Heraclitus

Abstract

This chapter examines how Heraclitus' insistence on the primacy of the logos anticipates the philosophizing of Plato and Aristotle, who nonetheless reject their predecessor on account of his enigmatic style. The logos of Heraclitus is opposed to Plato in at least two fundamental ways: first, his doctrine of flux is contrary to the theory of Forms; and second, the impression one gets is that his thinking is solitary, monologic, and misanthropic, whereas Plato is always social, dialogic, and inviting. Ultimately, Heraclitus stands at the elusive edge of discursive philosophy's dawn—his fragments are after and against the poetic surplus of Homer and Hesiod and before and against the prose systems of Plato and Aristotle. His laconic language is drawn from the obscurities of the oracles, yet his sayings are philosophical in the sense that they believe in truth derived from the human intellect rather than divine revelation.