The Metaphysics of Personhood in Plato' s Dialogues (original) (raw)
Related papers
The Platonic Soul, from the Early Academy to the First Centuryce
Body and Soul in Hellenistic Philosophy, 2020
For the modern reader, Timaeus 35a counts among the more abstruse passages in Plato's dialogues. But for ancient Platonists, too, it was considered to be obscure, yet also exerted an enduring fascination and was believed to contain the key to understanding Plato's concept of the soul. It indeed provides a technical description of the composition and nature of the world soul and can therefore be used better to understand the (rational) human soul, which was held to be structured analogously. Plutarch of Chaeronea is the author of an exegetical work dedicated to this passage. 2 Even though it is the oldest extensive treatment to have come down to us, there is strong evidence, as I hope to show, for an older exegetical tradition, going back to debates in the Early Academy. This exegetical tradition may not have been continuous, but there are traces of it even in the Hellenistic era. In this contribution I offer a reconstruction of the tradition preceding Plutarch. 3 Not only will this allow us a better understanding of Plutarch's own project, but it will also shed some light on some relatively unknown chapters in the history of the interpretation of Plato and on some other issues that are better known, but not fully understood, as for instance Xenocrates' and Speusippus' definitions of the soul. As Plutarch reads the passage, Plato specifies four 4 'ingredients' or constituents: (a) 'indivisible and always changeless being' (short: Indivisible Being); (b) '[being] that becomes divisible in the presence of'-or 'around'-bodies' or also 'divisible [being] belonging to bodies' 5 (ἡ περὶ τὰ σώµατα γιγνοµένη µεριστή [οὐσία]-short, but less accurate: 'Divisible Being'); 1 I would like to thank the participants of the Symposium Hellenisticum for their helpful questions and observations, and especially Brad Inwood, David Sedley, James Warren and the anonymous referees for their written remarks, from which I have greatly benefited. I further thank Emidio Spinelli, Francesco Verde, Riccardo Chiaradonna, Thomas Johansen, Eyjólfur Emilsson, and the members of the Centre Léon Robin for their comments. 2 More precisely to the consecutive passages Tim. 35a1-b4 and 35b4-36b5. 3 Some later interpretations are examined in Phillips (2002). 4 See also Sext. Emp. Pyrrh. Hyp. 3.189.
Rachel Barney, Ted Brennan, and Charles Brittain, eds. , Plato and the Divided Self . Reviewed by
Philosophy in Review, 2012
Plato and the Divided Self contains fifteen essays that track the development of Plato's tripartite theory of the soul throughout the course of his career, as well as the use of that theory among some later Platonists. This excellent volume, which was edited by Rachel Barney, Tad Brennan, and Charles Brittain (who contribute a brief introduction), usefully includes an index locorum, footnotes (rather than the less convenient endnotes), and an extensive bibliography. It is divided into four parts that correspond roughly to 'stages' in the development and use of Plato's theory of tripartition.
2022
The aspect of Plato’s theory of the soul: on soul’s constitution, education and developments - PDF-Powerpoint for the NATIONAL SCIENTIFIC CONFERENCE, DEDICATED TO WORLD PHILOSOPHY DAY - Philosophical Sciences Department at the Union of Scientists in Bulgaria, Sofia, 17th November 2022. In my inquiry, I shall analyse some aspects of the association among being, knowledge and soul in Plato. For my investigation, I shall consider passages from Republic, Phaedrus, Phaedo, Timaeus and Laws. My attention will be directed to the education and transformation of the soul. Through the process of learning, the individual becomes acquainted with the entities belonging to the dimension of being: this acquaintance brings about a complete transformation of the individual. The presence or absence of knowledge determines the moral ascent or the moral descent of the individual. Basing on the education programme of Republic book vii, I shall expose Plato’s aims, which consist in bringing the soul from the dimension of becoming to the dimension of being. The educational thread of the Republic proves to be, among other things, a progressive diminution of the influence of the senses and a corresponding growth of the rational part within the individual soul. The knowledge of the dimension of being leads the soul to the development of the rational part, to the acquisition of internal stability, to the harmony between the different components and to the correct composition of the elements of the soul. The education programme turns out to be a road of liberation from the bonds of the sense dimension. Correspondingly, the absence of knowledge is the cause of the individual’s liability to instability and moral degeneration: the effects of the absence of knowledge are described by Plato throughout his exposition of the degeneration of the forms of individuals and the forms of constitutions in Republic books viii and ix.
Plato on Divinization and the Divinity of the Rational Part of the Soul
Plato Journal, 2021
The divinity of the soul in Plato is analyzed into three aspects, one metaphysical, one epistemological, and one ethical, namely: (1) its immortality and kinship to the Forms, (2) its ability to know them, and (3) its ability to live by them, respectively. I argue that these aspects in combination naturally suggest a process of Platonic divinization or "becoming like god" according to which the person being divinized would be expected to gain (3) increasing moral virtue, which depends on (2) an increasing knowledge of the Forms, which in turn prepares the soul for reunification with (1) its metaphysical kin, the Forms. This interpretation of divinization is confirmed by successively comparing Plato's discussion of "becoming like god" in the Phaedo, Republic, Symposium, Phaedrus, and Timaeus. Since divinization on this understanding requires moral virtue and attentive engagement with the sensible world, other interpretations that take it to be an exclusively intellectual endeavor or a dismissive flight from the sensible world are mistaken.
The term 'Socratic intellectualism' is typically used to distinguish the philosophy of Socrates from the philosophy of Plato. The former is supposedly found in the so-called early dialogues and the latter in the so-called middle and later dialogues. A hallmark of Socratic intellectualism is the claim that knowledge is sufficient for virtue. Plato, it is held, rejected or compromised this intellectualism when he allowed for the possibility of incontinence in Republic and explained this possibility by the partitioning of the soul. Thus, appetitive desire is non-rational or even irrational and the origin of a type of action that is immune to the rule of reason. On this view, it would follow that knowledge is not sufficient for virtue. In this paper, I challenge the claim that in Republic the appetites are irrational or, as some put it, 'good-independent desires'. I argue that the embodied soul is a divided self or subject, but that all of its actions are those of a rational agent.
THE TRIPARTITION OF THE PLATONIC SOUL
This paper will treat, in first place, of the platonic division of the soul in three parts done in the IV book of the Republic, showing that in order for virtue to exist all the three parts must be considered. Plato names them , the rational part, calculating or reflexive part, the or simply , that in English we may call the part of anger and pride, and finally the the desiring part, that includes the desires of the body for food, drink and sex. In second place, it will be shown that for Plato, knowledge cannot be attained with an effort of the rational part only, but a special attention to the anger and desiring part is necessary. This necessity, in a third place, will then be related to what is called the platonic dramatization of philosophy , that is the importance of style to transmit a content.