A re-examination of the nature of the atheism and its historical development in the presocratics

2018 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 15K02076
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: History of thought
• Research Institution: Kanazawa University
• Principal Investigator: MIURA Kaname 金沢大学, 人間科学系, 教授 (20222317)
• Project Period (FY): 2015-04-01 – 2019-03-31
• Keywords: ソクラテス以前哲学 / 無神論

Outline of Final Research Achievements

It is often said that the presocratic philosophers reduced gods from personal beings to abstract principles through demythologization, which is not the case. Their natural principles still acted as a purposive and personal agency in the cosmological processes and such reduction had not been realized yet. As such, they are not super-natural nor non-natural but rather “intra-natural” deities ruling autonomously the world processes from inside the world. The divine intra-natural principles, not having a divine property of anthropomorphism any longer, retain the immortality and power which deserve religious faith and feeling.

Free Research Field

哲学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

要素的物質を「始源」とし神話的自然観に基づく神人同形論を否定するソクラテス以前哲学者の自然学説──それは自然の理性的探究から得られた世界についての彼らの新しい見解である──は，一般に，神話的・国家宗教的神論と根本的に異なる革新的神論（つまり自然神論）につながっていった，とみるのがオーソドックスな解釈だが，これに異を唱え，この解釈が彼らの異端的無神論の本質を捉えそこなったものであり，合理性と神秘性のはざまにおいて成立しているソクラテス以前哲学者の自然哲学とその宗教的心性を明らかする試みである。