Impact of the Ancient Greek Philosophers on Modern Thought

Impact of the Ancient Greek Philosophers on Modern Thought

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Impact of the Ancient Greek Philosophers on Modern Thought

Introduction

It has been over thousands of years since the Greek culture emerged, and many rushed to regard it as the cradle of modern civilization. The reason behind that is the fact that democracy, jury trials, and law procedures have first experimented in Greek. Greeks did not only influence the Western civilization as one of the important derive features, but ancient thinkers from Greek provide the basis for many fields of study relating to the intellectual foundation. Ancient Greeks were the pioneers of many subjects and formulas that we often take for granted, whether physics, linguistic, mathematics, geography, biology, to mention a few. The ancient Greek thinkers did not stop their discovering and innovation as they introduced art performance, music, and architectural design. Most of the plans that modern society use in their race to create value and beauty of structures and other things originated from the ancient Grecians. In other words, the contemporary world is more of an ancient Grecian than what many ought to think. Their complicated development of scientific culture and philosophies meant that they championed the impartial idea and insisted on logic as the natural world rational observation. The essay expounds on the contribution of the ancient Greeks to modern thought.

Democracy

Democracy is defined as the people’s government in which people are with supreme authority and directly or indirectly exercise power through a representation system, which involves typically free voting held after some time. The world’s first democracy came from the ancient Greeks. The city of Athens kick-started with the monarchical government preceded to oligarchy and eventually adopted democracy. The assembly members who formed the democratic government were 6000, and they were all grown up males citizens. They were all responsible for voting concerning different issues throughout Athens. Also, to what the modern society concept, they also used the vote of the majority to pass or amend laws. However, exiling individuals required a unanimous decision from all the 6000 members of the assembly (Held, 2006). For instance, the United States uses the democratic system of government where their democracy is indirect. In other words, American citizens have their democracy representatives in which they exercise their voting rights democratically with regards to the country’s decision-makers. The critical analysis on the same shows a simple modification of the American democracy to that of ancient Greece since their government system allowed citizens to vote on various decision-making processes as opposed to electing some individuals to make the decision.

The Alphabet

The Greek alphabet was derived from the Phoenician alphabet, which in the western understanding of the word emerged as the first alphabet. The consonants and vowels featured some distinctive letters. The Greek alphabet consisted of a total of 24 letters and was developed in the wake of Dark Ages. The order of the letters was from alpha to omega. The first two Greek letters (alpha and beta) form the word alphabet. The Greek alphabets gave rise to our modern alphabet, such as A, B, E, and O (Poletti, 2002). The ancient Greeks held the formation of every single letter. However, the upper-case and the lower-case letter versions were created later.

The Library

According Shubert, (1993) the library of Alexandria was the first library to have ever existed in the whole world. The library is based in Egypt. By then, Greeks were the ones controlling the whole of Egypt after submitting to the rule of Alexander. The Greek influence and way of life were spread by the Macedonians, who influenced the entirety of their conquered regions, including Egypt. The death of Alexander led to the shambling authority of the Egyptian Kingdom under the rule of Ptolemy, who was Alexander’s army general.

During his regime, Ptolemy was the sphere of influence behind the construction of the Alexandria library, speculated to hold over 700,000 different scrolls (Shubert, 1993). They set the rule that authorized the inspection of ships passing through Alexandrian harbor in search of any works relating to philosophy or even science. In the case where they could find any of the mentioned works, the librarians copied the work and returned the original manuscript to the ship captain. The accumulation of varied areas of knowledge held in the library encouraged and led to many and great discoveries. For instance, the circulation of Earth’s circumference was first done by Eratosthenes, who also happened to be the first in drawing up strategies for steam power. Since then, nations of the world have constructed many libraries that hold billions of pieces of literary works, the ideas that initially came from the Greeks in their construction of the Alexandria library.

The Olympic Games

The Olympic sports were held in the city of Olympia, in ancient Greece, for the first time in the world’s history. Ancient Greece, its colonies, and city-states were the participants of the Olympic events. These games, in honor of Zeus, were conducted every four years. Zeus was regarded as the king god. Fame and glory were the ultimate prizes for the event winners. At certain times, they erected the statues of individuals who emerged winners or their faces being put on coins. Olympic Games are celebrated even in today’s world, and some old traditions are still practiced, for example, the lighting of the flame, closing celebrations, opening celebrations, among others. Pythian Games were another type of game that took place in honoring Apollo, the god of the sun. Poseidon, the god of the sea, was honored through Isthmian Games.

Baron Pierre de Coubertin, through ancient Greece Olympics inspiration, came up with the idea of the Olympic Games. The ancient Greece Olympics dated between 8th century BCE and 4th century BCE. Coubertin viewed the sport as a way of bringing the entire world together, thus creating an International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 1984, intending to revive the Olympic sports, and it eventually led to the birth of the modern Olympic Games. During the summer of 1896, IOC held its first games (Chalkley & Essex, 1999). The event attracted a total of 14 countries, where 241 athletes participated in 43 different events. The interlocked rings with different colors are Baron Pierre de Coubertin designed symbol, which represents the five participating continents. The rings have a white background, with their coloring being yellow, black, green, and red. The continents were Oceania, Europe, America, Africa, and Asia. Besides, all participating countries were represented through flags of different colors they composed. The flame is one of the typical Olympic Games symbols. The Berlin Games held in 1936 where the origin of the torch relay and Olympic flame lighting before the beginning of the game. The idea got inspiration from ancient Greece. The fire symbolizes the start of the Olympic Games.

Mathematics and Science

The vast majority of famous scientists and all-time great mathematicians came from ancient Greece. Eratosthenes was the first mathematician to calculate the Earth’s circumference. He was able to calculate by comparing the mid-day sun altitudes at two separate locations. The calculation of the Earth’s axis was also inspired by him, which gave him the title of chief librarian of Alexandria library. A mathematician and astronomer by the name Aristarchus was the first person who comes up with the theory that placed the sun at the center of the universe with Earth moving around the sun (Dossey,1992). Aristarchus managed to put the other planets rightfully concerning how they exist in the solar system. He considered the stars to be just like other heavenly bodies such as the sun.

Archimedes was an all-time ancient Greek mathematician of antiquity. He was able to calculate the area of geometric shapes such as circle and sphere, in addition to his anticipation of modern calculus and geometrical theorems (Paipetis & Ceccarelli, 2010). . He achieved excellent academic credentials as a result of accurately approximating the pi and his efficient and effective designing of levers and pulleys. Lastly, an astronomer by the Hipparchus is the greatest known antiquity astronomer. There are high chances that he was the first person to predict solar eclipse as he also developed the first theory that opposed the movement of the sun and moon around the axis.

Architecture

Column or pillar are modern examples of works inspired by Greek architecture. Parthenon is an example of the most famous Greek architecture. The structure is located in Athens, which is a grand building with pillars. In today’s’ world, many buildings use pillars; for example, public buildings such as libraries and conventional halls. What inspired the ancient Greek architecture is the fact that the majority, if not all, were extremely rooted in religion (Ching, Jarzombek & Prakash, 2017). Many structures constructed in Greece were created by that architecture, with their minds only thinking about gods. The two great examples of Greek structures are Erechtheum and Parthenon. Synergy, precision, donation, and adornment are some of the Greek designs’ patterns. Each model was attributed to applaud one another concerning Greek architectural characteristics. Many modern buildings mimic the Greek style, in which the tales and specific gods inspired their design structures. The irony of the story is the fact that modern buildings are secular government centers. Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian are the three styles of classical Greek architecture.

The Lighthouse

Just like the Alexandria library, the first-ever lighthouse to exist in the entire universe was based at Alexandria, Egypt, which by then was a Greek protectorate. The Statue Liberty was shorter than that structured they often regarded as Lighthouse of Alexandria, which claimed the second position among the tallest buildings, coming as runners up to the Great Pyramid of Giza (Behrens-Abouseif, 2006). It comprised of three layers, where the first layer was at the base was square-shaped, the second layer had an octagonal midsection, and the last segment was around beacon on the top. The lighthouse could be sported from far at night as it could be seen by fire, while during the day by smoke. Earthquakes later dismantled the lighthouse although it did give light to all the modern lighthouses. Many structures are advancing the old Greek designs to place those buildings on the map of the globe. Some modern buildings can be sported from space.

Standardized Medicine

Even though Babylon, China, Egypt, and India had all practiced medicine, the ancient Greeks were pioneers who created a systemized medical approach that involved medical ethics, diagnosis, and prognosis (Longrigg, 2013). . The modern world practice similar medicine systems to those of ancient Greeks. Hippocrates was one figure that instituted medicine advancements in the ancient Greek had he was regarded as the “father of medicine.” Hippocrates did not only play a significant role in coming up with theories and ethics, which guided many physicians but also contributed to the use and prescription of medicine. Hippocrates held that all sicknesses were as a result of some natural cause as opposed to them being punishments from the gods.

Hippocrates also contributed to the Hippocratic Oath, which is a sworn historical statement used by physicians. The physicians swear by mentioning the names of healing gods to certify specific ethical standards of the medical field. Medical confidentiality, together with non-maleficence, are examples of such principles. The principles apply even in the new field of medicine. Some medical graduates still use the Hippocratic Oath as a rite of passage. In the diagnosis of various medical conditions, Hippocrates was able to tell if the illnesses were either chronic, acute, endemic, or even epidemic (Miles, 2005). . He remains the first person in the field of medicine to categorized the above diseases. He first introduced some medical terms such as crisis, relapse, convalescence, among others. In matters relating to the treatment of broken bones or other ailments, Hippocrates provided some advanced therapies to the patients who were useful in speeding up recoveries while at the same time reducing pain. Some methods (cautery and excision) used by Hippocrates for the treatment of hemorrhoids are still used up to date in some cases.

The Theater

The most obvious contribution of ancient Greeks to the modern world is the creation of theatres in ancient times. “Theatron” is a Greek word that gave rise to the term “theatre,” which translates to outdoor arena sections where individuals being watch plays. The city of Athens was the first to construct a western theatre, which was similar to the majority of the ancient Greeks theatres (Carlson, 2018). . They were capable of holding 10,000 to 20,000 seated spectators. A Greek theatre, which was considered standard, had a dressing room, dancing floor, and the scene-building area. One of the most significant features was theatre acoustics that made it possible for the male actors to be heard in the whole theater by everyone within. The creation of theatre structure began in the 6th century BCE in ancient Greek. They were also the pioneers of the art industry, which employed actors from various entertainment fields.

References

Behrens-Abouseif, D. (2006). The Islamic history of the lighthouse of Alexandria. Muqarnas Online, 23(1), 1-14.

Carlson, M. A. (2018). Theories of the Theatre: A Historical and Critical Survey, from the Greeks to the Present. Cornell University Press.

Chalkley, B., & Essex, S. (1999). Urban development through hosting international events: a history of the Olympic Games. Planning perspectives, 14(4), 369-394.

Ching, F. D., Jarzombek, M. M., & Prakash, V. (2017). A global history of architecture. John Wiley & Sons.

Dossey, J. A. (1992). The nature of mathematics: Its role and its influence. Handbook of research on mathematics teaching and learning, 39, 48.

Held, D. (2006). Models of democracy. Stanford University Press.

Longrigg, J. (2013). Greek rational medicine: philosophy and medicine from Alcmaeon to the Alexandrians. Routledge.

Miles, S. H. (2005). The Hippocratic Oath and the ethics of medicine. Oxford University Press.

Paipetis, S. A., & Ceccarelli, M. (2010). The Genius of Archimedes–23 Centuries of Influence on Mathematics, Science and Engineering. Springer.

Poletti, F. (2002). Plato’s vowels: How the alphabet influenced the evolution of consciousness. World Futures: The Journal of General Evolution, 58(1), 101-116.

Shubert, S. B. (1993). The oriental origins of the Alexandrian library. Libri, 43(2), 142.