Pirates & Revolutionaries: Sambursky. Samuel Sambursky

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Collected Brief Summaries for

Samuel Sambursky

Physics of the Stoics

Ch.1. The Dynamic Continuum

1.1 Pneuma and Coherence [selective summary]

The Stoics held that the cosmos is a continuous whole surrounded by a void. The continuity of the whole is a dynamic continuity resulting from a cohering activity of a very rarified substrate called pneuma. Pneuma is composed of a mixture of the active elements, Air and Fire, while Water and Earth are the other two passive elements that pneuma serves to bind. Pneuma has two physical features that give it this cohering role: {1} tonos, the tension which holds things together, and {2} gravitational neutrality, which means it gathers neither too high nor too low but instead equally pervades all domains of the cosmos.

1.2 The Physical State of a Body [selective summary]

Pneuma’s function is two-fold: it both coheres the parts of a thing and it also serves as a field carrying the properties of the thing. There are three hierarchical orders of compositional organizations for things. {1a} Discrete non-denumerable entities, where there is a disordered assembly of bodies that are too disorganized for us to count, as in a crowd of people. {1b} Discrete denumerable entities where the elements are arranged in an ordered way allowing for us to count them, as with an army formation. {2} Contiguous structures, whose elements are combined, as with links in a chain. Both discrete and contiguous structures have the property that any part can survive if all the others are destroyed, as they are constituted by an additive principle. The situation is different for {3} unified structures, which are organized by hexis. Hexis is what organizes the parts of inorganic objects, like physis for plants and psyche for animals. Here the units of the thing are not merely the parts but rather the different properties of the thing, which interpenetrate such that a change in one leads to a change in the others, as a result of the “sympathy” holding between the properties. But if it is the same thing, namely, pneuma, that carries the properties of various things, then how do we explain why different things have different properties? In Sambursky’s interpretation, a hexis of a thing is composed of many pneumata, one for each property. What differentiates the pneumata is that they have their own compositional ratio of mixture of Air and Fire. All such pneumata are combined in the thing but without each losing its own identity, hence their particular properties are expressed. But these pneumata are connected as well such that a change in one creates a change in the others.

1.3 The Problem of Mixture [selective summary]

Pneumata combine with substantial parts, binding them together, to compose whole things and to provide them with their qualities. We can characterize the sort of mixture pneumata make with physical parts as being a special kind of mixture that the Stoics invented. Note first that they regarded there being three types of mixtures. {1} Mingling or mechanical mixtures, which are granular in that its smallest parts sit side by side like a mosaic. {2} Fusions, which are like chemical compounds where the properties of the component parts are lost, while the new whole compound gains its own unique properties. {3} Mixtures proper (krasis for liquids and mixis for non-liquids), where the components interpenetrate entirely and thoroughly such that there is no mosaic-like distribution on the smallest scale. Yet somehow despite this constituent homogeneity, each part retains its own properties and can be separated out again. This is the sort of mixture pneumata make with the other physical parts of a thing so to form its hexis.

1.4 The Four Categories [selective summary]

The Stoics held that all things can be metaphysically classified under four hierarchical categories, all of which fall under the concept of the something. In their consecutive order they are: substratum, quality, state, and relative state. The fourth category is divided into two subcategories. {a} A relative state, which is defined by something outside it, like the father-son relation. And {b} a relative, which is something capable of undergoing change between states by matters of degree that are measure by comparing the two states, like being at a level of two degrees of sweetness compared to bitterness. A hexis is an example of a relative, because it is comprised of pneumata that each express a quality such that a continuous variation in the composition of the pneuma will result in a continuous variation in its quality. The four categories fit within the Stoic theory of the dynamic continuum. The substratum is the pneuma which binds the parts of all things and which endows them with qualities. The qualities are determined by the [physical] states of the pneuma, which are always in relative states, given that they are constantly under variation as their pneumata alter their compositions.

Sambursky, Samuel. 1973. Physics of the Stoics. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood. [First published 1959, London: Routledge and Kagen Paul.]

3 Feb 2017

Sambursky (1.4) Physics of the Stoics, “The Four Categories”, selective summary

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[The following is a selective summary, meaning that I select certain ideas to discuss rather than thoroughly summarize the text. All bracketed commentary and boldface is mine. Proofreading is incomplete, so you will encounter distracting typos. I apologize in advance.]

Samuel Sambursky

Physics of the Stoics

Ch.1

The Dynamic Continuum

1.4 The Four Categories

Selective summary

Brief summary [of selected ideas]:

Selective summary

Sambursky will now consider a methodological principle of the Stoics, called the Stoic doctrine of categories, which is directly relevant to their physical theory and which “was possibly developed first to fit the conceptual frame of physics and later generalized as a directive for other fields of scientific and philosophical thought” (17). Although they are called “categories”, they share nothing in common with Aristotle’s categories that classify concepts. The categories are not systematized hierarchically in the sense that the categories are not subclassifications of a higher notion. [I am not certain if this is related, but it reminds me of Henry Somers-Hall’s account of how there is no highest genus of being for Aristotle. See section 1.3 of his guide to Difference and Repetition. There he writes, “the ultimate categories through which being is understood must be multiple, as they themselves are species in relation to the undefined genus” (Somers-Hall 27)].

Aristotle’s ten categories⁸²are an attempt – in accordance with a principle not known to us – to compile a list of concepts such that every word of non-compounded meaning can be shown to belong to one of them. This list thus forms a horizontal classification. In other words-the various points of view from which one can look at objects are regarded by Aristotle as a group of co-ordinated notions not bound together by a higher notion embracing all of them.

82. Substance, quantity, quality, relation, place, time, position, state, action, affection.

(17)

The Stoic’s four categories, in contrast, “are a vertical classification according to which every object is determined by four successive steps of increasing specification such that every category includes the preceding one” (17). By means of this system, one can provide a “complete ontological definition of an object” (17). Now, although there are four categories, there is a notion that comprises all four, namely, the something. Under it are substratum, quality, state, and relative state (17). [Sambursky here cites in footnote 83: “Simpl., Categ., 66, 32 f.; Plotin, loc. cit., VI, i, 25: ὑποκείμενον, ποιόν, πως ἒχον, πρός τί πως ἒχον.” Refering to footnote 60 on page 11: “60. Plotin, Ennead., II, vii.”]

We can relate the categories to the conceptual structure underlying the Stoic’s notion of the physical continuum. [The first category, substratum, is the pneuma. The second category, qualities, arise when the pneuma, which is by itself quality-less, mixes with matter. The third category, state, corresponds to the ratio of Air and Fire making up the pneumata of an object’s hexis and determining its qualities. The sum total of all the pneumata constituting the hexis defines the thing’s physical state. I am not sure if this is the fourth category, relative state. There is a subdivision of this state into two sorts of relations: relative state and the relative. The relative state is defined by something outside it, like the father-son relation. A relative is something capable of undergoing change between states by matters of degree that are measure by comparing the two states, like being at a level of two degrees of sweetness compared to bitterness. I am not sure I follow the next idea. It seems to be the following. Hexis is an example of a relative. The hexis of a thing is the mixture of its pneumata, with each of which expressing one of its qualities and the entire mixture also serving to actively cohere the parts together. Now, if the pneumata alter their composition, they will do so continuously, thereby altering the property they carry continuously. Hexis, it would then seem, is a relative but in a more general sense, because a hexis would seem to contain a variety of relatives, that is, a varied set of many different continuously changeable qualities.]

If we look at the conceptual structure of the physical continuum as we have come to know it in the preceding pages, we perceive a striking analogy with the set-up of the Stoic categories. Shapeless and passive matter is the primary substratum of the cosmos and as such without any qualities.⁸⁷It is the all-pervading pneuma which, by totally mixing with matter, imbues it with all its qualities,³⁹and thus represents the second category. The third category, the state, is given by the fact that to each specific quality of the body there is attributed a specific mixture of the pneuma defined by a certain proportion of its two components, air and fire. The sum total of all pneumata permeating the body then defines its physical state. There is a lack of consistency in the extant sources with regard to terminology. Thus we find no direct reference to hexis as a physical state, but Alexander once mentions the “physical property of a body”, which is much the same as hexis, and calls it “pneuma in a certain state”.⁸⁸Hexis, however, is mentioned expressly in connection with the fourth category, and the passage in Simplicios referring to it⁸⁹is of great significance for the understanding of the whole subject. Simplicios informs us of a subdivision of the fourth category: the Stoics distinguished between two kinds of relations, the relative state⁹⁰ and the relative⁹¹. The first denoted a state defined by that of another thing outside it, such as the relation father-son or left- and right-hand neighbour. The relative referred to things capable of change (the examples given are sweet and bitter), whereby | the relation is given through comparison of two states of this change (e.g. two degrees of sweetness) . Simplicios quotes hexis as another example of the relative which throws into relief the dynamic notion of Stoic physics, because hexis is the key term of the physical continuum which embraces an infinity of different states. Each of these states can evolve from another by a continuous transition produced through the “change of the former quality”,⁹²a change which corresponds to that of the spectrum of all pneuma tensions permeating the body involved.

87. Diog. Laert., VII, 137.

[Footnote 39 is on page 7:

39. Plut., De Stoic. repugn., 1053 f.
]
88. Alex. Aphr., Topica. 360, 10.

89. Simpl., Categ., 165, 32-166, 29.

90. πρός τί πως ἔχον.

91. πρός τι.

92. Galen, Method. med., I, 6 (Arnim, II, 494) .

(18-19)

From:

Sambursky, Samuel. 1973. Physics of the Stoics. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood. [First published 1959, London: Routledge and Kagen Paul.]

Or if otherwise noted:

Somers-Hall, Henry. 2013. Deleuze’s Difference and Repetition. An Edinburgh Philosophical Guide. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University.

2 Feb 2017

Sambursky (1.3) Physics of the Stoics, “The Problem of Mixture”, selective summary

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Samuel Sambursky

Physics of the Stoics

Ch.1

The Dynamic Continuum

1.3 The Problem of Mixture

Selective summary

Brief summary [of selected ideas]:

Selective summary

[Recall that pneuma is has a two-fold function. On the one hand, it is the binding force that coheres the parts of the world. Here there is a mixture of pneuma with inert matter. On the other hand, it itself is composed of a mixture, being a combination of Fire and Air. See section 1.1 and section 1.2.]

We are thus led to the conclusion that the Stoic theory of hexis was based in a double sense on the process of mixture. On the one hand, mixture of pneuma with inert matter imbues the latter with physical properties, whereas pneuma itself, on the other hand, is a mixture of two components, fire and air. This easily explains the fact that the Stoics were occupied to such a large extent by the problem of mixture [...].

(11)

The sources of the Stoic theory of mixtures “are of a fragmentary nature;” nonetheless, “they give us some idea of how the Stoic view on mixture was heavily influenced by their extreme notions of continuity and their basic assumptions concerning the function of the pneuma” (11).

In the Stoic theory of mixtures, there are three types. {1} Mingling or mechanical mixture. An example is if we mix wheat and barley. It is characterized as having a “mosaic-like composition”. Its basic parts stand side-by-side rather than interpenetrating one another: “it applies essentially to bodies of a granular structure where a mosaic-like mixture results, each particle of one component being surrounded by particles of the other” (12). It is thus not homogeneous on the smallest scale, although on larger scales it might appear as homogeneous (11-12). {2} Fusion. Here the parts synthetically form a new substance altogether, like chemical compounds. The individual properties of each component are lost, as their compound gains its own new unique properties (12). {3} Mixture proper (krasis for liquids and mixis for non-liquids). This is the most important sort of blending for the Stoics. All the components interpenetrate completely and thoroughly. They retain their own properties, and they can be separated out again (12). [See this summary from John Sellars Stoicism on these mixture types.]

Between these two types lies a third case of “mixture” proper | (krasis for liquids, mixis for non-liquids) which, from the Stoic point of view, represents the most important category of blending. Here a complete interpenetration of all the components takes place, and any volume of the mixture, down to the smallest parts, is jointly occupied by all the components in the same proportion, each component preserving its own properties under any circumstances, irrespective of the ratio of its share in the mixture. The properties are preserved in all cases where – as opposed to the case of fusion – the components can be separated out again from the mixture by physical contrivances.

(12-13)

Using current terminology, we might call krasis a solution or a suspension (13). Even a minute portion of one part into a large portion of another can result in the smaller part thoroughly spreading throughout the larger part, keeping its properties, like a drop of wine in the whole sea, where that wine’s properties then are imbued throughout the entirety of the sea.

On the whole, krasis would apply to what in the language of today is called a mixture in any of the three phases, or to a solution or a suspension. Of special interest to the Stoics were, of course, cases of extreme dilution or rarefaction, because they regarded the pneuma which permeates bulky matter without losing its properties as one of these cases. Chrysippos, obviously referring to the passage in Aristotle quoted above,⁶³ stresses this point with deliberate exaggeration: “There is nothing to prevent one drop of wine from mixing with the whole sea.”⁶⁷

63. loc. cit., 328 a 27.

[Referring to footnote 56 on page 11:

56. Arist., De genr. et corr., I, 10.

]

67. Plut., loc. cit., 1078 e.

[Referring to footnote 59 on page 11:
59. Plut., De com. not., ch. 37.
]
(13)

This Stoic notion of mixture proper was misunderstood by other philosophers, who thought that the Stoics were claiming that to add to one cup of wine with two parts of water would result in four parts of mixture instead of three. This is because the one cup of wine, now mixing with the water, becomes two cups of wine, which when added to the original two cups of water, makes a total of four cups of mixture. [From Plutarch’s On Common Notions Against the Stoics: “But to the Stoics it is a matter of truth, that when one cup of wine is mixed with two of water, if it is not to be lost but the mixture is to be equalized, it must be extended through the whole and be confounded therewith, so as to make that which was one two by the equalization of the mixture. For the one remains, but is extended as much as two, and thus is equal to the double of itself. Now if it happens in the mixture with two to take the measure of two in the diffusion, this is together the measure both of three and four,—of three because one is mixed with two, and of four because, being mixed with two, it has an equal quantity with those with which it is mixed. ” (Plutarch 411. Also, Perseus Project. See as well the beginning of this summary on the Plutarch text for more discussion.)]

Plutarch, giving an account of the Stoic theory of mixture, also reveals in his criticism a complete lack of understanding of the nature of dilution. According to the Stoics, he says, one measure of wine mixed with two measures of water should give four measures of mixture, as the wine will extend into the whole volume occupied by the water.⁷¹
71. Plut., De comm. not., 1078 a.

(14)

[So that is a form of misunderstanding of the theory rather than a valid criticism.] The main reason that the Stoic’s theory was rejected was because of its notion of “total mixture:” the mixture means that it is homogeneous even at the smallest parts. Now, if the parts retain their properties, but the mixture is thoroughly homogeneous, implying that the smallest parts do not lie side by side, then how are they arranged instead? One conclusion was that they superposed, thereby destroying volume. [So one cup of wine plus two water will result in two cups of mixture, but we know that not to be true.] Plotinus however notes that since the parts retain their properties, and since volume is a property, the volume would not be destroyed in the combination.

But the Stoics, taking a radical position with regard to continuity, conceived of mixture as a complete interpenetration of the components which existed simultaneously in the given proportions down to the most minute elements of volume. This conception of total mixture was understood by them in the sense that every element of volume, however small, would be homogeneous with regard to the mixing of the components, and that from no point on would this homogeneity dissolve itself into a mosaic-like structure with bits of the components lying side by side. Alexander Aphrodisiensis and all the later critics – with one exception – saw in this notion of total mixture an infringement upon the principle that one body cannot occupy the place occupied by another. Their view was⁵⁸that complete interpenetration of bodies must necessarily lead to the volume of the mixture not being the sum of the volumes of the components, but instead it would remain constant as compared with the volume of the largest of the components.⁷³ Plotin⁷⁴gives a two-dimensional picture in explanation: Total mixture would be comparable not to the juxtaposition of two (material) lines drawn side by side – which would mean an increase in area – but to the superposition of the two lines whereby no increase occurs. In view of the obvious fact that generally a mixture occupies a larger volume than each of its components, the Stoic theory, as interpreted by its critics, was generally rejected. Plotin alone, in his endeavour to give the Stoic ideas a fair trial, attempts to reconcile their views with the facts.⁷⁵Volume, he says, is one of the many qualities of a body. According to the Stoics, the qualities of the components are preserved in the mixture; in fact, the properties of the latter result from the mixing of those of its components. In the same way, he concludes, the mixture will possess a volume which is exactly or nearly the sum of the volumes of the components – thus resulting in an increase of volume.

[Footnote 58 is on page 11

58. Alex. Aphr., Quaest. et solut., II, 12.
]
73. Cf. Simp., Phys., 530, 29: “A ladle mixed with another one in total mixture shall give again a ladleful.”

74. Plotin, loc. cit. , II, vii, 1, 45.

75. Plotin, loc. cit. , II, vii, 1, 35.

[Footnotes 74-75 refer to footnote 60 on page 11.
60. Plotin, Ennead., II, vii.
]
(15)

[Sambursky’s next point seems to be the following. It is one challenge already to conceive of how the physical parts of a mixture can form a total mixture of the kind we described. But the reason we went into that account was not simply to work on that problem. Rather, we are concerned with how to conceptualize hexis. It involves the thorough interpenetration of pneuma throughout the parts of some object. Thus we should think then of the mixture between pneuma and the other physical parts of something as a total mixture. Perhaps this is because the pneuma carries the qualities, and those qualities need to penetrate and inhabit the physical parts.]

We must look at the Stoic theory of total mixture in the light | of the main purpose it was supposed to serve – to give a firm foundation for its conception of hexis. We must remember that pneuma was thought to be an extremely rarefied substance and that its total interpenetration of matter would thus create a case analogous to that of the mixture of a small drop of wine with a large measure of water, i.e. of one component being negligible in bulk as compared with the other. Here again the starting-point for the argument was the organic world. Soul (psyche), the hexis of the living body, was itself corporeal according to the Stoics, who included it in the group of things which are capable of acting and being acted upon. Mutual interpenetration of soul and body, of physis and plants, of hexis and inorganic matter, have all one common feature – the total mixture of a very tenuous and rare component, the pneuma, with a much bulkier one.^{76, 77} The common denominator in all these cases are the physical qualities or properties which themselves are nothing less than pneumata mixed in definite proportions. And as we have seen, qualities are bodies, like the soul itself, and therefore their mixture with matter – organic and inorganic alike – must be of the nature of a total mixture.⁷⁸
76. Galen, Comm. 5 in Hippocr. epid. 6 (Arim, II, 715).

77. Alex. Aphr., De anima, 26, 10.

78. Simpl., Phys., 530, 9.

(15-16)

From:

Sambursky, Samuel. 1973. Physics of the Stoics. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood. [First published 1959, London: Routledge and Kagen Paul.]

Or if otherwise noted:

Plutarch. 1878. On Common Notions Against the Stoics. In Plutarch's Morals, vol.4, pp.372-427. Translated from the Greek by several hands. Corrected and revised by William W. Goodwin. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company. Cambridge: Press Of John Wilson and son. Available online at:

https://archive.org/details/plutarchsmorals04plut

Sambursky (1.2) Physics of the Stoics, “The Physical State of a Body”, selective summary

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Samuel Sambursky

Physics of the Stoics

Ch.1

The Dynamic Continuum

1.2 The Physical State of a Body

Selective summary

Brief summary [of selected ideas]:

Selective summary

As we saw in the prior section, pneuma’s tension produces the cohesion of matter. But that is just one half of pneuma’s two-fold function. It also generates the physical qualities of matter. [The way this works, as we will see later, is not entirely well known, but it has to do with the proportions of Fire and Air constituting the pneuma that serves as the thing’s hexis.] So, along with being the glue that binds the parts of matter, it is also like a physical field that somehow carries the thing’s specific properties. When we conceive the pneuma as serving these two function, it takes on the more specific meaning of hexis, which is the physical state of the body. This for example can mean that the hexis which binds iron together also gives it its property of hardness. [So perhaps the cohesion can at least explain certain physical properties that are obviously matters of density for instance.] Hexis as the structure of inorganic matter is similar to the way physis structures organic things and psyche living things [see Bréhier, La théorie des incorporels dans l'ancien stoïcisme, §7.]

Cohesion of matter is not the only effect produced by the tension of the pneuma. The latter has a twofold function: besides being a binding force, it is an agent which generates all the physical qualities of matter. [...] By their conception of the pneuma as the generator of physical qualities the Stoics generalized their continuum theory into a field theory; the pneuma is the physical field which is the carrier of all specific properties of material bodies, and cohesion as such thus gets a more specific meaning by becoming hexis, the physical state of the body. The following quotation from a book by Chrysippos On Physical States is very instructive: “The physical states are nothing else but spirits, because the bodies are made cohesive by the. And the binding air is the cause for those bound into such a state being imbued with a certain property which is called hardness in iron, solidity in stone, brightness in silver.”³⁹And a little later he continues: “Matter, being inert by itself and sluggish, is the substratum of the properties, which are | pneumata and air-like tensions giving definite form to those parts of matter in which they reside.” This gives some idea of the central position in the Stoic theory of matter of hexis, which denotes the structure of inorganic matter in a similar way to which physis expresses organic structure and psyche the structure of the living being.

39. Plut., De Stoic. repugn., 1053 f.

(7-8)

The Stoics thought there was a hierarchy of inorganic structures, with hexis being the highest. There are three sorts. [Please see the quotation to follow, as the divisions are not clear to me. It is possible that there are four levels but three qualities they may have. Or perhaps there are three levels, but the first has two distinct subcategories.] The lowest is {1a} discrete non-denumerable entities, where there is a disordered assembly of bodies whose members are too disorganized for us to count, as in a crowd of people. The next highest is {1b} discrete denumerable entities where the elements are arranged in an ordered way allowing for us to count them, as with an army formation. Then there are {2} contiguous structures, whose elements are combined, as with links in a chain. Both discrete and contiguous structures have the property that any part can survive if all the others are destroyed, as they are constituted by an additive principle. The situation is different for {3} unified structures, which are organized by hexis. Here the units of the thing are not merely the parts but rather the different properties of the thing, which interpenetrate such that a change in one leads to a change in the others. [Consider a metal where when you change one property, like its temperature, you affect its other properties, like its malleability.] This co-existence of the structural elements [the interpenetrating properties] is called sympathy (sympatheia), with the example of a living organism: when one’s finger is cut, the whole body shares that condition.

The structural concept of hexis, also defined as the “binding spirit” of a body,⁴³ represents the highest entity in the hierarchy of inorganic structures as conceived by the Stoics.⁴⁴These entities are divided into discrete, contiguous and unified.⁴⁵At the lowest level we have an assembly of bodies in a disordered state, such as a crowd which does not lend itself to numerical determination. The following level is also a discrete state, but here the elements are arranged in an order which allows for numerical determination, such as a choir or an army in formation. This is a “denumerable” entity.⁴⁶Contiguous structures are composed of conjoined elements, like the links of a chain or the planks of a ship or the stones of a house.⁴⁷What the discrete and contiguous structures have in common is that each of their elements can continue to exist even if the rest are destroyed,⁴⁸which is characterized by a simple additive relationship between the elements. [...]

|

The situation is completely different in the case of unified structures, such as stone or wood or metal which are “ruled by a single state”.⁴⁴It is not an additive principle which defines the relation between the physical state of a body, hexis, and its elements. We must realize that the elements of hexis are not mere localized units but physical properties which interpenetrate and create a totality where each of them shares in the existence of the rest. In our modern terminology: all the qualities which define the physical state of a certain body – its mechanical, thermic, electric, optical properties – have their origin in common roots and are therefore interdependent and not additive. Every one of them is affected if all or some of the others change. The physical state is an organization of dynamic character, each of its elements subsisting only in co-existence with the rest, and not able to exist if the organization as a whole disintegrates. The Stoic term for this form of co-existence of the elements of the highest structure was “sympathy” (sympatheia), and it is again significant that analogies from the living organism were given to exemplify this condition: when a finger is cut, the whole body shares in its condition.⁴⁸

43. Achill., Isagoge, 14 (Arnim, II, 368).

44. Sext. Emp., Adv. math., IX, 78; Plut., Praec. conug., 34: De def. orac., 29; Achill., Isagoge, 14.

45. διεστῶτα, συναπτόμενα, ἡνωμένα.

46. ἀριθμῷ ληπτός.

47. Seneca, Natur. quaest., II, 2.

48. Sext. Emp., loc. cit., 80.

(8-9. Note, the footnote enumerations in the text can be out of order, but it seems that means to refer to a footnote on a previous page.)

We now wonder, given “the unmistakable connection between hexis and pneuma” what is “the mechanism by which different physical states were thought to arise out of the pneuma pervading the bodies”? (10). The problem with determining this is that “The very scanty remnants of Stoic physics do not permit us more than vague conjectures about the details of their theory on this topic” (10). One clue comes from Galen, who says that the Stoics distinguish the pneuma of physis and psyche by saying that the pneuma of physis is more humid and colder, while the pneuma of psyche is drier and hotter. What we gather from this is that at least with regard to these two sorts of pneuma, there can be a differentiation in the composing mixtures of Air and Fire:

Some light is thrown on this problem in the passage in Galen already mentioned above⁹: “According to them (the Stoics), psyche is a sort of pneuma, as is also physis, but the pneuma of physis is more humid and colder, while that of psyche is drier and hotter. This pneuma is a kind of matter akin to psyche, and the specific quality of this matter is given by the proportions admixed of the airy and fiery substance.” Here a principle of differentiation is stated for the world of animals and plants, derived from the basic assumption of the composite nature of the pneuma which allows for different ratios of mixture of its two components – a definite proportion of this mixture defining a definite quality.

9. Galen, De anim. mor. (Arim, II, 787); cf. also Arnim, II, 446.
(10 / footnote: 2)

In similar vein, Diogenes of Apollonia, who seemed to have some influence on the Stoics,

identifies soul and intelligence with air, and the variations in the former are explained by the difference in proportion of hot and cold, dry and wet in air. The differences in the degree of warmth of the soul in animals and in human beings is particularly stressed by Diogenes. The multitude of possible variations of the mixture is the reason for the observed diversity in form, way of life, and intelligence.

(10)

So far, Sambursky’s point is that in the organic realm, differences between types of pneumata, like between that of plants, animals, and humans, was accounted for on the basis of differences in the mixture of Fire and Air in the pneuma. His made that point so that now, by analogy, we might infer the same principle would hold for the hexis of inorganic objects. In other words, what accounts for the different properties in objects is that they have a different hexis, whose variations are based on differences of composition, that is, different ratios of Fire and Air. Sambursky it seems further suggests that for each property there is a different pneuma. So a single hexis would be made of various pneumata, each retaining their individual and thus each property being distinct, while at the same time the various pneumata are physically interrelated such that a change in one property/pneuma corresponds with a change in the others.

We have seen already that hexis was regarded by the Stoics as | a notion equivalent in the inorganic realm to that of physis and psyche in the organic, and we may therefore assume by analogy that here, too, the same principle of differentiation was used in Stoic physics. In other words, each of the physical properties of a body, according to this principle, would be defined by a specific sort of pneuma, characterized by a definite mixture of fire and air. All these different sorts of pneuma permeate the body and mix with each other without losing their identity, since the properties to which they are co-ordinated are well defined and stable in spite of the fact that by coalescing they form the specific nexus by which an inert lump of matter is endowed with hexis.³⁹

39. Plut., De Stoic. repugn., 1055 f.

(10-11 footnote: 7)

Sambursky, Samuel. 1973. Physics of the Stoics. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood. [First published 1959, London: Routledge and Kagen Paul.]

1 Feb 2017

Sambursky (1.1) Physics of the Stoics, “Pneuma and Coherence”, selective summary

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