Origins of Greek Philosophy

Catalog description

How did philosophy come to be? Why did it emerge where it did and when it did? This course explores these questions by investigating the roots of western philosophy in the myths and cultural circumstances of the archaic Greeks and their neighbors. Special foci will be on the passage from mythical thinking to that of philosophy and what would come to be known as science; the cosmological speculations of pre-Socratic thinkers; and the change in focus represented by the figure of Socrates. Other topics include the role of political life in shaping thinking; the significance of mathematics and geometry; and the influence of historical events on the course of thought. Texts will be chosen from a selection of early thinkers and poets, as well as from scholarship on the topic.