Empedocles

Empedocles of Akragas (c. 495-435 BC, according to the dates most often cited) was a Greek philosopher and politician from the Greek city of Sicily, usually placed among the pre-Socratic thinkers. He is considered one of the pluralists: against Parmenides, who denied change, he argued that reality is made of several principles. His theory of four elements (water, air, fire and earth) remained the standard account of matter for nearly two thousand years, which explains his lasting importance in the history of thought.

The dates of his life are uncertain. Diogenes Laertius, Aristotle and Apollodorus give different chronologies, and some scholars push his birth back to around 495 BC. He came from a wealthy aristocratic family in Akragas; his grandfather, also named Empedocles, was said to have won a horse race at Olympia. He grew up in a city that, under the tyrant Theron, reached the height of its power and fame. After the fall of Trasideus, Theron's son, he helped establish a democracy, dissolved an oligarchic body and refused the public offices offered to him. His many enemies took advantage of one of his absences to prevent his return. Later sources credit him with skill as an orator and physician, and with wonders such as healing illnesses or controlling the weather. Many modern scholars believe much of this material grew out of interpretations of his own poems.

Many works are attributed to him, but only two poems survive with confidence: On Nature and Purifications, both written in hexameter verse. The first offers a rational account of the natural world, from its physiology to the movement of bodies. The second, religious in tone, tells of a soul fallen from its divine home and of the purification needed to return. Empedocles saw no contradiction between the two, since both expressed the same concern. He used comparisons drawn from human craft, such as baking bread, alloying metals or painting a picture, to illustrate general laws.

His thought is a dialogue with Parmenides. He agreed that nothing comes from nothing and nothing is wholly destroyed, but rejected the idea that being is one and unmoving. He proposed four roots or elements that mix and separate under two forces: Love (Philotes), which unites, and Strife (Neikos), which divides. In an original state the elements were gathered into a sphere ruled by Love; the growing power of Strife produced the world we know, which in his view follows a cycle in which the sphere forms again. He also described the appearance of strange creatures that dissolved, while only well-fitted combinations survived. On the soul, he taught the transmigration of souls among humans, animals and plants, and recommended vegetarianism as a path to purification.

His death gave rise to legends. It was said that he threw himself into Mount Etna to pass for a god, though according to Diogenes Laertius the volcano threw back one of his bronze sandals. Timaeus, by contrast, held that he died in the Peloponnese, in exile from his city. His influence was considerable: Galen regarded him as the founder of the Sicilian school of medicine, Lucretius admired him as a model, and his theory of four elements remained the dominant doctrine for centuries. He is also one of the pre-Socratics whose work survives in greater quantity.