Hi, I ordered a book for my online course and receive the WRONG book! I am waiting for the new book but my teacher assigned some questions. One question is "1.Compare and contrast the metaphysics of the three Milesians. Whose metaphysics seems most plausible to you, and why?"

Can someone tell me the names of the three Milesians? I googled but I cannot find any site that specifically states 'the three Milesians are'.

If I get the names then I'd be able to read up on their metaphysics.

This might help: Milesian school - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milesian_school)

Sometimes looking at things differently produces the required results..

Hi, I ordered a book for my online course and receive the WRONG book! I am waiting for the new book but my teacher assigned some questions. One question is "1.Compare and contrast the metaphysics of the three Milesians. Whose metaphysics seems most plausible to you, and why?"

Can someone tell me the names of the three Milesians? I googled but I cannot find any site that specifics states 'the three Milesians are'.

If I get the names then I'd be able to read up on their metaphysics.


My advice would be to be a bit careful with this question if you are starting in philosophy. When you read up on it don't get into a way of thinking that Milesians were doing science as we understand it today. They were still doing metaphysics. It is true they developed a crude scientific explanation in terms of earth, fire, air and water. They also asked the question as to whether these were the fundamental elements of the universe. They also put forward the possibility that something else could account for the elements and the events of nature.

It may be useful to look at them in terms of 'pluralism' and 'monism'. Pluralists hold that there is more than one feature of the universe which accounts for scientific knowledge. Monists hold there is only one basic feature of the universe. It is important to realize that the questions of the early metaphysicians arose after the physical problems had been considered. The are doing metaphysics because they wanted to interpret the physical theories in non-physical terms.

Hope this helps

Regards Tut