Samos Pythagoras

Pythagoras in Samos: Pythagoras was born on the island of Samos in 570 BC. This island lies slightly off the western coast of Asia Minor. His mother was native of Samos and his father was a merchant from Tyre. He studied with the priest of Memphis, who was well-known for his wisdom. After Memphis, he studied at the temples of Tyre and Byblos in Phoenicia. It is most likely in Egypt where he came up with his geometric principles that would lead to his famous theorems. The evidence of his Egyptian inspirations is called the Berlin Papyrus.

Pythagoras did not only think up mathematical principles during his life. He also founded a religious society. His society had very strict rules of conduct. The inner circle of the society was called Mathmetikoi. As a member of the society, you had to live at the school, have no personal possessions and had to follow a vegetarian diet. They did allow students from other areas to attend the school. These students, called Akousmatics, were permitted to eat meat and own a few personal things.

As a whole, the members of this society were known as Pythagoreans and had a very structured life of religious teaching, common meals, exercise, reading and philosophical study. They had to sing to the Greek god Apollo on a regular basis. They believed that they could use the lyre to cure illnesses of the soul and body. One had to do poetry recitations before and after sleep since they believed this exercise could help improve human memory.

The circumstances of his death are not clear as well. It has become a myth where he supposedly died at the hands of a soldier. The soldier killed him because he may have refused to trample a bean-field while he was fleeing.

Pythagorean Philosophy
The Pythagorean mathematics of nature was summed up by Aristotle.
• Pythagoras thought that all things consisted of numbers. All physical bodies are numbers. All the elements of numbers are the elements of everything.
• All units possess magnitude.
• Numbers are an expression of the universe. When you are talking about numbers, you are talking about what makes up the universe.
• You should regard unity and infinity as substances that form the basis of the universe.

Other people have tried to sum up the Pythagorean mathematics of nature. A man named Guthrie believes that one of them was that there is a numerical, proportional structure of the concordant notes of the scale. There is an infinite variety and quality of sound that is reduced to order by exact and simple law of ratio in quantity.

Pythagoras had what was called the Ten Principles or the Table of the Opposites. One principle is limit and the other, unlimited. There is an odd and an even. There is one and plurality. There is right and left. There is male and female. Things are at rest and moving. There is straight and crooked. There is light and darkness. There is good and bad. There is square and oblong. Pythagoras believed that this universe was a universe of opposites.

Pythagoras believed that Monad was God and the good. The good is the true nature of the One. The One is the Mind. The bad side is the indefinite Dyad who is evil. Evil has to do with material plurality. He did not like hedonism. One had to have moderation in life.

The Pythagorean principles do seem very similar to the Ying and Yang principles in the Chinese Tao philosophy.

The Ying and Yang principles are:
Sunshine/light - darkness/shadow
Masculinity - femininity
Activity - passivity
Heat - cold
Dryness - wetness
Hardness - softness
Odd - even

The similarities between Pythagorean principles and the Ying and Yang principles may have existed because he may have studied with the Magi, Chaldeans and a man named Zaroaster. These are people who may have been familiar with the Tao philosophy.

Pythagoras may have believed that the sun was the center of the universe. He always maintained that fire was the center of the cosmos. The problem is that it is very difficult to know directly about his teachings. There was a vow of silence required by people who first joined his order. Most information about Pythagoras comes from secondary sources. His original doctrines are unknown and his order scattered all over the known world after 545 BC.
Hicetas, a Pythagorean, was quoted as saying that the earth moved in a circle.

Pythagoras and Mathematics
These are some of the mathematical principles that Pythagoras is known for. One such principle is that the sum of the angles of a triangle is equal to two right angles. His followers were familiar with a generalization that stated a polygon with n sides has a sum of interior angles 2n-4 right angles and a sum of exterior angles equal to four right angles.

His famous theorem stated that when you have a right-angled triangle, the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares on the other two sides.
Pythagoras and his figures were known to solve equations like a (a – X) = x squared by geometrical means.

Pythagoras may have discovered irrational numbers. The problem is that it would go against his philosophy that all things are numbers since he meant that a number is a ratio of two whole numbers.

Statue of Pythagoras
There is a statue of Pythagorus on the island of Samos. The writing at the bottom of the status translates to “Pythagoras the Samosan” but the modified version of “Pythagoras of Samos” is widely preferred.