Parmenides of Elea

"All sense perceptions, says Parmenides, yield but illusions. And their main illusoriness lies in their pretense that the non-existent coexists with the existent, that Becoming, too, has being. All the manifold colorful world known to experience, all the transformations of its qualities, all the orderliness of its ups and downs, are cast aside mercilessly as mere semblance and illusion. Nothing may be learned from them." ~ Nietzsche

Parmenides was a native of Elea, a city in southern Italy, who is thought to have flourished around 500 BC, or at the very end of the sixth century BC. Unfortunately, very little is known of Parmenides’ life, nevertheless, according to Plato, Parmenides was around 65 years old when he visited Athens for a famous athletic festival held every four years to honor the goddess Athena1. At that time, Parmenides is said to have met Socrates and Zeno and shared a few important lessons on the subject of speculation. In another brief account of the life of Parmenides, Diogenes Laeritus says that he was Xenophanes’ pupil, although he also reports that Theophrastus said he was a pupil of Anaximander2.

Whatever of the teachings of Parmenides are available to us are in fact in the form of a single philosophical work: a laconic poem, written in dactylic hexameters. The poem reads like a mathematical theorem which starts with a premise and then proceeds towards certain conclusions just like in a deductive theorem. His poem is divided into three parts, ‘a Prologue, Truth and Opinion of Mortals’. In his poem he talks about the two ways or routes of investigation and he says that ‘what is’ and ‘what is not’ are those ways of which the first one is the path of persuasion and can be followed while the second route is forbidden and entirely uninvestigable.

When directly referring to this elusive object, I.e., ‘what-is’, Parmenides uses the Greek word esti which, strictly translated to English means ‘is’. However, it is still not clear as to what is here referred to as being? There has been much disagreement regarding the same among the scholars. Some have through their works referred it to as ‘reality’ or ‘existence’, others have described it as having cosmological attributes and called it as ‘the world or the universe’. Another group of ontology scholars have described it as ‘Being’ or ‘the one’ whereas others have described it as ‘Mind’ or ‘Truth’3. Parmenides claims that ‘what-is’ is beyond the understanding of the mortals, that it cannot be grasped by the human mind. Nevertheless, he brings forth some characteristics of ‘what-is’. He says that it is ungenerable and imperishable, indivisible and complete, without beginning or end, changeless and motionless, steadfast, unique and one. All of these qualities are reflected throughout the poem. All these attributes of ‘what is’ lie in the table of contents for ‘Truth’, most of which consists a series of proofs as to why when anything exists has these signs or attributes. Parmenides supports his claim of ‘what is’ to be eternal and ungenerated in the following lines of his poem in which he writes, “Nor was it ever, nor will it be, since it is now, all together, one, holding together: For what birth will you investigate for it?” By saying thus, he hints at the non-generation and eternity of ‘what is’ because according to him ‘what is’ was neither in the past and nor will it be in the future. It has no birth. He also demonstrates the imperishable nature of ‘what is’ in the poem by writing, “Nor will the force of conviction ever impel anything to come to be beside it from what-is-not. For this reason, neither coming to be nor perishing did Justice allow.” This line suggests that since ‘what is’ was never generated and is therefore imperishable. One of the intricate attributes of ‘what is’ is indivisibility. In the lines “Nor is it divisible, since it is all alike…….. is all full of what-is”, we infer that Parmenides suggests that ‘what is’ is pure and full of ‘what-is’. It is completely homogenous and it has not the slightest trace of ‘what-is-not’. This homogeneity of ‘what is’ betrays its indivisible nature because it is “all alike”. And conversely, since ‘what is’ is all alike it cannot be divided and hence is indivisible. Parmenides also hints at the continuity of ‘what is’ by suggesting that ‘what-is’ has no beginning and no end. The poem also reflects upon the motionless aspect of ‘what is’ as Parmenides demonstrates that it is ‘steadfast4’ or ‘unmoving’. Aristotle distinguishes between the different kinds of motion as change of position, state, decaying/growth of something. But Parmenides’ claims hint that he has neglected any kind of motion that has the possibility to take place. Hence, by saying so, he is completely opposing the Ionian cosmologies where a primary stuff is believed to be always in motion. The subsequent section of the poem drops signs of the uniqueness of ‘what is’. Parmenides explains this by using words like ‘whole’ and ‘unchanging’. This uniqueness can also be justified in the arguments put forth by Parmenides that the generation of what-is is from what is only. This specificity of the generation of what-is makes it unique.

On the contrary, Parmenides describes ‘what-is-not’ as something which can neither be conceived of in thought or expressed in any language. This idea is supported by the lines in which he writes, “for you cannot know what is not (for it cannot be accomplished) nor can you declare it.” Now since what-is-not is nothing, then talking about it would mean talking about nothing. But ‘nothing’ cannot be thought of in any sense, we cannot know what nothing is? We know that 'nothing' is not even an object of perception and the thing which neither exists nor can be perceived cannot be referred to. Parmenides thus says that the route of ‘what-is-not’ is forbidden, it cannot be understood and it would be a vain attempt to investigate this route.

Parmenides has inspired and influenced many philosophers after him and many of them have formulated their philosophies and investigations based on the work done by the great Parmenides. Parmenides’ philosophical-poem has emerged as an important work of philosophy that has left even the greatest minds bewildered. As Socrates had rightly said, “I met him when he was an old man, and I was a mere youth, and he appeared to me to have a glorious depth of mind. And I am afraid that we may not understand his words, and may be still further from understanding his meaning....”