Thread 24751846

Icebreaker: what are your favourite commentaries/secondary sources for understanding Plato?

Robin Waterfield's The First Philosophers is something I find myself going back to every time a really get into a dialogue. Even though Plato is never really the focus of the book at any point, its really good for contextualising his philosophy alongside what had gone before. Not only does it help one distinguish what might be original ideas from mere developments or rearticulations of already existing ones, but its also useful for clarifying some of the more esoteric references. Take Phaedo for instance, the dialogue ends with the hemlock working its way through Socrates:
>[the man administering Socrates the poison] felt it himself and said that when the cold reached his heart he would be gone
According to Philolaus:
>there are four sources of a rational creature - brain, heart, navel and genitals […] Head for thought, heart for soul…
Therefore, there implication by Plato here is that Socrates' soul left his body at the point the cold reached his heart

Previous Thread: >>24705276

Recent Plato-related threads:
>>24746113 (Will studying Plato give me wisdom on the nature of the soul?)
>>24745236 (Academic consensus on Plato's metaphysics/epistemology?)
>>24732342 (how does the physical world relate to the world of Forms?)
>>24728045 (why did Medieval Christians prefer Aristotle over Plato?)

Whoops. for the last general here's the archive version: https://archived.moe/lit/thread/24705276/#24705276

>>24751846 (OP)
>Icebreaker: what are your favourite commentaries/secondary sources for understanding Plato?
Debra Nails's "The People of Plato": A prosopography of every historical figure mentioned in the authentic and dubious dialogues, with references to where they're mentioned in other ancient sources or archaeological discoveries. Also has two great detailed discussions of both the Alcibiades controversy, and all the Platonic interlocutors caught up in it, and the brief rule of the Thirty. A great reminder of things one can easily miss, e.g., that Socrates had a brother who may have been wealthy, that Polemarchus was murdered by the Thirty, that Callias had a position within the Mysteries, and that almost everyone present except for Aristophanes in the Symposium was either exiled from Athens or voluntarily fled in light of the accusations against Alcibiades.

J.S. Morrison's "Meno of Pharsalus, Polycrates, and Ismenias": Tries to answer the question, "what the hell is Meno of Thessaly doing in Athens?" and goes over a detailed history of Thessaly's rocky political situation. Tl;dr of it is, "the Thessalians didn't like the Spartans messing with them, and after the Athenians overthrew the Spartan installed Thirty, they sought Athens' help." Also helps to spell out how Meno ended up supporting Cyrus the Younger.

Jacub Filonik's "Athenian Impiety Trials: A Reappraisal": The most thorough study of impiety trials available, trying to get to the bottom of how common or otherwise they were, late ancient exaggerations (e.g., whether Protagoras was ever prosecuted), and how often they resulted in the death penalty or something else.

Kilian Fleischer's "Philodem, Geschichte der Akademie": A modern German translation and reconstruction of a history of the Academy that Philodemus was working on. If anyone recalls the stories coming out a year or two ago about Plato being sold into slavery by the Spartans or the story of his death (mocking a Thracian girl for being unable to keep rhythm playing a song the night before he succumbed to fever), it's from this. There's apparently plans for an English translation or edition, but I wouldn't expect it soon.

Matthew Farmer's "Playing the Philosopher: Plato in Fourth Century Comedy": An inspection of the known comic fragments mentioning Plato, one of which is a parody on the opening of the Republic. Neat stuff.

Myles Burnyeat's "First Words" in Explorations Vol. 2: Someone from the analytic tradition observing the relationship between the contents of the dialogues and the apparently unconnected opening lines. Very persuasive.

Athenaeus' Deipnosophists: Not really a secondary work as normally understood, but book 11 has a long section where one of the characters criticizes Plato, and in the process shares all sorts of ancient gossip and accusations.

>>24751979
>Debra Nails's "The People of Plato"
Wow that sounds crazy... I'll have to check it out ASAP

>J.S. Morrison's "Meno of Pharsalus, Polycrates, and Ismenias": Tries to answer the question, "what the hell is Meno of Thessaly doing in Athens?" and goes over a detailed history of Thessaly's rocky political situation. Tl;dr of it is, "the Thessalians didn't like the Spartans messing with them, and after the Athenians overthrew the Spartan installed Thirty, they sought Athens' help." Also helps to spell out how Meno ended up supporting Cyrus the Younger.

That's an interesting premise, to assume that the dialogue is proof that Meno actually spent time in Athens; I'd assumed that Plato was using him liberally as a representative for the aristocrat class. Still, I'll definitely check this one out too, in part because I'm a big fan of Anabasis and find Meno's involvement really fascinating as Xenophon basically describes him as some sort of sociopath.

>>24752043
>That's an interesting premise, to assume that the dialogue is proof that Meno actually spent time in Athens; I'd assumed that Plato was using him liberally as a representative for the aristocrat class. Still, I'll definitely check this one out too, in part because I'm a big fan of Anabasis and find Meno's involvement really fascinating as Xenophon basically describes him as some sort of sociopath.
The conversation depicted in the Meno is plainly a kind of fiction, as are most of the dialogues, but one of the things that comes through Nails's book is how often Plato gets historical details right (there are notable exceptions), so Meno coming to Athens right after the overthrow of the Thirty in order to request assistance from Anytus, who was in political ascent for doing battle with the Thirty, seems plausible.

I take Plato and Xenophon to both be accurate accounts of Meno’s character, but I should also point to Truesdell Brown's essay "Menon of Thessaly," which tries to push back against that depiction as much as can plausibly be accomplished, while also relating some interesting details from a ancient summary of the lost Persica of Ctesias.

>Prodicus was a well-known sophist who was especially keen on the exact meaning of words

So this guy was basically the 400BC version of Jordan Peterson, huh?

>>24752104
>ut I should also point to Truesdell Brown's essay "Menon of Thessaly," which tries to push back against that depiction as much as can plausibly be accomplished, while also relating some interesting details from a ancient summary of the lost Persica of Ctesias

Yeah, I sense that Xenophon was partial to slandering those who he took a disliking to and has a bad reputation for being impartial (Hellenica most notoriously), so I wouldn't be too surprised if he was painting a slightly dishonest portrait

>>24752755
I don't think he was being dishonest. He was there to deal with the repercussions of Meno’s betrayal of the Greek generals, after all, which was no small thing. It's just good to occasionally have essays like that of Brown's to check our impulses toward judgement and raise the question of whether such a man could be defensible.

>>24751846 (OP)
Sell me on Plato.. I read The Republic and The last days of Socrates.. I really despised both. The last days of Socrates was a long time ago now but from what I remember it was my first exposure to the Socratic method and it made me want to gouge my eyes out with how difficult Socrates made even the simplest conversation. The Republic was that but for 200 pages. He just waxes poetic about shit and does logical leaps that his audience doesn't seem to catch because he's hypnotized them with the boredom of endless questions. They're proposing a utopian state which never came to be and never could have been. They make conclusions based on speculation on ideal behaivour from all participants based on their postulations. It's absolute trash for any modern man. Sure if I was born 3000 years ago my mind would probably explode from all of the wisdom.. But it has no value today... Oh you might say it influenced this and that... But as work on its own and not a historical document, what is the value of it for the modern man? The only greek philosophers of any worth are Aristotle and Epicurus.

>>24752818
On the one hand, I think ypur skepticism is good, since no decent reading of Plato can come from just nodding one's head. On the other hand, I'm not sure it sounds like you want to be sold on Plato. For example, you catch that the ideal city has never been and could not be, but you miss that Socrates says as much in book 5 (""Weren't we, as we assert, also making a pattern in speech of a good city?" "Certainly." "Do you suppose that what we say is any less good on account of our not being able to prove that it is possible to found a city the same as the one in speech?" "Surely not," he said. "Well, then, that's the truth of it," I said."). And, far from hypnotizing everyone into agreeing with mere assertions, Socrates is always working from the opinions of Glaucon and Adeimantus (in fact, the city that everyone recalls as the ideal city of the Republic is a result of Glaucon's direct interjection; he rejects the city that Socrates puts forward as a city of pigs). As for making conclusions based on ideal behavior, I don't think that's actually done, with the plausible exception of the philosopher, and I'm not sure you would actually reject the psychological behaviors of men described if you went through it more carefully.

But then Plato may not be for you, and Aristotle and the Epicurean corpus are worth reading too.

>>24752818
>it made me want to gouge my eyes out with how difficult Socrates made even the simplest conversation
>He just waxes poetic about shit and does logical leaps that his audience doesn't seem to catch because he's hypnotized them with the boredom of endless questions

This was my impression after reading a few dialogs. I do not see the appeal of Plato at all.

>>24752871
I'll concede that me being sold on Plato is highly unlikely. I guess more so my question is whether there is something I am missing?

It was a year ago that I read The Repbulic so my memory of it is a bit vague since I admitedly weren't entirely absorbed in what was said since the presentation made it incredibly dull to me.

The philosopher is who I had in mind as I think the assumption of them not falling to corruption is highly unlikely. I do recall there being some discussion with regards to avoiding corruption but it isn't sufficient to make me believe it as a possiblity. Then there's the rigid static nature of each persons role within the society, men are just cogs in the machine. Which sure we more or less are even in modern society. But the reliability of each cogs performance isn't as certain as it is made out to be in the book I feel.

I guess I reject their idealism. But they are trying to propose the good city so a utopia is what ought to be strived for I guess. I don't really see what I got out of reading it now that society has certainly had its time to absorb and implent whatever good that could be gained from this book. It feels redundant in that sense (for a modern audience).

As for the the implied manipulation or hypnosis I don't have a clear example but I remember there were some assertions that felt like leaps that weren't scrutinized as thouroughly as they ought to have been, so they get accepted as truthes even if I felt they weren't substantiated.

Of course here I am speaking my truth, unsubstantiated :-)

>>24752818
Could you provide examples of Socrates waxing poetic and making logical leaps that the audience doesn't catch?

>>24752910
Hmm, well, let me see if I can't go through the points to best of my memory. Since they're worth addressing.

>The philosopher is who I had in mind as I think the assumption of them not falling to corruption is highly unlikely. I do recall there being some discussion with regards to avoiding corruption but it isn't sufficient to make me believe it as a possiblity.
I don't think Plato discounts this. There's a passage in book 6 exactly on this subject, where he depicts Socrates laying out how the philosophic nature is "destroyed in *many*, while *a small number* escape." Now, he already acknowledges that philosophic natures are few, so he already admits that it's an even smaller number that might go uncorrupted. That they do spend a good chunk of books 6 and 7 going over the best case scenario and what would have to be required to prevent their corruption, I think, has to be understood in light of having already acknowledged that general implausibility. The philosopher who is incorruptible is an extreme case, by Plato's acknowledgement, the bearing of which is, "you're not going to have a philosopher-king rule over you for the good of society, and you shouldn't want just anyone who seems to be a philosopher, because they could easily be tempted into changing."

>Then there's the rigid static nature of each persons role within the society, men are just cogs in the machine. Which sure we more or less are even in modern society. But the reliability of each cogs performance isn't as certain as it is made out to be in the book I feel.
So, a couple of things. A big part of the Republic is trying to show you what would be required if you expected two things out of wisdom: 1) that it's precise, and 2) that it's the greatest benefit to politics. If wisdom were both precise and politically beneficial, then it would have to this kind of mechanical character to it, where everyone is sorted into castes according to a pass/fail education, where poetry has to prescribe only passages conducive to virtue, where marriages are decided by caste and children are kept in common until sorted into "families", where the best possible ruler has to go through an over 30-year education that includes subjects in mathematics that Socrates says there's barely any research on, and the rulers have to remember an intentionally ridiculous mathematical formula for figuring out when to have everyone breed where forgetting it results in the city just immediately starting to dissolve into something like Sparta. The other thing is that Plato has Socrates acknowledge that the caste system only holds if you get rid of everyone older than 10, and tell these kids that their life before was an illusion and teach them a noble lie about how their caste roles are natural. Plato even has Socrates acknowledge, "well, we all know that 'gold souls' in mating can produce dud 'bronze souls'", which is why they have to grant that the children are held in common until a certain age.

Cont.

>>24752969
ChatGPT:
1. Defining Justice by Analogy (the City–Soul analogy)

Leap: Socrates argues that since justice is hard to see in an individual, we should look at it in a larger thing — the city — and then "read it off" back into the soul.

Problem: Just because the structure of a city and the structure of an individual both involve "parts," it doesn’t follow that the same principle (justice = harmony) applies identically in both.

Why it works in the dialogue: His companions agree to the analogy and don’t demand proof that city/soul correspondence is valid.

2. Tripartite Division of the Soul

Leap: He infers three parts of the soul (reason, spirit, appetite) because people sometimes experience internal conflict, like being thirsty but refusing to drink.

Problem: From psychological conflict, it doesn’t strictly follow that there are literally three distinct "parts" of the soul. One could explain the conflict differently (e.g., competing desires of the same faculty).

Why it works: The reasoning feels intuitive, and the group accepts it quickly.

3. The Noble Lie (myth of metals)

Leap: Socrates proposes that society will function justly if people believe a myth about their natural roles (gold, silver, bronze souls).

Problem: There’s no real justification for why such a falsehood guarantees stability or fairness — he just asserts it as "necessary for harmony."

Why it works: Adeimantus and Glaucon don’t press him on the ethics of lying, so the assumption slides by.

4. Philosopher-Kings as the Only Rulers

Leap: He claims that since philosophers love truth and knowledge, only they can truly rule well.

Problem: Loving truth doesn’t obviously imply political competence. Also, Socrates assumes philosophers wouldn’t be corrupted by power — a big leap.

Why it works: The interlocutors admire the idea and let him idealize philosophers without addressing counterexamples.

5. Theory of Forms and the Form of the Good

Leap: He introduces the Forms (especially the Form of the Good) as the foundation of all knowledge and morality.

Problem: The dialogue never demonstrates the existence of Forms; Socrates uses metaphors (the Sun, the Divided Line, the Cave) instead of arguments. It’s persuasive imagery, not strict proof.

Why it works: The metaphors are powerful, and his audience accepts them rather than demanding a rigorous account.

6. Justice as “Each Part Doing Its Own Work”

Leap: After a long city-building exercise, Socrates concludes that justice = each part of the city (or soul) doing its proper work and not interfering with the others.

Problem: This is more a definitional stipulation than a deductive conclusion. Why should we accept that this is the definition of justice rather than a definition?

Why it works: By this point, the companions are drawn into his framework and don’t revisit alternative definitions from Book I (like Polemarchus’s or Thrasymachus’s)

>>24752969
Sorry for the chatGPT lad you brought it out of me. I can only talk about my memorys of the book in a general sense I don't have the energy to go through the book again just to respond to an internet post.

>>24752910
>I guess I reject their idealism.But they are trying to propose the good city so a utopia is what ought to be strived for I guess.
So, I don't think this is an unusual take. Many readers lean toward one of two extremes that both fall short, but which are both pretty natural: either a totally political reading, where the ideal city ruled by philosophers is the whole point, or a totally soul-focused reading, where all of the discussions about political life are extraneous. Both have to be put together, so that you learn something about the political yearning for perfect justice, as well as not lose sight of how the political discussions inform your understanding of your soul, or, if you prefer, how you carry yourself as a person. There are several points throughout the Republic where Socrates, pretty much always to Glaucon, has to remind him that they're not actually founding a city, and that they shouldn't be worried about feasibility, because they're trying to understand what living a just life among the unjust might require. As for idealism, there are also several passages where Socrates straight out says "certainty in any of this requires more investigation, don't get your hopes up, bud, lmao."

>>24753004
Going to bed so the response will have to be delayed. But I just remembered. Isn't it the case that the state will raise the children? I object to that quite vehemently. Better people = programmed people. It's dehumanizing, it takes the idea of chasing an ideal to a point where it is gross in my eyes.

>>24752979
>4. Philosopher-Kings as the Only Rulers
>Leap: He claims that since philosophers love truth and knowledge, only they can truly rule well.
>Problem: Loving truth doesn’t obviously imply political competence. Also, Socrates assumes philosophers wouldn’t be corrupted by power — a big leap.
What Socrates actually says in the dialogue:
>Until philosophers are kings, or the kings and princes of this world have the spirit and power of philosophy, and political greatness and wisdom meet in one, and those commoner natures who pursue either to the exclusion of the other are compelled to stand aside, cities will never have rest from their evils.
Socrates posits that until philosopher kings who possess both politcal greatness (this negates the ChatGPT 'politcal competence' rebuttal by definition) and wisdom (this negates the ChatGPT 'corrupted by power' rebuttal by definition since being moral is wisdom according to Socrates' conception of wisdom), the world shall not know rest from their evils. I honestly don't know how this is waxing poetic or making logical leaps. It's basically a tautology since Socrates speaks about the philosopher king qua philosopher king and not merely a philospher king (i.e. the ideal ruler). ChatGPT lacks reading comprehension; and I would say you do as well, but you haven't actually responded to me. Also, what is the point then in participating in a discussion of Plato if you don't even want to read the works?

>>24753032
>But I just remembered. Isn't it the case that the state will raise the children? I object to that quite vehemently. Better people = programmed people. It's dehumanizing, it takes the idea of chasing an ideal to a point where it is gross in my eyes.
Yes, they would be under the care of the guardian ruler caste. But again, this is to show what would really be required in order to satisfy Glaucon's desire for perfect political justice. This is related to what I was getting at by saying,

>A big part of the Republic is trying to show you what would be required if you expected two things out of wisdom: 1) that it's precise, and 2) that it's the greatest benefit to politics.

So the need for a community of children reared by the guardians would be a requirement according to the kind of opinions of someone who wanted to see perfect justice in a community. Now, the real bearing of this for a reader isn't to be convinced that the state or government or what have you needs to be rearing children, but is supposed to appeal to you on the level of considering how you and I would rear our children, and on what grounds we would justify it. Is our end goal to produce children who are just, or is it to produce free and liberated children, or children who are more talented than most people, etc.? Are those all compatible ends, or do we have to make compromises such that we can live with having a talented kid who maybe ends up also being a prick when they grow up?

I should also observe that Socrates lays this out as one of the "three waves", where the "waves" are waves of laughter that Socrates expects, knowing how absurd and ridiculous these three particular proposals are.

>>24753058
Ehh, I wouldn't be so harsh on him, he's already said it's been a year or so since a one-off reading, but he seems earnest and a bit willing to hear out why someone might think otherwise about Plato.

>>24753102
Seeing as my gripe is ephemeral and mostly to do with someone not wanting to read, I will cease my harangue. I am not a follower of Plato or am very much interested in actually building a community around Plato, but still, I don't desire to ruin anyone's hope for it. My apologies, and good luck.

is that nigga wearing a durag

>>24753298
Um they call it a δυραγ thank you thank you

>>24752818
I mean, like a lot of people on this board, I think I was first sold on Plato by the "Start With the Greeks" meme - the idea that to get into philosophy one should treat its history like an ongoing dialectic and thus, like any conversation, the easiest way to understand would be to start at the beginning. So, even if he no longer has inherent value, he is still, for instrumental purposes, worth reading.
Even if you don't rate his arguments that highly, do you not find that they're intellectually stimulating? That they raise interesting questions?

>>24752818
>>24752902
Out of curiosity, how old are you guys?
I read Plato originally in my early twenties (the Symposium and the Apologia) and didn't really find them interesting. I started re-reading Plato in my late 30s and I think they're some of the best books ever written.

>>24751846 (OP)
The First Philosophers is an amazing secondary source for Plato and should probably be mandatory reading for anyone who wants to get in to the wider world of Greco-Roman philosophy. I do like how it dedicates a section to the sophists to contextualize their arguments as I feel like Plato does kind of misrepresent them unfavorably for dramatic effect in his dialogues. Apart from that I'd say the best secondary source on Plato would probably just be Plotinus.
>>24753089
>>24753102
I think the issue can be attributed to Plato's method of delivery rather than the actual substance behind Plato's writing. Plato tends to over complicate his writing for the sake of artistic and dramatic merit which leads to people losing track of the actual arguments being presented and how they are deduced. A lot of his thoughts could be told in fewer words but if he were to do that he would actually be making the logical leaps that people accuse him of making.

>>24755243
>Plato tends to over complicate his writing for the sake of artistic and dramatic merit which leads to people losing track of the actual arguments being presented and how they are deduced.
Do you have something specific in mind?

>>24755388
I don't really have any specifics in mind since this is just a general thing that exists due to Plato's style of conveying knowledge, though I'm not too happy with how I phrased my initial post and I'd like to clarify that I didn't mean that Plato himself overcomplicates his writing consciously, but that the way he writes with a separate goal of artistic merit leads to the impression of overcomplicating a thought as well as the impression that he makes logical leaps despite the verbosity when this really comes about though a non careful examination of the substance behind the writing. This is opposed to someone like Aristotle or Schopenhauer where they don't attempt at all to make their work have a dramatic or artistic merit and want to convey a thought or a message as simply and clearly as possible. I personally enjoy the dialogues and think Plato might be the best thinker out there but I can see how someone who is unfamilar with Greek literary traditions, which are heavily seeped in poetry and drama as they didn't grow up with it would look at Plato's work as unsatisfactory, illogical or unserious.

>>24751846 (OP)
>Robin Waterfield's The First Philosophers is something I find myself going back to every time a really get into a dialogue. Even though Plato is never really the focus of the book at any point, its really good for contextualising his philosophy alongside what had gone before.
Based. You might also enjoy A Plato Reader: Eight Essential Dialogues by C.D.C. Reeve.

>>24756049
Hmm, why do you think Plato writes with "dramatic or artistic merit" in mind? I don't personally see any interest in aiming for literary merit, just a pointed interest in human psychology in its myriad appearances, and the way psychology and human types are related to the problems of the subjects brought up. Have you read Phaedrus?

>we built western civilization on the thoughts of some bald nigga

This is why we were destined to end up where we are today. Bald people lack virility and their brains are poisoned by the sun.

>>24756157
Because he was a poet and a dramatist for much of his youth and likely received an education on this art. If we are to consider his dialogues as apocryphal (which I do) he would have to employ the skills he learned in crafting a dialogue in order to suit its purpose, which leads to the goal of producing a work of artistic merit in order to get the attention of the reader. I have read the Phaedrus and what he has to say about the arts does tell me he wrote with artistic merit in mind, but with the goal of reconciling his skill with philosophy but that this ultimately did not come to pass which is why by the time he wrote the 7th letter where he solidified his belief that such things couldn't be taught though art because it led to the same outcomes that lead people now into misinterpretation and a general feeling of unseriousness towards the writer.

>>24756268
I'm hesitant to take Diogenes Laertius' account of Plato's youth too seriously, but, in any case, while I do agree that the dialogues are more or less fictions, the dramatic details are related to the substance of the dialogues, and in ways that aren't just literary decoration, but which point to the psychological phenomena being discussed. (An example would be in the Republic; the description of the soul as having three parts that vie for rule means you can evaluate the "characters" by that description, according to who's ruled by calculation, spiritedness, or appetite, and also Socrates' responses according to how he says you bring balance to those. Another example would the Phaedo, where the exit of Socrates' wife with their newborn son should make us ask whether Socrates' description of the philosopher, as someone who doesn't care for bodily things like sex, is what he really believes and if we shouldn't approach the subsequent accounts with more caution.)

Re: Phaedrus, that wasn't my take away from it, which I see as concerned with directing the appropriate speeches to the appropriate people. The talk of play there, if that's what you're thinking of, isn't about literary merit, for, as Socrates says about the man who plays with speeches about the just, the beautiful, and the good, "much more beautiful, I think, is the seriousness that comes into being about these things, when someone using the dialectical art, taking hold of a fitting soul, plants and sows with knowledge speeches that are competent to assist themselves and him who planted and are not barren but have seed, whence other speeches, naturally growing in other characters, are competent to pass this on, ever deathless, and make him who has it experience as much happiness as is possible for a human being." That sounds more like a concern with teaching while being mindful of different audiences.

As for the seventh letter, I have to correct that impression, but he doesn't say that; he says, rather:

>If it seemed to me that these matters could adequately be put down in writing for the many or be said, what could be nobler for us to have done in our lifetime than this, to write what is a great benefit for human beings and to lead nature forth into the light for all? But I do not think such an undertaking concerning these matters would be a good for human beings, ***unless for some few, those who are themselves able to discover them through a small indication***; of the rest, it would unsuitably fill some of them with a mistaken contempt, and others with lofty and empty hope as if they had learned awesome matters.

That sounds to me like a repetition of the point in Phaedrus, just put more bluntly.

>>24754438
Not them but I agree and am 23. I find the dialogs to be really boring at best, pure sophistry at worst.

>>24752969
Pic related. I'm reading this and it feels like Socrates is using "logic" to make things more complicated than they really are.

>It is quite illogical to be courageous due to terror and cowardice.
I would argue one can only be courageous in the face of terror. IIRC Aristotle made that argument somewhere too.

>They are, in a way, sound-minded due to lack of restraint.
I don't think this entire paragraph is an accurate representation of how sound-mindedness works for those who aren't "philosophers." In my experience, you're either impulsive or you aren't, the "pleasure" that controls you just happens to be the one life put in your way.

It feels like Socrates necessarily wants things to be this way to later further his argument.

>>24756349
I went and skimmed through Phaedrus and I do like your interpretation better as it sounds more consistent with the wider Plato teachings. I'm gonna reread it properly as Plato has always been a philosopher I've had to read twice over to extract some understanding, which is what I did with last days, Republic, Meno, Protagoras, Gorgias and Symposium. I still think there is artistic merit in his dialogues and that this format is what puts certain people off from Plato as its unfamiliar, and I think that Diogenes Laertius account does seem correct based on what I have felt reading Plato but perhaps the artistic merit is more of a side effect as he uses the dialogue to express different psychological states as well as the dialectic approach to the highest ideal
I'll try to do better next time around in this general.

>>24756684
Also as a general criticism of Plato, I don't like his obsession with the Forms. I agree they exist in theory, but 1) he overestimates our capacity to grasp them and apply them to society, and 2) he underestimates the fact that reality may be the way it is for a reason. Reality itself may be a better representation of the Forms (especially considering it has been subjected to time/evolution/progress for centuries) than whatever explanation our limited reasoning may come up with.

I'll admit I haven't gotten around to reading the Republic, so maybe I've got the wrong idea of its objective, but every society that has been rationalized and planned top-down (i.e., gone from theory/Forms to practice) has been an utter disaster when compared to societies that have grown organically.

>>24754438
>the Apologia
I have to say, that's probably the least interesting dialogue, philosophically speaking, that Plato wrote. It's rather misrepresentative of what Plato's works are like so its a shame that for many people its one of the first dialogues they read.

>>24755243
>The First Philosophers is an amazing secondary source for Plato and should probably be mandatory reading for anyone who wants to get in to the wider world of Greco-Roman philosophy. I do like how it dedicates a section to the sophists to contextualize their arguments as I feel like Plato does kind of misrepresent them unfavorably for dramatic effect in his dialogues

Agreed. I think its useful when you're getting into Plato for the first time to have an alternative source that treats the sophists seriously. If one reads the dialogues by themselves without any accompaniments, as most people do, its easy to simply dismiss the sophists as mere grifters - as reflected by their reputation to this day.

>>24756052
>You might also enjoy A Plato Reader: Eight Essential Dialogues
Even if I'm already familiar with all the dialogues?

>>24756684
>>24756708
>They are, in a way, sound-minded due to lack of restraint.
The argument is about being governed by pleasure. Let's say that somebody really likes spending time with goth girls down at the goth bar every Saturday night. Because he really likes this, he goes on to work tirelessly every day, be courageous, strong, and act according to other virtues. Still, he is doing all these because of a lack of restraint regarding the pleasure he gets from the goth girls.

>Regarding forms
It's nothing overtly complex. The argument made in the Republic is that what we are able to perceive with our senses are projections of the real. Like what we see from a distance when looking at a car, which is a two dimensional image of it. Using our intellect we are able to make hypotheses about representations closer to the real and as we move up this intellectual ladder we get closer to it. The real is what he call the ideal form.
This not only applies to physical things like a car of a vase, but intellectual ones too like courage.

Apuleius (author of The Golden Ass) wrote an epitome of platonic philosophy. I have never seen a translation of it, only Latin editions. I wonder why, since the text seemed not as complicated as the Golden ass.

>>24756776
Eh, that was the book that got me back into Plato. The main idea of knowing what you know and being able to know what others know is very important. Having read Xenophon's Socratic works, it seems that it was central in Socrates' thinking. Plato makes an excellent introductory presentation of it.
The fact that people don't know that they don't know is very pervasive.

>>24757011
There are translations of it, but it's like it's an overlooked text.

>>24756688
To be clear, I don't disagree that there are strong literary qualities to the dialogues, I just don't see them as being for the sake of writing something literary. If you do get to reading Phaedrus again, a few things you might want to observe:

- The second half at various points acts as a commentary on the first half. For example, Socrates, who has earlier spoken the long palinode as a correction of his first speech, now reveals that they were both one speech, in fact. (The first speech is an example of what the lover in the second speech, guided by the white horse, would say.)

- Pretty close to the start of the palinode, Socrates says that what follows is really a kind of shortcut to understanding the soul, and that there's a longer account (he says this in the Republic as well). This leaves the matter of the longer account of soul an open question, and what about that account would be different or if something is left out or needs expanding upon.

- There's a description of unifying experiences into an Idea in the palinode, there called Recollection, and it comes back up in the second half at least twice in a more rational description.

- There's a passage in the second half where they start reading Lysias' speech again, and Socrates complains that it lacks what he calls "speech-making necessity" or "logographic necessity"; the specific complaint is that it lacks any necessary order (however that's to be understood), and he gives an example of a poem on a statue where any of the lines could be placed in any order indifferently, with no effect on the meaning. This seems to me to be where Plato lays out a standard by which we may want to read the dialogues, looking for not just a formal arrangement (intro, discussion, conclusion), but also for reasons for the order (take Symposium, which calls attention to the order of speeches by putting off Aristophanes' speech by his hiccuping until after Eryximachus, so that the last three speeches are by the two poets and Socrates).

>>24756684
>>24756708
If you're looking at the Phaedo, I suggest spending time looking at 95e-100e very carefully, where he lays out his experience with Pre-Socratic philosophy, and shows what he's actually trying to do with the Forms. There, he suggests the Forms are very tentative as explanations in the face of certain problems.

>>24752818
>how difficult Socrates made even the simplest conversation.
2 digits IQ

>>24751979
>Myles Burnyeat's "First Words" in Explorations Vol. 2: Someone from the analytic tradition observing the relationship between the contents of the dialogues and the apparently unconnected opening lines. Very persuasive.
That reminds me of one of the first Yale lecture on The Republic where the lecturer said that Heidegger could spend an entire lecture on the first line alone. I'll look into this one, thanks.

>>24757665
I'm not the same anon you responded to but I do think that there is a lot of truth to his essential point, that decisions made by Plato over the direction of his dialogues were done primarily with dramatic interest in mind and sometimes to the detriment of philosophical clarity. It's why, as >>24745409 implies, its not at all easy, even after reading a lot of his works, to get a solid grasp over Plato's overall philosophy. I agree with you that the decisions many a time are done with the intention of elucidating the points made in the dialogue, or perhaps to cast doubt, but I'd still side with >>24755243
and say its not unusual for them have the opposite effects. For instance, a more fundamental decision: his insistence on using Socrates as his protagonist for the majority of his dialogues rather than himself obfuscates the line between Socratic and Platonic thought. I'd also agree with what >>24756049 implies: his philosophy would probably have been more accessible had he written in a more direct and stripped-back format like Aristotle used, rather than attempt to communicate ideas through artistic devices.

>>24760727
A very thoughtful post.

>decisions made by Plato over the direction of his dialogues were done primarily with dramatic interest in mind and sometimes to the detriment of philosophical clarity
I'd like to clarify what I think the relevance of the dramatic details amounts. To borrow Aristotle's terms, I think we're supposed to see the universals through the particulars. Socrates is a stand in for a kind of philosopher (I hesitate to say philosophers in general, he appears to acknowledge such diversity by using Parmenides, Zeno, Timaeus, and the Strangers), but this goes for the other characters, where they're stand-ins for certain types of people, where our expectations and understanding of what's going on have to be adjusted accordingly. So you could raise the question that sometimes comes up about strawmen arguments or fallacies Socrates uses in this way: would someone like Cephalus be able to follow a longer and more precise account of anything? Would he be able to do so without getting upset if his longstanding opinions were wholly replaced by a philosophical understanding (i.e., could such a person live, if not happily in the fullest sense, at least well enough if it were to turn out that some of his deeply held hopes were dashed)? And this seems to arise out of Plato's reflection on his experiences, that human types will differ in both their estimation of what philosophy is and does, but also in how they come to philosophy. So I think the dramatic elements of character and circumstance re ment to be, on the one hand, merely engaging and harmless reading to someone who's not or not yet taken by philosophy, and on the other hand, as case studies of the manifold of phenomena to attend to if one must philosophize. I have a related point for my last comment.

>It's why, as >>24745409 implies,
Lol das me

>his philosophy would probably have been more accessible had he written in a more direct and stripped-back format like Aristotle used, rather than attempt to communicate ideas through artistic devices.
I agree it would be more accessible, but I think Plato doesn't want it to be so accessible; people like Alcibiades, and Plato's own corrupt relatives, Charmides and Critias, are never far from his mind. And, his mentor having been put to death, out of suspicion that his questioning was politically motivated, seems to mean that Plato doesn't share our modern prejudice that one may more or less speak freely about all things as though the broader circumstances arpumd oneself are irrelevant. Aristotle, for his part, seems to have satisfied himself by keeping his treatises internal to his school, instead of publishing them.

Again, some very thoughtful pushback.

I target read bits of this recently to better understand classical natural right and it’s cosmological origins and greatly enjoyed it. Overall, think The Republic and Timaeus should be read as one piece, with an eye towards Plato being a mystical-cosmological realist after all.

>>24756169
>t.

If I read this, the Parmenides dialogue will suddenly become easy as piss to understand, right /pg/?

>>24762024
That's a course on the fragments of Parmenides (AND Heraclitus; it's mistitled, if I recall). There is apparently some bit from some course in the early 30s where Heidegger discussed the dialogue, but it's not translated as far as I can tell.

>>24762074
Are the contents of the fragments though similar enough to the dialogue in order for it to still be of some use?

>>24762084
Not really, and especially not with how Heidegger discusses the fragments. It's an interesting course, but it doesn't touch much of anything that could relate to the dialogue. Were you looking for a secondary on the Parmenides?

>>24752818
I agree with you. I'm on Book VII now, and so far, I'm not convinced on the Theory of Forms. I've heard from others that the Neoplatonists really start to systematize and provide more rational arguments for the Forms and the Soul, but I can't say since I haven't read any of them. I'm going to start reading Aristotle's Organon and Lucretius's De Rerum Natura soonish, so I'll see what Aristotelianism and Epicureanism is about.

>>24762094
yeah, it would be cool to know what's out there if you have anything

>>24762177
There's a bunch, but most of them are just treat plato like an analytic philosopher who was incapable. But the best three I'm aware of (check Anna's Archive) are Proclus's commentary, Robert Brumbaugh's study, "Plato on the One", and Alex Priou's more recent study, "Becoming Socrates". (And Brumbaugh is a very little read scholar who deserves more attention; he did great work on mathematics in Plato and on the manuscript tradition.)

Give Zuckert's Postmodern Platos to every continental fag online

>>24756349
>>24760858
How did you get to know Plato so well anon?

(I'm assuming I'm correctly recognising the style of one guy; thank you for your posts.)

>>24762518
Thank you, that's very kind of you to say (and you're spot on in recognizing me).

I think just being unbalanced enough to have a strong interest, and being willing to read broadly helps. I actually hated Plato when I first read him, I either hated or was bored by everything I read by him (which was a lot), with the sole exception of the Gorgias. And, actually, I was strongly analytic leaning at that point, with an interest in Vlastos's 'historical Socrates' studies. But I read an interesting dramatic interpretation of the Gorgias, thought it was bullshit but interesting, and that turned into reading pretty widely and being surprised by the plurality of readings, which spiralled into reading more of or about any ancient interpretations of him. Also, at some point I committed myself to reading Heidegger and Hegel in order to refute them (lol, lmao), and found myself realizing they were both actually intelligible, contra every analytic leaning book or person I knew, so I also learned quickly to keep an open mind to different schools of interpretation than I would have otherwise, and to be wary of my prejudices.

An old friend from college and I also, some years back, ended up talking every weekend for 3-5 hours, reading and interpreting Rival Lovers, Lysis, Symposium, Phaedrus, Theages, Apology (+ Xenophon's Apology), Hipparchus, and Ion line-by-line. Slowing down, forcing ourselves not to skim, and actively trying to work out counterfactuals and so on really helped us immensely.

I don't care for Plato. There's a lot of dancing around so everything is overlong and convoluted, and if you look at the arguments themselves, it's almost always a crude sophism or breezy dialectic. Plato was not scientific, he was not particularly interesting either as a thinker except as a stepping stone to Aristotle. I cannot imagine spending years reading the Dialogues over and over again. Philosophy is a science, it proceeds discursively and argumentatively. In its pure form, it can say more in a paragraph than Plato will say in dozens of pages. But Plato is just playing games and dicking around, for the most part, as, I fear, are most of his readers.

>>24762947
I'm very unread when it comes to Greek philosophy so I'm curious, what do you think of Aristotelianism?

>>24762934
That's interesting. Plato seems like one of the only topics here that gets good threads (or good contributions to threads) and I'm always glad there are still people using /lit/ with some kind of wisdom to dispense, so to speak.

>An old friend from college and I also, some years back, ended up talking every weekend for 3-5 hours, reading and interpreting Rival Lovers, Lysis, Symposium, Phaedrus, Theages, Apology (+ Xenophon's Apology), Hipparchus, and Ion line-by-line. Slowing down, forcing ourselves not to skim, and actively trying to work out counterfactuals and so on really helped us immensely.
That sounds ideal really doesn't it. Was your friend very into philosophy as well or did you manage to rope him into it just for the discussion?

>>24763127
>That's interesting. Plato seems like one of the only topics here that gets good threads (or good contributions to threads) and I'm always glad there are still people using /lit/ with some kind of wisdom to dispense, so to speak.
Well, I'm glad you're digging the thread. My experience is that Plato threads have been pretty miserable the last few years, this one's been an outlier so far.

>That sounds ideal really doesn't it. Was your friend very into philosophy as well or did you manage to rope him into it just for the discussion?
He actually called me up out of the blue, kinda drunk, read a letter from Nietzsche to his sister from the 1860s about the pursuit of truth, and then blurted out, "Wanna do a weekly study group on Plato?" So he roped me in with my full consent. For his part, he wrote a senior thesis on Phaedrus, and he adored that dialogue as a mystical mythopoetic presentation of philosophy; funny enough, while we finished Rival Lovers, Lysis, and Symposium at a pretty good clip (about two months for those three), Phaedrus took us practically a year, and he let go of his mystical take. I think the moment he broke, in my estimation, is when we read the "soul becoming winged" section of the palinode, where I supplied a philological comment that "winged" (pteros, in Greek) was Athenian slang for "boner," and then we broke into hysterics over Socrates clearly describing the soul like a boner while following up with, "Phaedrus, don't laugh."

We had a lot of material to reflect on, arguments to unpack or compare with other dialogues, but slowing down also showed us how funny and even mischevious Plato is. I recall the Apology surprising us with some howlers beyond the "Punish me by feeding me like an Olympic champion" passage. (One example that comes to mind: during the account of the Delphic Oracle, Socrates acknowledges some doubtfulness about his testimony, so he first calls as witness--the God! Well, this doesn't really work, no one's going to put the trial on hold to send someone to Delphi to check, it's totally risible. So then he offers, "I call as witness my friend who asked, a fellow member of your party, Chaerophon!" But Chaerophon's *been dead* for some time, so finally, Socrates settles for, "Okay, okay...just ask Chaerophon's brother, he'll tell you this shit." But Chaerophon and his brother, according to Xenophon, HATED each other. And he does this almost throughout the whole Apology.)

Hello, newfriend here. Just finished reading Plato and starting Aristotle. Does anyone have any recommendations on how to approach Aristotle coming from Plato?

>>24763301
More or less just start as you would with Aristotle in general, with the Organon. If you're looking for a point that "connects" more, maybe the Ethics-Politics, since a lot of positions discussed can be recognized from the dialogues, as either points Aristotle disputes, agrees with, or argrees with after qualification. But he engages with Plato pretty much all over the corpus.

>>24763325
Thank anon. Do you have any opinion on the differences between Plato and Aristotle?

>>24763301
I disagree with the Organon recommendation unless you are interested in fields like formal logic.
Take a list of Aristotle's works and pick those closer to your interests.

My recommendations would be:
Politics
Physics (how the physical world works)
Nicomachean Ethics (how to live your life)

>>24763341
Well, the key difference between them is that Aristotle thinks wisdom is available, not merely philosophy in the Platonic sense (seeking wisdom), whereas Plato either thinks philosophy can only hope to be seeking for wisdom or that if there is wisdom, it's still not good to write too openly about it. (The qualifier that I mention above in the thread is that Aristotle's treatises, the ones we have, were meant only for his school; Plato's dialogues were available, but guarded, precisely to counter the civic prejudices that got Socrates killed.). Aristotle's criticisms of the Republic in the Politics are reasonable, as are his criticisms about the Good in the Ethics, but, as per >>24752871 and >>24752975, it's not as if these criticisms are unknown to Plato or not made by him (the Third Man that Aristotle references in the Metaphysics shows up twice in Plato's dialogue Parmenides). The difference over the availability of wisdom is crucial. One could probably see the whole difference by comparing the Analytics and Theaetetus.

>>24763461
Thanks also. I have read the Nicomachean Ethics and I had the impression that Plato mocked Aristotle in the Protagoras, through the figure of Prodicus, especially because the latter makes almost unnecessary distinctions similar to those Aristotle makes regarding ethical virtues such as liberality or magnanimity. I have the opinion that there is a desire to contradict Plato just for the sake of doing so.

>>24751846 (OP)
>chicken boy
Diogenes owns this fucking nerd

>>24763697
>I have the opinion that there is a desire to contradict Plato just for the sake of doing so.
Nta, but that's hard to tell. Aristotle can sometimes be such an oddbird, like apparently taking Heraclitus' obviously metaphorical use of fire literally. I think we should read him with charity, but it can make things puzzling sometimes.

>>24754438
on the contrary, I started reading Plato at 18 and was immediately infatuated; over the six years since, my love has waned gradually (although I still have a strong desire to read all his works). Like others have said elsewhere in this thread (e.g.,>>24762947), I'm often unimpressed by his arguments (before, I think I was more impressionable and less critical). Nonetheless, I still retain a fondness for his artistry - especially in the middle dialogues.

I realised the other day I have a gap, possibly just in memory, of my description of the form of the Good. I can't really remember if Plato (Socrates) provides some sort of explicit reasoning of why it's the form of the Good, specifically, that's at the top of the sort of hierarchy of forms described in the middle of the Republic.

I can think of a sort of justification on my own but it's to do with how knowledge can be cultural and I think it's from somewhere else I got that. Anything else I try to come up with is the sort of scholastic "it's good that things exist therefore that by which things have existence is the most good" - obviously this is contentious since bad things exist. I suppose the same idea makes it very obvious the form of the Good is the "most good" thing since it is that through which anything else is good, and it is good that things are good (good good good good good no longer a real word!) so it could go at the top of a hierarchy of worth, but why couldn't it be created by, or emanate from, a less good form (i.e. that which also creates bad things which one could reasonably say is worse, for making bad things)? Lots more to write about good, bad and their origin but that's enough speculation, I just wanted to ask if someone can narrate the explanation in the Republic.

>>24765023
For me it's usually this passage from book VI of the Republic:
>In like manner the Good may be said to be not only the author of knowledge to all things known, but of their being and essence, and yet the good is not essence, but far exceeds essence in dignity and power.

>>24765043
This was from the Jowett translation.
Here's the one from the Davis 1854 version, which I find better:
>We may say, therefore, as to things cognizable by the intellect, that they become cognizable not only from the good, by which they are known, but likewise that their being and essence are thence derived, while the good itself is not essence, but beyond essence, and superior to both in dignity and power.

>>24765043
>>24765060
But is there some kind of justification attached to this? I may just go and read through book vi again.

>>24765091
Try thinking for yourself. What good is an intelligible thing that's unintelligible? What good is a non-existent being? What good is error?

>>24765109
Well I was specifically wondering about Plato's idea of it not if there is in general a justification for it.

As to what you said obviously there are bad things that are intelligible and bad things that exist, also. We can get around that by saying well that's just our imperfect idea of "bad" and "good" and actually yeah it is all good; which I agree with but seems to work backwards - one must assume or presuppose somewhere the conclusion that the good creates all things, in order to get to the point of accepting that all things are actually good in the truest sense.

>>24765192
>I was specifically wondering about Plato's idea of it not if there is in general a justification for it.
Sapere aude

>>24765023
>>24765091
>>24765192
The overall argument stretches all the way back to book V, beginning with Socrates' introduction of the third and biggest wave (of laughter) of the three proposals he makes in that book, that "Unless the philosophers rule as kings or those now called kings and chiefs genuinely and adequately philosophize...there is no rest from ills for the cities...or for human kind..." So everything that follows all the way to book VII is for the sake of trying to show what would be necessary for the improvement of political life. That framing is ultimately why it culminates in the Good, as opposed to, say, the Beautiful, like in Symposium. As for evils, there's two ways to understand them: 1) political evil, which is meddling between the classes, not strictly adhering to your one art, since the meddling encourages desire for more beyond need, and 2) and individual evil, which is implied to just be having a disordered soul. But the first kind of evil is a phantom of true evil, corresponding to political justice being a phantom of true justice, the real deal (apparently) being justice or ignorance in the soul. I haven't really paid attention to see how something like natural disasters understood as evils or bad things might be discussed. If you look back at the theology of Book II, though, there's a passage where, in the midst of trying to say only good things come from the gods, they admit that bad things might still happen to people, but that one would have to explain it as a just punishment of the gods. But that theology itself is framed entirely by political concerns, "what would have to be said about the gods, *so that* people respect the laws?" That can be taken as Plato's awareness of pious fraud as a phenomenon; the Republic opens with the Thracian goddess Bendis being introduced to Athens for political reasons.

>>24763697
>I had the impression that Plato mocked Aristotle in the Protagoras, through the figure of Prodicus, especially because the latter makes almost unnecessary distinctions similar to those Aristotle makes regarding ethical virtues such as liberality or magnanimity

If Prodicus was intended to be a vehicle of mockery, then why does Socrates speak highly (or at least respectfully) of him on many a occasion?

Then nothing should be more sternly laid down than that the inhabitants of your fair city should by all means learn geometry.

It's the thing most sternly said in republic so why is everyone ignorant about it?

>>24766060
In the Protagoras there is a section where Plato makes fun of Prodicus. In 341a there is a whole section in which Prodicus is asked what the meaning of a word is, leading him into error, only to later claim that Prodicus's error was intentional and he was just playing with them. Also, in the same dialogue, in 358e Prodicus is casually dismissed, almost as if the distinction he makes were trivial or unimportant.
>Well, I said, there is a certain thing called fear or terror; and here, Prodicus, I should particularly like to know whether you would agree with me in defining this fear or terror as expectation of evil.
>Protagoras and Hippias agreed, but Prodicus said that this was fear and not terror.
>Never mind, Prodicus, I said;

In another dialogue, I don't remember which one exactly, Socrates claims to be the disciple of a musician, who, according to the information available, was a terrible teacher and musician. It's likely that when Socrates claims to be someone's disciple, he says it mostly ironically, thinking primarily that if it were true that he was someone's disciple, he wouldn't say he knew anything, or that he was capable of learning, or that the teacher was bad.

Also Plato's opinion of the Sophists was that they were, at best, rich-boy hunters and, at worst, ironic poseurs. There may have been some value in Prodicus's linguistic analysis, but it would be too much to assume that Prodicus himself was seriously engaged in this and not simply in teaching how to win arguments through sophisms.

So in the Protagaras, it seems ironic the following paragraph:
>Prodicus added: That, Critias, seems to me to be well said, for those who are present at such discussions ought to be impartial hearers of both the speakers; remembering, however, that impartiality is not the same as equality, for both sides should be impartially heard, and yet an equal meed should not be assigned to both of them; but to the wiser a higher meed should be given, and a lower to the less wise. And I as well as Critias would beg you, Protagoras and Socrates, to grant our request, which is, that you will argue with one another and not wrangle; for friends argue with friends out of good-will, but only adversaries and enemies wrangle. And then our meeting will be delightful; for in this way you, who are the speakers, will be most likely to win esteem, and not praise only, among us who are your audience; for esteem is a sincere conviction of the hearers' souls, but praise is often an insincere expression of men uttering falsehoods contrary to their conviction. And thus we who are the hearers will be gratified and not pleased; for gratification is of the mind when receiving wisdom and knowledge, but pleasure is of the body when eating or experiencing some other bodily delight. Thus spoke Prodicus, and many of the company applauded his words.

>create a hypothetical time warp world "thinker" prison where everyone from ancient greek philosophers to 21st century jordan peterson are inmates

Who would come out as shotcaller?

>>24766476
Very astute reading, anon. If I may add, the dialogue Cratylus opens with a joke somewhat at Prodicus' expense. Socrates is appealed to by his friend Hermogenes to settle a dispute between him and Cratylus over the correctness of names, to which Socrates gives this funny rundown of his expertise, something like, "Did you guys know that Prodicus offers a 50 drachma course ALL ABOUT this topic, from top to bottom? Unfortunately I could only afford his 2 drachma remedial course. Let's get started!"

Now, this said, I am tempted to say with that other anon that of the sophists, Prodicus comes out receiving the best treatment, really just given some gentle ribbing over his extreme hair-splitting. And there's passages in other dialogues where Socrates says or suggests he sends some potential students looking for a teacher to Prodicus (Laches, and I think Theaetetus and Apology?); that seems like a good measure of the degree to which he was felt to be, at least among the sophists, an ultimately decent and harmless one.

If you're the same anon who above speculated that Prodicus could've been a stand-in for Aristotle, while I like the mischeviousness of the suggestion, I think that's far too doubtful. (I've seen similar takes on the Aristoteles of the Parmenides, but I think a different point is being alluded to more in line with what the Republic warns about the teaching of dialectic.)

But, and I want to emphasize, I do like seeing it when anons really try to grapple with those points of the dialogues that usually get skimmed over, and trying to see the relations of passages between them. Keep that up.

>>24766567
Thanks anon. I honestly don't believe that Prodicus is a parody of Aristotle. But I do believe that it parodies the kind of linguistic inquiry that must attribute to each word a portion of reality, as if each word's meaning didn't vary depending on how it is used.

I believe that Plato did value the analysis of language, not as a direct means of arriving at Ideas or Forms, but rather as a kind of reflection of them. Just as in the Republic it is said that the sun can be appreciated through its reflection in water, I believe that Ideas can be appreciated to the extent that one is aware of how water or language deforms what it reflects.

Now, I do believe that in Parmenides, in some sense, he alludes to Aristotle, because, at least in the Nicomachean Ethics, we can see that many conclusions identical to Plato's are shared (for example, that only for the good man do things appear as they truly are), but philosophy lacks any belief in Ideas or Forms. In this way, it seems that Aristotle's thought is something like Plato without the theory of forms, and in this way what Parmenides says is fulfilled:
>And yet, Socrates, said Parmenides, if a man, fixing his attention on these and the like difficulties, does away with ideas of things and will not admit that every individual thing has its own determinate idea which is always one and the same, he will have nothing on which his mind can rest; and so he will utterly destroy the power of reasoning, as you seem to me to have particularly noted.
Since in Nicomachean Ethics, it is denied that there is an idea of good, but nevertheless, it is said that there are different goods, and some are better than others, and for man, the highest good is politics, as Protagoras could have said.

>>24751846 (OP)
Hello fellow Plato enjoyers, I am currently reading Gorgias and getting filtered hard. in this section, Socrates manages to convince Polus that getting punished for crimes by the authorities no matter how much suffering it produces is not bas but good. What exactly is he doing?

SOCRATES: And he who punishes rightly, punishes justly?

POLUS: Yes.

SOCRATES: And therefore he acts justly?

POLUS: Justly.

SOCRATES: Then he who is punished and suffers retribution, suffers
justly?

POLUS: That is evident.

SOCRATES: And that which is just has been admitted to be honourable?

POLUS: Certainly.

SOCRATES: Then the punisher does what is honourable, and the punished
suffers what is honourable?

POLUS: True.

>SOCRATES: And if what is honourable, then what is good, for the
honourable is either pleasant or useful?

POLUS: Certainly.

>SOCRATES: Then he who is punished suffers what is good?

POLUS: That is true.

>SOCRATES: Then he is benefited?

POLUS: Yes.

Is the rhetorical technique being used here a kind of ambiguity fallacy or vagueness where one thinks of being whipped or punished as "bad" for oneself for it requires great suffering, but it is "good" in the not personal sense that it is right to punish the wicked, so good for society or good in the abstract and thus tricks Polus into agreeing with him?

https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/1672/pg1672.txt

>>24766728
There's a couple of things going on there. One is that (and this happens throughout the Gorgias) Socrates shows the shakiness of Gorgianic rhetoric, which praises and blames without defining what it's praising and blaming (so notice that justice never really gets defined in an outright manner, a lot of the terms really are left at an impressionistic remove). The other element here is showing Polus, much to his puzzlement and chagrin, that he's more of a moralist than he's been trying to make himself out to be. That latter point is another, somewhat more subtle, critique of Gorgias and his students; they talk a big game about using rhetoric to be free being ruled by others, but they tend to be very ordinary in their moralism (this is true of Callicles too, it just takes much longer to bring out; in Gorgias' case, it's instead that he's insufficiently careful in selecting students who could bring opprobrium to his person and practice, since his actual student Polus is praising a Macedonian tyrant in Athens, and his potential student Callicles is practically threatening to enslave everyone for his benefit).

>>24766667
Cheers. I do have something in mind to say about this, but I have to head to bed, and I'll hop back at it in the morning.

>>24766815
>to be free being ruled by others
*to be free from etc.

>>24766815
I am new to Socratic dialogues but greatly enjoying it so far. What is stopping me is I am unused to these kinds of dense vague wordplay and I have to stop and parse out causal chains of logic to see if I dis/agree with what is being claimed

>>24757000
>The argument is about being governed by pleasure. Let's say that somebody really likes spending time with goth girls down at the goth bar every Saturday night. Because he really likes this, he goes on to work tirelessly every day, be courageous, strong, and act according to other virtues. Still, he is doing all these because of a lack of restraint regarding the pleasure he gets from the goth girls.

I buy that argument but what makes the pursuit of philosophy any different? I could also argue philosophers may pursue knowledge in a vain attempt to garner attention, fame, and feel superior to their counterparts (Socrates definitely seems preposterous in the Phaedo), whereas this somebody might not be looking for vain pleasures but rather true love.

You don't actually have to answer that, my point is that Socrates' arguments appear really superficial and I kinda can't stand how fast and unquestioningly the other characters in the dialog accept his train of thought (his argument for reincarnation in this same dialog is particularly bad). I agree with >>24762947.

>>24756816
Is it commented? I might get it if so.

>>24757669
Haven't gotten there, will do, thanks.

>>24766476
I think the line that convinced me Socrates treated Prodicus with distinction amongst all other sophists was the line in Meno, where he says to the eponymous interlocutor,

>We are probably poor specimens, you and I, Meno. Gorgias has not adequately educated you, nor Prodicus me. (96d)

Since it has been clearly established already that Meno is an acolyte of Gorgias, indeed he views him as an exceptional sophist who is actually worth listening to

> I admire this most in Gorgias, Socrates, that you would never hear him promising this [to be a teacher of virtue; unlike sophists in general]. Instead, he ridicules the others when he hears them making this claim. (95c)

For Socrates to say that Prodicus is to he what Gorgias is to Meno, suggests that he views Prodicus as a similarly exceptional sophist.

>Socrates claims to be the disciple of a musician, who, according to the information available, was a terrible teacher and musician.

Ah, yes, Connus the harpist from Euthydemus:
>just as I have already disgraced Connus the harpist, Metrobius' son, who is still trying to teach me to play

>>24766996
>Is it commented? I might get it if so.
I assume that was for >>24756052?

>>24766728
I can offer another interpretation apart from the one given by anon here >>24766815.
Throughout Plato's work, every time he refers to punishment, he treats it as a good thing. The point he makes is that punishment itself would be a good thing insofar as it participates in the Idea of the good.

Thus, one can consider the following: everyone admits that punishment must exist, whether it is considered good in itself or bad for the recipient but good for society. However, for example, when one punishes a child, the punishment is never intended to render the child crippled or useless, but rather to make them better. Thus, a punishment that aims to traumatize the child and thus prevent them from doing something wrong, rather than improve them, disables them and makes them worse in a sense.

It can be said, then, that a punishment that is excessive in a certain sense is at the same time a bad punishment, because it fails to make anyone better. Therefore, an excessive punishment is bad, and at the same time, it only has the appearance of punishment.

Conversely, a good punishment is the only thing that can truly be called a punishment. So, if one is punished in this sense, one should feel honored that a good thing is being done.

So, in a sense, being punished is a good thing, because it will make us better in the sense of correcting ourselves.

This is why, in my opinion, it is said that the Idea of the Good gives essence to things.Only good punishment is punishment in itself.

Just as a medical treatment can be painful for someone but good for their health, a punishment can be uncomfortable or painful but not bad for the person undergoing it.

Now, in practice, what constitutes good punishment is difficult to learn. But at least if we consider that punishment generates benefits for the punished, we could say, for example, that sending someone to prison only to have them emerge a worse criminal is irrational and stupid, or at least that's what I think.

>>24767282
I agree with you that Prodicus is treated better than other sophists.

But to suggest that Meno is a poor student of Gorgias as Socrates is of Prodicus is to draw the same analogy in that both learned nothing from their teachers.

Now, this lack of learning may be due to the uselessness of students, as Socrates suggests, or because there was nothing of value to learn in the first place.

If we consider that Socrates, according to Plato, was the most intelligent and wisest of the Athenians, it is unlikely that he learned nothing through his own fault. So, when he says he was a poor student, he is being ironic, and in the same sense that Gorgias was an expert in rhetoric but ignorant of virtue, in the same sense Prodicus is an expert in linguistics but ignorant of the nature of things, or something like that.

Hello boys and girls. I've been wanting to learn greek but I got bored of the reading greek text because the stories are dumb so I got Beethams learning greek with Plato instead because it follows the meno which is one of my favourite dialogues. Any tips or advice?

>>24766667
Okay, I have some time to go over this. Now, if I understand you correctly, you're saying that the passage may allude to Aristotle in the following way: by rejecting taking the Forms the way they seem to be presented in the dialogue, Plato may be suggesting that Aristotle, from Plato's perspective, is not doing philosophy, and the passage you quote from the Parmenides suggests this to you. Correct me if I misunderstand you.

If I understand you, I don't think I would construe it so strongly as to say that philosophy requires belief in Forms, or at least not in the way most people might mean that (which I take to be that the Forms are really existent beings). I take it the following way: that what philosophy (which for the most part in Plato is "seeking wisdom") requires is speech and dialogue/conversation (not narrowly construed as only with other people, but for thinking as well; conversation with oneself), but that for thinking to perform its task, language must perform its task, and that language, in performing its task, already lends itself toward taking words as "in-itself"s; i.e., that a word like "justice" or "man" or "master" already quite naturally tempt us to take them as though there are Ideas/Looks of beings. Now, Aristotle's position, to the extent that I understand it, is that of Parmenides in the first half of the dialogue where the latter refutes Socrates with respect to our ability to assess participation (which Socrates there presupposes).

From here, I think matters would hinge on whether we take Parmenides' gymnastic to save participation, or to do something else. I don't take the gymnastic to do that, or, if it's supposed to do that, it's never been clear to me how it does that except by restoring Socrates' presupposition as a presupposition. What I take it to do, instead, is to offer a next-best bet: in the absence of certainty about these things, take a prospective Form up as an hypothesis, and, taking it as a given, work out what can be said if it is or is not, with reference to itself by itself, with reference to itself in relation to the other beings, with reference to the other beings in relation to itself, and, given the hypothesized Form, what the other beings are in relation to each other. And this would be a "next-best bet" insofar as, if you aren't certain that there is a Justice in itself, you at least have a way of tentatively understanding what it would be like, and what the world would have to be like if it existed.

>>24766888
Take it at your own pace. If you need to plow through in order to get a rough sense of the whole of it, that's fine, you can always come back to it with a fine-toothed comb. But it is good that you're trying to work these things out, and if you have the will to do so, I encourage you to do so.

>>24767839
I'm not familiar with that book, but I have read Meno in Greek. Not otherwise knowing how that book approaches it, I would almost be tempted to say to give more focus to what Meno says; one thing that will stand out quickly is that some of Socrates' lines, in even short passages, can be winding, while Meno's lines are much more straightforward.

>>24767965
Thanks do you have any other advice about learning greek like books or resources? Do i even need to bother with the accents? This was i sticking point for me in the past and so I mostly avoided them without too much trouble just to get to the texts quicker

>>24767991
Download a copy of Smythe's reference grammar. Smythe saved me over and over when I was a student. He's a bit terse, dry, and he expects you to have a good idea of what you're looking for, but he's pretty clear and helpful. I'll also tell you from experience that when I was a student, I mostly ignored accents, and I later considered that a mistake.

I'm not quite sure what else to recommend, not knowing how otherwise familiar you are with Greek, but if you want to dive in deeply, Denniston's books on particles and prose style are both very good, illuminating on the differences between authors, and, in the surprising case of the book on particles, engaging. I don't know, maybe those are too "in the weeds" though. Have you also asked over on the Classics general?

>>24765091
>>24765356
There's some argumentation about why knowledge of the Good and being a philosopher is at the top around 585b. The main idea is stated around 583b.

>>24751979
>book 11 has a long section where one of the characters criticizes Plato, and in the process shares all sorts of ancient gossip and accusations.
any juicy bits?

secondary sources i.e someone who thinks for me

>>24768574
The one that always strikes me is the claim not only that the Republic sucks, but that Plato also plagiarized it ad its title from Protagoras; I've literally never seen any other ancient account of Protagoras having written a Politeia.

There's a funnier one of Plato apparently having stood up during Socrates' trial, starting to say something like, "My fellow Athenians, I know I'm the youngest here among you, but..." before getting shouted down. And one anecdote about him apparently trying to pull rank on all the other Socratics after Socrates' death with everyone else rolling their eyes.

>>24768618
Proclus Theology of Plato

>>24768618
Diogenes Laertius

Ἀγεωμέτρητος μηδεὶς εἰσίτω

>>24767938
Yes, I believe it's true that philosophy, at least for Plato, requires the Forms to be philosophy. Now, I also believe that the Forms are eternal in the sense that they are real and have being.

But what you've said also sounds plausible and is an alternative that could be taken from what Plato said: no longer eternal Forms, but rather hypotheses that can function both as principles and as contrasts between themselves, and with respect to themselves. In a certain sense, Plato always speaks of a second navigation or second attemp at understanding things.
> But as I have failed either to discover myself, or to learn of any one else, the nature of the best, I will exhibit to you, if you like, what I have found to be the second best mode of enquiring into the cause.
>I should very much like to hear, he replied.
>Socrates proceeded:—I thought that as I had failed in the contemplation of true existence, I ought to be careful that I did not lose the eye of my soul; as people may injure their bodily eye by observing and gazing on the sun during an eclipse, unless they take the precaution of only looking at the image reflected in the water, or in some similar medium. So in my own case, I was afraid that my soul might be blinded altogether if I looked at things with my eyes or tried to apprehend them by the help of the senses. And I thought that I had better have recourse to the world of mind and seek there the truth of existence. I dare say that the simile is not perfect—for I am very far from admitting that he who contemplates existences through the medium of thought, sees them only 'through a glass darkly,' any more than he who considers them in action and operation. However, this was the method which I adopted: I first assumed some principle which I judged to be the strongest, and then I affirmed as true whatever seemed to agree with this, whether relating to the cause or to anything else; and that which disagreed I regarded as untrue. But I should like to explain my meaning more clearly, as I do not think that you as yet understand me.

However, I believe that the method of using Ideas as hypotheses should ultimately result in being able to demonstrate or understand the Forms themselves and how they function as those that give essence to things.

In this sense, I believe we can conclude that what Forms ought to be means what Forms are like, and what Forms are like means what they ought to be, at least with respect to the things that participate in them. Or, in a certain sense, what ought to be is what it is to be.

But in any case, I need to read more, and I haven't yet read Aristotle thoroughly enough to give a good opinion.

Big dick Plato thread, high level discourse acquired, why is every anon not ITT and actually trying to improve their mind and skill set?

The Protagoras, for me, is perhaps the dramatic masterpiece of Plato's oeuvre, only rivalled by the Phaedo. The part during the poetry analysis when Socrates describes receiving a blow from Protagoras's oratory as if he'd been punched in the face by a boxer and has to stall for time so he can regain his composure and come back into the debate is such a kino moment; you can just imagine how much of his pride is at stake at that point: its as if everyone previously referenced in any early dialogue is present: sophists, youth, and even politicians like Alcibiades - it so perfectly captures the stakes of essentially having your entire reputation on the line. I'll often think of it whenever I'm losing at chess or an argument or something.

>>24752390
What do you mean?
Define "guy"
Define "basically"
Define "version of"
Define "Jordan"
Define "Peterson"

>>24751846 (OP)
Can/Should I buy picrel and dive right in?

Who are your favorite contemporary Platooners frens?

>>24770277
Certainly, although I think the Apology, Alcibades, and Crito make better introductory dialogues. The Philibus is a good one too although definitely one to return to at the end too.

>>24766728
There have been good responses here. I will just note that if one thinks of the "good" more as "being as desirable" instead of a more modern conception like "whatever duty or 'moral obligation'" demands, then we can see that Plato is here circling around the difference between apparent goods and real goods.

So much of ancient ethics rests on the appearance/reality distinction here. We want what is truly best, but we often mistake the worse for the better. This is Socrates' initial point against Thrasymachus in the Republic, the strong can be wrong about what is best for them.

So, punishment is obviously undesirable in a rather obvious sense, and yet if one finds honor, justice, etc. desirable it seems that the apparent undesirablity of punishment may be only apparent.

This is not to contradict the first response. The problem with loose rhetoric and reasoning is precisely that it makes it difficult to separate reality from mere appearances, and of course appearances are themselves *really* appearances and are revelatory of reality, but not in whole.

>>24766888
In line with the other anon's advice, I'll typically do a first reading without any serious notes, save maybe some of the general structure and whatnot, and just try to enjoy it, then on the second and other subsequent readings, I'll try and get into the individual arguments and gain a more holistic understanding of the dialogue etc. This works pretty well for me and it helps me avoid sinking too much time into a dialogue which I might end up realising wasn't worth my time to begin with. It's like I'm sorta scouting it out for later analysis.

>>24770277
You can; for most people (especially undergrads), its the first, and perhaps only dialogue they read. Nonetheless, there are shorter, more accessible dialogues to choose. >>24770280 recommends some good ones, although I'd advise going with Euthyphro: its very short, rich, rather accessible and gives you a good taste of what's to come. It was my first, and I've been hooked ever since.

>>24763461
I'm starting Aristotle and everywhere he references the categories explained in the Organon. Seems like a fundational text to him.

>>24770277
Read chapter 6 as a sample.

>>24770973
Sure anon, go ahead.

So are Plato's works just 4th century BC "I AM SILLY" strawman rage comics?

>No, a twink romance is not gay aristotle. What you refer to as "gay" is simply a shadow on the wall, a construct but not knowledge. It is not a form, it is not a truth. It is something we observe in this world but a mere illusion.
>plato you are wrong. From observation a twink romance is indeed not a truth. I may even stop to use your own logic systems and argue that having a twink boyfriend is not the same as a tomboy girlfriend. You may see them as both illusions but on closer observation of observing their differences we can categorize the twink as still having male traits unlike that of the tomboy.
>"Stop, please do explain more aristotlle, why the tomboy is acceptable but the twink is different", said parmenides
>Yes, the tomboy exhibits the same physical appearance of the twink but on analysis of the posterior we see slight differences between these two, interpreted closer we can't categorize the twink and tomboy as the same if their posterior is different around the lower part of their bodies
>You are too physical and not metaphysical aristotle, a twink is feminine and masculine balanced out much like the tomboy is such, yes their posteriors are different but the bussy of a twink is comparable to that of the tomboy, therefore our logic balances out
>Metaphysically from my reality twink love is not gay and my reality is my truth therefore in my view it is not gay

What's with all the geometry in platos works

>>24771401
It was the shit back

>>24770221
The Protagoras always feels comical to me. Socrates asks Protagoras not to do these long speeches, and to answer more simply and concisely, and then follows up by giving the longest speech in the dialogue, like he's rubbing Protagoras' nose in what he can get away with.

>>24772551
Agreed. Its not the only work of his that I find funny, Euthydemus and Hippias Major also come to mind there, but I'd say its the one I've laughed at most. The bit I can remember the clearest is when someone jokes that Alcibiades always wants to be on the winning side; I could appreciate that one a lot after reading History of the Peloponnesian War

>>24770278
Does Philosophical Mysticism go into Plato's relationship with the Eleusinian Mysteries? I'm really interested to read more into that

>>24772585
I hear ya on those, Cratylus is pretty funny too. The moment in Protagoras that always gets me is when Prodicus is dragged in to defend a distinction Socrates makes, and Protagoras practically sputters in disbelief over what's happening.

>>24772592
I'm not familiar with that, so that anon can of course address that, but there's four points about the Mysteries and Plato that stand out to me:

1) Callias (the man at whose house Protagoras takes place) and his paternal lineage had an important role within the Mysteries.

2) Alcibiades, upon his return to Athens from exile, was allowed to lead the procession of the Mysteries.

3) Phaedrus, Eryximachus, Agathon, and Pausanias (all in both the Protagoras and Symposium, and of course Phaedrus in the dialogue by his name) were all caught up in Alcibiades blasphemy of the Mysteries scandal, with Phaedrus and Eryximachus being exiled, and I think Agathon and Pausanias getting off, but voluntarily fleeing to Macedon afterwards.

4) If you accept the Seventh Letter, Plato says the following (333d-334a):
>I, an Athenian man, Dion’s comrade and his ally, came to the tyrant so that I could make friendship take the place of war between them; but I was defeated in contending against the slanderers. Dionysius was trying to persuade me by means of honors and money to join with him as a witness and friend, with a view to lending seemliness to his casting out of Dion. Of course, he altogether missed the mark in these things. But later, when Dion was coming back home, he brought with him a pair of brothers from Athens who had come to be [his friends] **not from philosophy but from the promiscuous comradeship belonging to most friends, which they work out through hosting someone as a guest-friend or through initiation into the lesser and greater mysteries**. In this case, the pair of friends who together brought him back had come to be his comrades both from these things and from providing the service of his return; but when they came to Sicily, since they perceived that Dion had been slandered among the Siceliotes who had been freed by him to the effect that he was plotting to become tyrant, they not only betrayed their comrade and guest-friend but came to be, as it were, perpetrators of his murder, themselves holding weapons in their hands as they stood by as auxiliaries for the murderers.

>>24772713
Ah, those all really interesting - thanks!

>not from philosophy but from the promiscuous comradeship belonging to most friends

Do you think that Plato himself was initiated? My initial assumption was that he was since it sounds like that was the case with Socrates (e.g., Meno,77e: "I think you would agree, if you did not have to go away before the mysteries as you told me yesterday, but could remain and be initiated"); yet, it sounds like in the seventh letter that he's distancing himself from it a bit and maybe even holds some disdain towards it.

>>24772784
Well, it wouldn't surprise me that he and Socrates were initiated, but the dialogues and the letter seem to reflect some misgivings, if not of the teachings, then of how the institution of the Mysteries can be used politically for favors (giving Alcibiades a role in them), or be led or run by people of otherwise questionable character (Callias, who spends much money and time courting the sophists). And, if it may be the case that Plato reflected that the teachings of the Mysteries were ultimately good (see Phaedo 69c-d for a possible way to construe those teachings), it also seemed evident to Plato that he could not thereby place his trust in a man simply by being a fellow initiate, and the letter attests to his own experience in seeing his friend be murdered by men who used their status as fellow initiates as a means of deceiving that friend and gaining his trust (see also the speech Plato writes for his brother Adeimantus at Republic 364b-365a). So he appears to have some complicated feelings about it all.

>>24770278
I've been meaning to read Schindler's book. Anyone have thoughts on it?

Does Plato mention somewhere how his forms hierarchy works in nature outside human influence?
Do the forms degrade the same way?

>>24774519
What you would probably want to look to are the Symposium, the Timaeus, and the Sophist.

For the Symposium, I have in mind the first two thirds of Diotima's speeches, before the ladder of love. Diotima distinguishes between the Good and the Beautiful, and then a bit later claims that there's a narrow and a comprehensive sense of "lover", and she elaborates by analogy to the narrow and comprehensive senses of "poet", which is where reproduction in nature comes in. At that point, the discussion is still in light of the Good, where one's possession of it has a more clear end than the possession of the Beautiful. Hierarchy of all Forms isn't explicit, but you could potentially infer something from how the Good and the Beautiful are discussed, and how she sees love understood as desire from lack plays out in nature and psychology.

The Timaeus has a hierarchy more clearly in mind, and with constant reference to nature.

The Sophist depicts, towards the end, the Eleatic Stranger arguing that there must really be five "Greatest Kinds" (Being, Same, Other, Rest, Motion), which everything else requires some blending of in order to be what they are. Whether that account can be harmonized with the Good of the Republic would take some work to make out more clearly.

As for if Forms degrade, how might you mean? Do you mean in the sese of the degradation of regimes in the Republic, or something else?

>>24774862
>What you would probably want to look to are the Symposium, the Timaeus, and the Sophist.
Thank you for these pointers and your analysis anon.

>Do you mean in the sense of the degradation of regimes in the Republic, or something else?
That does relate to how I started thinking about this.
In the last chapter of the republic he talks about the ideal form of a sofa (ανάκλιντρο), the sofa form that a sofa builder has, and the sofa form that an artist has. Each one of the latter two being one level of degradation lower than the ideal.
I then thought that Plato is saying that in order to really understand an object you not only need a precise model (form) of the object but you also need to know how this form relates to the ideal form. Maybe it relates to how "knowing" as an act is very dependent on other people around you. And you need to know how degraded your inputs are in relation to some ideal, else your thoughts about the object may be completely unsubstantiated, only based on simulations, like those people in the cave.
And that is indeed the reason he started from the ideal society and described how it degrades in order to finally reach the current state.

But what if you saw a tree out in the wild? Would you still be affected by some social imprinting of the idea of the tree? Would your own filters affect your perception?

What do you lot think of Hegel's take on the Parmenides? Not trying to bait, I revisit that one every couple of years and every time I read it differently. His reading seems superficial to me. The framing at the beginning of the dialogue seems to point to the necessity of sublating these contradictions, and then I see the deductions as in one way or another pointing further toward the necessity of this sublation. Hegel seems to be missing the spirit for the letter. The deductions aren't meant to dig into external reflection at all, they're supposed to lead the reader to overcome it imo.

"The dialectic employed by Plato in treating of the One in the Parmenides is also to be regarded rather as a dialectic of external reflection. Being and the One are both Eleatic forms which are the same thing. But they are also to be distinguished; and it is thus that Plato takes them in that dialogue. After removing from the One the various determinations of whole and parts, of being-within-itself, of being-in-another, etc., of shape, time, etc., he reaches the result that being does not belong to the One, for being belongs to any particular something only in one of these modes. Plato next deals with the proposition: the One is, and we should refer to Plato himself to see how, starting from this proposition, he accomplishes the transition to the non-being of the One. He does it by comparing the two determinations of the proposition put forward: the One is; it contains the One and being, and 'the One is' contains more than when we only say: the One. It is through their being different that the moment of negation contained in the proposition is demonstrated. It is evident that this course has a presupposition and is an external reflection."

>>24774950
Hmm, interesting; I have some thoughts, but the matter is very murky, and Republic X contains a lot of puzzles to me, so forgive me for only circling around your questions. One point of curiosity is that the examples Socrates uses there are things Glaucon brought up in book II to reject the city of pigs, compare:

>And he said, "If you were providing for a city of sows, Socrates, on what else would you fatten them than this?"
>"Well, how should it be, Glaucon?" I said.
>"As is conventional (νομίζεται)," he said. "I suppose men who aren't going to be wretched recline on couches and eat from tables and have relishes and desserts just like men have nowadays."

>"Do you want us to make our consideration according to our customary procedure, beginning from the following point? For we are, presumably, accustomed to set down some one particular form for each of the particular 'manys' to which we apply the same name. Or don't you understand?"
>"I do."
>"Then let's now set down anyone of the 'manys' you please; for example, if you wish, there are surely many couches and tables."
>"Of course."
>"But as for ideas for these furnishings, there are presumably two, one of couch, one of table."

Glaucon sees couches and tables as connected with convention and the desire to not be wretched and animalistic. That is, Glaucon doesn't just see bare objects, but objects somehow already imbued with a meaningfulness of the sort "using these makes me better than animals or savage men." So, I wonder if the book X passage is then trying to draw his (and our) attention to the very questions you raise at the bottom of your post. What, after all, is the "couch in itself" apart from our use of it (as your question at >>24774519 effectively asks), apart from our desires related to it? (And, if desire turns out to be relevant here, is this why this appears in this belated and more harsh critique of poetry, since poetry can be formative of our desires?)

I'm also struck by how these questions seem to be implied in the Cave analogy. Socrates starts the analogy off by mentioning men and animals as examples of what there are shadows of on the cave wall, which speaks to our expectation after the divided line that the shadows be of visible things. But Socrates eventually adds shadows of the Just on the wall (I think with the return of the philosopher to the cave). So the issue can't be merely, at least, that we see people and animals around us and think that these objects of becoming are real, but that we have opinions about men and animals akin to our opinions about what the Just is, which must be something like how Glaucon takes couches and tables.

>>24775141
I don't think he's necessarily wrong, I would quibble with him over details, though. My understanding is that the relation between the first two hypotheses is already spelled out by Parmenides in his summary of the gymnastic:

>"Take, if you like," he said, "this hypothesis that Zeno hypothesized: 'If many *is*, what must result both [1] for the Many themselves in relation to themselves and [2] in relation to the One and [3] for the One both in relation to itself and [4] in relation to the Many?' Then, in turn, if many is not, you must inquire what will result both for the One and the Many both in relation to themselves and in relation to each another.

The first hypothesis would be the equivalent of what I labeled [1] ("for the Many themselves in relation to themselves") while what I labeled [2] would be equivalent to the second hypothesis ("the Many themselves...in relation to the One"). (The equivalents of [3] and [4] are switched when Parmenides actually goes over them.) (Also, try running through the first hypothesis according to Parmenides' advice that one do this for other Forms, and slotting in "Same" for "One.") So my quibble would be that both of the first two hypotheses are "if One is," but I see why he takes the way he does since Parmenides has to explain what the difference in approach has to be for Aristoteles at the start of the second.

I think Hegel was reasonable to say, in the Phenomenology, "The manner of study in ancient times is distinct from that of modern times, in that the former consisted in the veritable training and perfecting of the natural consciousness. Trying its powers at each part of its life severally, and philosophizing about everything it came across, the natural consciousness transformed itself into a universality of abstract understanding which was active in every matter and in every respect. In modern times, however, the individual finds the abstract form ready made."

>>24775149
>Glaucon brought up in book II
That is a good observation about Glaucon from Book 2.

>desire
Plato frequently analyzes the people's desires and where they derive pleasure from, such as from a play. He also always goes over the desires of the people as the political systems change, with tyranny being desire ran rampant.

>after the divided line that the shadows be of visible things.
Weren't there two lines, one for the visible things like animals and another one for the invisible ones like justice?

>>24775292
>I think Hegel was reasonable to say, in the Phenomenology, "The manner of study in ancient times is distinct from that of modern times, in that the former consisted in the veritable training and perfecting of the natural consciousness. Trying its powers at each part of its life severally, and philosophizing about everything it came across, the natural consciousness transformed itself into a universality of abstract understanding which was active in every matter and in every respect. In modern times, however, the individual finds the abstract form ready made."
Yeah that's a cool bit. In the old-timey times you learned how to think, ascending from the sensible to the noetic, now you have thinking presented to you on a platter and you have to break through this surface level understanding to what thinking is in itself, which is harder.

>>24775458
>Weren't there two lines, one for the visible things like animals and another one for the invisible ones like justice?
Well, the lower two parts of the line both deal with visible things, the lowest being visible reflections and shadows of the things in the next higher part of the line. The cave image, following from the line, naturally suggests that the shadows correspond to the bottom two sections of the line, but that gets complicated as soon as the Just is introduced as one of the shadows.

>>24775466
>Yeah that's a cool bit. In the old-timey times you learned how to think, ascending from the sensible to the noetic, now you have thinking presented to you on a platter and you have to break through this surface level understanding to what thinking is in itself, which is harder.
I really like that passage, I think it (incidentally?) captures the impediments of modern learning very well. It's very easy to dismiss the ancients without realizing that our modern conceptual apparatuses are deeply sedimented and entangled in over two and half centuries of thought.

>>24775486
Yeah and this is of course part of Hegel's point, we no longer have the 'innocence' of the Greeks. All of the knowledge that they would have acquired organically is now fossilized and we have to find a way to melt that ice. For Hegel we don't have the option of starting over, culture has already advanced beyond that point.

Bump

Gem of a book

>>24752910
>>24752871
>>24752818
I read the republic right after aristotle's nichomean ethics. What struck me is that aristotle brought me ideas that were solutions to things I got stuck on when thinking independantly. For example that whatever you're looking at, you have to look at it with the right level of magnification. Like it doesn't make sense to think of individuals when looking at large groups of people, but it does when judging one person from that group. Essentially when to look at trends, when to look at details.

When I read Plato, I went into it with similar enthusiasm. The experience I remembere is being annoyed by ideas that I thought would bring bad results, like the idea of kids being raised by state.

>>24777309
Sure, did you have any thoughts on what I said at >>24753089?

>>24777383
Not really, if only because I know how altogether lacking I am to discuss these topics. The best I could contribute is to add the 5 cents of my experience.

I have too little context and knowledge to either challenge or accept the idea that it's intended as an absurd thought experiment. Perhaps it doesn't sound so so absurd now because it's half true nowadays.

If the intent was to expose the disconnect between the public good and the personal good of the children it did so expertly and I deeply underestimated and misunderstood it, which wouldn't have been the first time. Thank you for pointing me to it so that I can consider it in the future. Sorry that I don't have anything interesting to add.

>>24777576
All good, anon.

>I have too little context and knowledge to either challenge or accept the idea that it's intended as an absurd thought experiment.
I do want to emphasize that Plato puts this consideration out there forwardly in several passages, and one of those passages, book V 471c-473a, takes place right after the account of how children would be raised (this point about not being concerned with actually founding such a city is repeated at the very end of book IX). So I do want to put before you that Plato is careful to openly write that we shouldn't be preoccupied with founding a city like this.

>If the intent was to expose the disconnect between the public good and the personal good of the children it did so expertly
That's a very good observation, and a big part of the thrust of the Republic, the difference between the public and private good. At one point, Socrates admits that the justice of the city is really only a phantom of justice in the soul of the individual.

>>24777631
>That's a very good observation, and a big part of the thrust of the Republic, the difference between the public and private good. At one point, Socrates admits that the justice of the city is really only a phantom of justice in the soul of the individual

I think I was mostly echoing what you were saying. Thanks for the detailed response, you make me want to read it again. At the time I was completely ideologically driven and thinking seriously about politics for the first time in my life. Curious to see what it brings to me this time. It's still in my nightstand with a couple of other books (nichomean ethics, my grandfathers memoirs of being in a japanese camp, gulag archipelago, hitler's war, the tao of jeet kune do, the war of art, the art of peace, mind gym) the last remnants before I moved on to e-reading. Didn't expect I'd ever pick up the republic again, but here we go.

Thank you.

>>24777270
How so anon?

>>24777934
Cheers, anon. If it helps any, as I said upthread somewhere, I used to hate Plato, and my own first readings of the Republic didn't leave me impressed.

But, in any case, if/when you do get back around to re-reading it, I'm sure we'll be here if you have more questions. Best of luck.

Socrates, Plato, Aristotles... how do they relate to each other? Which is superior?

>>24780286
Beyond being successive teachers of each other? The two points unifying them appear to me to be a kind of judgement of Pre-Socratic philosophy as having been in certain respects inadequate, and the importance of taking one's bearings, at least initially, by the opinions or things said about the phenomena being investigated, and then making one's way to inquiry into nature.

Your question about superiority is a harder question to get into without it just amounting to asserting one's tastes, and you'd have to come to some clarity about what measure you want to be deciding from. For example, Aristotle is more precise in his surviving writings, offers accounts of the connections between the subjects of his studies, and covers a greater breadth, most evident in his studies of biology and natural phenomena, whereas Plato and Xenophon's Socratic writings are more allusive, partly owing to political circumstances necessitating more reserve (for example, per Apology 18b-c and Laws 967a-d, the study of the heavens was associated by the many with atheism and impiety). So on that point, Aristotle readily appears more clear, systematic, and willing to elaborate on and establish answers concerning the subject of nature, and by that measure, I think most people would agree that Aristotle comes out in a superior light. But to give due to Plato and Xenophon's Socrates, they more clearly show something like the circumstances by which philosophic inquiry arises, the conditions that are hospitable or otherwise to that activity, and how people may or may not turn to philosophy, whereas Aristotle's surving treatises, seemingly meant only for students within his school, already presupposes that one has made that choice to pursue philosophy, so that, absent Aristotle's dialogues, where he may have been equally clear as Plato and Xenophon, some number of the problems involved in starting to philosophize are less clear, because he's addressing those already convinced (but I would not say all such problems, since he alludes to some of those difficulties throughout his corpus).

If the deciding factor is over who's right, that will run into difficulties given the modern rejection of both of them from the position of modern science, but even trying to ascertain who is, at least, more right would require taking each of them seriously while prodding and testing each to see if the answers they put forward are decisive or only provisional and tentative, naturally follow or are perhaps forced, and so on. People have spent lifetimes reading any of them and butt heads regularly over how to understand basic points, so it's not as clear cut as one may like.

I have reached the conclusion Plato is not worth reading and further that he is an extremly overrated writer that we are forced into seeing as great.
If his dialogues rotted away in the 14th century not much beyond good prose would have been lost.

>>24781253
Plato is peak midwit

Bump

Any good modern translations of Plato's work? I've been trying to read The Allegory of the Cave but I can't even get past the first 10 pages. The writing is too archaic and convulted. I have to read every sentence multiple times to figure out what it means.

>>24784383
which translation are you reading? Also, have you read any other parts of The Republic?

>>24772592
QRD on the mysteries? Is this where they were partaking in a psychedelic mystery religion?

guys, I made a Plato reading server!
https://discord.gg/PXtbdq5j

>>24784383
Either download a few and compare them or just go with Loeb.

>understand the allegory of the cave
Start reading from the chapter right before the allegory. I think the allegory was at the start of chapter 6 so start with 5.

>>24768639
choose wisely

>that insipid windbag Proclus
>I have here referred to Proclus because in him this procedure becomes specially clear through the frank audacity with which he carries it out. But in Plato also we find some examples of this kind, though not so glaring; and in general the philosophical literature of all ages affords a multitude of instances of the same thing. That of our own time is rich in them. Consider, for example, the writings of the school of Schelling, and observe the constructions that are built up out of abstractions like finite and infinite—being, non-being, other being—activity, hindrance, product—determining, being determined, determinateness—limit, limiting, being limited—unity, plurality, multiplicity—identity, diversity, indifference—thinking, being, essence, &c. Not only does all that has been said above hold good of constructions out of such materials, but because an infinite amount can be thought through such wide abstractions, only very little indeed can be thought in them; they are empty husks. But thus the matter of the whole philosophising becomes astonishingly trifling and paltry, and hence arises that unutterable and excruciating tediousness which is characteristic of all such writings. If indeed I now chose to call to mind the way in which Hegel and his companions have abused such wide and empty abstractions, I should have to fear that both the reader and I myself would be ill; for the most nauseous tediousness hangs over the empty word-juggling of this loathsome philophaster.
t. Schopenhauer

>in Proclus we have the culminating point of the Neo-Platonic philosophy; this method in philosophy is carried into later times, continuing even through the whole of the Middle Ages. […] Although the Neo-Platonic school ceased to exist outwardly, ideas of the Neo-Platonists, and specially the philosophy of Proclus, were long maintained and preserved in the Church.
t. Hegel

Hegel is not the german Aristoteles but the german Proclus.
t. Feuerbach (meant as Kompliment, kek)

>>24785000
the Eleusinian Mysteries were a cult dedicated to the gods of Persephone and Demeter. People would become initiated into the cult in return for promise of favourable treatment in the underworld.
Regarding psychedelic experiences, no one seems to know for sure, although I've heard there are theories that say such. I do know however that similar things have been said of the Oracle of Delphi who it is suspected would inhale hallucinogenic gases before delivering her prophecy.
Plato referenced the mysteries quite a few times throughout his works and Socrates shows a certain degree of reverence towards their teachings, even if he doesn't claim to fully understand them.

I admit I don't have the most comprehensive knowledge on this subject (hence why I want to read into them more) but other smart anons on this thread might be able to chip in with some deeper insight

>>24785000
The Eleusinian Mysteries were a kind of immortality cult devoted to Demeter, and based somewhat off of the Homeric Hymn to Demeter. Details are scarce because speaking openly about them was punishable by death, but one can infer pretty easily the connection between what Demeter stands for (the cycle of natural birth, death, and rebirth of the seasons and crops) and the expectation of being granted an immortal soul. It used to be somewhat exclusive, but it started taking on broader groups of initiates during the 5th and 4th centuries. There was apparently a kind of procession of initiates to the cult site, with some kind of visual spectacle of the things in Hades being acted out, followed by entering a dark temple where one would see a flash of light revealing a stalk of grain.

As for psychedelics, it's not well established. Ergot has been found at one site conducting Mysteries away from Eleusis, but nothing from Eleusis itself, nor other Mystery sites that would establish it as an intended component. It's known from what brief descriptions exist that the initiates drank kykeon, which is mentioned in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, but it probably would've just been a mix of wine and barley, and kykeon is made fun of by both Aristophanes and Theophrastus as a drink the poor use to get drunk, so it doesn't seem to be notable for being anything other than boozy.

I went over some of the ways the Mysteries come up in Plato at >>24772713.

>>24784383
You kinda have to be picky, but generally the assortment of English translations by the various Straussians are the gold standard.

>>24787190
Good bait