All of westerly philosophy , write the British mathematician and philosopher Alfred North Whitehead , is"a series of footnotes to Plato . " The ingeniousGreekphilosopher , who started as a youthful fan of Socrates , put the groundwork for more than two millennia of philosophical thought process . Plato ’s " dialogues , " including " Republic , " are required reading for every serious scholar of philosophy , and his Academy in Athens set the example for the modern university .
So , who was this gentleman’s gentleman ?
Plato of Collytus was deliver around 428 B.C.E. in the waning day of the Golden Age of Athens . He metSocratesas a youth and was a close follower of the provocative street philosopher , who discombobulate politician and prostitutes alike with his unrelenting questions , now known as the Socratic method .
Plato was around 20 when Athens lost the disastrous Peloponnesian War to rivalSparta(he served brieflyin it ) . After considering a career in politics , Plato grew disenchanted by tainted loss leader and the tragic writ of execution of Socrates , his hero and mentor . Plato came to believe that only " right philosophy " could cease human suffering and ascertain justice .
Plato turned his energies to pedagogy , analyze underPythagorean mathematiciansand traveling through Sicily , Italy and Egypt . In his former 30s , he render to Athens and base his academy in an open - air orchard . overt to Isle of Man and women , it drew the best and brightest from the Greek - speaking existence — include a young Aristotle — to learn math and natural philosophical system .
Plato never married or had any children . He pass in his former 80s but lives on in his captivating prose and sentiment - provoking dubiousness , recorded in 30 lively and challenging talks .
What’s Inside the Dialogues?
Reading one of Plato ’s dialogues is like eavesdropping on a gripping and roll conversation . The dialogue are constructed like intellectual dramas with Socrates often playing the main role . In them , Socrates tauntingly interrogates and plies answer out of his fellow Athenians , unveil the elusiveness of dim-witted truths .
Plato ’s other dialog are heavily indebted to Socrates , who left no composition of his own , but Plato ’s own idea emerge in middle and after works . Like Socrates , though , Plato does n’t beat the referee over the head word with his philosophy , but opt an collateral approach that tasks the proofreader with drawing his or her own ending .
" In his dialogues , Plato does n’t say , ' Here are the answers and here are the reasons — admit them on my authority , ' " saysEric Brown , a philosophy professor at Washington University in St. Louis . " Plato want to inspire people to do philosophy and guess it through for themselves . The dialog do that . They leave alone a lot of open motion . They do n’t settle everything . I think that ’s one of the reasons why Plato has determine so many lecturer over the centuries . He leaves a lot of work for the reader to do , which perchance we find inspiring . "
If Plato could be said to have a central doctrine , it ’s the concept of " forms , " the idea that the world we perceive with our physical Mary Jane is blemished , but there also exists a disjoined globe of perfect , eonian forms beyond our perception . Those perfect forms are abstract nonpareil like sweetheart , equality , goodness , being and cognition .
This core philosophy is called Platonism , and philosophers who have ascribed to it over the millennia are recognize as Platonists .
" Platonism is the idea that there are Truth , causes or principles that are abstract , not available to feel perception , but only to opine , " allege Brown . " And that when we get at these , we ’re in a better berth to understand the way the existence is , and in a near position to live a good life . "
“Symposium” and “Republic”
There are so many first-class dialogues , including " Symposium " and " Phaedo . " " Symposium " discusses love , including " Platonic love " ( a term Plato never used by the way ) , which , is far more nuanced than just a nonsexual relationship . Plato distinguishes between Divine Eros and Vulgar Eros . Divine Eros is a love that run beyond forcible attraction ( Vulgar Eros ) to Supreme Beauty or makes one think of spiritual things . Meanwhile , " Phaedo " explored the nature of the soul . However , the most - read of Plato ’s works is undoubtedly " Republic . "
" It covers so much land , " says Brown . " You get a little of Plato ’s intellection about political science , a little bit about the soul , about what it is to live a ripe living , what it is to understand the existence . How it is to instruct and what teaching really is . "
In " Republic , " Plato put ahead a number of bluff proposals , let in the claim that the idealistic city would be ruled by a year of virtuous manlike and distaff philosopher - King . Brown thinks that Plato is clearly trying to bear on his reader ' philosophical buttons .
" ' Republic’was plainly written to be provocative , " says Brown . The estimate that no metropolis is well - governed unless it ’s ruled by a philosopher — it ’s nutty . "
The Allegory of the Cave
One of the most bright and abiding passages in " Republic " is Socrates ' extendedallegory of the cave . In the allegory , a group of captives are chain up inside a dismal cave get down only by faint firelight . Their only knowledge of the outside earthly concern are the shadows that act on the cave wall and disordered bits of echoed conversation .
One of the captive cope to escape and discovers there ’s an intact reality outside of the cave . The brightness of the sun burns his eyes , but the pain is worth knowing the true statement . When he returns to the cave and offers to free his fellow captives , they mock his interpretation of their beloved shadows and resolve to kill him .
Here again , Plato is returning to his whim of truth existing out of doors of our limited perception . Brown believes that the cave fable is specifically talk about the straight nature and function of education .
" Real education is not being fill with information . It ’s a transformation of your mortal , a reorientation of your values , " says Brown . " For Plato , when you finish taking the world as it seems to you , and when you intercept believing other mass ’s judgement on what ’s valuable , and you get searching for what ’s beyond those mere appearance , that ’s when you ’re being educated . "
Plato’s Legacy
Brown teach Plato every semester at Washington University and says that students continue to have their mind open up by Plato ’s dialogues , which challenge lector to wrestle with some of the freehanded motion — how to have it off and how to go .
" He asks questions that are still worth asking , " says Brown . " And he need them in an engaging and provocative way that ’s still one of the unspoilt literary representations of how to do philosophy or get into doing philosophy . For those two reasonableness , he will always weigh . "
