Heraclitus

Heraclitus tries to highlight the power and the meaning that is active though invisible in the massive spectacle of the real world. The current paper does not attempt to criticize the modern scholars who have embarked on the Heraclitus theories, but it is trying to highlight the difficulties that most scholars will be ready to admit on the Heraclitus theories. The Heraclitus’ theories on change have resulted to some interesting philosophical concerns. Among several theories by Heraclitus, there is the concept of Logos. The current paper tends to disagree with hypothesis that the concept of Heraclitus’ Logos can be describes as a mere theory. Such approach is quite technical and does not indicate most of the Heraclitus’ philosophical remarks.

Historically, Heraclitus is not the one who was the first to deal with challenge of constancy and change. To the contrary, he just borrowed ideas from the earlier philosophers, though his laborious study on change and its behavior indicated a massive influence on the philosophers who came after him. One of the examples of the earlier influences on Heraclitus is aspect of the cosmos as a state of the constant struggle between elementary opposites that may be traced from Anaximander. Unlike Anaximander, Heraclitus found this concept to be the right state of events that should be adopted as a status quo. Nevertheless, this tension is pivotal to the world order (Melchert).

According to Graham, Heraclitus’ syntactic ambiguity tends to be intentional. However, according to this paper, Heraclitus’ application of styles is seen to be more suggestive and tends to call upon the readers to think about the meaning by themselves. In such sense, the Heraclitus styles have significant philosophical features that may not be separated from his philosophical aspects. The modern commentaries on the work of Heraclitus give a sense of quintessential role where majority of them attributes to the logos of interpretation of the remaining sections. Though it is not clear how far the fragments have been transformed over the centuries, it is a fact that Heraclitus provided special sense to the logos and applied it in a special manner. Logos may be described as a story, word, mathematical ratio, reasonable proportion and right reckoning (Schofield).

According to Heraclitus, people are supposed to pursue the right form of reasoning, whereby the outcome of reason would bring about the universal rules governing the world. He strongly believes that if people fail to use their rationality efficiently and effectively, the outcomes of their queries would not be universal. Although the logos is universal, there are many people who live as if they had their private source of understanding. According to Heraclitus, the assumption that logos is not universal is a grievous misunderstanding. He argues that there is minimal attainment through dependence on these private opinions which lead people astray. Logos is the genuine mean of reasoning, which would reveal the actual structure of the cosmos. The mean of reasoning, according to Heraclitus, should be universal. The concept of reasoning and its outcomes should not vary from one individual to the other, but should reveal the universal rule that is the root of all things. Heraclitus advocated for this idea, that the same way the reasoning is universal to all people, so should be the outcomes from understanding of how the world functions. Heraclitus does not coerce people to adopt his cosmos idea (Schofield).

According to Hen Patna concept, when a person listens to the logos, it would be wise for them to accept that all things are universal. Therefore, logos is as well the discourse of the Heraclitus ideas, languages, structure of the psyche and the common principle governing all things. In the current work the most significant aspect of the Logos is the one that illustrates the logos as universal rule, by which things happen universally. Thus, logos may be described as the rule that governs the constant transformation.

It is clear that Heraclitus tried to close the gap between the concept of pluralism and monism in his work, a concept that was also held by Plato. To deal with difficulties that are in the effort of bridging the gap between pluralism and monism, Kirk argues that people should emphasize the synthetic view to the world. The Kirk’s argument contrasts the conventional analytic reasoning. This is because the synthetic perspective shows the fundamental unity. The Heraclitus philosophy tends to be incomprehensible to an individual if he or she fails to keep in mind the idea that every change in the world resulted from the elementary opposing forces.

Whatever the perspective is given to the Heraclitus’ concept of transformation, there is not a single concept attributed to Heraclitus or identified with him. Despite his openness to various sensible cosmos, Heraclitus believed that there was a unity that must have been attained to bind the ceaseless transformation. The harmonious structure is recognizable to all human reasonings and can be expressed in words, though they are enigmatic to the human senses that all things are universal (Heraclitus).

In his theory Heraclitus sought to enunciate the philosophical perspective regarding the world. To attain this perspective he had to speak of the invisible for the theory of cosmos to be apparent to the human who have the ability to hear, see and think independently. From the concept of cosmos, according to Heraclitus, needed to be illustrated with paradox and imagery so as to incite people to agree with his school of thought that is outlined to them in the resounding insinuation of his words (Melchert).

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