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Monistic Argumentation
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2020
Extract
On those occasions on which one gives an interpretation of a work both scanty in remains and obscure in meaning I would take it to be appropriate to insist that one's task is not to argue that one's interpretation is certainly correct but rather to argue that it is probably correct. It is accordingly not my task to argue that it is not possible that other interpretations of Parmenides’ Way of Truth are correct. Nor do I increase the likelihood of my own by decreasing that of theirs.
I seek to give an interpretation which is rich enough to disclose the springs of monism. I am primarily concerned to show how we may understand those arguments which leave us with the conclusion that there is only one thing to know.
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- Copyright © The Authors 1976
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1 I use the standard edition of the fragments (Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, ed. Diels, H., Berlin, 1954).Google Scholar The position which I defend has developed through conversations with John Wilson, Susan Haley, Steven Leighton, Louis Mix, Mary Richardson and AI Spangler. I am also grateful to members of the Workshop on Parmenides, Zeno and Their Ancient Critics held in November, 1974, in Edmonton.
2 Kirk, G. S. and Raven, J.E. translate the lines as follows: “Come now, and I will tell thee ― and do thou hearken and carry my word away ― the only ways of enquiry that can be thought of.” (The Presocratic Philosophers, Cambridge, 1966, p. 269.)Google Scholar
3 The four selections are translated by Kirk and Raven in the following way: (1) “The one way, that it is and cannot not-be, is the path of Persuasion, for it attends upon Truth.” (p. 269)(2) “That which can be spoken and thought needs must be; for it is possible for it, but not for nothing, to be.” (p. 270) (3) “for the same thing can be thought as can be.” (p. 269) (4) What can be thought is only the thought that it is. For you will not find thought without what is, in relation to which it is uttered; for there is not, nor shall be, anything else besides what is.” (p. 277)
4 See Note 1 at the end of this paper.
5 See Note 2 at the end of this paper.
6 Kirk and Raven translate the passage as follows: “What can be thought is only the thought that it is. For you will not find thought without what is, in relation to which it is uttered; for there is not, nor shall be, anything else besides what is.“ (p. 270)
7 There has naturally been controversy about interpreting the fragment to which Cornford brought attention and which L. Woodbury has persuaded most of us now to accept as genuine. J.H.M.M.|Loenen maintains the authenticity of the fragment. He argues (Parmenides, Melissus, Gorgias, 1959) that there is no reason to assume that Plato misquoted. A. Mourelatos further meets the argument (The Route of Parmenides, 1970) against the authenticity of the line which rests on a word. He argues that the use of the word strengthens the case for keeping the line. (pp. 185ff) He then proposes to translate: Alone immobile is that for which as a whole the name is to be.
8 Kirk and Raven translate as follows: “The other. that it is-not and needs must not-be, that I tell thee is a path altogether unthinkable. For thou couldnst not know that which is-not (that is impossible) nor utter it:” (p. 269)
9 References are to the edition of Simplicius’ commentary on the Physics of Aristotle, edited by H. Diels in the edition of the Berlin Academy.
10 We may translate: “It is necessary for there to be saying and thinking being; for it is possible for there to be; it is not possible for there to be saying and thinking nothing.“
11 Some will say that Plato uses “is” and “is not” incompletely. In the context of my concluding survey it is not possible to discuss such an interpretation. For my present purposes I assume that the word “being” is the name of a form.