From the Beginning to Plato

FROM THE BEGINNING TO PLATO 151
4 The fragments of Parmenides have been edited many times. DK is the standard
edition for reference purposes; the most reliable and informed recent edition, on
matters of Greek linguistic usage and of textual history, is that of Coxon [4.8],
which also gives much the fullest collection of secondary ancient evidence. Among
minor sources are some other Neoplatonists (Plotinus, Iamblichus, Proclus), and
Sextus Empiricus the Sceptic.
5 The scholarly literature is extensive. A small selection is given in the bibliography;
the monograph of Mourelatos [4.24] can be particularly recommended for clarity,
fullness of information and breadth of approach. The footnotes below offer very
brief indications of the spread of opinion on cardinal points; they do not try to
outline the arguments needed to justify the reading given in the text.
6 On Xenophanes and his relevance here, Hussey [2.35], 17–32.
7 On the ‘opinions of mortals’ see below pp. 147–9.
8 On alētheiē and related words in early Greek, scholarly discussion has been too
often darkened by philosophical prejudice. See the useful study of Heitsch [4.29];
also Mourelatos [4.24], 63–7 and references there.
Alētheiē in Parmenides is taken as ‘reality’ by Verdenius [4.30], Mourelatos [4.
24], 63–7, Coxon [4.8], 168. Others understand it as ‘truth’ or ‘manifest or
necessary truth’.
9 So Verdenius [4.30]. Allied to this view are those who take the intended subject to
be ‘what is’ in the sense of ‘what is the case’ (e.g. Mourelatos [4.24]). Other
leading candidates for the role of subject of discourse: ‘that which is’ (so e.g.
Cornford [4.19], Verdenius [4.27], Hölscher [4.22], O’Brien [4.12]); ‘what can be
spoken and thought of (Owen [4.46]), ‘whatever may be the object of enquiry’
(Barnes [2.8]). That a wholly indefinite subject (‘something’) or no specific subject
at all is intended, at least initially, is suggested in different ways by e.g. Calogero
[4.18], Coxon [4.8].
10 On the verb einai ‘be’ in early Greek, see items [4.31] to [4.34] in the Bibliography.
The entirely straightforward Homeric usage (‘X is’—‘there is such a thing as X’) is
the obvious first hypothesis for the esti and ouk esti paths. Some, though, have put
the so-called ‘veridical’ uses (‘be’=‘be true’ or ‘be’=‘be so’, ‘be the case’) in the
forefront (e.g. Jantzen [4.23], Kahn [4.42]); others make the use of einai in
predication central (e.g. Mourelatos [4.24]); yet others (Calogero [4.18], Furth [4.
41]) have suggested that in Parmenides this verb is a ‘fusion’ of two or more of the
normal uses.
11 In fact premiss (2), even without (1) and (3), gives a reason to reject the way that
says ‘it is not’. For this way says, about reality generally, that it doesn’t exist or
obtain. So by its own account it can’t state any truth, since truth presupposes reality.
But there is nothing to show that Parmenides took this short cut.
12 Plato Theaetetus 188c9–189b6, Sophist 237b7-e7. On the versions of this argument
in Plato, see e.g. items [4.49] to [4.51] in the Bibliography.
13 It is true that in places the words ‘say’ (legein, phasthai), ‘think’ (noein) and their
derivatives are used in ways that seem inconsistent with principle (7). (a) The
goddess describes (at least) two ways as those ‘which alone are to be thought’ (B 2.
2), including (at least) one false one. (b) She warns Parmenides against a false way:
‘fence off your thought from this way of enquiry’ (B 7.2), as though it were
possible to think its falsities, (c) She speaks of ‘[my] trusty account (“saying”) and
thought about reality’ (B 8.50–1), as though it were possible to have un-trusty