— ParmenidesFragment B3 (Diels-Kranz numbering), preserved in Clement and Plotinus; approximate English rendering
Commentary
This fragment is among the most discussed sentences in Presocratic philosophy, and its interpretation has divided commentators for over a century. G. S. Kirk, J. E. Raven, and M. Schofield, in The Presocratic Philosophers, read the claim as an identity between thought and its object, so that whatever can be thought must be, and whatever is must be thinkable. Alexander Mourelatos, in The Route of Parmenides (1970), argues that the fragment should be read in the context of the poem's argument about the one way of inquiry, and that it supports a conception of thought as directed only at what is. Jonathan Barnes, in his commentary on the Presocratics, has cautioned that the Greek verb einai admits several senses, so that the identity may be existential, predicative, or both, and that the fragment's force depends on which reading is adopted. Patricia Curd, in The Legacy of Parmenides (1998), emphasises the role of this claim in the Eleatic argument against the possibility of thinking what is not. The wording given here is an approximate English rendering and should be checked against the Greek text in Diels-Kranz or Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, since the translations of the verb differ considerably.
Commentary
This fragment is among the most discussed sentences in Presocratic philosophy, and its interpretation has divided commentators for over a century. G. S. Kirk, J. E. Raven, and M. Schofield, in The Presocratic Philosophers, read the claim as an identity between thought and its object, so that whatever can be thought must be, and whatever is must be thinkable. Alexander Mourelatos, in The Route of Parmenides (1970), argues that the fragment should be read in the context of the poem's argument about the one way of inquiry, and that it supports a conception of thought as directed only at what is. Jonathan Barnes, in his commentary on the Presocratics, has cautioned that the Greek verb einai admits several senses, so that the identity may be existential, predicative, or both, and that the fragment's force depends on which reading is adopted. Patricia Curd, in The Legacy of Parmenides (1998), emphasises the role of this claim in the Eleatic argument against the possibility of thinking what is not. The wording given here is an approximate English rendering and should be checked against the Greek text in Diels-Kranz or Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, since the translations of the verb differ considerably.