Quick Facts
Born 428 BCE
Athenian
Follower of Socrates
Opened the Academy in 387 BCE
Teacher of Aristotle
Died 348 BCE
Died in Athens
Works
Plato's most famous work is title the Republic, in which he argues for a government structure run by philosopher kings. In this work, Plato explains why Athens' democracy, or any government run by the people, is doomed for failure. The Republic is also the home of the Allegory of the Cave, which I have another post about, be sure to check it out here!
Plato is also famous for his metaphysical theory of forms, which ha
s to do with abstract forms. The theory states that forms are the non-physical essence of things which we only see reflections of in our everyday lives; what we see in the physical world is only an imitation of the actual ideal form of an object. While this can be a bit confusing to wrap your head around, I found it much more digestible after reading about the Allegory of the Cave!
Plato's most famous work is titled the s is Plato's work, the Apology. This work details Socrates' defense during his trial for impiety and corruption of the youth. We talked about this work during our Athenian Agora discussion, and Tran did a wonderful job of explaining Socrates' trial in her site report if you haven't had the chance to watch it yet; you can visit her site here!
Views
Plato can be considered an idealist. His Theory of Forms that I mentioned above aligns well with idealism, meaning that he believed that reality is somewhat indistinguishable from human perception. Plato taught a theory of nature-based on a set of rules that objects in the real world could only ever be imperfect examples of. He believed that everything had ideal forms in another, ideal realm, but in the world we live in there are infinite imperfections. Again, this can be better understood alongside the Allegory of the Cave!
Plato also believed in the importance of training and how to think properly. This reminds me of Aristotle's orderly training in order to be virtuous. Each philosopher stresses the importance of learning how to think and go about making decisions. Aristotle simply focused on this in the subject of virtue, while Plato was of the opinion that it was necessary to train to think properly to learn.
As the name suggests, Platonism is essentially any philosophy that is derived from Plato's views and ideas. Plato had a sort of set of unwritten doctrines, and these are what lay at the foundation of Platonism. As happens with many original works, people tend to read Plato's doctrines however they see fit. This leads to a wide variety of opinions and ideas all being housed under the loose term "Platonism." There are, however, a few key ideas that most all Platonists have in common. For example, Platonists tend to have high regard for the quality of human life. Plato believed that his form theory explains how these realities of perfection gave value and meaning to the lives of the imperfect world. Encyclopedia Brittanica puts it best, "belief in absolute values rooted in an eternal world that distinguishes Platonism from" other philosophies. This idea of a separate reality from which originates both existence and the value of existence is what makes Platonists Platonists!
Sources
Blumenthal, Henry J., and A. Hilary Armstrong. “Platonism.”Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 10 Oct. 2019, www.britannica.com/topic/Platonism.
Kraut, Richard. “Plato.”Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Stanford University, 1 Aug. 2017, plato.stanford.edu/entries/plato/#PlaCenDoc.
Plato and Aristotle: Crash Course History of Science #3 Youtube Video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rh0fxJkvL44
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