PHL 550 Study Guide - Final Guide: Western Philosophy
10 Apr 2017
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Document Summary
The contrast between heraclitus and parmenides is stark. According to heraclitus, nothing really persists or endures, and the appearance that some things do persist through change is merely an illusion. According to parmenides, nothing really changes, and the appearance of ongoing flux and transformation is only an illusion. One of parmenides followers, melissa"s, expressed the central idea well when he said, now, if changed by so much as single hair in ten thousand years, it will all perish in the whole of time. This is a vivid illustration of the idea that if something changes in any way, however small, then the same thing cannot remain after the change. If what remains after a very small change is no longer the same thing that existed before the change, then the original thing no longer exists. Undergoing change is the same as being destroyed.
