In Plato’s Phaedrus, the Egyptian god of writing offers King Thamus writing as a “remedy” (“pharmakon”) that can help memory. Thamus refuses the gift on the grounds that it will only create forgetfulness: for him, it is not a remedy for memory itself, but merely a way of reminding. Writing is thus a “poison” (“pharmakon”). The word "pharmakon" meant both the disease and its cure to the ancient Greeks.
The word "pharma" is derived from the world "pharmakon"
