Practice question · Multiple choice
Why does Parmenides conclude that motion is impossible?
Hints
- Trace the argument back to the ban on what-is-not.
- Moving requires somewhere empty to move into, and emptiness is precisely what-is-not.
Show the answer
D. Motion requires empty space to move into, and empty space would be what-is-not
Why
Motion needs somewhere empty to move into, and emptiness is what-is-not, which cannot be. The unreliability of the senses is a separate strand, the argument against motion is purely a priori.
Practise Parmenides
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More questions on Parmenides
- Parmenides insists that what is not cannot even be an object of thought. What follows from taking this…
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- 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.