Parmenides and the history of dialectic : three essays

113 Pages·2007·0.455 MB·English

by  Parmenides., Parmenides., Austin, Scott

Parmenides/Dial.qx[fin3] 6/20/07 12:17 PM Page i
■ ALSO AVAILABLE FROM PARMENIDES PUBLISHING ■
PRE-SOCRATICS
By Being,It Is: The Thesis of Parmenidesby Néstor-Luis Cordero
To Think Like God: Pythagoras and Parmenides.The Origins of Philosophy.
Scholarly and fully annotated edition by Arnold Hermann
The Illustrated To Think Like God: Pythagoras and Parmenides.The Origins
of Philosophy. Over 200 full color illustrations. by Arnold Hermann
The Legacy of Parmenides: Eleatic Monism and Later Presocratic Thought
by Patricia Curd
Parmenides and the History of Dialectic: Three Essays by Scott Austin
The Route of Parmenides: A new edition, revised, with four additional
essays by Alexander P. D. Mourelatos
PLATO
God and Forms in Platoby Richard D. Mohr
Image and Paradigm in Plato’s Sophist by David Ambuel
Interpreting Plato’s Dialogues by J. Angelo Corlett
The Philosopher in Plato’s Statesman by Mitchell Miller
Plato’s Late Ontology: A Riddle Resolved by Kenneth M. Sayre
Plato’s Universe by Gregory Vlastos
ARISTOTLE
One and Many in Aristotle’s Metaphysics—Volume 1: Books Alpha–Delta
by Edward C. Halper
One and Many in Aristotle’s Metaphysics—Volume 2: The Central Books
by Edward C. Halper
ETHICS
Sentience and Sensibility: A Conversation about Moral Philosophy
by Matthew R. Silliman
AUDIOBOOKS
The Iliad (unabridged)by Stanley Lombardo
The Odyssey (unabridged) by Stanley Lombardo
The Essential Homer by Stanley Lombardo
The Essential Iliad by Stanley Lombardo
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PARMENIDES and the History of Dialectic
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PARMENIDES
and the History of Dialectic: Three Essays
SCOTT AUSTIN
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PARMENIDES PUBLISHING
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Published 2007
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ISBN-10: 1-930972-19-9
ISBN-13: 978-1-930972-19-3
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Austin, Scott, 1953-
Parmenides and the history of dialectic : three essays / Scott Austin.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-1-930972-19-3 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 1-930972-19-9 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. Parmenides. 2. Dialectic. I. Title.
B235.P24A96 2007
182'.3--dc22
2007017667
1-999-PARMENIDES
www.parmenides.com
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CONTENTS
Introduction ix
Acknowledgements xiii
ESSAY ONE
Parmenidean Dialectic 1
ESSAY TWO
Parmenidean Metaphysics 29
ESSAY THREE
Parmenides and the History of Dialectic 51
Bibliography 85
Index 91
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INTRODUCTION
Perhaps one ought to apologize for offering a second study
of Parmenides. But this is, I hope, the book I should have
written the first time. It is, at least, shorter. And Parmenides
himself is well worth returning to even twice in a lifetime, and
perhaps at the expense of other activities in life. Or so, I hope,
a sympathetic reader will agree. Much of what we think we
owe to the Enlightenment or to the Academy is originally
Eleatic, and it is possible that further rummaging around
among those philosophers whom Nietzsche called “the most
deeply buried of all Greek temples”1will inform us more about
the sources of our own heritage.
This study has as its broadest aim a rethinking of
Parmenides’ effect on Plato, and has benefited from fine
recent work by Coxon and Palmer.2 But, unlike these studies,
whose primary aim is to find Plato reacting to Parmenides’
content, the present attempt is almost entirely about the form
1The Will to Power, aphorism 419 (translated by Walter Kaufmann and R.J.
Hollingdale (London: Lowe & Brydone, Ltd., 1967)), p. 225.
2See A.H. Coxon, The Fragments of Parmenides(Assen: Van Gorcum, 1986),
and The Philosophy of Forms (Assen: Van Gorcum, 1999) and also John R.
Palmer, Plato’s Reception of Parmenides(Oxford, 1999).
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