Heraclitus Unity

In this essay I hope to illustrate two key themes in relation to the work of Heraclitus; that in sameness and difference is a notion of unity and that such unity can be identified by Heraclitus’ notion of flux and his understanding of there being a harmonic unity of opposites.

The view that everything is always changing has been attributed to Heraclitus due to a fragment in Plato’s Cratylus claiming that ‘Heraclitus said that everything is in a stage of change and nothing stays stable, and likening things to the flow of a river he says that you could not step twice into the same river’. In this regard, Plato’s interpretation of Heraclitus’ river example distinguishes the view I think Heraclitus thought most important to convey; that reality

Heraclitus thought all things in the world order united by a quantity of fire, implying it to be the main constituent on which everything is based. With this in mind, the supposition that once cannot step into the same river twice is justified by the notion of qualitative understanding, but more so the Logos on which Heraclitus’ philosophy is based. The modern definition of a river is a body of water with copious flow; the water must always be moving, thus distinguishing it from that of a lake or puddle. So, if a person steps into a river at point A, entering the same waters an hour later at the same position will enable one to determine the results as ‘different’ on the grounds that the waters have altered– e.g. they might have become murky. In this regard, said ‘difference’ suffices to say that rivers

Having argued that it is impossible to step into the same river twice comes the understanding that numerically, the river in question has not multiplied nor ceased to exist and so it can be argued that it is indeed the ‘same’ river and so can be entered twice. For example, we do not constantly rename rivers on the ground that they are no longer the same concept previously understood. The Thames has been identified one and the same numerically for decades, yet, if we are unable to step into the same river twice, then the name of this geographical feature would be in need of change for every instance it alters. The same can be said for people. We are constantly changing, we adapt new habits and are influenced by the surroundings in which we are placed, but we remain with the same with our individuality exempt from influence. Therefore, it could be argued that the same can be said for Heraclitus’ river example. By definition, change is a necessary element of a river, but this does not dictate that in changing its ceases to exist or is replaced by something else, just as we might bear little resemble to ourselves as a child physically or mentally does not determine that we are not the same