Plato
- Created by: willowspencer
- Created on: 08-12-15 16:34
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- Plato
- The Form of the Good
- Plato believed that the form of the good is the source of everything
- The Form of the Good can be represented as the sun
- Plato believed that The Form of the Good could also be suggested to be God
- The main source of good
- Concerned with...
- Beauty
- Justice
- Goodness
- Not just examples of these things but what they actually are in themselves
- The Sophists
- These were relativists and taught that there was no such thing as absolute and ultimate truth, only opinions
- Plato believed this attitude would lead to 'moral corruption'
- The Argument from Recollection
- Plato showed that an uneducated boy could solve a problem without being taught how.
- evidence of innate knowledge that must have existed 'apriori' - the opposite is 'aposteriori'
- Plato called this process of 'knowlegde'
- Plato showed that an uneducated boy could solve a problem without being taught how.
- Criticism
- Believe philosophers should rule the world but they do not even agree with each other
- Is Plato being elitist?
- We can have knowledge of the physical world (science)
- Can be difficult to prove the non-physical world
- The Forms
- Plato believed that the reason that we can recognise lots of circular objects as circles is due to the perfect fixed idea of a circle actually existing
- Can also be described as, ideals, archetypes and ideas
- Appearance are imperfect copies of forms
- They only 'participant' in the forms. Only philosophers through rational thoughts, can reach the knowledge of forms
- What is a human being to Plato?
- We have bodies with physical senses and these experience physical things
- These decay and fade away, these things cannot be true reality, since truth is eternal
- it is through rational thought and ideas in the mind that we can gain knowledge (rationalism)
- There is a soul that is separate from the body and this is the eternal part of humans and can exist independently of the body
- We have bodies with physical senses and these experience physical things
- The Analogy of The Cave
- The Cave: For Plato the cave is representing the physical world. You cannot have true knowledge in the cave as its constantly changing
- The Fire: The fire is representing the physical sun which causes us to think we see objects even though it is not real
- The Objects: The objects the visible things in the physical world, which are portrayed by the men
- The Shadows: The shadows were the mage of the visible things. But Plato believed none of these we real
- The Prisoners: Prisoners chained are the scientists so cannot escape the illusion
- Those who break free are philosophers they see true knowledge and can escape the illusion
- The Men: These men in the cave represent the politicians which give us the false idea that the cave is real, stopping us seeing the truth
- The Chains: These represent the physical body and sense, forcing us to believe the images we see.
- Even though the chains are stopping us from seeing the real non-physical world
- Plato's two wolrds
- The physical world of sense experience
- The non-physical realm of the forms and ideals
- The division of the physical and non-physical parts of us is called 'dualism'
- "You cannot step into the same river twice" - Heraclitus
- We cannot have knowledge of physical things - only opinions
- The Form of the Good
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