HeraclitusHeraclitus (ˌhɛrəˈklaɪtəs; Ἡράκλειτος ; 500 BC) was an ancient Greek pre-Socratic philosopher from the city of Ephesus, which was then part of the Persian Empire. Little is known of Heraclitus's life. He wrote a single work, only fragments of which have survived. Most of the ancient stories about him are thought to be later fabrications based on interpretations of the preserved fragments. His paradoxical philosophy and appreciation for wordplay and cryptic, oracular epigrams has earned him the epithets "the dark" and "the obscure" since antiquity.
ProclusProclus Lycius (ˈprɒkləs_laɪˈsiəs; 8 February 412 – 17 April 485), called Proclus the Successor (Πρόκλος ὁ Διάδοχος, Próklos ho Diádokhos), was a Greek Neoplatonist philosopher, one of the last major classical philosophers of late antiquity. He set forth one of the most elaborate and fully developed systems of Neoplatonism and, through later interpreters and translators, exerted an influence on Byzantine philosophy, Early Islamic philosophy, and Scholastic philosophy.
BoethiusAnicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, commonly known as Boethius (boʊˈiːθiəs; Latin: Boetius; 480–524 AD), was a Roman senator, consul, magister officiorum, historian, and philosopher of the Early Middle Ages. He was a central figure in the translation of the Greek classics into Latin, a precursor to the Scholastic movement, and, along with Cassiodorus, one of the two leading Christian scholars of the 6th century. The local cult of Boethius in the Diocese of Pavia was sanctioned by the Sacred Congregation of Rites in 1883, confirming the diocese's custom of honouring him on the 23 October.
IamblichusIamblichus (aɪˈæmblɪkəs ; Iámblichos; Yamlīḵū; 245-325) was a Syrian neoplatonic philosopher of Arabic origin. He determined a direction later taken by neoplatonism. Iamblichus was also the biographer of the Greek mystic, philosopher, and mathematician Pythagoras. In addition to his philosophical contributions, his Protrepticus is important for the study of the sophists because it preserved about ten pages of an otherwise-unknown sophist known as the Anonymus Iamblichi.
Alfred North WhiteheadAlfred North Whitehead (15 February 1861 – 30 December 1947) was an English mathematician and philosopher. He created the philosophical school known as process philosophy, which has been applied in a wide variety of disciplines, including ecology, theology, education, physics, biology, economics, and psychology. In his early career Whitehead wrote primarily on mathematics, logic, and physics. He wrote the three-volume Principia Mathematica (1910–1913), with his former student Bertrand Russell.
LogicismIn the philosophy of mathematics, logicism is a programme comprising one or more of the theses that — for some coherent meaning of 'logic' — mathematics is an extension of logic, some or all of mathematics is reducible to logic, or some or all of mathematics may be modelled in logic. Bertrand Russell and Alfred North Whitehead championed this programme, initiated by Gottlob Frege and subsequently developed by Richard Dedekind and Giuseppe Peano.
Athenagoras of AthensAthenagoras (ˌæθəˈnægərəs; Ἀθηναγόρας ὁ Ἀθηναῖος; c. 133 – c. 190 AD) was a Father of the Church, an Ante-Nicene Christian apologist who lived during the second half of the 2nd century of whom little is known for certain, besides that he was Athenian (though possibly not originally from Athens), a philosopher, and a convert to Christianity. Athenagoras' feast day is observed on 24 July in the Eastern Orthodox Church. In his writings he styles himself as "Athenagoras, the Athenian, Philosopher, and Christian".
Sophia (wisdom)Sophia (σοφία sophía "wisdom") is a central idea in Hellenistic philosophy and religion, Platonism, Gnosticism and Christian theology. Originally carrying a meaning of "cleverness, skill", the later meaning of the term, close to the meaning of Phronesis ("wisdom, intelligence"), was significantly shaped by the term philosophy ("love of wisdom") as used by Plato. In the Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church, the feminine personification of divine wisdom as Holy Wisdom (Ἁγία Σοφία Hagía Sophía) can refer either to Jesus Christ the Word of God (as in the dedication of the church of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople) or to the Holy Spirit.
Peripatetic schoolThe Peripatetic school was a philosophical school founded in 335 BC by Aristotle in the Lyceum in Ancient Athens. It was an informal institution whose members conducted philosophical and scientific inquiries. After the middle of the 3rd century BC, the school fell into decline, and it was not until the Roman Empire that there was a revival. The term peripatetic is a transliteration of the ancient Greek word περιπατητικός (peripatētikós), which means "of walking" or "given to walking about".
TheophrastusTheophrastus (ˌθiː.əˈfræstəs; ; 371 - 287 BC) was a Greek philosopher and the successor to Aristotle in the Peripatetic school. He was a native of Eresos in Lesbos. His given name was Τύρταμος (); his nickname Θεόφραστος () was given by Aristotle, his teacher, for his "divine style of expression". He came to Athens at a young age and initially studied in Plato's school. After Plato's death, he attached himself to Aristotle who took to Theophrastus in his writings. When Aristotle fled Athens, Theophrastus took over as head of the Lyceum.
