Mind Over Mixture - Anaxagoras

-Anaxagoras (c. 510-428 BC) is the most notable philosopher from Athens until Socrates; kicked off its reputation and tradition of being the intellectual capital of Ancient Greece.
   -However, Anaxagoras himself was from Klazomenai, Ionia (near modern-day Izmir, Turkey), so he must have relocated to Athens at some point.
   -Became an associate of the Athenian statesman Pericles, who would lead the Delian League against the Peloponnesian League in the Peloponnesian War, as well as building up Athen's power after its wars with Persia.
   -Anaxagoras, like Socrates, was also persecuted for not being religious enough, but instead of being executed he just fled the city instead.
-A major component of his philosophy was mind/reason ("nous") as what gives order to the universe.
   -However, it's more complicated than that, as reason only accounts for living things.  Therefore, it's not exactly "intelligent design";  it's more like an explanation for the abilities of living things.
      -For example, humans have lots of nous, but rocks have none.
-The other major component is universal mixture.
   -Before the cosmos was formed there was nothing but mind and another infinite substance in which all other things were mixed together.  However, in this other substance there were things called "seeds", which were the beginnings of later distinctive substances like air or water.  Only nous stands outside of this mixture.  It remains unmixed so it can control everything.
      -The nous then initiated a cosmic rotation in which the infinite mixture starts to spin around.  As it rotates, the seeds of lighter stuff goes out toward the edges and becomes the air and fire of the heavens, and the seeds of moisture and density stay in the middle.  At some point, some of the solids fly out of the center and form the sun and moon, burning white with heat.
         -We kind of saw stuff involving density earlier with Anaximenes, and the concept of nous is similar to what Xenophanes was saying about a supreme being or god that is ultimately alien to us with its infinite power.
             -However, Anaxagoras also adds to this stuff with his own idea- that even tho the stuff is separated out in the rotation, nothing (except for mind) is ever completely separated!  Instead, "everything is in everything."
               -For example, the ocean may appear to just be made of water, but it also has maybe a bit of air and fire in it as well.  In fact, all things contain all other kinds of things!
   -According to what Aristotle wrote about Anaxagoras, it's possible that he (Anaxagoras) also agreed with Parmenides that "nothingness" was impossible because something can't come from nothing, but also agreed with the atomists that things CAN change and move, which Parmenides believed was impossible.
      -Anaxagoras differed from the atomists by saying that absolute change is not required because everything is ALREADY everything else.
         -If you eat some food, that food replenishes your body.  Therefore, your body must have a part of itself in that food!
         -No matter how small you divide something, even to infinity, it will still contain the ingredients for all other things.  Nothing is completely pure.
-So, if everything is everything, then why doesn't everything look the same, or similar?
   -According to Anaxagoras, this is because everything is in everything else at different proportions. 
      -These proportions come from how the seeds were divided up in the rotation, as the seeds were the only original pure things.
   -It's possible also that this seems weird because we have an incomplete picture of his philosophy.
      -However, he's kind of right in a way about the seeds and ingredients of things, because this is a really primitive explanation of the periodic table!
-Mixture was a real problem for early philosophers.
   -Atomists believed (rightly so) that mixture was a complicated process of a mixing (or non-mixture/partial mixture) of atoms, but Anaxagoras believed that it was possible for 2 things to mix together completely, including a drop of wine in the entire ocean!  According to Anaxagoras, once you drop a bit of wine in it, even just a tiny bit, it will mix with the rest of the ocean.