more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
Pherecydes of Syros said that the principle and element of all things is earth.
Gist of Idea
Pherecydes said the first principle and element is earth
Source
report of Pherecydes (fragments/reports [c.600 BCE]) by Sextus Empiricus - Against the Physicists (two books) I.360
Book Ref
Sextus Empiricus: 'Against the Physicists/Against the Ethicists', ed/tr. Bury,R.G. [Harvard Loeb 1997], p.173
A Reaction
Sextus is giving the history, and mentions it before saying that Thales thought it was water. Earth seems a sensible starting point, and I am guessing that Thales was trying to think a bit more deeply than Pherecydes about it.
| 1494 | Thales said water is the first principle, perhaps from observing that food is moist [Thales, by Aristotle] |
| 22745 | Pherecydes said the first principle and element is earth [Pherecydes, by Sext.Empiricus] |
| 1497 | For Anaximenes nature is air, which takes different forms by rarefaction and condensation [Anaximenes, by Simplicius] |
| 614 | Heraclitus said sometimes everything becomes fire [Heraclitus, by Aristotle] |
| 550 | Anaxagoras said that the number of principles was infinite [Anaxagoras, by Aristotle] |
| 21383 | The ultimate constituents of reality are the homoeomeries [Anaxagoras, by Vlastos] |
| 484 | Everything is ultimately a variation of one underlying thing [Diogenes of Apollonia] |
| 488 | Air is divine, because it is in and around everything, and arranges everything [Diogenes of Apollonia] |
| 13224 | There couldn't be just one element, which was both water and air at the same time [Aristotle] |
| 17177 | In nature there is just one infinite substance [Spinoza] |
| 6421 | Newton's four fundamentals are: space, time, matter and force [Newton, by Russell] |