Tag: Historical Dictionary of Ancient Greek Philosophy

CHORA (χώρα). Place; Space. In Timaeus 52, Plato identifies the receptacle (hypodoche) with “space.” The implication of the passage seems to be that space pre-exists, in some sense, the appearance of phenomena (phainomena) in space. In Physics IV. 1, Aristotle argues for “place” (topos) rather than “space,” i.e., there is no pre-existing or independently existing…

Ῥητορική. Rhetoric, the art of the rhetor, or public speaker. In the latter part of the Phaedrus there is a very interesting summary of the “Art of Rhetoric” as it was taught at the end of the 5th century BCE. Socrates mentions as teachers of rhetoric Gorgias of Leontini and his student Polus, Thrasymachus, Theodorus…

Συνάγειν, συναγωγή, συνακτικός. To bring together, collect; a collection. Synagoge is the title of a lost book by Hippias of Elis that seems to have summarized the opinions of earlier thinkers. Plato uses the word as something close to “induction,” gathering together the examples before dividing them (diairesis). This “method of collection and division” appears…

gr. αιθήρ, aithêr: éter. Trata-se do éter, este corpo eterno, inalterável e imapssível do qual se compõe o céu. O éter não sofre por natureza nenhum corrimento. Sendo composto de éter, o corpo dos astros permanece então perfeitamente imutável. “Ether.” In early Greek thought, including the poets, aither is the purer air breathed by the…