Many of us Dopers often bust myths for other people. When urban legends are spread, we’re there to strike them down. Now, urban legends are just a modern variation of traditional folklore. Stories of this kind (if not exactly these stories) have been told since the beginning of humanity, I’d wager.
So, my question is this (and there might not be a factual answer, but I’ll give it a shot): When Julius, Lucius and Septimus were discussing sea monsters and Furies, did Publius raise his voice to proclaim the stories untrue? Were guys like us around back then?
Certainly there were. Plato has Socrates argue against the existence of fabulous creatures in one of his dialogues. Lucretius tries to explain away fabulous creatures as mixed-up optics in his De Rerum Natura.
But the overall best is Lucian’s piece on “Alexander the Miracle Monger”. He gives a wonderfully detailed critique of a Graeco-Roman “miracle worker” that’s worthy of today’s CSICOP, describing in detail how he achieved his miracles and scams. I have a copy of the Penguion translation, which I think is out of print, but the Loeb Classical Library still publishes an edition.
There’s apparently some corroboration for the existence of Alexander. Apparently they’ve found some tokens from his "shrine. Lucian claims that Alexander’s bouncers tried to have him “whacked”, and it may have been true.
There certainly were people in the past who questioned or doubted myths and received wisdom. The Epicureans, for instance, openly claimed that the myths were all fictional (check out Lucian of Samostrata’s satire “The Dialogue of the Gods”, for example), and if you remember, one of the things Socrates was put to death for was doubting the existance of the gods.
There are really a lot of examples of people throughout history who questioned or challenged conventional wisdom.
It was the Phaedrus of Plato, and what Socrates says is that “the wise” discount such myths, but that he himself really doesn’t have the leisure to look into it. He doesn’t really say he believes or disbelieves, essentially holding that the truth of these things is unimportant. He does indicate that the educated didn’t take it seriously, though.
Similar statements appear in Athernaeus’ deipnosophists, Lucian’s Hermotimus, Plutarch’s Moralia, Strabo’s Geography, and Galen’s De Placidutis Hippocrateis et Platonis. I think they’re all quoting or paraphrasing Plato.
Pausanias, in his Guide to Greece, is a regular spoilsport. He tries to rationalize every myth that he describes the locations of. For him, Medusa was a queen whom Perseus defeated. Daedalus and Icarus didn’t invent wings to fly from Crete – they invented sailboats, and Icarus fell overboard. And so on.
I just found this online, and it’s wonderful. Lucian was definitely the Amazing Randi of his day. I love the part where he submits sealed questions to Alexander, who will supposedly be able to divine answers without opening the packets (a la Carnac the Magnificent).
The equivalent of Cecil in 17th century England was Sir Thomas Browne
“Pseudodoxia Epidemica , a mouthful of a title, can be translated as “popular misconceptions”, or, as it was commonly known in its own time, “vulgar errors”. A detailed examination of folk-beliefs and superstitions, “wisdom” handed down from the ancient authorities, and curiosities in natural philosophy, the book was Thomas Browne’s contribution to the scientific project of the seventeenth century whichFrancis Bacon inaugurated in 1605 with The Advancement of Learning.”