It is the sophists, with Protagoras in the lead, who are the true precursors of modern thought; they are the "thinkers" properly so-called, in the sense that they limited themselves to reasoning and were hardly concerned with "perceiving" and taking into account that which "is". And it is a mistake to see in Socrates, Plato and Aristotle the fathers of rationalism, or even of modern thought generally; no doubt they reasoned − Shankara and Ramanuja did so as well − but they never said that reasoning is the alpha and omega of intelligence and of truth, nor a fortiori that our experiences or our tastes determine thought and have priority over intellectual intuition and logic, quod absit.