43 Facts About Parmenides

Parmenides was born in the Greek colony of Elea to a wealthy and illustrious family.

Parmenides is thought to have been in his prime around 475 BC.

The single known work by Parmenides is a poem whose original title is unknown but which is often referred to as On Nature.

Parmenides has been considered the founder of ontology and has, through his influence on Plato, influenced the whole history of Western philosophy.

Parmenides is considered to be the founder of the Eleatic school of philosophy, which included Zeno of Elea and Melissus of Samos.

In contemporary philosophy, Parmenides's work has remained relevant in debates about the philosophy of time.

Parmenides's ideas were followed by Melissus of Samos and Zeno of Elea, with the latter being a close friend of Parmenides.

Parmenides tries to always match the maturity of a philosopher with the birth of his alleged disciple.

The fact that the meeting between Socrates and Parmenides is mentioned in the dialogues Theaetetus and Sophist only indicates that it is referring to the same fictional event, and this is possible because both the Theaetetus and the Sophist are considered after the Parmenides.

Parmenides follows the traditional datum of the founding of Elea in 545 BC, pointing to it not only as terminus post quem, but as a possible date of Parmenides's birth, from which he concludes that his parents were part of the founding contingent of the city and that he was a contemporary of Heraclitus.

Parmenides would have been familiar with previous philosophers, such as the Milesians, as well as writers such as Homer and Hesiod.

Parmenides is understood to have known a Pythagorean philosopher, Ameinias, who introduced him to philosophy.

Parmenides is sometimes described as beginning his study in the Milesian school under the tutelage of Anaximenes.

Plato said that Parmenides traveled to Athens in 450 BCE, where he interacted with Socrates in the latter's youth.

Parmenides worked in government, as was common for pre-Socratic philosophers.

Plato, in his dialogue Parmenides, relates that, accompanied by his disciple Zeno of Elea, Parmenides visited Athens when he was approximately sixty-five years old and that, on that occasion, Socrates, then a young man, conversed with him.

Parmenides was the first Western philosopher to consider the nature of existence itself, and the first to make a distinction between what exists and what seems to exist.

Parmenides likely rejected the theories of the Milesian school, which described the world as being derived from specific elements, as Parmenides rejected that Being was derived from anything.

Parmenides rejected the existence of Nonbeing, as something cannot be nothing.

Parmenides defined all things that can be thought or spoken of as Being.

Parmenides rejected the existence of the the Void, as it would necessarily be made of Nonbeing, which cannot exist.

Parmenides depicted his philosophy as a revelation or a divine truth.

Parmenides rejected the evidence of the senses, believing that truth about Being could only be found through reason.

Parmenides believed that humanity struggles to understand Being because language is insufficient to describe it as it truly exists.

Mortal opinions are formed through language, which Parmenides described as "aimless eye, ringing ear and tongue".

Parmenides considered both the divine and mortal understandings worth learning, as mortal understandings can still carry meaning.

Parmenides was the first Western philosopher to invoke what are now considered the basic principles of logic.

Parmenides' conclusion is defined by the law of identity, as Being is to be and Nonbeing is to not be.

Much of Parmenides' cosmology has been lost and the details are unknown.

Parmenides developed a system defined by opposites, based on light and dark.

Parmenides understood the Moon's illumination to be the reflection of sunlight off of its spherical surface.

Parmenides is sometimes described as the first philosopher to describe the Earth as spherical and to identify the morning star and the evening star were both manifestations of a single object, Venus.

Parmenides's sole work, which has only survived in fragments, is a poem in dactylic hexameter, later titled On Nature.

Parmenides' philosophy formed the basis of the Eleatic school, which was continued by Melissus of Samos and Zeno of Elea.

Melissus built on Parmenides' ideas, proposing a continuous eternal Being instead of a constant existence of the present.

Parmenides influenced both the Sophists and the students of Socrates.

Parmenides considered Nonbeing to be something that exists, albeit separately from Being.

Eusebius of Caesarea, quoting Aristocles of Messene, says that Parmenides was part of a line of skeptical philosophy that culminated in Pyrrhonism for he, by the root, rejects the validity of perception through the senses whilst, at any rate, it is first through our five forms of senses that we become aware of things and then by faculty of reasoning.

Parmenides described Parmenides as the first to create a unified concept of Being and Nonbeing.

In On Nature, Parmenides describes the truth as the path of that is.

Friedrich Nietzsche suggested that Parmenides believed his cosmology, even though he understood that it was only part of the seeming world.

Karl Popper said that it was necessary for Parmenides to disprove his own cosmology to prove that the seeming world was not true.

Parmenides likened this to modern physics, in which theories of physics do not necessarily correspond to what appears to be true.