Eubulides

, of Miletus, a philosopher of the Megaric school, who flourished about the 105th olympiad, or the year 360 B. C. was the disciple and successor of Euclid, and a strenuous opponent of Aristotle, whose writings and character he took every occasion of censuring and calumniating. He is most remarkable, however, for having introduced new subtleties into the art of disputation, several of which, though often mentioned as proofs of great ingenuity, deserve only to be remembered as examples of egregious trifling. Of these sophistical modes of reasoning, called by Aristotle Eristic syllogisms, the following may suffice: 1. Of the sophism, called from the example, The Lying: “if when you speak the truth, you say you lie, you lie; but you say you lie, when you speak the truth: therefore, in speaking the truth, you lie.” 2. The Occult; “Do you know your father? Yes. Do you know this man who is veiled? No. Then you do not know your father; for it is your father who is veiled.” 3. Sorites, “Is one grain a heap? No. Two grains? No. Three grains? No. Go on, adding one by one and, if one grain be not a heap, it will be impossible to say, what number of grains make a heap.” 4. The Horned. “You have what you have not lost; you have not lost horns; therefore you have horns.” In such high repute were these silly inventions for perplexing plain truth, that Chrysippus wrote six books upon the first of these sophisms; and Philetas, a Choan, died of a consumption which he contracted by the close study which he bestowed upon it. ²