From: hoople@anchor.cs.colorado.edu (Andy Hoople)
Subject: Response to Peter Cash
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 1992 21:29:27 GMT

Peter Cash writes:
>I've always been intrigued by the possible connections between ancient
>Greek philosophy and far Eastern (Hindu and Buddhist) philosophy. Given the
>historical background, there must have been quite a bit of communication
>between the Indian subcontient and the Eastern Mediterranean, and this must
>have lead to an interchange of ideas. Certainly, the notion that the world
>is not real because it is in a state of constant change (sangsara) sounds a
>great deal like the thinking you ascribe to Parmenides. And the

Thanks for mentioning this stuff about Hindu philosophy.  I just checked
out a book on the Upanishads last night, and I was very surprised to see
how similar their views are with Parmenides'.  The ultimate reality is
"Brahmin", or God.  This is the same view as that of Parmenide's predecessor,
Xenophanes.  The Upanishads also hold that the ultimate reality is
consciousness, or awareness.  I think this is perfectly in line with
what Parmenides says:
     "At an earlier date, Parmenides too touched on this doctrine
      inasmuch as he identified being and thought and did not locate
      being in sensible objects.  He said:
           For the same things can be thought of and can be.[B 3]
                                      (Plotinus,Enneads V i 8)
This makes sense as long as you keep in mind that for Parmenides,
perception, awarenesss, and thought are all the same thing.  The
Upanishads also discuss the idea that there must be degrees of reality
to things, since the world of becoming is obviously unreal.

>You know, I do wish you gave me some references here to look up. Some
>Stephanus numbers in the Republic would do wonders to sharpen our discourse
>here. It's not at all clear to me that Plato makes the distinction between
>"images", "appearances" and "reality" that you delineate. Why aren't
>"images" the same as "appearances"? Is the unreality of images due to the
>"flux" of the world, or due to the unreliability of the senses? In what
>sense are "images" unreal?

I just looked up in Schopenhauer's "Essays and Aphorisms," and I found
the perfect statement of the doctrine of "Appearance" and "Reality."
"On the Antithesis of Thing In Itself and Appearance:"
     "Just as we know of the earth only the surface, not the great,
solid masses of the interior, so we know empirically of things and
the world nothing at all except their 'appearances', i.e. the surface.
Exact knowledge of this constitutes physics, taken in the widest sense.
But that this surface presupposes an interior which is not merely
superficies but possesses cubic content is, together with deductions as
to the character of the interior, the theme of metaphysics."

All of this I think is perfectly true, and to this extent, I would
believe in the doctrine of Appearance and Reality.  However, I'm not
so sure I would go as far as Kant and Schopenhauer do in limiting
the scope of human knowledge.  Kant holds that about the Thing In
Itself, we can know nothing.  But what about thought?  This obviously
exists, and it can in no way be spatial.  It hardly seems proper to
say that it even has a surface to it.  When we think, when we perceive
the Platonic "Idea-Forms", we perceive being in itself, the Thing In
Itself.  The human mind is not shackled by the categories as Kant
supposes.
     As to your question about images, I would point you to the last
part of Book VI of the Republic.  The book I'm using is the translation
by Allan Bloom.  Perhaps some translators would not use the term
"image" as he does.  I would hope that my quotation from Schopenhauer
clears up your questions as to why "images" are not the same thing as
"appearances."  In a sense they are; they are simply what is perceived
through the faculty of sight.  Plato calls them "images", because they
simply are unreal and simply must be reflections of a higher reality,
the reality of the Platonic "Idea-Forms."   In response to your
second question, I would say that "images" are unreal due to the "flux"
of the world.  Plato calls the world of "flux" the world of becoming.
Anything in the world of becoming must be unreal because it came about
through a process of change or becoming, but this means that it came
out of nothingness, since this is what is always entailed when there
is any process of becoming whatsoever.  The being of something perceived
through the five senses is very "thin", because it came out of
nothingness.  Whatever is real about it has to be a reflection of
another reality that is not in a state of flux, the realm of
"Idea-Forms."
     Since you obviously know alot about philosophy, I would be
very interested to know your ideas about the nature of God and the
immortality of the soul.  These are as Kant and Dostoevsky and I would
have them, the most significant and ultimate questions of philosophy.
-Andy R. Hoople