Early Greek Philosophy: Ionian Physics (Natural Philosophy). The Milesians and Heraclitus of Ephesus

The Emergence of Ancient Greek Philosophy

The emergence of ancient Greek philosophy began at the end of the Archaic period, around the 7th-6th centuries BCE, coinciding with the transition from Mycenaean palace civilization to city-state civilization.

A city-state (polis) is a city with its surrounding countryside, representing the primary form of socio-economic, legal, and political organization in ancient Greece. The polis emerged as the influence of the aristocracy waned and the role of the common people (demos) increased. Thus, the polis was a community of free citizens engaged in agriculture, craftsmanship, trade, and industry, governed by the principles of equality (isonomia) and the rule of the people (democracy).

The role of the polis in Greek life was immense. Firstly, it marked the emergence of a fully-fledged society and public life, as evidenced by the centrality of the city square (agora)—a place for daily social interaction and public gatherings, as well as the theater. Secondly, the relative freedom of citizens, especially in a democratic state, significantly contributed to the dynamism of public life, which manifested in the pervasiveness of competition (agon) in all aspects of civic life, including legal disputes, political struggles, athletic contests, and literary rivalries. This competitiveness undoubtedly fostered the development of critical thinking and freedom of opinion, which were crucial for the emergence of philosophy.

During the same period, the Greeks adopted the alphabetic writing system from the Phoenicians, replacing the earlier syllabic script used during the Minoan-Mycenaean era. This new technology revolutionized the transmission of information, preservation of legal documents, literary works, and scientific knowledge, and thus facilitated the recording and dissemination of philosophical ideas as literacy expanded. What had been solely oral poetic tradition (epos) and the work of rhapsodes—performers of epic poetry—now became the domain of prose writers, chroniclers, and historians, known as logographers, or "writers of words (in prose)." It was under these conditions that Greek philosophy began to take shape.

Among the Greek city-states of the 7th-6th centuries BCE, the most advanced were the cities of the Eastern Mediterranean, founded by the Ionian Greeks on the western coast of Asia Minor and the nearby islands. The most prominent of these cities, known as the Twelve Cities, was Miletus. It was in Miletus, and later in other Ionian cities, that the first Greek philosophers appeared. Thus, we begin our discussion of the development of Greek philosophy with the pioneers of Ionian natural philosophy.

Greek philosophy emerged as natural philosophy, which remains one of the principal branches of philosophy to this day—concerned with the study of nature (physis). The founders of Ionian natural philosophy were the Milesian philosophers of the 7th-6th centuries BCE: Thales (correctly Thalēs), Anaximander, and Anaximenes. Their writings have not survived; only accounts of their views remain (known as doxography). Scholars like Y. V. Chaikovsky, relying on doxographers such as Theophrastus, suggest that the views of the Milesians were based on a pre-scientific tradition that existed in Greece during the 8th-7th centuries BCE and developed within the context of the Greek pre-scientific community.