Philosophical Views of Plato - Essay Example

?Running Head: PLATO Plato Plato Introduction Biography Plato was Socrates' most famous Born of aristocratic origins (c.428 BC), Plato's mother descended from Solon's brother and his father was from the line of the King of Codrus (Jaspers, 1962). Plato met Socrates in 408 B.C. and studied with him until the teacher died in 399 B.C. It does not appear from Plato's own writings that he was particularly intimate with Socrates, and he cannot have been more than twenty-nine years old when he saw the teacher for the last time. In about his fortieth year Plato is said to have left Athens to study with Pythagoras at Crotona. Plato was perhaps the only Pythagorean whose work and teachings are known today. Traveling to Syracuse, Plato met Dionysius I and became friends with his brother­ in-law, Dion, who later became his follower (Jaspers, 1962). After leaving Italy Plato traveled to Egypt, Cyrene, Judea and to the banks of the Ganges. It was said that his mind became a treasure house of the world's wisdom (Thomas & Thomas, 1941). But it was Socrates to whom Plato remained devoted all his life. Plato returned to Athens in 386 to start his Academy, which he patterned after Pythagoras' school in Crotona. Here he immortalized the mental prowess of his master, Socrates, presenting Socratic ideas in the form of dialogues though the mouth of his teacher. He gave us a fair picture of Socrates but little of himself, so that it is hard to tell when Socrates leaves off and Plato takes over. When Plato was sixty (c. 368) Aristotle, then twenty, joined the Academy and continued as Plato's primary student for the next twenty years, until Plato's death in 347 BC. Personal Opinion Merely recalling the name of Plato brings instant and complete admiration in most educational circles. As Alfred North Whitehead put it, it seems that all of Western history is a series of footnotes to Plato. Plato took the liberty of giving his personal philosophy through the mouth of Socrates. The two seem inseparable. Socrates is known to us because Plato took the time to write down the story of his teacher. Everything we know of Socrates was written by Plato. There is no way to know where Socrates' thinking stops and Plato's begins. Body Influences on Plato Plato's early life and writings were very much influenced by Socrates. Plato's beginning works reflected Socrates' thinking, and perhaps ideas that came to him as Socrates was speaking, but which Socrates himself never uttered. As time passed the words of the teacher appeared to reflect the original thinking of the student. In time Socrates became a secondary character, then finally disappeared altogether in Laws (Jaspers, 1962). Plato and Socrates are distinct in some aspects. They approached life in two utterly different ways. Socrates walked the streets of Athens verbally proclaiming his message while Plato lived in seclusion, away from the evils of society. Socrates was bound to Athens; Plato remained an Athenian but was on his way to becoming a cosmopolitan; he was capable of living and working outside of his native city. Socrates philosophized in the immediate present, Plato indirectly, through his works and the school he founded. Socrates remained in the market place, Plato withdrew to the Academy with a chosen few. Socrates did not write a line, Plato left a monumental work (Jaspers, 1962, p. 121). On their darker sides, the two philosophers shared an acceptance of homosexual attraction between adult males and their young male students that most would not agree with today. In his Symposium Plato creates an argument for homosexual love for boys. He suggests that some men are meant to pursue heavenly love and some earthy love. Those who look to heaven are more attracted to boys than to women. Why? Because boys are mentally keener, more beautiful, thus closer to the realm of perfection. According to Plato, loving boys is a means of acquiring wisdom. But also necessary to the pursuit of perfection, according to Socrates and Plato, is the exercising of restraint. We start by gazing upon and being overwhelmed by beautiful boys. From this we can go on to contemplate beautiful souls and pursuits (like the fascination of the quest for knowledge). As we do so, we start to realize that it is not the particular beautiful thing which attracts us, but the ele­ment in which they all participate, the Form of Beauty or the Good. So, finally, having restrained ourselves in the physical (genital) realm, we come to be rewarded by what is almost literally a philosophical orgasm. As in the physical world, at the moment of climax we get a real sense of oneness with everything (Ruse, 1988, p. 181). While early Greeks accepted homosexual relationships between men and boys, the later Greek cities wrote laws to protect boys from these affairs. Some scholars have wondered if, when Socrates was put to death for "corrupting the youth" he might actually have been accused of having relations with young boys. In his writings Plato goes to great lengths to portray Socrates exercising restraint in his relationships with boys (Dover, 1978), perhaps in an effort to clear his teacher's reputation. Plato openly admits to his own attraction to boys, though he leaves the reader with the impression that he also preferred to practice restraint (Ruse, 1988). Plato's Writings & Philosophy Plato believed that there exists an ideal world in which everything is true and pure. As a corollary he believed that the world in which humans live on earth, the phenomenal world, is but a poor representation of this ideal world. The world we live in is in a continual state of becoming, as those who live in it strive to become more congruent with the ideal world, which is perfect. Plato shared with his teachers Pythagoras and Socrates a belief in reincarnation. He held that individuals can know this ideal world because at death they return to it. Some of what they experience there can be recollected upon their return to incarnation. The individual carries the memory of the ideal with her always, and this memory can be recollected under the right circumstances. In an effort to illustrate his theory of the ideal world, Plato constructed his allegory of the cave. His premise is that while one is in the phenomenal world, one doesn't perceive the true images of things, but rather the illusions, or shadows, of things. Through education one can come to know the true nature of things and progress toward the light of knowledge (Lewis, 1981). In Plato's cave people are sitting as prisoners, chained and facing the wall of the cave, not able to see the light of the sun, which is outside their experience. They are able to see only the shadows of whatever passes by. The people, though they don't realize it, are being held in "chains" not by any outer force, but by the force of their own illusions. Occasionally a prisoner will become free of his chains and begin to move toward the entrance to the cave. Upon seeing the intense brightness of the sun (the light, or truth, of the ideal world) he will be blinded and will have to hide his eyes. Repeated exposure to the light (truth) will help him become accustomed to it. Once accustomed to its brilliance, the freed man will prefer the true light to the murky shadows of the cave (Lewis, 1981). According to Plato, mortals who are uneducated and who derive all that they know through their senses are like the chained prisoners in the dark cave. Learning begins to release people's chains, making these learners progress toward the light of knowledge. As they progress toward this light, they are learning to rely not so much on their senses, by which they can see only images, but they are able to conceptualize the real truth of things. Finally, after many decades of learning, they will be able to see the sun itself, which for Plato was the allegorical equivalent of the light of truth that illumines his ideal world (Lewis, 1981). Naturally the brightness of the forms that exist in the ideal world, which Plato called the "forms of the good," are so satisfying that those able to reach this level of awareness will want to continue forever to savor learning and philosophy in the brightness of this light. But some -the philosophers and teachers- must return to the sensory world of the cave in order to help lead other captives out of their self-imposed darkness. In the Republic Plato put forth his concept of the perfect community which he attempted to pattern after a community he believed exists in the world of ideals. Plato conceived of a state which is ruled by three social classes: the rulers-the philosopher kings and legislators of the state-who were to be men and women of wisdom trained in philosophical reasoning. the warriors, or men and women of courage who defended the state from foreign enemies and citizens who broke the law. the artisans, who were the masses. Their obligation would be to exercise self­ control over their appetites and to hold their bodies ready for obedient service. They would be required to obey the laws and abide by the rules. These artisans would manufacture all the goods for the state. Plato believed that each person was born with inherent qualities which he equated with the metals gold, silver and brass or iron. Birth did not determine which qualities one would inherit, so a gold parent might give birth to a silver child or a brass parent might give birth to a gold child. These inherent qualities related mainly to mental development and ability. Those who were of brass were relegated to the artisan class, silver to the warrior class and gold to the ruling class (Plato, 1986). All three classes had a duty to work for the common good, and each person was to stay within his or her own class for life. For just as you would not give to a carpenter the work of a cobbler and vice versa, so you would not give to an artisan the work of a warrior or ruler (Plato, 1986). Plato, believing that the greatest burden upon men was the constant struggle between these classes, designed his educational system to keep people from class conflict by restricting them to their given classes. All children in Plato's state were to be raised in common. There were no families per se for citizens of Plato's State; children and wives were held in common. He also promoted selective breeding; in order to breed the best children, the ruling class would mate only with those who had their same attainment. Children would be reared and educated by the state. The first course of instruction was in music and gymnastics. This instruction was to promote inner harmony and outer fitness. Plato considered music essential in the development of each citizen and the maintenance of the state. "Music -and to Plato music meant all harmony, whether audible or not- is the underlying principle which keeps the world from falling into disjointed chaos. It is the soul of the universe…" (Thomas & Thomas, 1941, p.12). Besides physical gymnastics, Plato's school for citizens would offer opportunity for mental gymnastics; children would compete with each other in the exchange of ideas. Plato believed that by the time the youth reached twenty years of age the state would be able to assess their development to determine which students appeared to be incapable of further education. These students would be weeded out and relegated into the lowest class to become, for instance, farmers, laborers or business people. Those who were left after the lower classes were weeded out were given instruction in the sciences, i.e., arithmetic, geometry and astronomy. When they reached the age of thirty there would be a second weeding out and those who were deemed incapable of further instruction would be assigned to the warrior class (Thomas & Thomas, 1941). Only those of superior mental ability would be permitted to continue their education in philosophy. These would be groomed to become the philospher/kings, rulers and legislators in the ideal State (Thomas & Thomas, 1941). In analyzing Plato's concept of the ideal world state and it's means of educating the populous, one begins to note some conflicts between his ideal and some of the other educational concepts he advocates. The problem with Plato's educational system is that once a young adult has been "classed," there is no way that that individual can make a creative leap beyond his class. This leaves one in doubt as to whether Plato believed that every person has the innate capacity to transcend himself, to fulfill his current level of understanding or ability to perform and then to move beyond his own and other's preconception of his potential. Additionally, his system of rulership presupposes that no one outside of the virtually arbitrary group called "rulers" is qualified to rule. Plato sets rational intelligence as the standard for those in the gold class, and ignores other forms of intelligence like intuition or social intelligence also important in those who lead. Other Works and Contributions Plato's educational interests are explicit in the Republic and Laws, and education is generally recognized as a key topic in the Protagoras, Meno, Euthydemus, and Gorgias. Furthermore, Plato's allegory of the cave is an excellent illustration of the power of one's personal experience in learning. It reminds us that people are bound (chained) to their level of perception (cave) by what they have seen and experienced (shadows on the wall) and the way they interpret and analyze what they experience. Even when someone tries to tell an individual the "truth," it will remain irrelevant to the person until such time as he or she has a personal experience with that truth. The person may accept it because it came from the mouth of one who is respected (i.e., the teacher), but it will remain just another illusion, theory or concept-the shadow of the real concept-until the person's experience bears it out. In addition, Plato's real lasting influence came from the Neo-Platonic movement founded in the third century by Plotinus. Platonism became Neoplatonism, and the influence of this movement lasted for over a thousand years. In the Renaissance, the Florentine Academy honored Plato as the man who was both philosopher and priest. Later Kepler and Galileo credited their interest in the modem mathematical science of nature to Plato. And in the new world the dialogues of Plato provided for Ben Franklin a model for how men should discourse with one another that helped lay the foundations of American public life. Plato's educational theories have had enormous impact, as many educators have tried to inculcate parts of them into their systems. But several aspects seem to conflict with what he taught in his allegory of the cave, that the goal of learning is to eventually crawl out of the cave of limitation into ultimate freedom. His own educational design seems limiting as compared with this illustration. The concepts of the necessity of staying within one's class, and of selective breeding, suggest the creation of what some might term a "power elite" society. During Plato's lifetime he became a link in a chain of philosophers who got their names and calling from Pythagoras. In Plato's academy, philosophy became a way of life, a living process. The Academy became a meeting place for independent thinkers from all over Greece. They came to engage in "dialogues." It is likely that the Socratic dialogues are idealized versions of the conversations that took place at the Academy. Criticism Since Plato's Socrates first suggested that philosophers should become kings in Book V of the Republic, political theorists have questioned the relationship between philosophy or reason on the one hand, and the conduct of practical and political affairs on the other. By suggesting that there are objective truths according to which our lives should be ordered, Plato raised the central question of rationalism that still holds relevance today: that is, the extent to which our lives may be adequately guided by our reason. Throughout his philosophy Plato intimates the existence of objective or eternal truths; but these remain for Plato always either assumed or asserted, rather than proven. The question of whether or not the failure to find eternally valid answers to our deepest questions means they are by nature unattainable has created a challenge whose influence is felt, whether positively or negatively, throughout almost all subsequent Western philosophy. The positive response to this challenge was best expressed by the thinkers of the Enlightenment who maintained that truth is attainable, and human reason progressive in its ability to contribute to the achievement of this end. While in some periods this view has been dominant, however, it has never gone unchallenged. Objections to it have appeared since at least the beginning of modern times, by philosophers who have cautioned that an exaggerated faith in the powers of human reason is not only unjustified, but also potentially dangerous (Nietzsche, 1956) To a large degree, anti-rationalistic doubts about the existence of truth and of the capacities of human reason have formed the backdrop for certain strands of 'postmodernism.' Although many different accounts are given of the emergence and even the precise definition of postmodernism, it may be broadly characterized as having its starting point in Nietzsche's pronouncement that all of Western philosophy is founded on an illusion-the illusion of truth. On Nietzsche's account Western philosophy rests on the metaphysical error that "the whole of nature is intelligible or that we live in a cosmos and not a chaos" (Stern, 1993: p. 1). For Nietzsche, this was an error originated by Socrates and promoted by Plato, and while not all postmodern thinkers are equally concerned with the role of Plato and Socrates, many accept the substance of Nietzsche's claims as the starting point for their own thinking. On this view', it is accepted that much of Western political philosophy is founded on a mistake. In short, it is believed that the failure of philosophy to find a transcendent or eternal truth cannot be remedied; instead, we must accept that human reason is both limited and defective, and ultimately incapable of delivering on the promises of progress and improvement once ascribed to it. Alternatively, there is a second current of thought that agrees with the postmodern verdict on reason, but finds reason's chief failures are specific to modernity (Gillespie, 1997). On this side are those who identify the deepest errors of philosophical thought not with Plato, but instead with the rejection of Platonic philosophy and ancient philosophy in general. On this view, the failure of philosophy and in particular political philosophy to achieve truth is in large part a consequence of the way its aims have been understood-or rather, misunderstood-since the beginning of modem times. Specifically, what is critiqued is the shift from political philosophy to a political science in which the Platonic quest for truth and for the good have been abandoned in favor of a more limited goal. The most pressing task of political thought, it is claimed, is to overcome this gap through a return to the principles of classical, and hence Socratic-Platonic, philosophy (Strauss, 1989). Despite their many disagreements, particularly regarding the role of Platonic philosophy and the current possibilities for the quest for truth as envisioned by Plato, these two perspectives are united in their general opposition to rationalism. Conclusion History has come to revere Plato as a philosopher, political visionary, and great literary stylist. All of these things he was. If we ask how Plato saw himself, however, the answer might be: as an educator, even an educational revolutionary. While Plato's founding of the Academy is perhaps the most concrete indication of his interest in education, there is, behind all of his writings, a project for educational reform. Plato's Academy left its own legacy. The school remained influential for over one thousand years, until AD 529 when it was forcibly closed. But the Academy also became the center for many forms inappropriate to the Platonic spirit. References Dover, K.J. (1978). Greek Homosexuality. Cambridge. MA: Harvard University Press. Gillespie, M. (1997) Nietzsche and the Pre-modernist Critique of Postmodernism, Critical Review 2(4): 537-54. Jaspers, K. (1962), The Great Philosophers, tr. by Ralph Manheim. London: Rupert Hart- Davis. Lewis, R.B. (1981). The philosophical roots of lifelong learning. Toledo Ohio: Toledo University Center for the Study of Higher Education. ERIC Document Reproduction Service. Nietzsche (1956), The Birth of Tragedy in The Birth of Tragedy and the Genealogy of Morals, trans. Francis Golffing, NY: Anchor Books. Plato. (1986). The Republic. (B. Jowett, Trans.). Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books. Ruse, M. (1988). Homosexuality: A philosophical inquiry. New York: Basil Blackwell. Stern, S. (1993). Socratic Rationalism and Political Philosophy: An Interpretation of Plato's Phaedo. NY: SUNY Albany Press. Strauss, L. (1989). The Rebirth of Classical Political Rationalism: An Introduction to the Thought of Leo Strauss, selected and introduced by Thomas Pangle Chicago. University of Chicago Press. Thomas, H. & Thomas, D.L. (1941). Living biographies of great philosophers. Garden City, NY: Garden City Publishing Co., Inc. Read More