[Previously published on Medium.com, June, 2023]
One of the many fascinating adventures of Odysseus in Homer’s Odyssey is his encounter with the Sirens. The Sirens have the appearance of beautiful women but are half-bird. They sing, and their song is so compelling that men are irresistibly drawn toward them. In the Odyssey they are situated on rocks in the ocean. Men coming towards them on boats would have their boats smashed on the rocks and drown. The Sirens were counterparts to the Muses. While the Muses inspired greatness in music and poetry, the Sirens’ songs led to death.
Odysseus came up with a clever scheme to get his ship past the Sirens while getting to hear their song. He sealed the ears of his sailors with wax so that they would be unable to hear the Sirens. He had his sailors tie him firmly to his ship’s mast so that he would be unable to move.
On the surface, this story seems to be a cautionary tale about the influence beautiful women can have over men. This, however, is not what the story is about. Cicero tells us the true meaning of the story in De Finibus V.18:
…it was not the sweetness of their voices or the novelty and diversity of their songs, but their professions of knowledge that used to attract the passing voyageurs; it was the passion for learning that kept men rooted to the Sirens’ rocky shores. Homer was aware that his story would not sound plausible if the magic that held his hero immeshed was merely an idle song! It is knowledge that the Sirens offer, and it was no marvel if a lover of wisdom held this dearer than his home.
The allure of the Sirens was not how beautiful they were and how lovely was their singing. The lyrics to their songs contained claims that they knew everything that had happened to the Greeks and Trojans during and since the war. They promised those who would come to them that they could learn of all things that had come to pass on earth.
Another encounter with the Sirens occurs in the Argonotica in which Jason and the argonauts must also get their ship safely past the Sirens. Their trick for sailing past the Sirens is that they have brought Orpheus along with them. Orpheus is the greatest musician to have ever lived. When the argonauts start to hear the Sirens, Orpheus takes up his lyre and sings even more loudly and beautifully than they do. Holding the argonauts’ attention, Orpheus guides the ship past the danger of the Sirens.
The Argonotica was an epic poem composed by Apollonius of Rhodes in the 3rd Century BCE. Apollonius was influenced by the philosophical debates of his time, and inserted philosophical issues into the Argonotica. According to Dee Clayman in her book, Timon of Phlius: Pyrrhonism into Poetry (pp 187–200), the Argonautica heavily sources themes from Pyrrhonism in such a way that it appears to be a subtle parody of the philosophy. The poem repeatedly puts the characters into aporia (a state of puzzlement) and they fall into a chronic mental paralysis in decision-making that parodies epoche (a state of mind in which judgment is suspended). The poem’s description of Medea’s experience in trying to decide what to do for or about Jason is presented as a tetralemma — a form of logical reasoning seldom encountered in ancient Greek philosophy but used by Pyrrho. Nearly all of the decisions made by the characters follow the Pyrrhonist criteria of action rather than assuming, as is commonly done, that there’s some way of knowing truth. Characters consistently say how things appear rather than how things are. Ataraxia is parodied as apathy.
The encounter with the Sirens turns out to also be about Pyrrhonism. One of the techniques Pyrrhonists use to induce epoche is to set up counter-arguments of equal strength. Hence, the song of Orpheus is set up as a counter to the song of the Sirens. Of course, in the poem it is not of perfectly equal strength, but it is all Oprheus can do to out-sing the Sirens. Even then one of the argonauts finds the Siren’s song more compelling, and jumps overboard to swim to them.
Epic poetry in ancient Greece was used to deliver moral training in the form of stories. Ancient writers such as Diogenes Laertius considered Homer to be a philosophical forerunner of Pyrrho. So, of course, there’s moral instruction encoded into these tales of the Sirens.
As Aristotle pointed out in the first line of his Metaphysics, “all men by nature desire to know.” The ancient Greeks who came before Aristotle believed, however, that only the gods had knowlege. What mere mortals were left with was just appearances — shadows of the real. Plato describes this in his famous Allegory of the Cave.
The moral Homer and Apollonius give us is that this desire for knowledge puts us in danger of hubris. That’s why “know thyself” — the first maxim inscribed on the entrance to the Temple of Apollo at Delphi — the sacred sanctuary of the Delphic Oracle — is immediately followed by two other maxims which together form a poem. The second maxim is “nothing to excess,” and the third maxim is “firm commitment brings ruin nearby.”
The desire for knowledge tends towards excess. Firm commitment to what is believed to be knowledge invites ruin.
The Sirens promise more knowledge than a human could ever grasp. A commitment to pursuing the knowledge promised by the Sirens leads to assured ruin.
Homer gives a primate solution: seal up your ears and commit to ignorance. Accept your mortal limitations. Do not be seduced by promises that you can have what is reserved for the gods.
Appalonius gives a more sophisticated Pyrrhonist solution: balance out the allure of any belief with an alternative. Don’t commit firmly to either.
Having just read the Odyssey for the umpteenth time and the Argonautica for the first time, I had noticed these differences, too. However, not having had the benefit of reading Dee Clayman's book yet, I didn't perceive the Pyrrhonian influence on Apollonius. Thanks for pointing this out! BTW, you might have an interest in an epic poem I've started composing about Pyrrho: https://stpeter.im/writings/pyrrho/
I wonder if the problem isn't so much the desire for knowledge, or the exposure to it, but rather the mistake of thinking you know something for certain. That's where the ruinous mistakes come from.
"The desire for knowledge tends towards excess. Firm commitment to what is believed to be knowledge invites ruin."