Long considered antagonists, myth and philosophy are currently the protagonists of a (re)conciliation. Since the beginning, Philosophy, the search for knowledge, has been understood as a rational discourse that emerged to to oppose the mythical model developed in Ancient Greece and which served as the basis of his Paideia (education). The word myth is Greek and means to tell, to narrate something to someone who recognizes the speaker as the authority over what was said.
Thus, Homer (Iliad and Odyssey) and Hesiod (Theogony and Of the works and of the Days) are considered the educators of Hellas (as Greece was called) par excellence, as well as the rhapsodes (a kind of actor, singer, reciter) were seen as bearers of a fundamental truth about the origin of the universe, laws, etc., as they reproduced the narratives contained in the works of those authors.
It was only under certain conditions (navigation, use and invention of the calendar and currency, the creation of democracy that advocated the use of the word, as well as publicity of laws etc.) that the mythical model was being questioned and replaced by a way of thinking that demanded other criteria for making arguments. Philosophy arises as a search for rational, systematic knowledge with universal validity.
From Aristotle to Descartes, Philosophy gained a connotation of science, of secure, infallible knowledge, and this notion lasted until the 19th century, when the foundations of what we call Reason suffered harsh criticism with the development of technique and the capitalist system of production. The belief in the domain of nature, the exploration of work, as well as the discovery of the unconscious as the great motivator of human actions, evidenced the decline of an armament society, exclusionary and unbridled draining of natural resources. The rationalist tendency is then shaken and a new approach to the world is needed.
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What was previously regarded as pre-scientific, primitive, unsystematic, gains a special role in the formation of cultures. The notions of civilization, progress and development are slowly being replaced by cultural diversity, as those are no longer justified. The re-reading of one of the thinkers considered to be the founders of rationalist idealism suggests that already in the Greece the myth was not merely replaced neither radically nor gradually by thought philosophical. Plato's texts, analyzed not only from a conceptual but also a dramatic point of view, allow us to understand that a certain use of myth is necessary where the logos (speech, reason, word) cannot reach its object yet, that is, what was just fanciful, imaginary, is highlighted for its practical value in the formation of the men.
In other words, although man wants to know in depth the world in which he lives, he will always depend on the improvement of methods and techniques of interpretation. Science is really knowledge, but it is also historical and its practical validity depends on how it was constructed argumentatively. It is interesting to realize that Philosophy is love of knowledge, pursuit of knowledge and never possession, as defined by Plato. So, we must never confuse it with science, which is the possession of knowledge constructed historically, that is, determined by the conditions of its time. Therefore, Myth, Philosophy and Science do not have a relationship of exclusion or gradation to each other, but rather of intercomplementarity, given that one always succeeds the other in a cyclical way during the time.
By João Francisco P. Cabral
Brazil School Collaborator
Graduated in Philosophy from the Federal University of Uberlândia - UFU
Master's student in Philosophy at the State University of Campinas - UNICAMP