Philosopher Profiles

Zeno was a Pre-Socratic and, as Socrates discovered philosophy, this meant he couldn't actually do proper philosophy. So instead he spent most of his life thinking of ways to reword the same paradox.

Zeno's famous paradox (and its many rewordings) tries to show that change is not possible — I suppose you have to give him credit for being original (although it was much easier back when philosophy hadn't been discovered yet). His argument goes as follows: imagine a tortoise and Achilles having a race; the tortoise is given a head start of a meter or two. But, argues Zeno, it is now impossible for Achilles to catch the tortoise because he's too busy fighting in the Trojan war to spare the time to race a bloody tortoise. Hence, nothing changes.

Zeno's theory was not popular with those people that believed in change (i.e. everyone in the whole world except Zeno). As a result Zeno gave up pre-philosophy and became the world's first living statue.

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