The souls of animals called unreasoning are reasonable, not however with active reasoning powers, because of an imperfect mixture of the bodies and because they do not have the power of speech, as in the case of apes and dogs; for these have intelligence but not the power of speech.
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"Don't eat your heart."
"Choose always the way that seems the best, however rough it may be; custom will soon render it easy and agreeable."
"Do not cut your nails on holy days."
"Geometry is knowledge of the eternally existent."
"Above all things, reverence yourself."
Greek philosopher and mathematician whose school in Croton combined geometry (the Pythagorean theorem), number-mysticism, and a religious-vegetarian way of life. Closely associated with Thales of Miletus (earlier pre-Socratic and the first philosopher). For an intellectual contrast, see Heraclitus, pre-Socratic Greek philosopher of flux — Heraclitus called Pythagoras 'the chief of swindlers' — among the founding insults of the philosophical-rivalry tradition. Their 'all is flux' vs 'all is number' poles still organize the philosophy of mathematics today (Platonist vs anti-realist).
A belief attributed to Pythagoras in doxographies, reflecting his views on animal souls.
Date: c. 570-495 BCE (attributed later)
BiblicalFound in 1 providers: gemini
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Animals typically labeled 'irrational' actually possess a latent form of reason, but two constraints prevent its full exercise: imperfect bodily composition and the absence of speech. Apes and dogs serve as examples — they clearly demonstrate intelligence through behavior yet cannot articulate thoughts verbally. The argument reframes animal 'irrationality' not as an absence of mind but as a limitation of physical form and communication, suggesting their inner life is richer than their outward behavior can fully convey.
Pythagoras taught metempsychosis — that souls migrate between human and animal bodies across lifetimes, making animals morally significant kin. He famously abstained from meat and founded a community around strict dietary rules. This quote is the philosophical backbone of that ethics: animals reason imperfectly, not not-at-all, so they deserve moral consideration. His drive to find deep unities beneath surface differences — evident in his mathematics — extended naturally to asserting a shared rational substrate across species.
In 6th-century BCE Greece, logos — rational speech — defined the boundary between human and animal, civilized and wild. Animal sacrifice was central to Greek religion, which required animals to be morally lesser. Pythagoras worked in Magna Graecia, where Orphic mysticism and possibly Eastern philosophies had penetrated mainstream thought. Asserting animal intelligence directly challenged both religious ritual and philosophical consensus, positioning his school as radically revisionary precisely when Greek natural philosophy was first attempting to systematize questions about life, soul, and reason.
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