ὦ Σοφιστής

On a lark (?), I've decided to offer those of you playing along at home a glimpse of what goes on in my Ancient Philosophy class. Now, keep in mind that we just finished up with a group of thinkers called Sophists, considered by many (like Plato, for example), to be something like philosophers gone bad. Despite that characterization, these folks made some entertaining arguments. Among my favorites is a series of arguments by a man named Gorgias which supposedly show that 1) Nothing exists; 2) even if something did exist we could not know or think of it; and 3) that even if we could know or think of what exists, we could not talk about it. For my students' sake, I attempted to write up a formal proof of the arguments--if you have a minute, and feel like some fun, please click here and enjoy. I cannot find an online text of the actual fragment, but it's a good deal of fun . . .

on a totally unrelated note, just for the record, my prediction for today's game is--oh yes--KU 83, Texas 68