Little is known about kipps, and his works have hardly been handed down, but he was called democritus's teacher by ancient writers, and apparently wrote many topics other than atomism. Democritus is called "a philosopher who loves to laugh" because he attaches great importance to happiness. Most of his works, like those left in kipps, have been lost, but later writers claimed that he wrote 70 books on topics ranging from agriculture to geometry, the origin of human beings, ethics, astronomy, poetry and literature, and fragments of his works were quoted by later philosophers (especially Aristotle of Stajila (384-322 BC)) and highly praised him.
He was the first philosopher who claimed that what people called the "Milky Way" was the light of naturally occurring stars, not the result of God's actions, although at the same time, he did not seem to deny the existence of spirit or soul. Although his atomic theory clearly shows that everything happens out of necessity-one event will naturally lead to the next-he insists that people should be responsible for their own actions, one must first consider the interests of one's own soul, not any other considerations, and it is free will, not determinism, that guides one's life path.
Democritus developed Anaxagoras's "seed" theory into the concept of atomic universe.
He is considered as one of the most important pre-Socratic philosophers (so called because they preceded and influenced Socrates in Athens (470/469-399 BC), and directly inspired Plato (428/427-348/347 BC) and the development of western philosophy. Democritus's influence on Socrates is obvious in Fragments of Ethics, but his concept of atomic universe is also considered to help form Plato's belief in an unchanging eternal field, which shows that the world is a part of it. This is just a reflection, and his materialism challenges this concept.
In turn, democritus was influenced by people before him, especially parmenides of Elias (485 BC), Zhi Nuo of Elias (465 BC) and empedocles (484-424 BC). The philosopher thinks he is most impressed. However, except for his teacher leucippus, Anaxagoras (500-428 BC) proposed for the first time that everything is made up of "seeds", which makes them look like them. Democritus developed this "seed" theory into the concept of atomic universe.
Travel and reputation
Few people know democritus's life. It is said that he was born and raised in Abdullah and comes from a wealthy family, which can provide him with a good education. His father may be a Thracian aristocrat, or at least an upper class. It is doubtful that he may have studied under the philosopher Anaxagoras, but he gained a wide education by traveling and learning from many masters.
After his father died, democritus inherited the inheritance, left Abdullah, traveled around the Mediterranean world, studied mathematics in Egypt for at least five years, and then went south to Mero. According to the historian Diogenēs Laertius (A.D. 180-240), he is also considered to have stayed in Babylon and studied there with the priests. His connection with Babylon was also studied by Thales, a philosopher in Miletus (585 BC), which may be the reason why later writers claimed that democritus came from Miletus.
The exact route and sequence of his travels are unknown, but it is said that he studied in India and possibly Persia before returning to Abdullah. As soon as he got home, he devoted himself to further study, studying nature and writing. He is a prolific writer (more than 300 works have been identified as his works). It is said that he has written 70 books, all of which are very popular. Scholar Robin Waterfield commented:
Democritus not only covered familiar pre-Socratic issues, such as embryology and why magnets attract iron, but also wrote books on mathematics and geometry, geography, medicine, astronomy, calendars, Pythagoras, acoustics and other scientific topics, the origin of human beings and animals, and even literature and rhythm. Importantly, it is also clear that he not only covers such a wide range of topics, but also covers the depth of these topics-for example, by raising and answering possible objections. So he is an important bridge between many pre-Socratic dogmatism and Plato's mature philosophy. ( 164)
As democritus himself said "nothing", he was obviously influenced by Socrates philosophers before him. It is unclear how much influence kipps had on him, because he knew nothing about this philosopher except his connection with democritus. Only two fragments of kipps's works remain, and the only complete sentence is his famous "Nothing happens randomly; Everything is rational and inevitable "(Baird, 39). Because this concept was echoed by democritus, it is likely that staying in kipps had a great influence on his thoughts, but what is certain is that he also probably stayed in kipps and was influenced by parmenides, Zhi Nuo, empedocles and Anaxagoras in Park Jung Su.
Philosophical influence
Parmenides claimed that all reality is a single entity, and people only recognize the duality of the world, because they believe in sensory experience, which is wrong and may lead to mistakes. Believe your feelings, it is the true essence of reality for one to accept the changes and differences in life, but according to parmenides, it would be a serious mistake, because change is an illusion. A person's appearance may change a person's environment, but it will not change a person's essence.
For parmenides, what has always existed in its actual potential form will never change. What is regarded as variability and change is the lie of the senses, which separates a person from his understanding of himself and the real reality. Zhi Nuo of Elias, a student of parmenides, defended his master's claim through 40 mathematical paradoxes, proving that change and even movement are an illusion. Zhi Nuo proved mathematically that if a person wants to get from point A to point B, he must walk halfway first, then walk halfway before reaching the halfway mark, and so on. Therefore, a person can never really go from point A to point B, claiming that he can do it is just a sensory lie.
Zhi Nuo used this paradox to illustrate how the dependence on sensory perception separates a person from the actual reality and the essence of making the world a reality and allowing it to operate in its own way. For these two philosophers, existence needs neither the first cause nor any "meaning". It was and will always be.
Empedocles used this concept to declare that the basic form of the universe is love, which is a force of change and regeneration, manifested in the combination and separation of natural forces, which produce four elements and then affect everything else. Empedocles's insistence on singleness, unity and strength inspired Anaxagoras's idea that everything is made of particles (which he called "seeds"). These particles are all the same substance, but they are arranged in different ways, which will produce different results. Sometimes it is a person, sometimes it is an animal, a tree, a grass, a mountain and a bird.
Like parmenides, Anaxagoras thinks that the essence of reality is one, but this point has been expressed in many stories. Because of this, we can see that there must be something in every aspect of the world, and this "thing" is a "seed", which now produces one visible phenomenon after another in a given arrangement.
Anaxagoras and his seed theory directly inspired leucippus and Democritus's atomic theory. Rice field explained:
Anaxagoras believes that natural matter, as a basic component of things, is infinitely inseparable: no matter how many parts you divide a piece of wood, it is still wood. But presumably, as the earliest atomist, Liu Jipu made a genius leap in intuition, and proposed that the world is ultimately composed of things without mass, just like wood. He said that if you continue to divide anything, at some point you will reach something that can't be divided-they are atoms and inseparable. ( 165- 166)
Waterfield attributed this understanding to staying in kipps, which is consistent with the tradition that staying in kipps is democritus's teacher-probably staying in kipps was the first to draw this conclusion-but if so, democritus fully developed it.
Atomic universe
For democritus, atoms are essentially the same, but when they are "hooked together" in different ways, they form different entities and visible phenomena.
In view of parmenides's proposition that "change is impossible and everything is one" and Anaxagoras's seed theory, democritus tried to find a way to show how change and movement can simultaneously maintain the unity of the fundamental nature of the physical world. Democritus believes that everything, including human beings, is made up of very small particles, which he calls atoms ("indivisible" in Greek). These atoms make up everything we see and exist. Atoms are essentially the same, but when they "hook together" in different ways, they form different entities and visible phenomena.
Democritus claimed that when a person was born, a person's atoms were composed of a body shape, and there was a soul, which was also composed of atoms. When a person is alive, a person can perceive what he is doing by knowing the atoms outside the body and explain it through the inner soul. So when atoms are combined into a certain form, a person looks at that form and says "that's a book", when they are combined into another form, a person says "that's a tree", but when these atoms are combined together, they are all integrated, "indivisible" and indestructible. When a person dies, a person's body will lose energy, and a person's atoms will scatter, because there is no soul in the body to generate heat to keep the atoms of the body together.
According to Aristotle, democritus claimed that the soul is made up of fire atoms, while the body is made up of earth atoms, which needs the energy of fire to condense. Nevertheless, Aristotle asserted that this does not mean that these atoms are different atoms, but that they are like letters in the alphabet. Although they are all letters, they represent different sounds and are combined in different ways to spell different words. For a simple example, the letters "n", "d" and "a" can be combined into the word "and", or the name "Dan" can be spelled in different combinations, although it has different meanings from "and", it still consists of the same letters.
Although some materialists claim that democritus's atomic view of human life denies the possibility of an afterlife, this is not necessarily correct. Because democritus seems to regard the soul as the cause of movement and even life, and thinks that the soul is an indestructible and "insurmountable" physical movement of atoms, even if it is defined according to the materialistic line, the soul may survive after the death of the body.
However, democritus has never talked about the "meaning" of life anywhere except keeping a cheerful personality. For him, life does not need to be given meaning, whether in life or in another realm later, because the essence of life has always existed and will always exist; The meaning of existence is existence.
moral philosophy
In democritus's philosophy, a person's birth, life and death are based on the aggregation and dispersion of atoms. Some people may ask, "What caused this to happen?" Then define, for example, the cause of the accident, but prevent people from asking "why did this happen?" I hope it has a higher meaning. Leucippus's famous saying ("Nothing happens randomly; Everything happens for reasons and inevitability ") is a concept, which runs through a lot of democritus's own works, especially his proposition that" everything is based on inevitability "in the operation of atoms in some way. Of course, what happens in life is out of the necessity of this operation, whether people like it or not.
Although this statement seems to deny the possibility of human free will, democritus has written many articles on ethics, and clearly believes that people can make free will choices within the scope of atomic determinism. Although a person is composed of these inseparable particles, the outside is the body and the inside is the soul. These atoms gather and split according to their natural functions, but they can still control their choices in life and be responsible for them. Professor forest e Baird commented:
Both soul and body are made up of atoms. When atoms of objects outside the human body hit the sensory organs in the human body, perception will occur, and the sensory organs in the human body will hit the soul atoms deeper. On the contrary, death is only the dissipation of soul atoms, when body atoms no longer hold them together. This understanding of people seems to rule out all possibilities of freedom of choice. In fact, the only known statement in kipps is that "nothing happens randomly; Everything happens out of reason and necessity. " This position seems to eliminate all morality: if you have to act in a certain way, it seems futile to talk about what you should do. (39)
However, democritus solved this objection. He stipulated that a person should still be responsible for what he did to his body and soul, because human beings can distinguish between "right" and "wrong". The former is democritus's connection with the happiness of the soul, and the latter is defined as reckless pursuit of sensory enjoyment. Democritus suggested that everything should be guided by moderation to maintain a balanced life. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with pursuing sensual pleasures, money or power, but we need to realize that these pleasures are short-lived, and if we don't realize this, or pursue them without restraint, it will lead to pain.
For democritus, ethics seems to be mainly a means. By admitting the ultimate futility of trying to enrich life, people live a contented and peaceful life. Realizing that everything is made up of uncontrollable atoms, and responding to others in the same situation with sympathy and happiness, we can get rid of the worry about the "meaning" of life and focus on simple life.
conclusion
The specific circumstances and exact date of democritus's death are as unclear as most events in his life, but what is certain is that he was praised as an original thinker and writer before his death, and was obviously respected afterwards and often quoted. He made a great contribution to the philosophical foundation that Plato will develop, and did so by synthesizing and defining the concepts previously put forward by other philosophers. Democritus did this in such a way that today he is regarded as the "first scientist" by many people, because his ideas and obvious methods have contributed to the development of this subject.
His influence on later Greek and Roman writers is not only reflected in their philosophy, but also their reference and influence on him is obviously far-reaching and important. Baird pointed out:
Democritus's philosophy is important for at least two reasons. First of all, although atomism still represents another pluralistic answer to parmenides, and kipps is a pre-Socrates, democritus is actually a young contemporary of Socrates and an old contemporary of Plato. Therefore, democritus's atomic materialism can be regarded as an important substitute for Plato's idealism. Secondly, democritus's thought continued to exert its influence, which was first accepted by Epicurus and then by Lucretius in Roman times. (40)
In fact, the famous Epicurean philosopher Epicurus (34 1-270 BC) borrowed democritus's thought about happiness, claiming that happiness is the main good and purpose that life should pursue. Democritus insists that happiness is the best response to life, which is reflected in Epicurus' philosophy. They all hold that moderation is the best way to pursue happiness and enrich life.
However, Epicurus is just one of many people who have been influenced by democritus's works since ancient times. Modern thinkers and writers have expressed their admiration for democritus and acknowledged their debts to him. He is still highly praised today, just as he was at that time.