Elements of Greek Philosophy e-bog

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. We shall expect, then, to find that philosophy is concerned with viewing things in their context and with assigning a right value to them in relation to the whole of that context. Plato defined it as a speculation upon all time and all existence - Oewpia 1rav1'6s pev xpdvou mims 82 eddies Republic, It is concerned with our knowledge as a whole; but before we can define it more precisely we must briefly consider how we come to have any knowledge at all. For man and beast alike the senses are the avenues through which comes know ledge of the external world. Sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell are senses which we share with the lower animals. But man alone can draw general and universal conclusions from the data thus provided. Some animals - dogs, for example - are endowed with a further faculty beyond the sense-perception (aiaenois) which is common to the whole animal kingdom. They remember that the whip smarts, and are capable of visualizing the effects of turning the handle of a door. Roughly Speaking, we may say that, in the scale of animal life.