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Socrates was an ancient Greek philosopher who is widely credited with laying the groundwork for Western philosophy. He is known for the Socratic method, a form of cooperative argumentative dialogue. His philosophy is known primarily through the accounts of later classical writers, especially the writings of his students Plato and Xenophon.

Plato was a student of Socrates and the teacher of Aristotle. His writings explored justice, beauty, equality, and the theory of forms - abstract properties that are said to make the objects we perceive a reality.

Aristotle, a student of Plato, is an ancient Greek philosopher who made contributions to logic, metaphysics, mathematics, physics, biology, botany, ethics, politics, agriculture, medicine, dance and theatre. He believed in a teleological universe where everything has a purpose or end.

Heraclitus was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher known for his doctrine that change is central to the universe, summarized in the phrase 'panta rhei' (everything flows).

Parmenides was a pre-Socratic philosopher who posited that the reality of the universe is one unchanging, ungenerated, indestructible whole which is imperceptible and beyond change, in contrast to Heraclitus' doctrine.

Democritus was an ancient Greek philosopher, best known for his atomic theory of the universe, which posited that all matter is composed of small, indestructible units he called atoms.

Pythagoras was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher who founded the Pythagoreanism movement. He is also known for the Pythagorean theorem in mathematics. His philosophy included beliefs in the immortality and reincarnation of the soul, and in the existence of abstract mathematical entities.

Zeno of Elea is famous for his paradoxes, which are arguments that lead to conclusions that defy intuition. The most famous is perhaps the paradox of Achilles and the tortoise, illustrating the problem of infinity and divisibility in space and time.

Epicurus was an ancient Greek philosopher who founded Epicureanism. He taught that pleasure and pain are the measures of good and evil, that death is the end of body and soul and should not be feared, and that the gods do not reward or punish humans.

Stoicism is a philosophy of personal ethics informed by a system of logic and its views on the natural world. The philosophy asserts the development of self-control and fortitude as a means of overcoming destructive emotions.

Diogenes was a Greek philosopher and one of the founders of Cynicism. He advocated for living a simple and ascetic life, disdained social conventions, and frequently used humor to convey his philosophical ideas.

Empedocles was a pre-Socratic philosopher who proposed a cosmogenic theory of the four classical elements: earth, air, fire, and water. He also introduced the two opposing forces of Love and Strife as responsible for the mixtures and separations of elements.

Anaximander was a pre-Socratic philosopher who is credited with having created one of the earliest maps of the world, postulated the Apeiron (the 'unlimited') as the origin of all things, and attempted to explain the origins of human beings.

Anaximenes of Miletus was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher who believed that air is the primary substance of all matter and that by processes of rarefaction and condensation, different forms of matter could be produced.

Protagoras was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher and is known as the most famous of the Sophists. He is best known for the statement 'Man is the measure of all things', indicating that there is no absolute truth but only individual perspective.

Gorgias was a pre-Socratic Sophist philosopher who believed that nothing exists; if anything does exist, it cannot be known; and if it can be known, it cannot be communicated.

Antisthenes was a pupil of Socrates and is considered to be the founder of the Cynic philosophy, which teaches the virtues of self-control, independence, and austerity; he taught that virtue is sufficient for happiness.

Thales of Miletus was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher who is recognized for his belief that the originating principle of nature and the nature of matter was a single substance, water.

Plotinus was an ancient philosopher who was the founder of Neoplatonism. He taught that there is a supreme, totally transcendent 'One', containing no division, multiplicity, or distinction; it is beyond all categories of being and non-being.

Pyrrho was an ancient Greek philosopher and is considered to be the first Western skeptic philosopher. He believed that because knowledge is subjective, we cannot have accurate knowledge about the world, leading to a suspension of judgment (epoché).

Anaxagoras was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher known for introducing the concept of Nous (mind or reason) as an ordering force for the cosmos. He claimed that the Sun is a burning stone and that the Moon reflects the Sun's light.

Melissus of Samos was a pre-Socratic philosopher who supported Parmenides’ ideas and argued that reality is one, unchanging, ungenerated, indestructible whole and that motion is impossible.

Xenophanes was a philosopher and poet who criticized the anthropomorphism of the Greek gods and proposed a monotheistic conception of a supreme god who was omnipotent and omniscient.

Leucippus is credited with developing, along with his student Democritus, the atomic theory of the cosmos. He stated that the universe is composed of an infinite number of indivisible particles (atoms) and the void.

Anaxarchus was a philosopher of the school of Democritus known for his extreme relativism and skepticism, as well as for his association with Alexander the Great as a philosophical advisor.

Metrodorus of Chios was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Atomist school. He took atomistic materialism further by stating that even the soul was composed of atoms and nothing was secret or unsolvable.

Archytas was an ancient Greek philosopher and mathematician who was a follower of Pythagoras. He made significant contributions to mathematics and is known for his work on harmonics and the theory of proportions.

Hippasus was a Pythagorean philosopher known for his work on the mathematical concept of irrational numbers, which were a significant challenge to the Pythagorean belief that all phenomena in the universe could be reduced to whole numbers and their ratios.

Speusippus was Plato's nephew and successor as the head of the Academy. His philosophical work continued to develop the theory of Forms and he placed significant emphasis on ethics and the theory of knowledge.