SCIENTIFIC THOUGHT IN THE GREEK PHILOSOPHICAL TRADITIONS

JACK G. L. MEDRANA, M.D., M.Sc.

Department of Biology, College of Science
University of the Philippines Baguio
The Greek and Islamic intellectual traditions gave rise to a European
scientific thought that developed into modern science

Overlooking the Theater of Dionysius. The site of Aristotle’s

Lyceum is located at the back of the distant green hill in the
picture’s left side.

(Picture: Athens, 2014)

The Mediterranean in the classical Greek era,
6th century bce

ACHAEMENID EMPIRE
Athens
Miletus
Classical Greece era

• Thales of Miletus (600-500 BCE) – the material world is composed of water,

the single fundamental substance

• Anaximander of Miletus (600-500 BCE) – there is a single fundamental

substance comprising all things, but it is not water or the other so-called
“elements” but some other [unidentified] substance

• Anaximenes of Miletus (600-500 BCE) – the material world is composed of air,

the single fundamental substance

(Picture: Aegean Sea, 2014)

• Xenophanes of Colophon/Sicily (600-500 BCE) – earth
as fundamental substance of all matter?

• Heraclitus of Ephesus (600-500 BCE) – fire is the

fundamental substance of all matter

• Empedocles of Acragas, Sicily (500-400 BCE) – water,

air, earth, fire as the 4 fundamental substances
comprising all matter

(Picture: Aegean Sea, 2014)

• Democritus of Miletus and Abdera (500-400 BCE) – all
matter are composed of “atoms” (Gk: “uncuttable”)
which are the basic indivisible particles; “sweet exists
by convention, bitter by convention; atoms and void
[alone] exist in reality”

• Leucippus of Abdera, Thrace (500-400 BCE) – “no thing

happens in vain, but everything for a reason and by
necessity”

• Parmenides of Elea, Italy (500-400 BCE) – change and

variety in nature are all illusions
Pythagoreans
• a cult group founded by Pythagoras, a native of Samos island and emigrated to
Croton around 530 BCE
• Organized around religious leadership, the group believed in transmigration of
souls, worn white robes, avoided beans because it looked like human fetuses
• Loved mathematics, the principles of which they believed were the principles
of all things.
Pythagoreans
• Passion for mathematics may have been due to their observation on music:
they noticed that if among the strings of an instrument, the length of one and
that of the other can be expressed as a ratio having simple whole numbers,
plucking them would produce a similar pleasing sound although one will be
an octave higher or lower than the other.

• Pythagorean theorem: 𝑐 2 = 𝑎2 + 𝑏 2

Eudoxus of Cnidus (400-300 BCE)

• Theorems being deduced from axioms

Deductive approach in mathematics partly influenced

queries about the natural world
Socrates & Plato (500-300 BCE)
• more interested in human affairs than in the natural world

PHILOSOPHICAL SCHOOLS
(1) Plato
• developed the idea of the 4 fundamental substances of matter and by suggesting that these basic
4 have polyhedral forms
• use of reasoning to prove; emphasis on concepts and ideas
• believed that everything, even abstract things, have ideal forms in the manner of shapes and the
like that existed in some unidentified realm, and what we see as objects are mere
reflections/products of these ideal forms
• Aristotle in contrast believed that objects and their respective forms exist in our world, and that
objects are made of themselves and their forms.
(2) Aristotle (4th century BCE)

• Born in Stagira, Macedeon and moved to Athens to study in

the school founded by Plato
• After Plato’s death he went to Lesbos; use of observation (of
nature) to prove; classifying as a method (he practiced this
in Lesvos)
• In 343 BCE was requested by Philip II to return to Macedon
to tutor his son, Alexander the Great
• After Philip II’s death he returned to Athens and founded his
own school, the Lyceum
(2) Aristotle (4th century BCE)

• Aimed to produce knowledge for its own sake.

• Saw that things are what they are because they serve a
purpose
• He thought that things either exist by nature or from other
causes, and because he prioritized more the study of those
that exist by nature, he did not think of testing
(experimentation) them.
• Suggested that in addition to the 4 basic substances
comprising all matter, there is a 5th which is ether or
quintessence that filled the space above moon’s orbit believed
that solid objects fall to the ground because place of the earth
element is downward, and that sparks flew up because the
place of the fire element is in the heavens.
(2) Aristotle (4th century BCE)

• Believed that solid objects fall to the ground because place of

the earth element is downward, and that sparks flew up
because the place of the fire element is in the heavens
• Believed that all motions have causes. According to him there
are 4 kinds of cause: material, formal, efficient, final
• An object’s motion is caused by another motion, which in turn
is caused by another until you get to the ultimate cause
(teleological reason) = existence of God
• Teleological reasoning was adopted by Christians and
Muslims; however in the European middle ages, it was said
that God did not create a void, and thus this was a problem for
Aristotelian followers in Christianity and Islam.
(3) Atomist school (founded by Epikouros, late 4th to early
3rd centuries BCE) – believed that the world is a void
space and atoms go through it moving in straight lines;

(4) Stoa school – founded by Zenon; believed that

pnuema, an aether-like blending of air and fire suffused
the cosmos

The 4 schools get support for their beliefs about the

natural world, and refute beliefs that oppose theirs,
through
(a) abstract reasoning, and
(b) incompletely validated observation of everyday
phenomenon.
The Mediterranean in the Hellenistic era,
Late 4th to 1st century bce

Athens
CARTHAGE
SELEUCID EMPIRE

Alexandria
PTOLEMAIC KINGDOM
Strato

• Member of the Lyceum in Athens; was called to

Alexandria by Ptolemy I to be tutor to his son
• May have been responsible for the thrust of
Alexandria’s Museum (a locus of the city’s intellectual
activity) into having been a science-oriented institution
• Had noted that when a falling body is from a greater
height, it makes a greater impact on the ground than a
falling body from a lower height, showing that a falling
body increases in speed as it falls
• Ctesibius of Alexandria – invented a water clock
around 250 BCE

• Philo of Byzantium – around 250 BCE, he argued

experimentally that air is real by explaining that in an
empty upside down bottle submerged in water, water
cannot enter the bottle unless a hole is made at the
other end of the bottle by which air can escape to
allow water to flow in.

• Apolonios – investigated conical sections

Euclid (Alexandria, 3rd century BCE)
• Behavior of light (optics); a reflection of an object in a
mirror also stays at exactly the place opposite to the
object being reflected, which means that the angle a
light ray makes when it strikes a mirror and the angle
made when it is reflected is equal
• derived all known theorems in plane and solid
geometry (eg, like this observation on reflection)

Hero (of Alexandria)

• His writings around 60 CE that showed a mathematical
proof of Euclid’s theorem
• nvented the theodolite, and explained the principles of
siphons, catapults, and a basic steam engine.
Archimedes
• Determination of areas and volumes of different 2D
and 3D figures
• Apparent loss of weight in a body submerged in fluid is
equal to the weight of the fluid displaced.

Hipparchus (2nd century BCE)

• Models for the motion of sun and moon; sun revolves
around the earth in an eccentric path
Claudius Ptolemy (Alexandria, around 150 CE)

• Astronomer; verified the equal-angle rule of Euclid

and Hero, and also applied this to curved mirrors,
which he said was just the same as a flat one as the
reflections occur tangent to the point of reflection
• Also investigated refraction
• Earth-centric model of the universe
Science and religion

• Plato invoked God as the cause of order in the universe.

Other thinkers like Democritus were naturalistic in their
explanations.
• Various thought and human activities did not overtly
antagonize the existing religions in the Greek realm and vice
versa
• Only when the state institutionalize religions (as in the
Roman Empire) was there a greater degree of restriction to
thought and activities (eg, Christian minorities in the pre-
Christian Roman empire)
• Open expressions of atheism were also sanctioned even
before Socrates’ time.
Progress in the different fields of inquiry

Astronomy
• The field that saw the greatest progress in the ancient world.
Astronomical phenomena are readily observable and regular compared
to other environmental phenomena.

Medicine
• was slower in advancement than astronomy because of some
restrictions
• Aristotle – doctrine of the 4 elements
• Hippokrates – introduced the theory of the 4 humors (that the body was
made up of blood, phlegm, black bile, yellow bile, and for a person to be
in good health all of these have to be in balance), and this was adopted
by Galen in the 2nd century CE
• Thinkers of the Classical Greek era generally did not bother to
verify their speculations.

• Greek math was primarily geometric, as compared to

Mesopotamians who had greatly developed arithmetic through
a number system based on 60 (instead of 10) and some forms
of algebra.

• The ancient Greek concept of numbers seem to be limited to

rational numbers. Otherwise, they used geometry to express
irrational numbers. This limitation was an obstacle to the
development of arithmetic among the Greeks.
 Athens Alexandria
Thought Comprehensive (all- Piecemeal (focus on
embracing theories) particular phenomenon)

Way of explanation Positing of first Tendency to express

principles mathematically

Use of phenomenon to Empirical phenomena Empirical phenomena

support argument are selected as serve as starting points
examples according to for mathematical
their capacity to validate analysis
the principles posited
 Athens Alexandria

Direction of inquiry A solid grasp of reality Branching out into more

(from a particular unexpected information,
perspective, depending particularly through
on the school) more mathematical
possibilities obtained:
stimuli to future
scientific revolutions

Technological Knowledge for its own Distinction between

application sake was held in high theorists and inventors
esteem; held a marked was not strong: creation
snobbish distinction of new things
between theorists and
inventors
Naimbag nga aldaw cadacayo amin!

Magandang araw sa inyong lahat!

Good day to all!