Sophists as the first teachers of wisdom. Sophists. Soffits – (translated from Greek “sophists” - sages, teachers of wisdom) a philosophical school in ancient Greece. Sophistry and natural philosophy
Protagoras as "teacher of wisdom"
The “older” group includes the ancient Greek philosopher-sophist Protagoras from Abdera in Thrace (c. 481 - c. 411 BC), whose teachings were based on the teachings of Democritus, Heraclitus, Parmenides and Empedocles, revised in the spirit of relativism. He was the first to call himself a “sophist” - “a teacher of the science of virtue.” It is known that Protagoras wrote the books “On the Gods”, “On Truth”, “The Science of Dispute”, “On the Original Order of Things”, “On the State”, “On the Virtues”, “On Existence”.
Protagoras had the most pronounced philosophical thinking among the Sophists. It is believed that Protagoras was a materialist, arguing about the fluidity of matter, the relativity of perception, and the equal reality of existence and non-existence. According to Protagoras, matter flows and changes, and with its variability and fluidity, something comes to the place of what has gone, and accordingly they are transformed according to the age or state of the bodies of perception. The essence of all phenomena is hidden in matter, and matter can be everything that it appears to everyone. According to Protagoras, the initial metaphysical attitudes can be distinguished:
· by determining the character and method, which “self”
(person) is a person;
· essential interpretation of the existence of beings;
· project of truth as a phenomenon of cognition;
· the sense in which a person turns out to be a measure in relation to being and in relation to truth.
According to Protagoras, everything is relative: there is no absolute truth and there are no absolute moral values or good. However, there is something that is more useful, more acceptable, and therefore more appropriate. A sage is one who understands the usefulness of the relative, acceptable and appropriate, knows how to convince others of this and actualize this usefulness.
The sophist-philosopher Protagoras argued: “Man is the measure of all things: existing - in the fact that they exist - and non-existent - in that they do not exist,” believing that every person existing on earth has his own special truth (the principle of man -measures). By measure, Protagoras understood a certain “norm of judgment” by G. Reale and D. Antiseri. Western philosophy from its origins to the present day. I Antiquity. - TK Petropolis LLP, 1997, P.56, under things - facts and experience in general. With this famous axiom, Protagoras negated the absolute criterion that distinguished being from non-being, truth from falsehood. The criterion is only a person, an individual: “as individual things appear before me, such they are for me, as before you, such they are for you.” Is the wind blowing, for example, warm or cold? The answer, in the spirit of Protagoras, should be: “Whoever is cold is cold, whoever is not is warm.” And if so, then neither one nor the other is false, everything is true, i.e. true in its own way.
Protagoras talked about the democratic system of government and substantiated the idea of equality of free people. In 444 or 443 BC. e. Protagoras visited Athens and, at the request of Pericles, wrote a code of laws for a new Greek colony called Thurii in southern Italy. It is interesting that these laws did not change for a long time, because Protagoras introduced a trick: if a person wants to change or abolish an old law, or come up with a new one, he must present his reasons and, putting a noose around his neck, await the decision of the citizens. The proposal is accepted - everything is in order, if the changes are rejected, then... Well.... He chose his fate by wearing a rope with a noose around his neck.
Protagoras argued: every statement is opposed by a statement that contradicts it (about every thing, every object, “there are two opinions opposite to each other”). Using such opposing opinions, the sophist philosopher created the art of philosophical dialogue, which was later given special brilliance by Socrates and Plato. Protagoras’ idea about the deep origin of dialogue is interesting. “He was the first to say that there are two opinions about every thing, opposite to each other. He composed a dialogue from them, being the first to use this method of presentation.” Bogomolov A.S. Ancient philosophy. - M., 1985, p. 183. According to Protagoras, it is clear that the dialogic artistic form arises from the contradictions that lie in the depths of the things themselves.
The skill that Protagoras taught lay precisely in this ability to give weight and meaning to any point of view, as well as the one opposing it. And his success is due to the fact that his students, trained in this ability, mastered all new opportunities in public tribunals, assemblies and political life at all.
It is believed that Protagoras taught how one can “beat a stronger one with a weaker argument.” But this does not mean that the goal was to overwhelm justice and rightness with lawlessness and injustice. He demonstrated how technically and methodologically it is possible to strengthen positions and achieve victory using an initially weak argument.
According to Diogenes Laertius (3rd century BC), Protagoras “was the first to use arguments in disputes,” “began to organize competitions in disputes and came up with tricks for the litigants; he didn’t care about thoughts, he argued about words.” Eloquence requires a lot of work. Protagoras explains this beautifully: “Labour, work, learning, education and wisdom form the crown of glory, which is woven from the flowers of eloquence and placed on the heads of those who love it. It is true that language is difficult, but its flowers are rich and always new, and spectators applaud and teachers rejoice when students make progress, and fools get angry - or maybe sometimes they don’t get angry, because they are not insightful enough.”
Protagoras saw in the word the main basis for human power, believing that it is possible “with the power of words to transform a bad deed into a valiant one.”
In Protagoras, every speech is divided into four separate parts: request, question, answer and command. These are attempts at a separate aesthetic assessment of human speech, which will later play a large role in ancient rhetoric, and then in world grammar and stylistics.
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6. Philosophy of the Sophists and Socrates.
Sophists( "sophists" sages, teachers of wisdom).
Representatives: Protagoras, Gorgias, Hippias, Lycophron, Alcidamus. Sophists are paid teachers of eloquence and argument. By deftly and skillfully manipulating words and arguments, they could prove the false and refute the true. They were not interested in the truth, but in methods of proof and refutation. Representatives of this philosophical school proved their rightness with the help of sophisms logical techniques, tricks, thanks to which a conclusion that was correct at first glance ultimately turned out to be false and the interlocutor became confused in his own thoughts. An example of this conclusion is the “horned” sophism: “What you have not lost, you have;
you haven't lost your horns; that means you have them."
The goal is to achieve victory in a dispute at any cost.
Prominent representativesenior sophists was Protagoras (V V. BC e.). Protagoras expressed his philosophical credo in the statement: “Man is the measure of all things that exist, that they exist, and non-existent, that they do not exist.”;font-family:"TimesNewRoman""> Morality is what is beneficial to society and invented by it. A benefit is generally something that is beneficial to someone. Nothing is absolute, everything
regarding both knowledge (the same statement can be proven and disproved) and morality.
As a criterion for assessing the surrounding reality, good and bad, the sophists put forward the subjective opinion of a person:
Nothing exists outside human consciousness;
nothing is given once and for all;
What is good for a person today is good in reality;
If tomorrow what is good today becomes bad, then it means that it is harmful and bad in reality;
The entire surrounding reality depends on a person’s sensory perception (“What seems sweet to a healthy person will seem bitter to a sick person”);
The world relative;
Objective (true) knowledge is unattainable;
Exists only a world of opinion.
Socrates (469399 BC) did not write anything, was a sage close to the people, philosophized in the streets and squares, entered into philosophical disputes everywhere: we are known as one of the founders of dialectics in the sense of finding truth through conversations and disputes ; developed the principles of rationalism (cognition is represented by reason and thinking) in matters of ethics, arguing that virtue comes from knowledge and a person who knows what good is will not act badly.
The main method developed and applied by Socrates was called"maieutics". The essence of maieutics is not to teach the truth, but to, through logical techniques and leading questions, lead the interlocutor to independently find the truth.
Socrates was the first to place the problem of man at the center of philosophy. ;font-family:"TimesNewRoman""> Philosophy in the understanding of Socrates is not the study of nature, but the teaching
about how to live. The goal of Socrates' philosophy is self-knowledge as the path to comprehension of the good; virtue is knowledge or wisdom.
Socrates was not understood by the official authorities and was perceived by them as an ordinary sophist, undermining the foundations of society, confusing young people and not honoring the gods. For this he was in 399 BC. e. sentenced to death and took a cup of poison - hemlock.
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As a philosophical movement, the Sophists do not represent a completely homogeneous phenomenon. The most characteristic feature common to all sophistry is the assertion of the relativity of all human concepts, ethical norms and assessments; it is expressed by Protagoras in his famous statement: “Man is the measure of all things: those that exist in the fact that they exist, and those that do not exist in that they do not exist.”
Sophists as the first teachers of wisdom in antiquity
In the 5th century BC e. in many cities of Greece to replace political power The power of slave-owning democracy came to the ancient aristocracy and tyranny. The development of new elective institutions created by its rule - the people's assembly and the court, which played a large role in the struggle of classes and parties of the free population - gave rise to the need to train people who master the art of judicial and political eloquence, who are able to convince with the power of words and prove, who are able to freely navigate V various issues and tasks of law, political life and diplomatic practice. Some of the most advanced people in this area - masters of eloquence, lawyers, diplomats - became teachers of political knowledge and rhetoric. However, the lack of division of knowledge of that time into philosophical and specifically scientific areas, as well as the significance that in the eyes of educated people of the Greek West had time in the 5th century. BC e. to receive philosophy with its questions about the beginnings of things, about the world and its emergence, led to the fact that these new teachers usually taught not only the technique of political and legal activity, but connected this technique with general questions of philosophy and worldview.
Thus, Hippias taught, according to the testimony of Xenophon and Plato, astronomy, meteorology, geometry and music; Paul was versed in the teachings of physics; Critias shared, according to Aristotle, the psychological views of Empedocles; Antiphon dealt with the problem of squaring the circle and tried to explain meteorological phenomena - either according to Heraclitus, then according to Diogenes, then according to Anaxagoras. The new teachers were called “sophists.” Initially, the word “sophist” was used to describe people skilled in any task - poets, musicians, legislators, sages. Subsequently, writers of a conservative and reactionary way of thinking, who rejected the democratic system, its institutions and the practices of its leaders, transferred their hostility to the new teachers who prepared young people for political and judicial careers. “Sophists” they began to call those who, in speeches addressed to listeners, sought not to clarify the truth, but to present lies as truth, opinions as reliable truth, superficiality as knowledge.
"Sophists and Sophistry"
Introduction
In the 5th century BC e. In many Greek cities, slave-owning democracy was established, replacing the ancient aristocracy in power. New elected institutions arose: popular assemblies and courts, which were of great importance in the struggle of classes and parties of the free population. There was a need for people who mastered the art of speech to participate in judicial and political affairs. They had to be able to convince, prove, understand legal issues, know the intricacies of political life, and master diplomatic practice. Some of them, who successfully completed their tasks (lawyers, diplomats, masters of eloquence), became teachers of rhetoric and political knowledge. Their training in the techniques of legal and political activity was closely connected with general questions of philosophy and worldview.
Special prerequisites were created for the flourishing of eloquence. The speaker needed to attract attention and present his ideas and beliefs in an attractive way. In public decisions on political and judicial issues, the one who had the gift of eloquence and the ability to win over listeners often won. It was necessary to speak beautifully and convincingly at the People's Assembly, in front of soldiers, as well as at crowded festivals and friendly meetings. Therefore, there was a need for people who taught eloquence and composed texts of speeches. They became sophists - philosophers-educators, excellent in the art of oratory, the laws of logic and able to influence the assembled listeners with their words.
Sophists - a symbol for a group of ancient Greek thinkers. V - 1st floor. IV centuries BC e. The time of their active work is often called the age of the Greek Enlightenment. Initially, the word was synonymous with the word (“wise”) and denoted a person with authority in various matters of private and public life. From the middle of the 5th century. Sophists began to be called the paid teachers of eloquence and all kinds of knowledge that appeared at that time, considered necessary for active participation in civil life, who themselves often actively participated in political life.
2. Sophistry as a phenomenon of ancient Greek culture and philosophy
.1 Interpretation of the concept of “sophistry”
The terms “sophistry” and “sophists” come from the ancient Greek word for “wisdom.” Literally translated, the word “sophist” means “sage, master, expert.”
Sophistry -
) the teaching of representatives that developed in Athens in the second half of the 5th century. BC. schools of sophists - educational philosophers who gravitated towards relativism, the first professional teachers of general education.
) (Greek sophisma - fabrication, cunning) - the deliberate use in a dispute and in evidence of false arguments based on a deliberate violation of logical rules (sophisms); misleading verbal tricks.
The first schools of oratory arose in the cities of Sicily, and development in the 5th century. BC e. democracy in Athens and connections with other Greek cities made Athens a public arena for the performances and teaching activities of the sophists.
Sophistic teachers were very popular in Ancient Greece. They went on trips throughout the country on diplomatic missions, engaged government activities, speaking in front of people and teaching those interested the basics of eloquence.
“Wandering teachers of eloquence”, “the first European intellectuals”, as A.F. called the sophists. Losev, were engaged in rhetorical pedagogy - the practice of mastering speech skills. Their didactic activities united heterogeneous groups of people both in age and social status. In the process of upbringing, it was now important not only physical and spiritual perfection, but also education, which led to its widespread distribution. The gift of speech began to be perceived as a sign and an indispensable condition for a full, good education. A truly educated person, " the best way brought up for philosophy and literature,” “suddenly, at any point in speech, he will throw... like a mighty archer, some wonderful saying, short and concise, and the interlocutor will turn out to be no better than a child,” says Plato’s famous dialogue “Protagoras "
The sophists first spoke in Greece about the power of words and built a theory of this power. Many of them were virtuosos in using the theory of words in life, they created treatises on this topic. Plato, in his treatise Gorgias, argued that the art of the Sophists is a greater good than all other arts; considering that the sophist is “a master of persuasion: this is his whole essence and all his concern,” who ... “has the ability to convince with words both judges in court, ... and in any other assembly of citizens, ... and as for our businessman, it turns out that he is not making money for himself, but for someone else and for you, who has a command of the word and the ability to convince the crowd.”
It is believed that the sophists did not have a complete, defined system of knowledge. Sophistry did not represent a single circle of thinkers. Sophistry of the 5th century - “a complex of efforts independent from each other, satisfying identical requests by appropriate means.” Their works have practically not survived; most of the information about the works of the sophists is contained in the works of philosophers of later times.
2.2 Philosophical views sophists
To justify their practical activities, the sophists relied on philosophy. A characteristic feature of their philosophy is the affirmation of the relativity of all human concepts, ethical norms and assessments. They introduced relativism into the theory of knowledge, which led the sophists to deny objective truth. Therefore, an objective truth common to everyone is impossible. There is no objective criterion of good and evil: what benefits someone is good for him: “Disease is evil for the sick, but good for doctors. Death is evil for those who are dying, but for sellers of things needed for funerals and for gravediggers it is good.”
The sophists understood perfectly well that everything could be proven purely formally. The main goal of the sophists in their didactic activities was to teach students how to argue. Therefore, during the preparation process, much attention was paid to rhetoric. Students learned methods of proof and refutation and became familiar with the rules of logical thinking.
The philosophy of the Sophists was humanistic. It is important to emphasize that the sophists paid a lot of attention to social issues, man and communication problems, teaching eloquence and political activity, as well as scientific and philosophical knowledge. Some sophists used techniques and forms of persuasion and evidence, regardless of the question of the truth of the propositions being proven. But in their desire to convince their interlocutor, the sophists reached the idea that it was possible to prove and disprove anything, depending on interest and circumstances, which sometimes led to a distortion of the truth in proofs and refutations. Gradually, methods of thinking emerged that came to be called sophistry.
The Sophists paid almost no attention to the study of nature. But they were the first to distinguish between the laws of nature, as something unshakable, and the laws of society, which arise by human institution.
The Sophists found beauty in the endlessly varied phenomena of human life. But these phenomena were contradictory. To use eloquent words, to amaze the listener with unexpected metaphors and oratorical techniques in general, to arouse anger and indignation both in an individual and in a crowd, and at the same time, with the help of convincing artistry, to calm human suffering and free him from vain complaints - these are the new ways along which the aesthetics of the Sophists followed.
2.3 “Senior” sophists as teachers and researchers of the art of speech
Some researchers of the activities of ancient Greek philosophers distinguish three groups of sophists:
) major famous masters of the first generation, not at all devoid of moral restrictions;
) so-called “erists”, i.e. disputants who insisted on the formal aspect of the method, which aroused indignation, because, losing interest in the content of concepts, they inevitably lost the moral context;
) “sophist-politicians” who utilized sophistic ideas, in modern expression, into an ideological complex, and therefore fell into excesses of various kinds, which often ended in direct theorization of immoralism.
Taking into account the historical sequence in the history of Russian philosophical thought, two groups of sophists are distinguished: “senior” and “younger”.
The “senior sophists” explored political, ethical, state, and legal problems, and studied linguistics. They questioned all the principles existing before their time, and declared the truths relative. In the concept of the “senior” sophists, the subjective nature and relativity of knowledge are absolutized.
The sophists did not study the problem of being as a problem of matter: they started talking about being for themselves, but earlier being was developed - in itself. In the Sophists, the ancient spirit first turns to itself, within itself.
Many sophists doubted the existence of gods or even denied them, considering them a human invention. Sophistry by its nature is anti-dogmatic, and any religion is built on dogma. The Sophists played important role in the destruction of traditional religious dogmas.
The older group of sophists attempted to critically examine religious beliefs. It is known that Protagoras said: “About the Gods I have no opportunity to assert either that they exist or that they do not exist.” The basis of his method was the ability to demonstrate both arguments in favor of the existence of Gods and against it. This does not mean that he is an atheist, as they already concluded about him in ancient times, but only that he was an agnostic.
Protagoras's work on the gods, despite the extremely careful formulation of religious skepticism, was publicly burned and became the reason for the philosopher's expulsion from Athens.
Prodicus, developing the views of Anaxagoras and Democritus, began to interpret religious myths as the personification of the forces of nature.
Common features in the philosophy of the “senior” sophists:
· the movement of philosophical interests from the sphere of natural philosophy to the field of ethics, politics, and theory of knowledge;
· the study of the person himself and his subjective characteristics.
2.3.1 Protagoras as "teacher of wisdom"
The “elder” group includes the ancient Greek philosopher-sophist Protagoras from Abdera in Thrace (c. 481 - c. 411 BC), whose teachings were based on the teachings of Democritus, Heraclitus, Parmenides and Empedocles, revised in the spirit of relativism. He was the first to call himself a “sophist” - “a teacher of the science of virtue.” It is known that Protagoras wrote the books “On the Gods”, “On Truth”, “The Science of Dispute”, “On the Original Order of Things”, “On the State”, “On the Virtues”, “On Existence”.
Protagoras had the most pronounced philosophical thinking among the Sophists. It is believed that Protagoras was a materialist, arguing about the fluidity of matter, the relativity of perception, and the equal reality of existence and non-existence. According to Protagoras, matter flows and changes, and with its variability and fluidity, something comes to the place of what has gone, and accordingly they are transformed according to the age or state of the bodies of perception. The essence of all phenomena is hidden in matter, and matter can be everything that it appears to everyone. According to Protagoras, the initial metaphysical attitudes can be distinguished:
· by determining the nature and method of which “self”
(person) is a person;
· essential interpretation of the being of beings;
· the project of truth as a phenomenon of knowledge;
· the sense in which a person turns out to be a measure in relation to being and in relation to truth.
According to Protagoras, everything is relative: there is no absolute truth and there are no absolute moral values or good. However, there is something that is more useful, more acceptable, and therefore more appropriate. A sage is one who understands the usefulness of the relative, acceptable and appropriate, knows how to convince others of this and actualize this usefulness.
The sophist-philosopher Protagoras argued: “Man is the measure of all things: existing - in the fact that they exist - and non-existent - in that they do not exist,” believing that every person existing on earth has his own special truth (the principle of man -measures). By measure, Protagoras understood a certain “norm of judgment,” and by things, facts and experience in general. With this famous axiom, Protagoras negated the absolute criterion that distinguished being from non-being, truth from falsehood. The criterion is only a person, an individual: “as individual things appear before me, such they are for me, as before you, such they are for you.” Is the wind blowing, for example, warm or cold? The answer, in the spirit of Protagoras, should be: “Whoever is cold is cold, whoever is not is warm.” And if so, then neither one nor the other is false, everything is true, i.e. true in its own way.
Protagoras talked about the democratic system of government and substantiated the idea of equality of free people. In 444 or 443 BC. e. Protagoras visited Athens and, at the request of Pericles, wrote a code of laws for a new Greek colony called Thurii in southern Italy. It is interesting that these laws did not change for a long time, because Protagoras introduced a trick: if a person wants to change or abolish an old law, or come up with a new one, he must present his reasons and, putting a noose around his neck, await the decision of the citizens. The proposal is accepted - everything is in order, if the changes are rejected, then... Well.... He chose his fate by wearing a rope with a noose around his neck.
Protagoras argued: every statement is opposed by a statement that contradicts it (about every thing, every object, “there are two opinions opposite to each other”). Using such opposing opinions, the sophist philosopher created the art of philosophical dialogue, which was later given special brilliance by Socrates and Plato. Protagoras’ idea about the deep origin of dialogue is interesting. “He was the first to say that about every thing there are two opinions that are opposite to each other. He composed a dialogue from them, being the first to use this method of presentation.” According to Protagoras, it is clear that the dialogic artistic form arises from the contradictions that lie in the depths of things themselves.
The skill that Protagoras taught lay precisely in this ability to give weight and meaning to any point of view, as well as the one opposing it. And his success is due to the fact that his students, trained in this ability, mastered ever new possibilities in public tribunals, assemblies and political life in general.
It is believed that Protagoras taught how one can “beat a stronger one with a weaker argument.” But this does not mean that the goal was to overwhelm justice and rightness with lawlessness and injustice. He demonstrated how technically and methodologically it is possible to strengthen positions and achieve victory using an initially weak argument.
According to Diogenes Laertius (3rd century BC), Protagoras “was the first to use arguments in disputes,” “began to organize competitions in disputes and came up with tricks for the litigants; he didn’t care about thoughts, he argued about words.” Eloquence requires a lot of work. Protagoras explains this beautifully: “Labour, work, learning, education and wisdom form the crown of glory, which is woven from the flowers of eloquence and placed on the heads of those who love it. It is true that language is difficult, but its flowers are rich and always new, and spectators applaud and teachers rejoice when students make progress, and fools get angry - or maybe sometimes they don’t get angry, because they are not insightful enough.”
Protagoras saw in the word the main basis for human power, believing that it is possible “with the power of words to transform a bad deed into a valiant one.”
In Protagoras, every speech is divided into four separate parts: request, question, answer and command. These are attempts at a separate aesthetic assessment of human speech, which will later play a large role in ancient rhetoric, and then in world grammar and stylistics.
2.3.2 "Father of Sophistry" Gorgias
Gorgias of Leontina (presumably 485-380 BC) is considered the creator of rhetoric. The sophist-philosopher defined rhetoric as the art of speeches and worked a lot on the theory of judicial and political eloquence. A true orator, according to Gorgias, must be able to both praise and blame the same thing.
Gorgias himself became famous for a speech delivered before the People's Assembly of Athens in 427 BC. e. Warning the Athenians about the danger looming over their homeland, he surprised the citizens with skillfully spoken words and skillfully selected examples.
Gorgias, in his essay “On the Non-Existent, or On Nature,” declared that “nothing exists at all,” including nature itself. He argued that being does not exist, that even if we assume being to exist, it still cannot be known, that even if we recognize being as existing and knowable, it is still impossible to communicate what is known to other people. In this philosophical work, Gorgias substantiated three paradoxical theses:
· nothing exists;
· even if something existed, a person could not know it;
· even if he could know, he would not be able to express it in words and prove it to other people.
Having destroyed the very possibility of achieving absolute truth, Gorgias was in search of a path of reason limited to illuminating the facts, circumstances, situations of people’s lives and the city. According to the sophist, this is “not a science that gives definitions and absolute rules, and not wandering individualism... This is an analysis of situations, a description of what should and should not be done... Gorgias is one of the first representatives of the ethics of situations, the essence of which in that responsibilities depend on the moment, era, social characteristics; the same action is both good and bad, depending on what it relates to.”
Separately, there is a curious judgment of Gorgias about beauty and art: “The outstanding beauty of something hidden is revealed when wise artists cannot paint it with their tried and tested colors. For their enormous work and great tireless labor provides satisfactory proof of how beautiful it is in its mystery. And if individual stages of their work have reached the end, then they silently give him again a wreath of victory. And what no one’s hand grasps and no one’s eye sees, how can the tongue express it or perceive the listener’s ear?” Gorgias wants to say here that true beauty is inexpressible by any means, even artistic, but always remains something mysterious; its artistic expression, no matter how perfect it may be, only confirms its mysterious nature. The possibility of such reasoning for Gorgias follows from the very great sensitivity of the sophists to the phenomenon of all beauty in general (According to Losev).
Gorgias's position on rhetoric was also new. If there is no absolute truth and everything is false, the word has almost limitless power, as long as it is not connected with being. The theoretical discovery of Gorgias consists in the discovery of the word as a carrier of persuasion, belief and suggestion, regardless of its truth. Rhetoric is the art of persuasion, i.e. that which uses the possibilities of the word. This art in Greece of the 5th century was a true “steering wheel in the hands of a statesman.” The politician was therefore called a rhetorician, capable of persuading judges in tribunals, advisers in the Council, members of the people's assembly, his citizens in any community. The significance of rhetoric is obvious, just as the unprecedented success of Gorgias is clear to us. Thus, Gorgias, in his speech “Praise to Helen,” writes: “The Word is a great ruler who, possessing a very small and completely invisible body, performs the most wonderful deeds. For it can instill fear, destroy sadness, instill joy, and awaken compassion.”
Gorgias was the first philosopher who sought the theoretical meaning of what is now called the aesthetic value of words and the essence of poetry. “Poetry in its various forms,” he said, “I call a certain dimensional judgment, and the one who listens is captured, trembling with fear, compassion, shedding tears, trembling with grief, his soul suffers from the action of words, happiness and the misfortunes of others become his own.”
Gorgias is famous for creating artistic means of expression - tropes and figures of speech as exquisite decorations for what is said. He used all sorts of artificial, pretentious and subtle expressions, which later became known as the “Gorgian style.” Gorgias invented the colon - a rhythmic-intonation unit of speech: the number of words pronounced in one breath. He is considered the creator of artistic prose: he combined poetic style with prose. The golden statue of Gorgias, which was erected in Delphi, confirms the services of this sophist to Greek culture, as well as the significant role that Gorgias played in the historical fate of Athens. Here is how A.F. Losev writes about the rhetorical activity of Gorgias, relying on ancient sources: “He was the first to introduce the type of education that prepares orators, special training in the ability and art of speaking, and he was the first to use tropes, metaphors, allegories, and the misuse of words in improper sense, inversions, secondary doublings, repetitions, apostrophes...". Being himself a virtuoso of brevity, Gorgias taught everyone to speak well so that they would be able to conquer people, “to make them their slaves of their own free will, and not by force. By the power of his conviction, he forced the patients to drink such bitter medicines and undergo such operations that even doctors could not force them to do.”
2.3.3 Hippias as one of the representatives of the Greek Enlightenment
Hippias (?????)from Elis (470s - after 399 BC), Greek sophist, younger contemporary of Protagoras. He is considered one of the most erudite and versatile representatives of the Greek Enlightenment.
Hippias paid a lot of attention to rhetoric. The naturalness and entertaining nature of the story were his main strength; he more than once went to different cities with large political assignments and always performed successfully. He traveled throughout Greece as a teacher and speaker, thus amassing a large fortune. He took an active part in government affairs, traveled with embassies to Athens, Sparta and other cities, gave public lectures on the genealogies of heroes and local noble families, and on the founding of cities in ancient times. Hippias wrote works on mathematics, astronomy, meteorology, grammar, poetry, music, mythology and history. He worked on the creation of epics, tragedies and dithyrambs. He wrote poems, songs, a variety of prose and was an expert in rhythm, harmony, spelling and mnemonics. Despite the diversity of his interests, Hippias basically remained a sophist, since he sharply contrasted the tyrannical law with supposedly free nature. He taught the science of the nature of legislation, believing that knowledge about nature is indispensable for success in life, that in life one should be guided by the laws of nature, and not by human institutions. Nature unites people, but law rather separates them. The law is devalued to the extent that it is opposed to nature. A distinction emerges between law and the law of nature, natural and positive law. The natural is eternal, the second is accidental. Thus, the beginning appears for the subsequent desacralization of human laws that require examination. However, Hippias draws more positive conclusions than negative ones. He finds, for example, that, based on natural law, it makes no sense to separate the citizens of one city from the citizens of another, or to discriminate against citizens within the same city.
2.3.4 Prodicus's interest in language
The Sophists dealt a lot with the theory of words, so they can be considered the first Greek philologists. Prodicus especially delved into verbal semantics.
Prodicus of Keos (c. 470-after 400 BC) - Greek sophist. In 431 or 421 BC. e. received great acclaim in Athens. He developed Protagoras's teaching on correct speech. Prodicus worked on synonymy, emphasizing the differences between words with similar lexical meanings. The only work of Prodicus that is known reliably is “The Seasons,” the name of which he associated with the goddesses of the seasons, revered on Keos.
The sophistic philosopher argued that the emergence of agriculture led to the development of human culture. He presented a theory of the origin of religion. Protagoras proclaimed a theory of divine honors for things useful to people (a type of fetishism) and for their inventors (a theory later called euphemerism). He was the first to explain the origin of religion by psychological reasons (feelings of gratitude). His understanding of the gods is original. According to Prodicus, the gods are nothing more than a “hypostatization of the useful and beneficial”: “The ancients came up with gods due to the superiority and redundancy that flowed from them: the sun, the moon, the sources of all the forces that influence our lives, such as the Nile on life of the Egyptians."
In ethics he became famous for his interpretation of sophistic doctrine through the example of the familiar myth of Hercules, who at the crossroads makes a choice between virtue and vice, where virtue was interpreted as the appropriate means of achieving true gain and real benefit.
2.3.5 Proclamation of the idea of equality of people in the writings of Antiphon
Antiphon from Athens (2nd half of the 5th century BC) is an ancient Greek sophist philosopher of the older generation, who wrote the works: “Truth”, “On Concord”, “Speech on the State”, “Interpretation of Dreams”.
The main philosophical work “Truth” consisted of two books: 1 - general principles and theory of knowledge; 2- physics, anthropology, ethics. He argued that the antithesis of truth - opinion correlates with the antithesis of nature - law. As a result, all socio-legal “establishments”, laws and “generally accepted norms” of morality turn out to be a conventional fiction, “hostile” to human nature. Nature is understood as natural inclinations, biological instincts and declares itself in the well-known hedonistic postulate: maximum pleasure, minimum suffering. “Justice” is hypocritical and forced observance of laws; therefore, “for a person, the most beneficial way of using justice is this: in the presence of witnesses, respect the laws, and without witnesses, the requirements of nature. The superiority of “nature over “law”” leads Antiphon to the idea of the equality of all people and the untruth of class and racial privileges: “By nature, we are all built the same in everything - both barbarians and Hellenes,” “we all breathe air through our mouth and nose and eat with our hands "
Antiphon placed nature above the law and contrasted it with state power and social institutions. He not only developed a materialistic explanation of the principles of nature and the origin of its bodies and elements, but also tried to criticize cultural phenomena, defending the advantages of nature over the institutions of culture and over art.
In his essay “Truth,” Antiphon set forth astronomical and meteorological views (the doctrine of the origin of the world from a vortex) and argued that “everything is one.” He denied the objective existence of individual things and time. He understood ethics as “the art of being carefree.”
2.4 general characteristics"younger" sophists
In the teachings of the younger sophists (4th century BC), about which extremely scanty information has been preserved, their ethical and social ideas are especially prominent.
· Lycophron and Alcidamant opposed the barriers between social classes: Lycophron argued that nobility is a fiction, and Alcidamant argued that nature did not create anyone as slaves and that people are born free. Lycophron, speaking out against the aristocracy, put forward the thesis that “nobility” is only a fiction, it by nature does not reveal itself in any way, but is based only on opinion; “In truth, the ignoble and the noble are no different from each other.”
· Thrasymachus extended the doctrine of relativity to social and ethical norms and reduced justice to what is useful for the strong, arguing that each power establishes laws useful to itself: democracy - democratic, and tyranny - tyrannical, etc. Following Prodicus, who is natural In this way he tried to explain the emergence of religion (“the sun, the moon, rivers, springs and in general everything that is useful to our life, the ancestors considered deities, like the Egyptians - the Nile”), Thrasymachus openly comes out on the side of atheism. He says “that the gods do not see human affairs: for they could not fail to notice the greatest asset of people - justice; What we see is that people don’t resort to it.”
2.5 Evaluation of the activities of the sophists
The sophists paid great attention not only to the practice, but also to the theory of eloquence. They taught that “speeches should be neither long nor short, but in moderation,” they used antithesis and consonance of endings; they paid attention to the conciseness and roundness of thought, the rhythm of speech, studied oratorical vocabulary, as well as the impact of speech on feelings. The sophists knew how to destroy the opponent's argument with ridicule, and to respond to his ridicule with dignity.
Initially, the word “sophist” was used to describe people skilled in any task - poets, musicians, legislators, sages. Subsequently, those who, in speeches addressed to listeners, sought not to clarify the truth, but to present lies as truth, opinions as reliable truth, superficiality as knowledge.
The sophists laid the foundations of rhetoric as the science of oratory. To master eloquence, certain techniques were proposed. According to the sophists, the goal of the speaker is not to reveal the truth, but to be persuasive. The task of the sophist is to teach “to make a weak opinion strong.” Hence the meaning of the word sophistry - a deliberately false conclusion. The one who makes a speech, by the power of his word, must make “small things seem large, and large things small, new things seem ancient, and ancient things new,” he can make people “his slaves of their own free will, and not by force.”
Sophistry (from Greek s ó phisma - trick, trick, invention, puzzle) a conclusion or reasoning that substantiates some deliberate absurdity, absurdity or paradoxical statement that contradicts generally accepted ideas. Aristotle called sophisms “imaginary proofs,” in which the validity of the conclusion is apparent and is due to a purely subjective impression caused by a lack of logical or semantic analysis.
Here is one example of the sophism of the ancients, attributed to Eubulides: “What you have not lost, you have. You didn't lose your horns. So you have horns." This is where ambiguity is masked. If it is thought of as universal: “Everything that you haven’t lost...”, then the conclusion is logically flawless; if it is thought of as private, then the conclusion does not follow logically. But here is a modern sophism that substantiates that with age, “years of life” not only seem to be, but are actually shorter: “Every year of your life is its 1/n part, where n is the number of years you have lived. But n + 1>n. Therefore, 1/(n + 1)<1/ n».
It is impossible to talk about the unambiguous characterization of the activities of the sophists. Evaluating the sophists as philosophers, modern researchers determine the negative and positive sides of their actions:
Accusations against the sophists “Defense” (a positive result of the sophists’ activities) 1. They pursued purely practical goals, and it was essential for them to look for students for “profit” They brought to the fore the problem of education, and pedagogical activity acquired a new meaning They argued that virtue is not given by birth and does not depend on the nobility of blood, but is based only on knowledge. For the Sophists, the study of truth was tantamount to its dissemination. 2. They charged a fee for teaching, because knowledge was understood as a product of disinterested spiritual communication, the occupation of rich and noble people who had already solved their life problems. The Sophists destroyed the old social scheme , which made culture accessible only to select layers, opening up the possibility of cultural penetration into other layers of society. Sophists engaged in knowledge as a craft and therefore had to demand payment in order to live, to travel. 3. Sophists were reproached for vagrancy, for disrespect for their hometown, to which they were attached was a kind of ethical dogma for the Greeks until that time. The Sophists were aware of the narrow boundaries of the polis; pushing them apart, they became bearers of the panhellenistic principle, felt themselves not only citizens of their city, but also of Hellas. 4. They violated traditions, norms and codifications. The sophists proclaimed freedom of spirit and demonstrated unlimited faith in reason. Earned the title of Greek “enlightenment”
“Sophist” - this term, in itself positive, meaning “wise”, sophisticated, expert of knowledge, later began to be used as negative, especially in the context of the polemics between Plato and Aristotle.
After all, in the beginning the sophists
· taught the correct methods of proof and refutation,
· discovered a number of rules of logical thinking,
· but they soon moved away from the logical principles of its organization and focused all their attention on the development of logical tricks based on the external similarity of phenomena, on the fact that an event is extracted from the general connection of events, on the polysemy of words, on the substitution of concepts, etc.
Some, like Socrates, considered the knowledge of the sophists to be superficial and ineffective, since they lacked the disinterested goal of seeking truth as such, but in modern conditions their true historical significance was determined.
Conclusion
The historical significance of sophistry for the development of philosophy and culture.
Most importantly, the sophists shifted the axis of philosophical research from space to man. The grandeur of space receded into the background. Human life and the human personality with their endless chaos and diversity, with their inconstancy, far from cosmic greatness, came to the fore.
The old image of man in the pre-philosophical poetic tradition was destroyed by the Sophists, but a new one has not yet appeared:
· Protagoras associated man mainly with sensuality,
· Gorgias thought of man as a subject of mobile emotions, moving in any direction.
The sophists spoke about nature, about man as a biological animal nature, while keeping silent about his spiritual nature. In order to find himself again, a person had to find a more solid foundation.
The Sophists rejected the old Gods, but, abandoning the search for the beginning, they moved towards the denial of the divine in general:
· Protagoras settled on agnosticism,
· Prodicus already sees the Gods as an exaggeration of benefit,
· Critias - as an ideological image of politicians.
It is clear: in order to think about the divine, it was necessary to look for a different, higher sphere.
The same can be said about truth:
· Protagoras divided logos into “two arguments” and revealed that logos posits and opposes.
· Gorgias rejected logos as thinking, and retained it only as a magical word, but he also found that the word, with the help of which one can say everything and also refute everything, does not truly express anything. Thought and word have lost their subject and their order, being and truth have been lost. Word and thought had to restore themselves to a higher level.
The significance of sophistry for the history of philosophical thought is the opening up for critical discussion of new topics in epistemology, philosophy of language, ethics, sociology and political theory:
· the reliability of sensory ideas and judgments of the mind, as well as their expression in language,
· the relativity of truth in relation to various subjects, circumstances of place and time, ethnic characteristics,
· the relationship between universal principles and norms established by people in the field of ethics, language, public institutions,
· criteria for choice in the moral field (the influence of pleasure on behavior, the nature of utilitarian calculation in the choice of actions),
· the principles on which social life is based,
· the motives that led to the emergence of society, the essence of the gods and the origin of religion.
Thus, the Greek sophists are “deep thinkers” who contributed to changing the philosophy of the teaching of nature into the field of ethics and theory of knowledge. Denying absolute truth, they for the first time paid significant attention to the study of the subjective world of man.
List of used literature
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