From the book
Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II
Empedocles of Acragas · Diotimos Editions · 2026
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At a Glance
- The wordPhaion denotes a grey or dusky colour; meikta means mixed, opposed here to simple colours.
- In this workTheophrastus grants, for the sake of argument, that a sight made of fire and its opposite could recognize white and black by likes.
- In this editionThe commentary's claim that mixed colours “match nothing” is a reconstruction of Theophrastus's objection.
- A place to readMakes grey and mixed colours the counterexample to the reported two-channel account.
Meaning
Phaion denotes a grey or dusky colour; meikta means mixed, opposed here to simple colours. This vocabulary concerns perceived appearances. It is distinct from glauka, the grey or light-coloured eyes discussed by Aristotle.
Use in the book
Theophrastus grants, for the sake of argument, that a sight made of fire and its opposite could recognize white and black by likes. He then asks how it recognizes grey and other mixed colours. The account gives them neither fire-passages nor water-passages nor common passages made from both. Yet their perception is no less evident than that of the simple colours.
The argument does not preserve an independent Empedoclean classification of every intermediate hue. It identifies an apparent gap in the reported sensory mechanism and names grey as a decisive counterexample. Nor does Aëtius's separate list of four colours automatically answer it: naming red and yellow does not explain how a mixed colour enters or is recognized by the specified channels. The article therefore records a problem of explanatory coverage rather than inventing missing receptors or blend proportions.
Places to read
- A 86 §§ 16–17 (polemical)Theophrastus, On the Senses 17. Makes grey and mixed colours the counterexample to the reported two-channel account.
- A 92 (testimony)Aëtius. Provides a four-colour list without supplying the missing mixed-colour mechanism.
Translation in this edition
The commentary's claim that mixed colours “match nothing” is a reconstruction of Theophrastus's objection. The surviving text says the account assigns no appropriate passages; it does not prove every possible Empedoclean explanation impossible.