Thales

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Thales is the father of ancient Greek philosophy insofar as he was the first that raised the point that a material substance explains all the natural phenomena. He was born about 624 BCE in Miletus and he considered the founder of the Ionian School, also called the Milesian school. Thales was an avid traveler as Hieronymus of Rhodes indicates in his report that Thales measured the pyramids by their shadow, having observed the time when our shadow is equal to our height. For the ancient Greek Sages of the sixth-century (for example Solon, see Timaeus) it was a custom to visit Egypt and studding the traditional fountain-head. Proclus, in Euclidem, mentions that "Thales left Egypt and went to Greece to further his study of geometry"(1). Thales was regarded as one of the "Seven Sages" of ancient Greece. He died at an old age when watching athletic matches due to heat exhaustion. The inscription on his tomb is: Here in a narrow tomb great Thales lies; Yet his renown for wisdom reached the skies.(1)

[The Water As The First Principle]
Thales was the first Greek philosopher to speculate about the primary material element of all beings and cosmic phenomena, which he identified as water. The importance of water in life and nature was probably the principal reason that made Thales came to this conclusion. In Orphic mythology and cosmogony we find Water and Earth as one of the first cosmic elements of the Cosmos creation. Damascius in "de principiis" notes that "The Orphic Theology which is said to be according to Hieronymus and Hellanicus (if indeed he is not the same man) is as follows: water existed from the beginning, and is the matter from which earth was solidified."(1) Water, Air, Fire or any other principle was for the Presocratics the root of life, soul and generally the power of the living nature. This power the ancient Greeks called Fiesthe....