Plato Mindmap

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  • Plato
    • Background info
      • Greek philosopher (428ish - 347 BC)
      • Became disciple of Socrates, accepted his basic philosophy and dialectical style of debate (questioning)
        • Witnessed death of Socrates in 399 BC
      • In 387 BC, founded Academy in Athens, first European university. Aristotle was most prominent student
    • Theory of the Forms
      • The World of Forms
        • A Posteriori, relative, imperfect, within space and time
        • Soul is from World of Forms, possesses perfect knowledge, enters body and forgets, then as we learn, reawaken what soul already knew
          • Our knowledge is innate (born with it)
        • Qualities Plato believed in were Justice, Truth and Beauty
          • A flower and a person can both reveal what beauty is, this led Plato to suggest that underlying all these images and examples of beauty is the real Form of beauty
            • He talks about things in world of appearances participating in world of Forms - meaning the Form of beauty, eg, is somehow present in a beautiful person
      • The World of Appearances
        • A Priori, absolute, perfect, beyond space and time
      • Strengths:
        • Could be argued people are misinterpreting Plato's theory, Plato thought about qualities and many philosophers agree we all have an infinitive knowledge of good
        • Explains imperfections
        • Encourages questioning, not accepting physical things as being absolute
        • Explains how we can readily ecognise a dog as a dog etc
      • Weaknesses:
        • - some, including Aristotle criticised theory saying its ridiculous when pushed to its logical extremes
        • - many scientists (eg. Richard Dawkins) believe its nonsense to talk of a transcendent 'other world' beyond the physical. Our world changes but we can learn from it
        • Can except some concepts such as infinity or prime numbers, but harder to except ideal forms of negative qualities such as spite
        • So much variation in world, an ideal form of a flower, or rose, or Gertrude Jekyll or every individual rose plant?
        • Plato would be criticised for not being clear about relation between forms and objects, or concepts and phenomena. He talks of phenomena 'participating' in their ideal forms, but not clear how this works
        • Some dislike theory because no scientific evidence, for some (like Aristotle), makes more sense to focus on our efforts on things we can see around us
          • However (counter argument) today, quantum mechanics in physics suggests its likely for there to be additional dimensions, also, is it possible to prove something which is metaphysical (a piori) with empirical/physical (a posteriori) evidence?
      • The Cave
        • story expresses his understanding of mind from lowest stages to excellent knowledge of good
          • in cave, mind knows only shadows of things, when philosopher leaves, knows perfection so has excellent knowledge of good
        • Story expressed idea of body (the cave) is a prison, and soul (the prisoner) is trapped inside
        • Also shows contrast between people who only see appearances but mistake them for truth, and those who see the truth. believed there's a difference between intellectual knowledge gained through reason, and that gained through senses
        • The Sun
          • Symbolises form of Good
          • with sun/light, can see more clearly
          • just as light and sight said to be like sun, but not the sun, science and truth said to be like Good, but not be the good. its by the sun theres light and sight and by good theres science and truth
            • Thus the Good is beyond being and the cause of all existence
          • ultimate, most perfect source of wisdom, full enlightenment
        • Story is allegorical, meaning different elements of story are symbolic
      • Basic theory: every object in our world has a perfect 'form' (the essence of it) in World of Forms
        • An object will be mutable (changing) in world of Appearances, Form of object will be immutable (unchanging) in world of Forms
        • Education, to Plato, is a matter of remembering and recalling from World of Forms
        • He also believed the demiurge  (creator)created the world from chaotic material using the Forms as a model

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