Roman and Greek Philosophy's Influence on Today's Western Culture

Advances in Art, science and politics were made in the eastern part of the Mediterranean Sea. Greek philosophers were among the first in the West to explore nature in a rational way and to make educated guesses about the creation of the world and the universe. This is why Greece is often referred to as the birthplace of Western culture.

The ancient Greeks viewed the world in a way that one would today perhaps describe as "holistic". Science, philosophy, art and politics were interwoven and combined into one worldview. Moreover, those who look carefully will find subtle, but intelligible parallels between early Greek philosophy and Eastern thought. The Heraclitean fire resembles Buddhist impermanence, while the Greek Logos resembles the way of the Tao, just to name two examples. More detailed portraits of Greek ideas and their contenders can be found on the following pages, so read on and find out more about them.

When Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 bc, that ended the strong Roman Republic. His adopted heir, calling himself Augustus Caesar, became first emperor. The Roman Empire would reach its greatest extent in 116 ad under the Emperor Trajan. As you can imagine, the best minds of Rome were absorbed into politics, war, and economics. Few had the luxury of abstract philosophizing. Besides which, the Greeks had done that already, and look how far it got them: Quite a number of Greek philosophers wound up as Roman slaves, tutoring the youth of Roman aristocracy! In this atmosphere, we find a powerful renewed interest, among the rich and poor alike, in religion. The old religion of Rome was given lip service, to be sure. But most saw the gods as little more than stories to scare naughty children . They were looking for ...

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... the nature of reality, and by cognitive optimism, a belief in the capacity of the human mind to attain the truth and to use this truth for the rational and virtuous ordering of human affairs. Plato believes that conflicting interests of different parts of society can be harmonized. The best, rational and righteous, political order, which he proposes, leads to a harmonious unity of society and allows each of its parts to flourish, but not at the expense of others. The theoretical design and practical implementation of such order, he argues, are impossible without virtue.

In my opinion ?the western political thought? is diverse in nature. Variety of differences is found in different school of thoughts. It?ll be convenient if we divide Western Political thought into three phases, i.e. Classical Political Theory, Modern Political Theory and Contemporary Political views.