy Doug, it just had nothing to do with the greeks and western civilization. I am sure there was philosophy going on at some level with the cave man so you are correct, the Greeks did not invent philosophy. They did however invent their philosophy and we live by it in the west to this very day to a great extent.
Posts: 2069 | From: Texas | Registered: Sep 2008
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posted
As usual Mr. Patriot more opinions no fact.
What specific points are you refuting? I posted a series of links to books and other references showing clearly that "Western Civilization" has no meaning outside of feel good histrionics. I have posted clearly that most history curriculum teaches that civilization flowed from Asia and Africa to Europe and that includes thinking and writing about the purpose and meaning of life itself (philosophy).
Again, you have no concept of what you are talking about.
Posts: 8891 | Registered: May 2005
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posted
You are as nutty as a christmas cake Doug. History books all show that western civilization started in ancient greece. What civilization flowed out of africa? Do you thing there is only one civilization in the world?
there must be a computer lab in a mental institution spewing all of this nonsense out.
Posts: 2069 | From: Texas | Registered: Sep 2008
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quote:Originally posted by TheAmericanPatriot: You are as nutty as a christmas cake Doug. History books all show that western civilization started in ancient greece. What civilization flowed out of africa? Do you thing there is only one civilization in the world?
there must be a computer lab in a mental institution spewing all of this nonsense out.
No amount of name calling will change facts. So far you have presented absolutely no evidence or citings to counter what is being said.
^ Keep babbling or maybe present something useful for a change.
Posts: 426 | From: Cali-for-nia | Registered: Jan 2006
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posted
^^Of course A.P. is not to be taken seriously.
As we can see from the following, his frequent usage of outdated terms and classifications is clearly of some old senile simpleton feeble mind, living ignorantly and desperately in the past. The elderly mans refusal to debate, while ducking and dodging is clearly indicative of him actually knowing he is wrong, but unwillingness to accept it.
quote:Originally posted by Knowledgeiskey718:
quote:Originally posted by TheAmericanPatriot: I'm not going to play that game Mmmkay, you know full well what an african negroid is.
This is the continuous ignorant racialist thinking of the likes of ol Carleton Coon
The Story of Man
Carleton Coon
p 196-197
Borzoi Books, 1965
quote: Few skeletons have been found in the Sahara, and these are hard to date because of soil erosion. In Arabia prehistoric archaeology has barely been started. Yet we can be reasonably confident, until other evidence upsets the theory, that these deserts were the home of the slender variety of Caucasoid man. In East Africa this type has survived among the slender, narrow-faced Watusi and other cattle people.
Tutsis have ~80% E3a according to published data. Can you explain why you still adhere to Coon? Can you explain his idiocy from his above quote, which your posts also obviously stem from?
Posts: 6572 | From: N.Y.C....Capital of the World | Registered: Jun 2008
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quote:Originally posted by TheAmericanPatriot: You are as nutty as a christmas cake Doug. History books all show that western civilization started in ancient greece. What civilization flowed out of africa? Do you thing there is only one civilization in the world?
there must be a computer lab in a mental institution spewing all of this nonsense out.
Well nobody can be nuttier than you if you don't know of the multiple civilizations in Africa that flowed into Europe and Asia. This proves once and for all that your perspective isn't on the facts of history, but ideology.
Question: What civilization flowed out of Europe 5,000 years ago and set the pattern of all civilizations that followed?
Answer: NONE.
Question: What civilization(s) flowed out of Africa and Asia 5,000 years ag and set the pattern of all civilizations that followed:
Egypt, Sumer, Persia, Babylon, Indus Valley, Kush. Even the Americas also had cradles of civilization predating Europe.
The fact is that Europe is not the birthplace of civilization. Civilization was born in Asia, Africa and the Americas. It has nothing to do with Europe. That is why you resort to phony concepts like "Western civilization" as something that means more than it really does. ALL civilizations flow back to the cradles of civilization in places like Africa and Asia. "Western" civilization is simply a variation on an ancient pattern of living that WAS NOT born in Europe, no matter how much you try and pretend that it was.
No scholar states this and only you keep trying to maintain it.
Posts: 8891 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:Originally posted by TheAmericanPatriot: I do not disregard Egyptian philosophy Doug, it just had nothing to do with the greeks and western civilization. I am sure there was philosophy going on at some level with the cave man so you are correct, the Greeks did not invent philosophy. They did however invent their philosophy and we live by it in the west to this very day to a great extent.
Greek philosophy focused on the role of reason and inquiry, that's what makes their philosophy unique.
What was the works of Plato, Aristotle, Democratus, and Epicurus? Do we not call Plato's works examples of philosophy even if he learnt it from Socrates? Thus, even if the Greeks learnt philosophy from the Egyptians (which they didn't), there still would be Greek philosophy. The works of Plato et al are recognized as philosophy and are taught by philosophy departments in universities. The error of Afrocentrists is that they fail to distinguish philosophy from religion.
Philosophy explains the nature of things without the recourse to gods. Religious systems are not philosophy, just as much as chemistry is not physics, though in spots they overlap. What the Egyptians developed does not resemble Greek philosophy. The Greek philosophers didn't rely on the gods to explain the nature of things. None but the supporters of the religious-like glorification of Africans would make such a claim.
It is not the Greeks who stole the Egyptian-African heritage, but rather a few black racists who are stealing the Greek-caucasian heritage.
Posts: 504 | Registered: Sep 2008
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posted
earth calling Doug, is anyone home? naturally all of those civilization preceeded Greece.....so what, that is not the point.
Posts: 2069 | From: Texas | Registered: Sep 2008
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posted
I think Unfinished could certainly make a case that Greek philosophy is not identical to that of Egypt or the Near East. Sure. But no one is arguing that. Everyone knows that the Greeks developed their own unique brand and signature on certain items of philosophical thought. But his notion of religion being so separated from reason in the Greek world is questionable. Indeed, religion is woven throughout the discourse of the Greek philosophers. See for exampl the book below which shows that the origins of Greek philosophy were closely tied to religion:
From Religion To Philosophy (1957), Author: F.M. Cornford, Publisher: Harper & Row
review blurb:
This book is a very special publication in the context of the history of ancient philosophy. Cornford presented us with a great new horison of interpretation of the origins of Greek philosophy. The author not only shows us a new view but lets us to accompany him in this inquiry. "From Religion to Philosophy" is a fascinating book about the origins and continuity of human thought. It unveils before us the "great link" between religion and philosophy. Cornford's interpretation shows us ancient world as it was: full of spirits and gods, not all-rationalistic. Cornford allows us to see that this religious view was so natural for the Greeks that the origins of philosophy could not change it radically. >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Also to be taken into account is that Greek philosophy, science, art etc did not develop in a vacuum. The Greeks were massive borrowers. Their well known alphabet for example was borrowed and adapted from a Phonecian one. They also borrowed and adapted from the current of ideas and theories of Egypt and the Near East as well. In fact the link below gives a detailed breakdown of some borrowings. It acknowledges that the Greeks made their own refinements, adaptations and extensions to their borrowings an developed their own distinctive brand. But they also borrowed massively. The two things go together, distressing as this is to "pure" Medicentrists.
Also to be considered is that the people popularly known as "Greeks" were relative latecomers to the Aegean. The Cretan/Minoan culture flourished there before, and shared several commonalities with the religious thought of Egypt. As the link says: http://www.maat.sofiatopia.org/hermes1.htm
Three important features of the Minoan religious experience stand out :
the sacrality of the tree : the tree marks a sanctuary and is surrounded by a sacred enclosure. During processions, the anthropomorphic Great Goddess is enthroned beneath it. The same holds for pillars, columns and stones ;
the chthonic powers : sacrifice of the bull (symbol of the fecundity of nature, the male god of vegetation), bull-games, double axe and sacral horns point to the mastering of the chthonic powers of the mother goddess, who played a central role ;
the epiphany of the deity from above in the sacred dance : it seems that mystical communion with the god (i.e. the direct experience of the Divine) was important and momentary scenes of epiphany show the deity besides the sacred tree, in front of shrines, next to a stepped altar or on a mountain peak.
Although obvious differences are present, Minoan and Egyptian religion are of the same family. Both are based on nature, the exhaltation of life and divine kingship. They share identical iconography : the bull as symbol of permanence, the sacrality of trees and elevated places, the ample use of colorful representations of fauna and flora and similar jewelry. On Crete, nature at times was a rumbling, bull-like underground which knocked down their best palaces. Hence, to find and keep the proper "equilibrium" was what was needed to allow the acrobat to jump over the back of the bull. In Egypt, were chaotic Nile-floods could cause famine and wreck social order, the image of the balance expressed a solidarity with nature, despite its darker, destructive sides.
Does this mean they were identical or that the Minoans "stole" anything? Of course not, but it shows a number of shared elements. So the notion of the "Greeks" as these pristine folks who developed philosophy all by themselves is deeply flawed, both on the notion that they dispensed with religion and on the notion that they did it all independently. Some of that massive borrowing by the relative latecomers to the Agean, is also from the older Minoan civilization as well.
Now I have already presented several threads of evidence supporting the above points. Can Unfinished or AP prove that:
(a)Greek philosophy is massively separate from religion? If so when and how?
(b) That the Greeks were not massive borrowers on numerous things?
(c) That the precursors to the late coming Greeks, the Minoans shared no contacts with Greece, or had commonalities in religion?
(d) That Egyptian law, philosophy or religion had no influence on Greece?
Unfinished also claimed that: "Philosophy explains the nature of things without the recourse to gods."
Here he fails to account for the different phases of Greek philosophy. The link below undermines his claim, offering detailed examples showing that religion and philosophy was not as separate as he would have them.
It has been argued that Greek natural philosophy began when philosophers rejected religious explanations for natural phenomena, favoring physical explanations instead. This early science was not marked by this bold rejection, though, because it developed gradually from other Greek philosophical traditions, which frequently included theological elements. Even the philosophers who most influenced the later development of science, Plato and Aristotle, referred to gods in their natural philosophies. Their works were in many ways less theological than those of their predecessors, but they nonetheless never declared theology to be a separate enterprise from natural science. Instead, these philosophers tried to understand all that they could about the world, unconstrained by modern concepts about the purely empirical nature of science and modern distinctions between intellectual occupations. They thus wrote about mathematics, theology, political theory, biology, psychology, ethics, and a range of other topics without regard to the boundaries that have since developed between these disciplines.
These subjects do not all intermingle in Greek philosophy chaotically, though; instead, certain subjects tend to relate to each other. A dialogue like Plato’s Republic that focuses on an ethical question—what is justice?—delves also into political theory, and the easy juxtaposition of these subjects suggests that they are closely related. Similarly, works like Plato’s Timaeus and Aristotle’s Metaphysics focus on natural philosophy but also refer to gods, suggesting a relationship between the science and theology of their time. In both of these works, the gods or other eternal, uncreated beings are used to explain phenomena, but are not used to explain all phenomena. Some things have purely naturalistic explanations, but the first, most grand, and most complex phenomena are the works of the divine.
The Pre-Socratics The relationship between natural philosophy and theology was a dynamic one, though, and earlier philosophers often focused more on theology than did Plato and Aristotle. Empedocles, who Aristotle credits with claiming that all is made of four elements, also wrote about Aphrodite and Zeus. Many philosophers described the vastness of the infinite, and, according to Theophrastus, Anaximander was the first to claim “that the material cause and first element of things was the Infinite.” This emphasis on the infinite is one that is common within theology to this day, and Anaximander’s statement about the source of matter sounds more like modern religion than modern science.
Plato and Aristotle Later Greek philosophy, particularly that of Aristotle, is sometimes more empirical, but even in the rationalist works of Plato there is less reliance on gods than in pre-Socratic natural philosophy. The references that exist to gods are prominent, though, and often suggest a strong link between science and religion. Near the beginning of Timaeus, for instance, Plato makes an important statement about the uncertain nature of the sciences, but includes theology among them. “We won’t be able to produce accounts,” he writes, “on a great many subjects—on gods or the coming to be of the universe—that are completely and perfectly consistent and accurate.” The uncertainty of science has been claimed by many scientists and philosophers as one of its defining characteristics, but if it is uncertainty and imperfect accuracy that distinguish science from religion, Plato claims, theology is as much a science as cosmology.
And yet, in part because it was so influential, Plato’s conception of the supreme deity is not all that different from modern Western religious conceptions. The role of the divine that has best endured in Western thought is that of creator, and both Plato and Aristotle claimed that a god created the universe. They did have different views of this creation, though. Plato attributed the creation of the universe to the Demiurge, the “maker and father of the universe” who, following Plato’s doctrine of forms, formed the universe based on “the eternal model.” This being, who Plato sometimes referred to as a god, “was good” and “wanted everything to be good.” It found the natural materials of the universe in chaos, and “the first thing the god then did was to give them their distinctive shapes, using forms and numbers.” The Demiurge is thus credited with creating the four elements—earth, air, fire, and water—“to be as perfect and excellent as possible, when they were not so before.” Furthermore, though Plato describes the structures of these elements in detail, he admits that “principles yet more ultimate than these are known only to the god, and to any man he may hold dear.”
Aristotle also formulated a theology-dependent natural philosophy. The best known theological element of Aristotle’s worldview is the Prime Mover, which historian of science David C. Lindberg describes as “a living deity representing the highest good, wholly actualized, totally absorbed in self-contemplation, nonspatial, separated from the spheres it moves.” This deity, or actually these deities, as Aristotle concludes that there is one for each celestial sphere, are the final causes of the motion of the spheres, the reasons that the planets move.
The nature of theology Aristotle’s theology had other elements too, though. One of these is part of his epistemology, which is introduced in Metaphysics and tightly coupled with his natural philosophy. In Metaphysics, Aristotle determines that “the science which knows to what end each thing must be done is the most authoritative of the sciences.” This science is that which “deals with divine objects,” theology. It is more than this, though. Theology to Aristotle is not only the science of the divine; it is “a divine science,” as it is that which God knows. “God,” wrote Aristotle, “is thought to be among the causes of all things and to be a first principle, and such a science either God alone can have, or God above all others.” Because he has determined that “the divine power cannot be jealous,” the latter must be the case, and theology must be a science accessible to humans but mastered only by God. Aristotle does sense that theology is perhaps more logical and less empirical than other sciences, but it is still clearly a science, as it aims to understand “in order to escape from ignorance.” Furthermore, Aristotle asserts, because this is its only goal, theology is the best and least necessary (or perhaps least practical) science.
Historical context Plato, Aristotle, and earlier philosophers share the conclusion that understanding the one or more gods they believed in is part of understanding the world. The idea that science began when philosophers tried to explain nature without recourse to the supernatural does have some truth to it, but this change in method of explanation did not happen suddenly in ancient Greece. On the contrary, for most of the history of science philosophers and scientists have used both natural and supernatural explanations for phenomena. A late example is William Paley’s 1802 Natural Theology, which drew from both science and religion to present a theory of biology. It has only been during the modern era that scientists have made a conscious effort to constrain their theories to the observable world and that science and religion have become, in Stephen Jay Gould’s phrase, “non-overlapping magisteria.” The greatest of the ancient Greek natural philosophers may have explained most phenomena naturally, but they also each referred to divine causes when they thought them to be the best explanations.
Works Cited Aristotle, Metaphysics. James Fieser, editor, Presocratic Fragments and Testimonials, internet release (1996). David C. Lindberg, The Beginnings of Western Science (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992). Platom Timaeus, translated by Donald B. Zeyl (Indianopolis: Hackett, 2000).
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More on Greek rationality and philosophy
"Greek natural philosophy was not 'scientific'. Not only experiment but observation was absent from the work of, for example, Anaximenes, who never tested by inspection his theory that ice is denser than water, and that of Empedocles, who ought to have made the experiment of taking a bath, to see if we really do respire through the pores of the chest. Such thinkers relied, either tacitly or (like Heraclitus) openly, on the claim to exceptional powers of 'inspiration' or 'intuition', which (they thought) enabled them to lay hold of comprehensive truths without attempting to supply detailed evidence. Nor did the Baconian ideals of utility and industrial progress occur to them; if 'science' means the conquest of nature by technology, Greek philosophy cannot be called scientific. Cornford reserves that adjective for the medical writers who proceeded 'empirically' and made no pretence to 'prophetic insight'. What the Ionians and their successors pro- duced was 'a dogmatic structure based on a priori premises' and guaranteed by nothing save the philosopher's confidence in his own superhuman endowments."
FROM: Review: The Origins of Greek Philosophy Author(s): J. Tate "Principium Sapientiae" by F. M. Cornford Source: The Classical Review, New Series, Vol. 4, No. 3/4 (Dec., 1954), pp. 237-240 Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Classical Association
Posts: 5905 | From: The Hammer | Registered: Aug 2008
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quote: Even the forum Show Girl mmmkay demands: Stop making blanket claims and properly prove the following: 2) That Greek philosophy and knowledge was "homegrown" Do so, or simply "shut up".
^ Don't use any of my quotes for your idiotic purposes and/or agendas.
Ok then, but can I cum in your mouth when you blow me show girl? lol
Posts: 4165 | From: jamaica | Registered: May 2008
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quote: Even the forum Show Girl mmmkay demands: Stop making blanket claims and properly prove the following: 2) That Greek philosophy and knowledge was "homegrown" Do so, or simply "shut up".
^ Don't use any of my quotes for your idiotic purposes and/or agendas.
Ok then, but can I cum in your mouth when you blow me show girl? lol
^ Keep your homosexual fantasies to yourself you pathetic low-life.
After all, you would'nt want to make your mother jealous. Posts: 426 | From: Cali-for-nia | Registered: Jan 2006
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posted
Pray tell, if the ancient Greeks did not appeal to gods to ultimately explain nature, why then did they appeal to that famous pantheon headed by Zeus?
Posts: 7516 | From: Somewhere on Earth | Registered: Jan 2008
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posted
Greek philosophy focused on the role of both reason and inquiry in the world around them. Although philosophers and scientists before the Greeks may have also relied on reason and inquiry, the Greeks pushed the envelope further by abandoning popular dogmatic principles, and instead relied on rational debates among one another to come up with a consensus, often not invoking the notion of God...something unheard of in previous societies.
Certainly great thinkers and writers existed in the elder civilizations, such as the ancient Egyptians and Babylonians, however, the early Greek thinkers add at least one element which differentiates their thought from all those who came before them. For the first time in history, we discover in their writings something more than dogmatic assertions about the ordering of the world - we find reasoned arguments for various beliefs about the world.
It is now believed that decision making through oral debate in the polis would have developed rational thought to carefully construct arguments for and against an action, and these debates would have required calling on abstract principles such as justice, without invoking the notion of a god.
As it turns out, nearly all of the various cosmologies proposed by the early Greek philosophers are profoundly and demonstrably false, and this was often due to their speculations running far ahead of what their senses could cope with, but this does not diminish their importance. For even if later philosophers summarily rejected the answers they provided, they could not escape their questions:
* What is life? * From where does everything come? * Of what does it really consist? * How do we explain the plurality of things found in nature? * And why can we describe them with a singular mathematics?
And the method the Greek philosophers followed in forming and transmitting their answers became just as important as the questions they asked. The pre-Socratic philosophers rejected traditional mythological explanations for the phenomena they saw around them in favor of more rational explanations. In other words they depended on reason and observation to illuminate the true nature of the world around them, and they used rational argument to advance their views to others. And though philosophers have argued at length about the relative weights that reason and observation should have, for two and a half millennia they have basically united in the use of the very method first used by the pre-Socratics.
This type of thinking heavily influenced the expanding Roman culture of the time, as the Romans adopted much of the Greek culture as their own while the expanded their global empire. This type of philosophical thinking would end with the Roman adoption of Christianity which eventually lead to Medieval thinking, and the Dark Ages.
Much of modern philosophy, and modern scientific thought, reflect the basic principles of ancient philosophy. If you look into the Greek philosophic movement of Pythagoreanism, you can see the foundation for mathematics still used today. If you look into the Socratic Method, you can see the roots of moral philosophy & ethics still used today in Western civilization, and if you look into Platonic Realism, you can see the beginnings of metaphysical thought, which has heavily influenced Western philiosophy and religion.
Posts: 504 | Registered: Sep 2008
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posted
That question about the Greek Pantheon remains unanswered. The so-called Pythogorean theorem, as an example, is hardly something original to ancient Greece. The mere fact that mathematics doesn't begin with ancient Greece, tells us that the idea of trying to examine the workings of forces of nature -- that is, short of directly appealing to supernatural authority isn't something that is hardly distinctively Greek either. The Greeks learned much of "modern Medicine" from their ancient Egyptian mentors for crying out loud.
Posts: 7516 | From: Somewhere on Earth | Registered: Jan 2008
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posted
Did anyone say Math began in Greece. Geometry did but obviously people could count long before the Greeks came along.
Posts: 2069 | From: Texas | Registered: Sep 2008
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posted
Did you read the rest of the post? If geometry started in ancient Greece, what do you suppose visible outward manifestations of say, the Giza Pyramids, were all about?
-------------------- The Complete Picture of the Past tells Us what Not to Repeat Posts: 7516 | From: Somewhere on Earth | Registered: Jan 2008
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posted
Who is "we"; since when did your ignorance encompass that of humanity's? This is an example of why you should be reading ancient Egypt 101, rather than attempting to argue with your intellectual superiors.
-------------------- The Complete Picture of the Past tells Us what Not to Repeat Posts: 7516 | From: Somewhere on Earth | Registered: Jan 2008
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posted
Wow, I can't believe you said something that dumb. I take that back. Yes, I can.
Posts: 3595 | From: Moved To Mars. Waiting with shotgun | Registered: Dec 2006
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quote: Even the forum Show Girl mmmkay demands: Stop making blanket claims and properly prove the following: 2) That Greek philosophy and knowledge was "homegrown" Do so, or simply "shut up".
^ Don't use any of my quotes for your idiotic purposes and/or agendas.
Ok then, but can I cum in your mouth when you blow me show girl? lol
^ Keep your homosexual fantasies to yourself you pathetic low-life.
After all, you would'nt want to make your mother jealous.
How could his mother ever be jealous ?
She has no teeth. There is no competition!
Every boy in the neighbourhood knows ako's mum for her 15 minute "wet & wild" to-completion action. Posts: 3423 | From: the jungle - when y'all stop playing games, call me. | Registered: Jul 2006
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Re - meninarmer: Wow, I can't believe you said something that dumb. I take that back. Yes, I can.
To borrow US presidential-elect's line, let's second that with: "Yes, we can"! Lol.
Posts: 7516 | From: Somewhere on Earth | Registered: Jan 2008
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posted
Explorateur, A little logic on your part would be helpful. First, you refer to "the so called Pythogorean Theorem." It is not so called, it is the Pythogorean Theorem, period. It was not developed in Egypt, Chile or on Mars, it was developed in Greece. For some reason that is accepted in math departments around the world not withstanding the views of poorly educated afronuts.
Posts: 2069 | From: Texas | Registered: Sep 2008
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posted
I wished logic were contagious and rubbed off onto you; you are the very definition of what is "intelligence-retardant". Here's a hint: Pythagorus was conceivably the last person in antiquity to get in on his so-called "Pythagorean Theorem". Why does your so-called western history start with ancient Egypt, anyway, as you yourself have admitted elsewhere here before...or are you going to take that back now?
Posts: 7516 | From: Somewhere on Earth | Registered: Jan 2008
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quote:Originally posted by unfinished thought: Greek philosophy focused on the role of both reason and inquiry in the world around them. Although philosophers and scientists before the Greeks may have also relied on reason and inquiry, the Greeks pushed the envelope further by abandoning popular dogmatic principles, and [binstead relied on rational debates among one another to come up with a consensus, often not invoking the notion of God...something unheard of in previous societies.
Certainly great thinkers and writers existed in the elder civilizations, such as the ancient Egyptians and Babylonians, however, the early Greek thinkers add at least one element which differentiates their thought from all those who came before them. For the first time in history, we discover in their writings something more than dogmatic assertions about the ordering of the world - we find reasoned arguments for various beliefs about the world.
It is now believed that decision making through oral debate in the polis would have developed rational thought to carefully construct arguments for and against an action, and these debates would have required calling on abstract principles such as justice, without invoking the notion of a god.
As it turns out, nearly all of the various cosmologies proposed by the early Greek philosophers are profoundly and demonstrably false, and this was often due to their speculations running far ahead of what their senses could cope with, but this does not diminish their importance. For even if later philosophers summarily rejected the answers they provided, they could not escape their questions:
* What is life? * From where does everything come? * Of what does it really consist? * How do we explain the plurality of things found in nature? * And why can we describe them with a singular mathematics?
And the method the Greek philosophers followed in forming and transmitting their answers became just as important as the questions they asked. The pre-Socratic philosophers rejected traditional mythological explanations for the phenomena they saw around them in favor of more rational explanations. In other words they depended on reason and observation to illuminate the true nature of the world around them, and they used rational argument to advance their views to others. And though philosophers have argued at length about the relative weights that reason and observation should have, for two and a half millennia they have basically united in the use of the very method first used by the pre-Socratics.
This type of thinking heavily influenced the expanding Roman culture of the time, as the Romans adopted much of the Greek culture as their own while the expanded their global empire. This type of philosophical thinking would end with the Roman adoption of Christianity which eventually lead to Medieval thinking, and the Dark Ages.
Much of modern philosophy, and modern scientific thought, reflect the basic principles of ancient philosophy. If you look into the Greek philosophic movement of Pythagoreanism, you can see the foundation for mathematics still used today. If you look into the Socratic Method, you can see the roots of moral philosophy & ethics still used today in Western civilization, and if you look into Platonic Realism, you can see the beginnings of metaphysical thought, which has heavily influenced Western philiosophy and religion.
If you were to ACTUALLY read some of the works of the Greek philosophers, you would see that their ideas were HEAVILY influenced by that of Egypt. Egyptian cosmology hid a lot of TRUTH behind symbolism that people today interpret as GODS. They were called neter, not gods, which means aspects of the divine "NATURE" of gods presence in the universe. But they weren't GODS in the same as the bearded white man of the "western" tradition. They were forces and aspects of nature. The concepts BEHIND these "gods" were the same concepts seen in Greek philosophy:
Maat ("god" of justice to the Egyptians): reason, logic, justice determining the difference between good and evil
Ptah: ("god" of the word, thought and craftsmen): words, speech, law and order in the Universe and society, divine power of will in creation, the power to bring form in to existence from an idea.
Ra: ("god" of the sun) Heat, energy the inner FORCE of life that radiates in the universe, the divine spark or fire at the core of creation.
ALL of these concepts above are found in the works of the Greek philosophers so it CANNOT be said that the Greeks were not inspired by Egypt. Strip off the Egyptian "gods" from these ideas and the concept still remains and it is those CONCEPT that the Greeks inherited from Egypt, especially concerning the origin of the universe and life itself.
The following extract shows this quite clearly:
quote: Aristotle on Non-contradiction First published Fri Feb 2, 2007
According to Aristotle, first philosophy, or metaphysics, deals with ontology and first principles, of which the principle (or law) of non-contradiction is the firmest. Aristotle says that without the principle of non-contradiction we could not know anything that we do know. Presumably, we could not demarcate the subject matter of any of the special sciences, for example, biology or mathematics, and we would not be able to distinguish between what something is, for example a human being or a rabbit, and what it is like, for example pale or white. Aristotle's own distinction between essence and accident would be impossible to draw, and the inability to draw distinctions in general would make rational discussion impossible. According to Aristotle, the principle of non-contradiction is a principle of scientific inquiry, reasoning and communication that we cannot do without.
Aristotle's main and most famous discussion of the principle of non-contradiction occurs in Metaphysics IV (Gamma) 3–6, especially 4. There are also snippets of discussion about the principle of non-contradiction early in the corpus, for example in De Interpretatione, and there is the obscure chapter 11 of Posterior Analytics I, but none of these rival Aristotle's treatment of the principle of non-contradiction in Metaphysics IV. Below is a summary of the main interpretative and philosophical issues that arise from reading Metaphysics IV 3–6.
Aristotle's discussion of the principle of non-contradiction also raises thorny issues in many areas of modern philosophy, for example, questions about what we are committed to by our beliefs, the relationship between language, thought and the world, and the status of transcendental arguments. Arguments from conflicting appearances have proved remarkably long-lived, and debates about skepticism, realism and anti-realism continue to this day.
In this excerpt Aristotle HIMSELF says that "first philosophy" is a search for the origins and purpose of life. OBVIOUSLY this is the same basis for the development of Egyptian cosmology which IS a way of explaining the ORIGIN and PURPOSE of life, and the PRINCIPLES behind it. Likewise, the principle of NON contradiction is simply a restatement of the ideals symbolized by MAAT, namely the idea of TWO TRUTHS, or the principle of contending opposites (horus and set) as the core feature of the universe. The TWO TRUTHS are symbolic of the idea that things are either one or the other not both. It is the guiding principle behind determining whether something is right or wrong and true or false or in other words RATIONAL THINKING and REASONING. Therefore it is the basis of LOGIC as used to determine and analyze FACTS. The balance SYMBOLIZES the analysis of the facts and not being biased to one side or the other. This was a symbol of the Egyptian judges thousands of years ago and IS STILL a symbol of justice (the justice department) in America and elsewhere TO THIS DAY. Maat was not simply a "god" but a complex set of ideas and concepts that were symbolized by this deity and those concepts are what were most influential on the minds of the Greeks. Initiation into the "mysteries" was an initiation into the meaning OF THE SYMBOLS and was a core part of the teaching of ancient Egypt.
quote: Ma'at, Goddess of Truth, Balance, Order...
Ma'at, unlike Hathor and Nephthys, seemed to be more of a concept than an actual goddess. Her name, literally, meant 'truth' in Egyptian. She was truth, order, balance and justice personified. She was harmony, she was what was right, she was what things should be. It was thought that if Ma'at didn't exist, the universe would become chaos, once again!
For the Egyptian believed that the universe was above everything else an ordered and rational place. It functioned with predictability and regularity; the cycles of the universe always remained constant; in the moral sphere, purity was rewarded and sin was punished. Both morally and physically, the universe was in perfect balance.
Because of Ma'at, the Egyptians knew that the universe, that everything in the universe, worked on a pattern, just as, later on, the Greeks called the underlying order of the universe logos (meaning, order, pattern).
"In the beginning was the logos*, and the logos* was with God and the logos* was God." - John 1:1
* Logos was the 'Word', another name for Jesus.
Egypt, then, was seen to be nothing without Ma'at.
Ma'at was reality, the solid grounding of reality that made the Sun rise, the stars shine, the river flood and mankind think. The universe itself, all the world around them, was sacred in the ancient view. "Ethics" is an issue of human will and human permission. It is a function of the human world of duality. What is "ethical" for one group is sin for another. But Ma'at, the reality that made all groups what they are is transcendent of ethics, just as a rock or a flower is amoral, a-ethical, without "truth or falsehood." How can a flower be "false" or "ethical." It just is. How can the universe be "ethical or moral, right or wrong"? It simply is. That is Ma'at.
Despite being a winged goddess (like Nephthys), she was judge at the Egyptian underworld at the Halls of Ma'ati or Halls of the Double Ma'at.
The dead person's heart was placed on a scale, balanced by Ma'at herself, or by the Feather of Ma'at (her symbol that she wore on her head was an ostrich feather).
Thoth (god of writing and scribes) weighed the heart... if the deceased had been found to not have followed the concept of ma'at during his life (if he had lied or cheated or killed or done anything against ma'at) his heart was devoured by a demon (she was called Ammut - Devouress of the Dead) and he died the final death. If the heart weighed the same as Ma'at, the deceased was allowed to go on to the afterlife.
Maat is a symbol of the RATIONAL ordering of the universe and the fact that the universe and the principles of creation and the forces of nature are based on SOUND principles not irrational laws and forces that behave some ways in one case or other ways in another case. And it is through ones analysis of these forces at play in the universe that one begins to glimpse the face of the "gods" or the force/mind of creation. In other words, the TRUTH of the divine presence in all nature is made manifest. Therefore, Maat is the penultimate symbol of logic and reckoning. Again, suggesting that logic or rational thought originated with the Greeks or that the Egyptians had no concept of it in their cosmology IS INCORRECT.
Posts: 8891 | Registered: May 2005
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posted
We are glad Doug that you guys have filled us in on all of these Egyptian contributions to Greece. It is ashame that the body of the academic community has missed your point. Classical scholars disagree with you at every turn, you know that. It is exactly why you never quote them in this rubble you promote. This negroid political-history is about as valid as assorted UFO theories floating around.
Posts: 2069 | From: Texas | Registered: Sep 2008
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posted
Mr Patriot nobody needs your empty rhetoric. What "classical" scholars are you referring to? Nobody lives in that fantasy world you keep talking about and almost all historians acknowledge the legacy of Egypt and other cultures on Greece. As usual, you just talk a lot with nothing to support it.
I have already provided links to books that refute the nonsense you are claiming. I even watched a story on the history channel last night showing how the 3 religions have "roots" in Egypt.
Posts: 8891 | Registered: May 2005
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