Plato: The Rule of Reason
Plato: The Rule of Reason
There are some people from ancient times that seen to have been ahead of their time. The philosopher and mathematician, Plato, was definitely one of those people. Being born into a very influential family, in Athens Greece, which is remembered by its’ intellectual inquires, including sculpture, drama, history, mathematics, science, and philosophy, was very influential in framing Plato into who he became. Another huge factor in creating Plato into the prominent figure he ultimately became was the fact that one of the greatest ethical philosophers, Socrates, was his teacher. Even though Socrates was condemned to death in 399 B.C.E. he had already become “the founder of philosophy”. Unfortunately, Socrates did not leave ant writings behind because he believed that dialogue was the best way to being people to starting to think for themselves and perhaps even change their approach to life itself. But on the other hand, his student, Plato, left behind a plethora of writings. Touching on many different subjects like “metaphysics, (the) theory of knowledge, human psychology, morals, politics, social classes, the family, education, and the arts” (p. 81). One of Plato’s’ areas of concentration is metaphysics, which the Theory of Forms derived from. This Socrates’ theory is difficult to philosophically interpret and even Plato himself struggled with it in Parmenides. There are four main aspects or concepts used to explain the Theory of Forms. The first concept is a more logical perspective, which provides a “one over many” concept, meaning that we generalize everything, making it falling under a certain category, like the color red. There are many different shades of red, but we do not specifically state what shade we mean. But, we all generally get the same idea of what the color is. Another viewpoint of the Forms, a more metaphysical aspect, states that the Forms do not change, decay or cease to exist. Plato’s’ grand metaphysical theory is
There are some people from ancient times that seen to have been ahead of their time. The philosopher and mathematician, Plato, was definitely one of those people. Being born into a very influential family, in Athens Greece, which is remembered by its’ intellectual inquires, including sculpture, drama, history, mathematics, science, and philosophy, was very influential in framing Plato into who he became. Another huge factor in creating Plato into the prominent figure he ultimately became was the fact that one of the greatest ethical philosophers, Socrates, was his teacher. Even though Socrates was condemned to death in 399 B.C.E. he had already become “the founder of philosophy”. Unfortunately, Socrates did not leave ant writings behind because he believed that dialogue was the best way to being people to starting to think for themselves and perhaps even change their approach to life itself. But on the other hand, his student, Plato, left behind a plethora of writings. Touching on many different subjects like “metaphysics, (the) theory of knowledge, human psychology, morals, politics, social classes, the family, education, and the arts” (p. 81). One of Plato’s’ areas of concentration is metaphysics, which the Theory of Forms derived from. This Socrates’ theory is difficult to philosophically interpret and even Plato himself struggled with it in Parmenides. There are four main aspects or concepts used to explain the Theory of Forms. The first concept is a more logical perspective, which provides a “one over many” concept, meaning that we generalize everything, making it falling under a certain category, like the color red. There are many different shades of red, but we do not specifically state what shade we mean. But, we all generally get the same idea of what the color is. Another viewpoint of the Forms, a more metaphysical aspect, states that the Forms do not change, decay or cease to exist. Plato’s’ grand metaphysical theory is