Ionian school
(redirected from Ionian School of Philosophy)Ionian school,
pre-Socratic group of Greek philosophers of the 6th and 5th cent. B.C.; most of them were born in Ionia. Its members were primarily concerned with the origins of the universe—the forces that shaped it and the materials of which it is composed. ThalesThales, c.636–c.546 B.C., pre-Socratic Greek philosopher of Miletus and reputed founder of the Milesian school of philosophy. He is the first recorded Western philosopher. Thales taught that everything in nature is composed of one basic stuff, which he thought to be water.
..... Click the link for more information. , his successor AnaximanderAnaximander
, c.611–c.547 B.C., Greek philosopher, b. Miletus; pupil of Thales. He made the first attempt to offer a detailed explanation of all aspects of nature.
..... Click the link for more information. , and AnaximenesAnaximenes
, Greek philosopher, 6th cent. B.C., last of the Milesian school founded by Thales. With Thales he held that a single element lay behind the diversity of nature, and with Anaximander he sought a principle to account for diversity.
..... Click the link for more information. were all from Miletus. Other prominent members included AnaxagorasAnaxagoras
, c.500–428 B.C., Greek philosopher of Clazomenae. He is credited with having transferred the seat of philosophy to Athens. He was closely associated with many famous Athenians and is thought to have been the teacher of Socrates.
..... Click the link for more information. , Diogenes of ApolloniaDiogenes of Apollonia
, 5th cent. B.C., Greek philosopher. An eclectic, he reverted to the Milesian tradition of a century earlier in seeking to explain the constitution of all matter in terms of a single basic stuff.
..... Click the link for more information. , and Archelaus. It is also known as the Milesian school.
Ionian School
a spontaneously materialistic trend in ancient Greek philosophy that arose and developed in the Ionian colonies in the sixth through fourth centuries B.C. The school originated in the city of Miletus and was represented by the philosophers Thales, Anaximander, and Anaximenes (the Milesian school), and Heraclitus of Ephesus. It is customary to contrast the Ionian school to the Pythagorean, Eleatic, and Athenian schools. Among the fundamental ideas first advanced by the Ionian philosophers was that of the unity of everything that exists, the origin of all things from a single prime principle, which was understood as one or another material element (water in Thales, air in Anaximenes, and fire in Heraclitus) or as the “unlimited,” from which the fundamental opposites warm and cold emerged (the apeiron of Anaximander). The works of the Ionian philosophers were written in the Ionian dialect, in contrast to the Athenian dialect of the works of Plato and Aristotle.
REFERENCE
Mikhailova, E. N., and A. N. Chanyshev. Ioniiskaia filosofiia. Moscow, 1966.A. O. MAKOVEL’SKII