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All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Reply to 'Rorarius' 2nd ed' and 'fragments/reports'

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5 ideas

15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 1. Mind / d. Location of mind

5987	Alcmaeon was the first to say the brain is central to thinking [Alcmaeon, by Staden, von]
	Full Idea: Alcmaeon apparently was the first Greek to assign central cognitive and biological functions to the brain.
	From: report of Alcmaeon (fragments/reports [c.490 BCE]) by Heinrich von Staden - Alcmaeon
	A reaction: The name of Alcmaeon should be remembered with honour. This was 200 years before Aristotle, who still hadn't worked it out. I presume Alcmaeon inferred the truth from head injuries, which is overwhelming evidence, if you notice it.

23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / e. Character

541	Virtue comes more from habit than character [Critias]
	Full Idea: More men are good through habit than through character.
	From: Critias (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE], B09), quoted by John Stobaeus - Anthology 3.29.41

27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / b. Relative time

19384	Space and time are the order of all possibilities, and don't just relate to what is actual [Leibniz]
	Full Idea: Space and time taken together constitute the order of possibilities of the one entire universe, so that these orders relate not only to what actually is, but also to anything that could be put in its place.
	From: Gottfried Leibniz (Reply to 'Rorarius' 2nd ed [1702], GP iv 568), quoted by Richard T.W. Arthur - Leibniz 7 'Space and Time'
	A reaction: A very nice idea. Rather like the 'space of reasons', where all rational thought must exist, space and time are the 'space of existence and action'. Their concepts involve more than relations between what actually exists.

28. God / C. Attitudes to God / 5. Atheism

542	Fear of the gods was invented to discourage secret sin [Critias]
	Full Idea: When the laws forbade men to commit open crimes of violence, and they began to do them in secret, a wise and clever man invented fear of the gods for mortals, to frighten the wicked, even if they sin in secret.
	From: Critias (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE], B25), quoted by Sextus Empiricus - Against the Professors (six books) 9.54

29. Religion / D. Religious Issues / 2. Immortality / b. Soul

24043	Soul must be immortal, since it continually moves, like the heavens [Alcmaeon, by Aristotle]
	Full Idea: Alcmaeon says that the soul is immortal because it resembles immortal things and that this affection belongs to it because it is always in movement, like divine things, such the moon, the sun, the stars and the whole heaven.
	From: report of Alcmaeon (fragments/reports [c.490 BCE], DK 24) by Aristotle - De Anima 405a30
	A reaction: Hm. Fish and rivers seem to be continually moving too. Presumably we are like gods, but then Greek gods seem awfully like humans. I don't know the history of belief in immortality; an interesting topic.