Who was Gorgias?

Gorgias was another celebrated Sophist, who was most popular for his work Encomium of Helen. Gorgias argues that no truth exists, and if a truth does exist we cannot know it, and even if we know it we cannot communicate it.

In his life, Gorgias was an Italian nomad, traveling to share his philosophical knowledge. He is remembered for being almost magical and poetic in sound. As a Sophist, we know that he did this purposefully for it’s manipulative effects on a crowd. Gorgias emphasized throughout his lifetime the important of diction, assonance, alliteration and delivery of language. He believed language could be used to support his purpose as an arguer.

Gorgias also emphasized the importance of ethos, pathos and logos. Although he believed that there was no truth in this world or even gods in the heavens, he believed that provisional knowledge should be shared and understood. He emphasizes the importance of this by tying it back to language, insinuating that as humans our experiences are limited because of who we are. Provisional knowledge is the only knowledge we can attain, therefore, people have the power to shape our own beliefs and ideas through provisional knowledge.

Sources

Herzberg, Bruce, and Patricia Bizzel. The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical times to the Present. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2001. Print.

Pecorino, Philip A. "Chapter 2: The Greeks." Introduction to Philopsophy. Queensboro: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License, 2000. N. pag. Print.