Anaximander was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher who lived in Miletus, a city of Ionia.
Не was the first who proposed transcendental and dialectical approach to the Nature and new level of conceptual abstraction in philosophy. He asserted that physical forces, rather than supernatural means, create order in the universe.
It is neither water nor any other elements that are not first principles. At the core of all lies "apeiron"- ("unbounded" or "indefinite") - a infinite, non-perceivable substance from which arise all the heavens and the multiple worlds within them.
“Apeiron” had always existed, filled all space embraced everything and, by its constant motion, separated opposites out from itself, e.g., hot and cold, moist and dry. The opposing state are under a general framework, being concentrated in a certain uniform, from which they are singled out.
Anaximander never defined the apeiron precisely, and it has generally (for instance by Aristotle and St. Augustine) been understood as a sort of primal chaos. This concept is similar in some respects to the "abyss" found in Eastern cosmogonies.
The first version of law of conservation of energy. “Apeiron” directed the movement of things, by which there grew up a host of shapes and differences. These multiple forms return to the indefinite, into the vague immensity from which they had issued. It is the infinitive process of genesis and dissolution, which works inexorably through the ages.
Cosmology. He asserted that Earth remained unsupported at the centre of the universe because it had no reason to move in any direction.
He discover the obliquity of the ecliptic, is said to have introduced into Greece the gnomon (for determining the solstices), celestial globe and the sundial.
Cosmogony. He suggested that universes come into existence from an ageless and eternal reservoir, into which they are eventually reabsorbed.
He also anticipated the theory of evolution. He said that man himself and the animals had come into being by like transmutations and adaptation to environment.
Theory of Multiple worlds. He first proposed the theory of Multiple worlds and he attributes different gods to the countless worlds.
His view that man achieved his physical state by adaptation to environment, that life had evolved from moisture, and that man developed from fish.
He said that the earth is cylindrical in form, and that its depth is as a third part of its breadth.
Anaximander was the first of the Greeks who drew a map of the Earth.
First coined the term "law" by applying the concept of social practice to the nature and science.
He was the first who laid the foundation of dialectical concepts of the follow philosophy - the law of "unity and struggle of opposites”. Thus apeyron by vorticose process is divided into physical opposites of hot and cold, wet and dry.
According to Themistius, he was the "first of the known Greeks to publish a written document on nature."
His Notable ideas:
-The apeiron is the first element, principle and the arche.
- Multiple worlds.
- The "Boundless" as Principle.
- Evolutionary view of living things.
- Earth floats unsupported.
- Mechanical model of the sky.
- Water of rain from evaporation.
He was a pupil and companion of Thales and the second master of Milesian school where he counted Anaximenes and Pythagoras amongst his pupils.
Anaximander is said to have taken part in the founding of Apollonia on the Black Sea and to have traveled to Sparta.
He was also involved in the politics of Miletus and was sent as the legislator of the Milesian colony to Apollonia on the Black Sea coast (now Sozopol, Bulgaria).
Little of his life and work is known today. He seems to have been a much-traveled man. He displayed solemn manners and wore pompous garments.