Practice question · Multiple choice
Parmenides insists that what is not cannot even be an object of thought. What follows from taking this constraint strictly when examining the apparent diversity of the physical world?
Hints
- What would have to sit between two distinct objects to keep them separate?
- Does Parmenides treat sensory evidence as flawed data to be corrected, or as a fundamental illusion?
Show the answer
C. Plurality is impossible because boundaries require non-being
Why
Confusing the unreliability of perception with physical non-existence misreads the two ways; Parmenides denies the reality of division itself rather than offering an empirical fix. Admitting void concedes what-is-not, which later atomists embraced precisely to rescue motion.
Practise Parmenides
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More questions on Parmenides
- Why does Parmenides conclude that motion is impossible?
- Parmenides holds that where reason and the senses conflict, the senses should be trusted.
- Which responses to Parmenides did later Greek thinkers actually make?
- Arrange the steps of Parmenides’ central argument in order.
- Sort each claim by whether Parmenides assigns it to the Way of Truth or the Way of Opinion.