Zeno of Elea Zeno of Elea (zēˈnō, ēˈlēə) [key], c.490–c.430
B.C., Greek philosopher of the Eleatic school. He undertook to
support in his only known work, fragments of which are extant,
the doctrine of Parmenides by demonstrating that motion and
multiplicity are logically impossible. The substance of his
argument against multiplicity was that a whole must be composed
of ultimate indivisible units, or it must be divisible ad
infinitum. If the whole is divisible ad infinitum, there is a
contradiction involved in the assumption that an infinite number
of parts can be added up to a finite total. The essence of his
argument against motion was that a moving body can never come to
the end of a line, as it must first cover half the line, then
half the remainder, and so on ad infinitum. The thrust of these
arguments was to demonstrate, through logical reasoning, the
error of common-sense notions of time and space. According to
Aristotle, Zeno was the first to employ the dialectical method.
Contemporary philosophers an