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Riview Jurnal Sport, Philosophy, an The Quest For Knowledge
1. MAKALAH RIVIEW JURNAL
“SPORT, PHILOSOPHY, AND THE QUEST FOR KNOWLEDGE”
Disusun oleh :
Ardhi Nur Wahid 20060484051/2020B
Fakultas Ilmu Olahraga
Jurusan Pendidikan Kesehatan dan Rekreasi
Universitas Negeri Surabaya
Tahun 2020
3. “Olympía, déspoin’ alatheías” (Olympia, mistress of truth). So begins Pindar’s eighth
Olympian Ode (10: pp. 136–7). The ancient association between Olympia and knowledge
seeking derives partly from the existence of an oracle at the site, but also from the less tangible
sentiment that athletic results from Olympia were reliable indicators of truth about the gods’
wishes and the relative merits of ath
letes and their tribes. There was nothing new or revolutionary in the association of athletics
and truth. Our earliest accounts of sport-like activities (up to a millen nium before the
Olympic Games) among Mesopotamians, Egyptians, Assyrians, Minoans, and Hittites, show
royals using athletic display as public evidence for social standing and worthiness to lead.
Rarely, if ever, though was the worthiness of the ruler actually challenged.2 What was
distinctive about Hellenic athletics and Olympic style contests was that they were
knowledge-seeking, rather than presumption-affirming. Their outcomes were generally
uncertain, they were gov
erned by impartial rules, and they were subject to public scrutiny. As a result, Hellenic
athletics were from the start subversive. But what they subverted specifically were dogmatic
and relativistic standards for truth (i.e., those controlled by worldly rank and power) and
what they promoted were more impar tial and universal standards, capable of settling
disagreements among diverse and even warring tribes. Philosophical inquiry emerges in 6th
century Ionia as an approach to studying nature that has similar characteristics and similar
results. Having encountered competing religious and mythological claims from neighbor ing
cultures, the Presocratic philosophers sought a more impartial and demon strable method of
understanding nature—one that bypassed worldly authority and social hierarchies. The
dreams of athletic glory still harbored by underprivileged youth are evidence that social
subversion remains part of our modern conception of sport. But sport’s power to challenge
social hierarchies faces erosion–as it always has–by those in power who would be subverted.
To preserve sport’s socially subversive function, we must appreciate its connection to
authentic ques tioning, impartial testing, and public display of evidence.
Uncertainty and Authentic Questioning
The Greek term ‘philosophia’, which literally means “love of wisdom” (9: p. 1980),3 seems
to have been coined in the 6th century BCE by Pythagoras, who used it to describe those rare
thinkers, like himself, who acknowledged not their wisdom but rather their ignorance (2: 1.12).
It was of course Socrates who made this conception of philosophy famous by declaring more
than a century later that his renowned “wisdom” derived precisely from the awareness that he
lacked knowledge. We cannot truly love and desire what we think we already possess; so we
are philosophers only as long as we pursue authentic questions with uncertain answers.4 Sport,
likewise, is philosophical only as long as it is actually open to finding answers which may
conflict with what people already believe. The contest must not be designed simply to affirm
the status-quo, or any other preferred out come: it has to reflect the spirit of really wanting to
know. When challengers boxed the pharaoh in Ancient Egypt, the question of who would win
was neither
42 Reid
authentic nor was its answer uncertain. Although such contests were intended to reassure
subjects of the pharaoh’s divine invincibility, they begged their own ques tion. Philosophical
sport begins with authentic questions derived from real uncer tainty about outcomes.5
But where did such “authentic questions” come from? What prompted Preso cratic
philosophy and contemporary athletics as described in Homer and practiced at Olympia to
embrace the uncertain, impartial, and public pursuit of truth? The answer quite simply is:
4. closely competing claims among divergent stakeholders. Mycenean funeral games, perhaps
the earliest form of philosophical sport, settled competing claims to the deceased’s property.
Patroclos’ funeral games as depicted in Homer’s Iliad take this concept further by
negotiating Achilles’ and Agamem non’s competing claims to honor and authority. Later, at
Olympia, the religious puzzle of who should have the honor of lighting the sacrificial flame
came to be solved by a simple footrace from the edge of the sanctuary to the altar.5 And in
6th century Ionia, increased contact among diverse cultural traditions in the absence of
overarching authority prompted the development a more universal method of truth-seeking.6
It shouldn’t be a surprise that the method they invented (now known as philosophy and early
natural science) resembled athletic games, since all were responses to competing truth-
claims.
What was distinctive—and subversive—about the athletic and philosophical methods of
truth-seeking is that the answering of the questions they ask is dele gated to the contest rather
than tradition or authority. In this way they exhibit the characteristically philosophical
quality of uncertainty, or acknowledged igno rance. Although modern sport no longer
addresses questions about religious favor or worthiness to lead, it still negotiates competing
claims to excellence and often decides the distribution of cash, prizes, and educational
opportunities. It is impor tant, therefore, to remain sensitive to the authenticity of our
questions by keeping social presumptions from compromising the integrity of the contest.
The athletic success of marginalized classes and races certainly has helped to subvert
modern social hierarchies, and it is widely recognized that preemptive exclusion of par
ticipants based on class or race runs counter to the logic of philosophical contest. But
exclusion based on sex and inequities derived from financial disparity persist in sport,
drawing little criticism, perhaps because they reflect our presumptions about athletic
excellence. Sport’s ability to subvert social hierarchies requires first that we honor its
philosophical heritage of authentic questioning.
Open and Impartial Testing
The very act of authentic questioning displays intellectual humility with respect to the truth,
but for sport to be philosophical, humility must also be reflected in the construction of the test.
If one’s method for resolving disputes is simply to let the local sovereign decide, or even to
set armies to battle, one hasn’t fully acknowl
edged the limitations of the human mind. Insofar as “truth” is understood as some thing
universal and eternal, knowledge of such truths must be reliable and demon strable; not just a
matter of belief, persuasion, or worldly power (military, political, or otherwise). As
Heraclitus taught us about the river, the world of senses is con stantly in flux;7 if we are to
know something universal we must therefore approach it through reason. This is why the
Pythagoreans sought to understand the kosmos
Sport, Philosophy, and the Quest for Knowledge 43
using impartial criteria such as number and proportion.8 It is also why Olympia’s judges and
organizers (the so-called hellanodikae), enforced contest rules very strictly while rejecting
all subjectively-judged events. Since their goal was to ded icate truly pleasing victors to a
supremely wise god, their own biases and prefer ences couldn’t be allowed to interfere.
Impartial mechanisms for truth-seeking act to neutralize the effects of human fallibility and
worldly bias, providing equal
opportunity for diverse possibilities: athletes, ideas, even hypotheses. The basic features of
Olympic-style sports, such as common starting lines and level playing fields, exhibit the
philosophical drive for rational impartiality. Already in Homer’s Bronze Age, the fair
5. construction of contests is emphasized. In the chariot race, for example, there is no
permanent track, so a common starting line is literally drawn in the sand and the reliable
elder Phoenix is sent off to ref eree the turnaround point. The starting positions are
determined by drawing lots, and when young Antilochos recklessly cuts off Menelaos at a
narrow stream crossing, a dispute erupts over the validity of the results. A serious discussion
and redistribution of prizes ensues until the community is satisfied with the end result. The
Homeric creed “to always be the best and outdo others” (4: 11.784) generated authentic
questions about who was the best. In the context of hand-to-hand combat, the truth of a
warrior’s aretē is important, and contests provided a rela tively impartial mechanism not just
to affirm, but to impartially test it.9 Insofar as the community’s welfare depends on contest
results (whether they are imagined to represent god favor or military prowess), it is essential
to sport’s social and philo sophical functions that contests be constructed and conducted
impartially. Modern sports rules generally respect the principles of impartial
testing; competitors even switch sides in field and court games just in case some advan tage
has slipped through the cracks. On the other hand, the competitive and often greed-fueled
drive to gain any advantage possible sets up an antagonistic relation ship between
competitors and officials that often leaves the purpose of the contest behind. Just as with
scientific experiments, the value of the results depends on the integrity of the test. Not only
must competitors obey the contest rules, officials must meticulously enforce them. The
proliferation of doping in the 1980s and 1990s was due not only to unscrupulous
competitors, but also to financially-inter ested foxes guarding the drug-testing hen house; it
took the establishment of an impartial and independent drug-testing body (WADA) to gain
any real traction on the issue. To be sure a variety of stakeholders can serve their interests
though sport. But the goods that all of us seek—results, revenue, honor, entertainment—
depend for their value ultimately upon the integrity and impartiality of the contest.
Public Display of Evidence
The third characteristic of philosophical sport is public observation of the contest and the effect
this has on their acceptance of the results.10 Rooting for one’s favorite athlete or team is as
much a part of sports as arguing for one’s thesis is part of philosophical inquiry. In neither
practice, however, should the winner be determined by who supports it or even how many
support it. Rather, each candi
date should be subjected to the rational and impartial test before everyone’s eyes. The
public’s interest in accurate results requires that popular opinion defer to
44 Reid
demonstrable evidence. Public demonstration leads to acceptance of contest results by
fostering consensus without appeal to tradition, authority, faith, or violence. Indeed the
unifying and pacifying effects of athletic games were thought to contribute to the Achaean
victory over the Trojans and the Hellenic victory over the Persians. Olympia’s sacred truce
made the Games a rare opportunity for diverse (and often warring) tribes to come together for
a common cause of worship. Intellectuals came to exchange ideas just as boxers came to
exchange blows. Indeed intertribal contact at Olympia fostered the economic development of
trade, as well as the political negotiation of peace.
But getting rivals to agree on anything—even to imagine that they could agree—takes
more than a safe time and place. It takes common interest in a common cause. Since the
worshippers at Olympia had a common interest in selecting victors who would please the
relevant god—they took a common inter
6. est in the validity of contest results. In this regard, nothing was left to chance. A month-long
pre-Olympic training camp was held at Elis under the supervision of holy-men to assure the
worthiness of every candidate. At the Games competitors were literally stripped of their
cultural differences and socially-constructed inequalities and a stadium was built so that
everyone could observe the process. No doubt political rivalries were played out in the Games,
but the public scrutiny facilitated acceptance of the results even when they subverted personal
preference or conventional wisdom. Most important, the cooperation expressed in the
Games paved the way for economic and military cooperation without subjection to a single
authority. Through the use of such mechanisms as blind review and public presentation,
philosophers and scientists engage in a similar kind of competitive cooperation for the
common cause of truth, one ideally independent of power, politics, cultural ideology.
Modern sport is still subject to widespread public scrutiny, albeit increasingly through
the medium of television. What has changed is the influence on the con test of unseen factors
such as doping. In some sports this has eroded public confi dence in the validity of results
and thereby reduced their unifying power. An excellent example is the Tour de France,
which found a winner in Lance Arm strong who was able to unify diverse people in the
common cause of fighting cancer. After Armstrong’s retirement, cycling’s long-term doping
problems were unmasked and the sport has been scrambling to restore its public credibility
and hence its value to sponsors. Even Armstrong harnessed his comeback bid to a respected
dope-testing expert who promised to monitor the champion and place his test results on the
Internet for all to see. Once a sport loses public credibility, its potential for social subversion
dries up. Both the impartiality of the test and the authenticity of the question are drawn into
doubt, and we regress to the pharaoh’s boxing match with its dispassionate and incredulous
spectators. In the modern world, sport remains a worthy way to challenge social hierarchies
and assump tions, but only insofar we values and preserve its ancient philosophical
structure. Sport must be open to authentic questions, secure the impartiality of its tests,
and strive for public transparency in its results.
Sport, Philosophy, and the Quest for Knowledge 45
II. Contests of Virtue: The Educational Function of Ancient Athletics
In Ancient Greece, the social function of athletics was already well-developed by the time that
gymnastics became an integral part of education for excellence (aretē). Confusion abounded
even in Plato’s time about how exercises apparently focused on the body could build the moral
strength we like to call ‘character.’ No doubt it was the youth’s obsession with sports that led
Socrates into Athens’ gym
nasia where he learned and adapted tricks from the athletes’ trade to turn young men’s souls
away from victory and toward wisdom. But this philosophical jour ney, at least for Plato,
does not leave athletics behind. Rather the force of character revealed and developed through
sport seems essential for those who would become philosopher-kings in the Republic. This is
because the body (sōma) was to the ancient mind inanimate. Intentional physical movement
was a product and expres sion of the mind/soul (psychē). The fit athletic body, as a product of
voluntary and intentional movement, is merely testament to the aretē of the soul. Athletics
func tioned within ancient education not merely as physical training, but as a way
to cultivate strong, truth-seeking souls that would ultimately serve their communi ties. Their
goals were not so different from ours; let us observe their methods.
Socratic Contest
It is well known that Socrates turned the natural investigations of the Presocratics toward the
explicitly educational ends of moral philosophy. Less well known are the connections
7. between the Socratic method known as elenchos and athletic con test. Plato’s persistent use
of athletic settings and metaphors is more than literary window-dressing. The Socratic
dialogues exhibit the same characteristics of truth seeking as athletics described above. Like
competitive sport, they expose imper fections, test for improvement, and provide public
evidence of their findings. Socrates adapts this athletic framework, along with its attendant
lust for victory (philonikia), away from the relativistic goal of defeat and toward the
idealistic goals of truth and virtue, that is, philosōphia.
Socrates was put on trial for corrupting the youth by publicly exposing local wise men’s
ignorance. The social subversion already associated with Greek athletics was certainly part of
his aim. Indeed he compares his “labors” in Apology to those of the athletic Heracles, who
liberated the Greeks from onerous monsters and tyrants (22a). But Socrates’ shame game
(indeed the verb for Socratic examination, elenchō, means to disgrace or put to shame) has the
explicitly educational function of motivating Athenian youths to inquire for themselves rather
than pay sophists for gimmicky answers.11 Just as athletes are motivated by losing, or at least
the risk of losing, to spend long hours in training and preparation, Socrates’ disclosure of
ignorance is designed to motivate serious philosophical inquiry. In this sense it is a benefit and
he describes it as a service both to the city and to the god, adding that the city should reward
him like an Olympic victor,
46 Reid
since champions only make the city think itself happier, whereas Socrates offers them a
chance at true happiness (36e).
This idea that agonistic struggle (with its shaming and defeat) can be per ceived as an
educational service remains central to justifications for scholastic athletics today. Socrates’
use of dialectic clearly aims at the improvement of the individual. “You love to win,
Socrates,” says Callicles in Gorgias (515b); it is a charge the philosopher does not deny. But
Socrates is less interested in winning the argument, than he is in winning over his
interlocutors to the practice of phi losophy. He exemplifies–if he doesn’t invent–the
friendship aspect of competi tion, explaining his challenge to Callicles as a test of the soul
analogous to a stone that tests gold (486c).12 Socrates’ elenchos is also described as an
intellectual undressing comparable to athletic nudity and aimed explicitly at psychic improve
ment.13 He insists that everyone participate, chastising the aged Theodorus for refusing to
enter the philosophical conversation by comparing him to a voyeur at a Spartan wrestling
school. Replies Theodorus, “The Spartans tell one either to strip or to go away; but you seem
rather to be playing the part of Antaeus. You don’t let any comer go till you have stripped
him and made him wrestle with you in the argument.” Socrates’ response is telling:
That, Theodorus, is an excellent simile to describe what is the matter with me. But I am
more of a fiend for exercise than Sciron and Antaeus. I have met with many and many a
Heracles and Theseus in my time, mighty men of words; and they have well battered me.
But for all that I don’t retire from the field, so terrible a lust has come upon me for these
exercises. You must not begrudge me this, either, try a fall with me and we shall both be
the better. (Theaetetus 169bc)
Importantly, and unlike today’s scholastic sports, submission of oneself to the contest is
required—but all contestants are expected to benefit, not just the winners.
As philosophers we value the challenge and even refutation of our arguments. Why is
public discourse about the value of failure in sports so rare? Misapprehen sion of athletic
goals—even in educational settings—explains this phenomenon. Colleges and universities
use sports as a means to financial ends and students do the same. Since financial (but not
8. educational) results depend on winning, its pri macy in that environment goes largely
unquestioned. Public risking and losing, on the other hand, the value of which is educational
(but not financial) is generally avoided—and at the expense of moral education.
Struggling With Souls in Plato
In Plato’s Republic, athletics are woven into education explicitly for the purpose of developing
souls capable of philosophy and, eventually, community leadership. The authentic question
here addressed by athletics comes from uncertainty about who should lead. And the role
athletics plays in answering that question is not simply the testing of hypotheses, but the testing
and selection of souls that can withstand the rigors of mathematical and philosophical
education aimed at an understanding of the Good. Plato also expects athletic soul training to
turn
Sport, Philosophy, and the Quest for Knowledge 47
individuals’ interests away from personal pleasure and material wealth in favor of public
service. Indeed the guardians and philosopher kings will not have personal property or
individual families.
The aretē sought in Plato’s Republic is described as the healthful and harmo nious
organization of the intellectual, spirited, and appetitive parts of the soul. Plato seems to think
athletics can achieve this because they require the intellect to apprehend the rules of the
game and then to recruit the spirit and appetite to its cause. In another dialogue, Phaedrus,
this virtuous harmony is illustrated by the athletic metaphor of a two-horse chariot in which
the intellect drives a noble and spirited horse alongside the strong but less obedient
appetitive horse. Since ath letic success depends on the taming of selfish appetites and the
directing of honor or spirit toward the noble ends apprehended by the intellect, sport could
train the soul for higher education and ultimately public service. Significantly, Plato
doesn’t neglect any element of the soul in his account. Appetite and spirit are needed
to climb the arduous path from the cave of appearance to the divine light of truth— and they
prepare for this expedition through athletic competition.
Athletics in the Republic are neither playful nor autotelic. Plato uses them explicitly to
train souls and select a social elite who will go on to distinguish themselves in academics and,
ultimately, public service. Candidates are to be kept “under observation from childhood,” and
subjected to “labors (ponous), pains, and contests (agōnas)” so that they may be tested “more
thoroughly than gold is tested by fire” (413cd). Our modern ideas that sports are a means of
recreation, entertainment, or personal and institutional income are all negated in Republic
by the abandonment of appetitive desires (which include wealth as well as physical pleasure).
Modern scholastic sports, by contrast, are generally pursued for profit and at the expense of
academics and public service. Whereas the primacy of wealth is unquestioned today, in Plato’s
Republic the most prestigious careers are based on public service and require the abandonment
of personal ambitions and often one’s family and property. As seriously as sports are taken in
educational institutions today, I suspect Plato would lament that we don’t take them
seriously enough to put them explicitly and intentionally in the service of our most impor tant
social functions.
Conclusion
Some say that we should look to Rome rather than Greece to see our own athletic values
reflected in antiquity. There, they say, sports were primarily entertainment enjoyed by masses
9. of inactive spectators and exploited by politicians who sought public favor. But even the
bloody spectacle of gladiator fights preserved the truth
seeking and educational functions that connect sport and philosophy. While the Emperor
saluted the Roman spectators, who were seated in tiers according to social class, the contest
itself challenged that hierarchy. It gave the lowly “social ly-dead” gladiator the opportunity
to prove his social worth by prevailing in a publicly observed and strictly regulated test of
relevant virtues. The condemned gladiator who received the wooden sword of freedom from
the emperor as the community shouted its approval stands as an enduring symbol of sport’s
ancestral ties to philosophy.
48 Reid
Today, as philosophers of sport seek to critically examine and improve ath letic
competition in our world, they should remember to recognize the ancient resemblance
between sport and philosophical inquiry. This connection recalls the important social and
educational functions of ancient Greek athletics and it chal lenges us to preserve the integrity
of sport as a knowledge-seeking practice capa ble of serving noble human ends. We should
appreciate sport’s capacity for social subversion as well as its potential for individual
education. This requires the humility to ask authentic questions about hierarchy and
authority and the courage to let the contest answer them impartially without manipulation
from worldly interests and hierarchies. Finally, we need to preserve the public’s confidence
in the results—enforcing the rules of the contest no less rigorously than a scientific study.
After all sport, philosophy, and science all share knowledge-seeking char acteristics. Sport
philosophers may preserve the social and educational value of athletics if we view sport not
just as a form of play, but also as a form of knowl edge seeking—one still capable of serving
social and educational goals, as it did in Ancient Greece.
Notes
1. Huizinga’s conception of play turns out to be so broad that I think he can plausibly
include Greek agōn within it. What we need to avoid is a narrower conception of play that
ultimately denies or ignores sport’s potential (in the ancient or modern world) as an important
educational and political tool.
2. Donald Kyle (8: p. 37) describes these earliest contests as “fields of play on which status was
defined and social orders were (re)constituted.” He notes, however, that competition
was rarely open and equal. Superhuman emperors and Egyptian pharaohs could not risk
losing.
3. Sport,’ by contrast, is a modern term that derives from the Anglo-French desporter,
which means to divert or amuse. This etymological heritage helps to explain the focus on play
in the philosophy of sport literature. In Homo Ludens, Johan Huizinga claims that play is older
than culture itself (5: p. 1). By focusing on Greek athletics, I am not denying this claim, but
rather looking to the intentionally cultural practice of sport.
4. This is how Aristotle (1: 982b12–21) distinguishes the first Ionian philosophers from
the myth-tellers that came before them. He says they believed they were ignorant and
pursued phi losophy to escape that ignorance; preferring reason and evidence to the
traditional faith and storytelling.
5. This is based on a passage in Philostratos (Gym. 5). For the latest on the scholarly
debate over the passage, ser Valavanis (12: pp. 141–5).
6. In fact the Ionian intellectual revolution was based upon political, social, and
religious changes described by Kirk, Raven and Schofield as a transition “away from the
10. closed tradi tional society (which in its archetypal form is an oral society in which the telling
of tales is an important instrument of stability and analysis) and toward an open society in
which the values of the past become relatively unimportant and radically fresh opinions can
be formed both of the community itself and of its expanding environment” (7: p. 74). More
specifically in Ionia this included material wealth and the opportunity for contact with other
cultures such as Sardis and Egypt (7: p. 75).
7. Heraclitus was famous for saying that you can’t step in the same river twice. On the reli
ability of reason, see (3: p. 27).
Sport, Philosophy, and the Quest for Knowledge 49
8. The Milesians sought a single substance underlying all things. The Greek term kosmos,
means not only universe but order. The general idea of Pythagoreanism was to impose order
on disorder. Numerical philosophy emphasized proportion and a common standard by which
all things could be measured/ordered. See (3: p. 106).
9. Says Kyle (8: pp. 56, 68) of the Homeric era: “Contests were a mechanism of status
definition. . . . [In the Odyssey] sport clarifies status relationships (and here ethnicities as
well) and furthers the hero’s reintegration and return to society.
10. This is implied in the common roots of the words agōn (contest) and ‘agora’ (market
place).
11. In addition, in writing aporetic dialogues, mightn’t Plato be attempting to produce the
same effect among his readers? It makes particular sense that Plato should have portrayed
Socrates defeating rival educators in Athens. After all, Plato had his Academy to promote.
12. Since friends are by definition those who seek the benefit or improvement of their
friends, the competitor’s challenge is a form of friendship. See Hyland (1978).
13. This is suggested when Theaetetus is asked to “show himself” for Socrates’
examination (Theaetetus 145b). Socrates then scolds Theodorus for refusing to enter the
conversation, asking him whether it would be right, were he visiting a Spartan wrestling-
school, “to sit and watch other men exercising naked—some of them not much to look at—
and refuse to strip yourself alongside of them, and take your turn of letting people see what
you look like?” (162b).
References
1. Aristotle. “Metaphysics.” In The Complete Works of Aristotle, 2 vols, J. Barnes (Ed.). New
Jersey: Princeton U.P., 1984.
2. Laertius, Diogenes. Lives of Eminent Philosophers, vol. I, translated by R.D.
Hicks. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1972.
3. Hermann, Arnold. To Think Like God. Las Vegas, NV: Paramenides Publishing, 2004.
4. Homer. The Iliad. Trans. Robert Fagles. New York: Penguin, 1990. 5. Huizinga, J. Homo
Ludens: A Study of the Play Element in Culture. Boston: Beacon Press, 1955.
6. Hyland, Drew A. “Competition and Friendship.” Journal of the Philosophy of Sport
V (1978): 27-37.
7. Kirk, Raven, Schofield, G.S., Raven, J.E., and Schofield, M. The Presocratic Philoso
phers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983.
8. Kyle, Donald G. Sport and Spectacle in the Ancient World. Malden, MA:
Blackwell, 2007.
9. Little, W., Fowler, H., and Coulson, J. The Oxford Universal Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford
U.P., 1955.
11. 10. Pindar. Olympian Odes, Pythian Odes. Trans. William H. Race. Cambridge, MA: Har vard
University Press, 1997.
11. Plato. Complete Works. Ed. John M. Cooper. Indianapolis: Hackett, 1997. 12. Valavanis,
Panos. “Thoughts on the Historical Origins of the Olympic Games and the Cult of Pelops in
Olympia.” Nikephoros, 19, 2006, 137–152.
13. 6. Faktanya, revolusi intelektual Ionia didasarkan pada perubahan
politik, sosial, dan agama yang dijelaskan oleh Kirk, Raven dan
Schofield sebagai transisi “menjauh dari masyarakat tradisional
tertutup (yang dalam bentuk pola dasar adalah masyarakat lisan di
mana penceritaan dongeng adalah instrumen penting untuk stabilitas
dan analisis) dan menuju masyarakat terbuka di mana nilai-nilai masa
lalu menjadi relatif tidak penting dan opini-opini segar yang radikal
dapat dibentuk baik dari komunitas itu sendiri maupun tentang
lingkungannya yang berkembang ”(7: p. 74 ). Lebih khusus lagi di
Ionia ini termasuk kekayaan materi dan kesempatan untuk
berhubungan dengan budaya lain seperti Sardis dan Mesir (7: hal 75).
7. Heraclitus terkenal karena mengatakan bahwa Anda tidak dapat
menginjak sungai yang sama dua kali. Tentang reliabilitas alasan,
lihat (3: hlm. 27).
Keunggulan Alat yang digunakan dalam penelitian berupa puisi ini mudah
digunakan oleh subjek penelitian
Kekurangan Menggunakan durasi waktu yang terlalu lama
Memerlukan banyak analisis
14. BAB III
PENUTUP
3.1 Kesimpulan
Saat ini, sebagai filsuf olahraga berusaha untuk memeriksa secara kritis dan
meningkatkan persaingan atletik di dunia kita, mereka harus ingat untuk mengenali
kemiripan kuno antara olahraga dan penyelidikan filosofis. Hubungan ini
mengingatkan fungsi sosial dan pendidikan yang penting dari atletik Yunani kuno dan
itu menantang kita untuk menjaga integritas olahraga sebagai praktik pencarian
pengetahuan yang mampu melayani tujuan kemanusiaan yang mulia. Kita harus
menghargai kapasitas olahraga untuk subversi sosial serta potensinya untuk pendidikan
individu. Ini membutuhkan kerendahan hati untuk mengajukan pertanyaan otentik
tentang hierarki dan otoritas dan keberanian untuk membiarkan kontes menjawabnya
secara tidak memihak tanpa manipulasi dari kepentingan dan hierarki duniawi.
Terakhir, kita perlu menjaga kepercayaan publik terhadap hasil — menegakkan aturan
kontes tidak kurang dari studi ilmiah. Bagaimanapun juga olahraga, filosofi, dan sains
semuanya berbagi karakteristik pencarian pengetahuan. Para filsuf olahraga dapat
mempertahankan nilai sosial dan pendidikan atletik jika kita memandang olahraga tidak
hanya sebagai bentuk permainan, tetapi juga sebagai bentuk pencarian pengetahuan —
yang masih mampu melayani tujuan sosial dan pendidikan, seperti yang terjadi di
Yunani Kuno.
3.2 Saran
Sebagai penulis saya menyadari bahwa masih banyakkekurangan di dalammakalah ini.
Untuk kedepannya penulis akan menjelaskan secara detail dari sumber yang lebih
banyak.
DAFTAR PUSTAKA
Reid, H. L. (2009). Sport, Philosophy, and the Quest for Knowledge. Journal of the
Philosophy of Sport, 40-49.
