My personal interest in philosophy has long been fluctuating, as it seems to me that whatever the accomplishments of philosophy across the

centuries, many dimensions of human existence had either been ignored or described in depleted form. I, therefore, would reflect upon the allegory of the cave applying in the opposite direction, the shackles being religion and its egotistical beliefs based upon mythology holding people back from seeing the reality of the world around them. Its difficult for people to throw off the chain of their previous beliefs and accept the world as real; the identity crises they go through in the process and the brainwashing they must endure. In Heraclituss problem of change, Heraclitus's main contribution to philosophy is his thought that there is unity in diversity. Reality is one and many at the same time. There is identity in difference. Changes from day to night and from summer to winter show the predominance of one kind of matter over another, but only for a time. We all experience change and yet in some sense we remain the same. So there must be some unity beneath the changes. The world is an everlasting fire taking on new matter and giving off new matter. The world remains stable because equal measures of matter go into and out of existence. In Parmenidess contravention, I reflected that the perception of movement and change is an illusion and says that everything that is, has always been and will ever be, since it can always be thought and spoken of. The essence of this argument is: If you speak or think of something, the word or thought relates to something that actually exists, that is both thought and language require objects outside themselves, otherwise they would be inconceivable. Parmenides assumes a constant meaning of words and concludes from there that everything always exists and that there is no change, for everything can be thought of at all times.

Benjie J. Cartajenas