Concept
Phosphorus (morning star)
Overview
Phosphorus (Ancient Greek: Φωσφόρος, romanized: Phōsphóros) is the god of the planet Venus in its appearance as the Morning Star. Another Greek name for the Morning Star is "Eosphorus" (Ancient Greek: Ἑωσφόρος, romanized: Heōsphóros), which means "dawn-bringer". The term "eosphorus" is sometimes met in English. As an adjective, the word "phosphorus" is applied in the sense of "light-bringing" (for instance, the dawn, the god Dionysus, pine torches and the day) and "torch-bearing" as an epithet of several gods and goddesses, especially of Hecate but also of Artemis/Diana and Hephaestus. Seasonally, Venus is the "light bringer" in the northern hemisphere, appearing most brightly in December (an optical illusion due to shorter days), signalling the "rebirth" of longer days as winter wanes.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where Phosphorus (morning star) is discussed.
Suppose now we find that phosphorus does not melt at 44°, but at 43.9°. Shall we conclude that phosphorus being by definition that which melts at 44°, this body that we did call phosphorus is not true phosphorus, or, on the other hand, that phosphorous melts at 43.9°? Here again we are free to adopt the one or the other definition and consequently the one or the other conclusion; but to adopt the first would be…
Henri Poincaré, The Foundations of Science
names the idea; states what it is
The only straight way to ascertain the importance of phosphorus to thought would be to find whether more is excreted by the brain during mental activity than during rest. Unfortunately we cannot do this directly, but can only gauge the amount of PO_{5} in the urine, and this procedure has been adopted by a variety of observers, some of whom found the phosphates in the urine diminished,…
William James, Psychology
names the idea; opens on it
Now (like sulphur, present in the albuminoid base), phosphorus is an element which, besides having several allotropic forms, has a great affinity for oxygen; and an organic compound into which it enters, beyond the instability otherwise caused, has a special instability caused by its presence. The tendency to undergo change will therefore be great when the proportion of the phosphorized component is great.
Herbert Spencer, The Principles of Biology, Volume 1
names the idea; states what it is
Cholesterin and creatin are both excrementitious products, and are both found in the brain. The subject belongs to chemistry rather than to psychology, and I only mention it here for the sake of saying a word about a wide-spread popular error about brain-activity and phosphorus. '_Ohne Phosphor, kein Gedanke_,' was a noted war-cry of the 'materialists' during the excitement on that subject which filled Germany in…
William James, The Principles of Psychology, Volume 1
names the idea
The reality of my Mind is thus in my Mind itself and not outside of it; it is my real Being, my own substance, without which I am without existence. This reality is, so to speak, the combustible material which may be kindled and lit up by the universal reality as such as objective; and only so far as this phosphorus is in men, is comprehension, the kindling and lighting up, possible. Feeling, anticipation, knowledge…
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Hegel's Lectures on the History of Philosophy
states what it is; names the idea
Philosophers who discussed Phosphorus (morning star)
Related ideas
- Greek language
- Hesiod
- Moon
- Greek mythology
- Sun
- Semantics
- Theogony
- Ovid
- Pliny the Elder
- Saul Kripke
- Gottlob Frege
- Proper noun
- A priori and a posteriori
- Philosophy of language
- Hesperus
- Metamorphoses
- Earth
Place in the tradition
Part of Analytic philosophy.
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