Plato

Introduction

Plato (428–347 BCE) was an ancient Greek philosopher who effectively founded the Western philosophical tradition. His central preoccupation was truth, specifically, how to distinguish appearance from reality. For Plato, this wasn't abstract navel-gazing. If you can't tell the difference between shadows and substance, between opinion and knowledge, you can't build a just society or live a good life.

Everything else in his philosophy flows from this concern. Justice, morality, politics, education all require access to truth. The question that animates his work: how do we get there?

Life & Historical Context

Plato came from an aristocratic Athenian family where he had every advantage: wealth, education, political connections. But he lived through Athens' collapse.

He was born near the end of the Peloponnesian War, which Athens lost catastrophically in 404 BCE. That defeat brought the Thirty Tyrants to power, a brutal oligarchy that murdered citizens and confiscated property for eight months before being overthrown. Democracy returned, but in a paranoid, unstable form. In 399 BCE, democratic Athens executed Plato's teacher, SocratesSocrates had such an impact on Plato that most of Plato's dialogues feature Socrates as the "protagonist", on charges of impiety and corrupting the youth.

That execution marked Plato. The man who taught him to pursue truth through questioning was killed by popular vote. This event shaped his lifelong distrust of democracy and his conviction that truth cannot be determined by majority opinion or sensory experience.

Around 387 BCE, Plato founded the Academy, essentially the first university. It lasted nearly 900 years, training generations of philosophers, mathematicians, and statesmen.

Core Ideas

1. Theory of Forms
2. Plato's Epistomology
3. The Tripartite Soul
4. Plato's Justice

Major Works

• The Republic – His political philosophy and theory of justice.
• The Symposium
• Phaedo
• Apology
• Timaeus