Parmenides, son of Pyres (Pyrrhes), was a noble Greek philosopher, born in Elea (southern Italy) around 515 bce. Many historians cite Parmenides as the pupil of Xenophanes and teacher of Zeno of Elea and Melissus of Samos; he was also an associate of the Pythagorean society. Parmenides founded Eleaticism, “one of the leading pre-Socratic schools of Greek thought.” His philosophy of radical monism focuses intently on “the One” as well as the nature of Being (“Parmenides”).

He was also Heraclitus’s contemporary and complete philosophical opposite. “Both men were intrigued by the immense variety of phenomena” (“Parmenides of Elea”). Heraclitus of Ephesus saw logos as the universal principle and sought to organize and rationalize the chaos of existence, whereas Parmenides rejoiced in the multitudinous possibilities and eternal changes of the universe as mere illusions of Being.

With his basic principal of “all is one,” Parmenides taught that there is one single Being and “held that the multiplicity of existing things, their changing forms and motion, are but an appearance of a single eternal reality” (“Parmenides”). Plato’s dialogue the Parmenides engages directly with Eleaticism as a school of thought.

On Nature (Peri physeōs)

Parmenides’s notable work is titled Peri physeōs (On Nature)—scholars have pieced together extant artifacts to reconstruct it. Many sources indicate that On Nature was a collection of and addition to the teachings of Xenophanes (Fairbanks). Less than two hundred lines of On Nature have survived in thirteen fragments. Called a poem by some and verse composition by others, On Nature originally split into three sections: preface, Way of Truth (“aletheia”), and Way of Opinion (“doxa”).  

Sextus Empiricus copied most of them, and Simplicius quoted lengthy parts of On Nature in his writings about Aristotle. Other collectors include Peyron, Leipzig 1810; Karsten, Amsterdam 1830; Brandis, Comm. Eleat. Altona 1813; Vatke, Berlin 1864; Stein, Symb. philol. Bonn. Leipzig 1867; V. Revue Phil. 1883, 5: 1884, 9. Berger, Die Zonenlehre d. Parm. München, 1895 (Fairbanks).

Pupil of Parmenides – Zeno of Elea

 Attempting to demonstrate his own philosophies, Zeno of Elea became famous for crafting various paradoxes. He set out “to prove that the world of our everyday experience is inconsistent with the real world of our intellect.” A famous example is the Achilles paradox:

A swift runner like Achilles will never be able to overtake a slow tortoise, because the pursuer must first reach the point from which the tortoise started. When Achilles has reached this point, however, the animal will have covered some additional distance, which the runner must also cover. By the time he has done this, the tortoise is again some distance ahead. Zeno was starting to recognize what is called a "limit," but the Greeks never developed this type of mathematics. (“Parmenides of Elea”)

Works Consulted and Cited

 Fairbanks, Arthur. “Parmenides.” The First Philosophers of Greece. London, 1898. Hanover Historical Texts Project, Hanover College History Department. Web. 15 Nov. 2013.

“Parmenides.” Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Web. 10 Nov. 2013.

“Parmenides of Elea.” LIVIUS – Articles on Ancient History. Web. 15 Nov. 2013.

“Parmenides of Elea – Biography.” The European Graduate School. Web. 10 Nov. 2013.