Plato : The Philosopher King

Plato was a great philosopher during his time. Here's a complete PowerPoint presentation based on the topic, Plato: The Philosopher King.

1. GR

Plato : The

» Philosopher King J)

2. TODAY'S

PRESENTATION

DISCUSSION POINTS

Introduction to Plato
Plato's Life Sketch
Plato's Influencers
Plato's Philosophies
Criticism

3. INRODUCTION

Plato is one of the most brilliant and far-reaching writers
to have ever lived. Our very conception of philosophy—

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of rigorous thinking concerning the true situation of
man, the nature of the whole, and the perplexity of
being—owes a great debt to his work. No area of inquiry
seems foreign to him: his writings investigate ethics,
politics, mathematics, metaphysics, logic, aesthetics,
and epistemology in tremendous depth and breadth. In
the words of Alfred North Whitehead, “The safest
general characterization of the European philosophical
tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to
Plato.”

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4. QUOTES

One of the penalties for
refusing to participate in
politics is that you end up
being governed by your
inferiors.

PLATO

5. PLATO'S LIFE

Plato (428/427 or 424/423 - 348/347
BC) was

an Athenian philosopher during

the Classical period in Ancient
Greece and the founder of

the Academy, the first institution of
higher learning in the Western world.
He is widely considered the pivotal
figure in the history of Ancient
Greek and Western philosophy, along
with his teacher, Socrates, and his
most famous student, Aristotle. AM

6. PLATO'S INFLUENCERS

PYTHAGORAS
Although Socrates influenced Plato directly as

related in the dialogues, the influence

of Pythagoras upon Plato, or in a broader sense,
the Pythagoreans, such as Archytas also appears
to have been significant. Aristotle claimed that the
philosophy of Plato closely followed the teachings

of the Pythagoreans, and Cicero repeats "YY

i
claim: "They say Plato learned all things Y Í
Pythagorean." 7 y

Saumya Brata Dutt

7. PLATO'S INFLUENCERS

HERACLITUS AND PARMENIDES

The ideas about change and permanence, or
becoming and Being, influenced Plato in
formulating his theory of Forms. According to this
theory, there is a world of perfect, eternal, and
changeless meanings of predicates, the Forms, the
realm of Being, and an imperfect sensible world of
becoming, somehow in a state between being and
nothing, that partakes of the qualities of the
Forms, and is its instantiation in the sensible world.

Soumya Brata Dutt

8. PLATO'S INFLUENCERS

SOCRATES

Plato was one of the devoted young followers of
Socrates. The precise relationship between Plato
and Socrates remains an area of contention
among scholars.

In the dialogues of Plato though, Socrates

sometimes seems to support a mystical side, \ 4

discussing reincarnation and the mystery Mp ,

this is generally attributed to Plato. _ Pin
Uy joumya Brata Du

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9. PLATO'S PHILOSOPHY

Socrates and his company of
disputants had something to
say on many subjects,
including politics and art,
religion and science, justice
and medicine, virtue and vice,
etc. More than one dialogue
contrasts knowledge and
opinion, perception

and reality, nature and
custom, and body and soul.

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Metaphysics is the branch of
philosophy concerned with the
nature of existence, being and
the world. Arguably,
metaphysics is the foundation of
philosophy:
philosophy" (or sometimes just
"wisdom"), and says it is the
subject that deals with "first
causes and the principles of
things”.

ristotle calls it "first

Epistemology is the study of the
nature and scope of knowledge
and justified belief. It analyzes
the nature of knowledge and
how it relates to similar notions
such as truth, belief and
justification. It also deals with
the means of production of
knowledge, as well as
skepticism about different
knowledge claims

10. 7 RECURRENT THEMES OW

DIALECTIC

Socrates employs a dialectic method which proceeds by questioning. The role of dialectic in Plato's thought is contested but
there are two main interpretations: a type of reasoning and a method of intuition.

IGNORANCE
Socrates always insists on his ignorance and humility, that he knows nothing, so called Socratic irony.

DEFINITIONS

Socrates regularly asks for the meaning of a general term, intensional definitions - What is X?, and criticizes those who instead
give him extensional examples. One author calls this the definist fallacy.

APORIA

Several dialogues refute series of viewpoints on an issue, but offer no positive position of its own, ending in aporia.

FAMILY

Plato often discusses the father-son relationship and the question of whether a father's interest in his sons has much to do with
how well his sons turn out, In ancient Athens, a boy was socially located by his family identity, and Plato often refers to his
characters in terms of their paternal and fraternal relationships.

11. THE FORMS
"Platonism" denies the reality of the
material world. His theory of Forms
(or theory of Ideas) typically refers to
the belief that the material world as
it seems to us is not the real world,
but only an "image" or "copy" of the
real world

Metaphysics

ALLEGORY OF THE CAVE

Socrates’ idea that reality is
unavailable to those who use their
senses is what puts him at odds with
the common man. Socrates says that
he who sees with his eyes is blind,
and this idea is most famously
captured in his Allegory of the Cave.

THE SOUL

Plato advocates a belief in the
immortality of the soul, and several
dialogues end with long speeches

imagining the afterlife. In
the Timaeus, Socrates locates the
parts of the soul within the human
body.

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change:

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RECOLLECTION

In several of Plato's dialogues,
Socrates promulgates the idea
that knowledge is a matter

of recollection of the state before
one is born, and not of
observation or study.

JUSTIFIED TRUE BELIEF

Many have interpreted Plato as
stating—even having been the first to
write—that knowledge is justified true
belief, an influential view that
informed future developments in
epistemology.

13. PLATO'S PHILOSOPHY

Like most other ancient
philosophers, Plato maintains a
virtue-based

eudaemonistic conception of
ethics. That is to say, happiness
or well-being (eudaimonia) is
the highest aim of moral
thought and conduct, and the
virtues (areté: 'excellence') are
the requisite skills and
dispositions needed to attain
it

RAN

In the Republic, Plato's Socrates
raises a number of objections to
democracy. He claims that
democracy is a danger due to
excessive freedom.

In Plato's Republic, Socrates is
highly critical of democracy and
proposes an aristocracy ruled
by philosopher-kings. Plato's
political philosophy has thus
often been

considered totalitarian.

Several dialogues tackle
questions about art: Socrates
says that poetry is inspired by
the muses, and is not rational. He
speaks approvingly of this, and
other forms of divine madness
(drunkenness, eroticism, and
dreaming) in

the Phaedrus (265a-c), and yet
in the Republic wants to outlaw
Homer's great poetry, and
laughter as well.

14. PLATO - MYTH

Plato, in general, distinguished between three

types of myth. First there were the fal

se myths,

like those based on stories of gods subject to

passions and sufferings, because rea
teaches that God is perfect. Then ca
myths based on true reasoning, and tl

also true. Finally there were those non

verifiable because beyond of human

son
me the
erefore

reason,

but containing some truth in them. Regarding

the subjects of Plato's myths they are
types, those dealing with the origin o
iverse, and those about morals an:

of two
the
the

15. CRITICISM

Despite Plato's prominence as a philosopher, he is
not without criticism. The most famous criticism of
Platonism is the Third Man Argument. Plato actually

considered this objection with "large" rather than

man in the Parmenides dialogue.

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