About this Event
History buffs and Philosophy enthusiasts, join us for professor Dr. James Rietveld's Zoom talk "The Origins of Greek Philosophy" for Ipso Facto on Thursday, February 12, 8 pm.
Pay What You Wish. Sorry no refunds.
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/1977737277436
At one point in time, the mind of humanity suddenly experienced a dramatic and fundamental shift, much like an earthquake of human consciousness, with aftershocks still shaking us today every time we ponder the nature of reality!
The origins of this sudden interest in the Nature of Reality as parsed out from pure and utter superstition, hearsay, and long-established tradition arrived from a groups of often forgotten Greeks who were not even living in Greece but most of them living along the western shores of what is now Turkey, thriving here from the sixth to the fifth century BCE.
As if waking up from a deep slumber, a new intelligence now peered out from behind our eyes as those known as the “Natural Philosophers” outright rejected mythology as an ultimate explanation for why the universe was the way it was and instead sought out “rational” explanations!
They wanted to know the origin of all things, what the essential building blocks for the universe were, and how to prove what they speculated, often through mathematical deductions.
From such men as Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes, Pythagoras, Heraclitus, Empedocles, and Leucippe arrived everything from belief that water was the basic element for a life and the concept of the evolution of humanity to the profession that the universe was always in flux and all things were created out of atoms!!!!
We will get to personally know each of those philosophers who came up with all these ideas—getting to know their stories, often odd, and always entertaining (think: “Big Bang Theory” types). Despite professing ideas separated from religion—religious ideas did manage to emerge from time to time, for example, the conception of the Logos (which will become part of the Gospel of John), the journey and nature of the human soul, the belief in the transmigration of souls (yes, reincarnation in the Greco-Roman world folks!), and the essential power of the Four Elements (Earth, Air, Fire, & Water).
We will explore the very essence of what makes up our society today and provide exact reasons for why this sudden Ancient Great Awakening of the human mind came about in the first place and in this particular location—you will leave with precise reasons why we think the way we do right now (even as you read this description here) and realize without these Pre-Socratic philosophers there would be no sophisticated Roman Empire with its idea of Natural Law, no Renaissance, no Enlightenment, and no Scientific Age in the West!!! Prepare for your mind to be blown…but in a “good” way!
This lecture will be posted on the Dr. James Rietveld Salon Lecture You Tube channel, where you can also watch previous lectures: dr.jamesrietveldsalonlectu2903
Dr. James Rietveld is a professor at CSU, Fullerton and Cal Poly Pomona, CA of History, Anthropology, Religion with a PHD from Claremont School of Religion, is author of two books, and can be seen on History channel's "Crazy Rich Ancients."
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Ipso Facto, 517 North Harbor Boulevard, Fullerton, United States
USD 0.00
