Anaximenes of Miletus
The Ionian philosopher’s account of ‘air’ as the first principle
About
Anaximenes of Miletus was a student of Anaximander who lived during the 6th century BC. He is believed to be one of the earliest physicists. Of the three Milesian philosophers, Anaximenes was the last (preceded by Thales and Anaximander; Miletus was destroyed by the Persians in 494 BC). It is believed that he is the first philosopher to write in prosaic form (and not in verse). As is the case with the other early Greek thinkers, very little of his original writing has survived and what we know of him is through other philosophers or historians.
Air as the first principle
Continuing with the pre-Socratic attempt of answering the question of origin and first principle of the universe, he presented air as the arche. Upon conjecture, we might think that he thought this because breathing is observably essential for life. Additionally, air is always in motion, and since they equated motion with change, this could be one of the reasons why he chose air as the arche. This air, however, is not the regular atmospheric air that we know to be one of the five elements. It is, instead, cosmic air, of which all matter (including the atmospheric air) is a product. The diversity of matter can be explained through the two processes of condensation (cooling) and rarefaction (heating) of air.
This seems to be, in one sense, in opposition to Anaximander’s indeterminate notion of arche, and return to Thales’ conception of arche as a determinate element. But like Anaximander’s apeiron, Anaximenes believed this cosmic air to be spatially infinite and perpetually in motion (and, he believed that the world was always in flux; this is believed to have influenced Heraclitus). But unlike apeiron, cosmic air was claimed to be determinate. This air had the characteristic of density, but did not have any specific density in its primordial form. Specific density makes for particular objects. (In an order of increasing condensation and decreasing rarefaction, here is the sequence: fire —(secondary) air — wind — cloud — water — earth — stones).
As an arche, air provided a very simple understanding of reality as it invoked just one element, air, and one principle, density (through the two process of condensation or manosis and rarefaction or pukosis) to explain all change. That is the brilliance of this explanation — it is simplistic yet all pervading.
Anaximenes believed that the Gods were generated by air, rather than believing that air was created by Gods.
The following quotation is perhaps the only surviving one that can be attributed to Anaximenes (with some certainty):
“Just as our soul … being air holds us together, so pneuma and air encompass [and guard] the whole world.”
The cosmic air can be understood in two senses:
- Pneuma, or the life breath/soul
- Thumos/Thymos, or the desire to do the right thing
He believed that Earth (and the other celestial bodies) must be perfectly flat for it to be stable and float on air. It, and everything else, rests on and in the spatially infinite cosmic air.
Endnote
Most of the early Greek philosophers were not only philosophers. Thales was a mathematician and Anaximander was a cartographer. And Anaximenes was a cosmologist. (He might have been the first person to differentiate between planets and stars). And because of his contributions to cosmology, a crater on Moon has been named after him.
In terms of his philosophical thought, unlike most of the other Greek pre-Socratic thinkers, Anaximenes did not invoke the principle of justice in his philosophy. He also abandoned the abstract notion of the ‘play of opposites’ that was adopted by philosophers like Anaximander and Heraclitus. Thus, even in a span of a century, there were contrasting accounts of existence and reality.
https://academic-accelerator.com/encyclopedia/anaximenes-of-miletus
