The origins of Greek thought

When Aristotle defines man as a "political animal," he emphasizes what separates Greek Reason in his time from that of today. If homo sapiens is, in his eyes, a homo politicus, this is because Reason itself, at its core, is political. In *The Origins of Greek Thought*, we learn how, although tied to myth, Reason not only detached itself from it but also transcended it, thereby achieving the constitution of what we know as Philosophy. This enabled the emergence of the Polis and political debate, which began to be experienced in the Agora, the greatest symbol of the exchange not only of goods but also of ideas. For Greek thought, if the social world must be subject to number and quantification, nature represents notably the domain of proximity, not geometric precision. Paradoxical as it may seem, the Greeks began to understand themselves better through contact—primarily commercial—with the East. Thus, by understanding themselves better, they gained a proper sense of their supposed superiority over the "barbarian" world with which they now interacted. Divided into eight chapters, The Origins of Greek Thought addresses: Mycenaean Royalty; The Crisis of Sovereignty; The Spiritual Universe of the Polis; The Crisis of the City and the First Sages; The Organization of the Human Cosmos; Cosmogonies and Myths of Sovereignty; and The New Image of the World.