About this book
Let’s learn about Plato! I chanced upon this tiny book as I was browsing the library recently for Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. Discover Plato by Roy Jackson is a concise summary of Plato’s background, his works, a brief introduction in philosophy itself as well as differing view points of other philosophers and some modern commentary. As someone that has no idea on philosophy, this was a fantastic book to get started and explained things in layman terms.
In addition to being in layman terms, the book’s small size isn’t intimidating. It is 89 pages in length, and very small in size, a book you can slip into a large pocket. The presentation itself made it less intimidating to dive into the complex subject of philosophy.
I found commentary on how Plato and other philosopher’s ideals were adopted or similar to other religions very fascinating. The author Roy Jackson is a senior lecturer in University of Gloucestershire, he studies religion as well and compares how the Christian faith has many similarities to Plato’s ideas. You can get the book here.
Plato’s connections
- Socrates was his teacher
- Aristotle was his pupil
- Glaucon was his brother
Plato’s background
Plato was born into a wealthy political family in Athens. This was a big contrast to his teacher, Socrates; who lived frugally and in poverty. Socrates and his teachings had a profound effect on Plato, it shaped his thoughts. Socrates searched for truth and the right way to live, what is ‘good’ and how we can teach it to our children. In 405BC, Athens lost the war to Sparta. Politicians blamed the fall of the mighty Athens on the teachings of Socrates. He was put to trial for ‘corrupting the youth’ with his ideas and condemned to death. Socrates did not seek sympathy and was resolute in that he had done nothing wrong, he chose to drink the poison and die with conviction. This execution deeply affected Plato and most likely grew his distrust in politicians and the democratic structure in general.
were sophists the same as modern politicians?
Sophists, a group at Plato’s time, thought ‘man is the measure of all things’. What is right or wrong was established by man and not the gods or some existence independent of humankind. Sophists didn’t believe in an absolute moral standard, and whether something is good or bad was all relative. Morality was dictated by the society you lived in and its conventions. Laws of one society may not be practiced in others.
Plato and Socrates rejected this notion of ‘moral relativism’. If each person is the judge of what is right or wrong, then we cannot make judgements of how other people think or view the world. If person A said an apple is red and person B said an apple is green, there would be no definitive answer using this theory. In the absence of absolute standards, how do teachers teach what is right or wrong?
Roy Jackson here makes a commentary that today’s world has some parallels with this thought process as the decline in institutional religion has given rise to there is ‘no one truth’. Jackson states that the Sophist were concerned more on acquisition of power and not the person you are. They desired to make money and win arguments by whatever means. I don’t know if this is an objective fact, something I will need to look into, but it certainly sounds like modern politicians!
Plato’s works
Socrates believed unlocking knowledge was done through conversing and dialogues with others. His ideas were not written down. Plato wrote down all these ideas. It can be said his works were the early written works in philosophy. He retained that tradition but writing his ideas down in a series of dialogues, much like a play or script of a film. The works usually involved two characters conversing in which he presented his ideas. The main character was always Socrates.
the cave
To explain Plato’s complex ideas about forms, let us consider a hypothetical cave:
- In the bottom of this deep cave, prisoners were born shackled, knowing of nothing outside the cave
- All prisoners are shackled facing one way and cannot turn their heads, staring at one particular wall of the cave
- Behind these prisoners a large fire is burning away that throws light onto the wall the prisoners are staring at
- Between the large fire and prisoners, people are carrying artifacts such as wooden and stone figures above their heads.
- A screen is there so the shadows of the people are hidden, but the shadows of the artifacts above the screen casts shadows onto the wall the prisoners are facing.
- Since the prisoners are not aware of the people behind, their world consists of only shadows of these artifacts.
- One prisoner one day is released from his shackles, led to look around, dazzled by the bright fire and now being told the artifacts he is seeing is real and what he was viewing before were shadows.
- He is then led up the cave, into the bright light where there are very little shadows. It is a confusing and frightening place for him. So different to all he has known to this point.
- He slow adapts, seeing things at night, then shadows of objects in the sun, then finally the objects themselves.
The author here makes an interesting comparison that modern theater is not too different to this, light is being thrown onto the screen from the projector and the viewer believes what they are seeing is ‘real’.
The Free Man – The Philosopher
Socrates postulates that despite being frightened, the prisoner will gradually be more ‘enlightened’. That the world is much bigger than the caves. The shadows the prisoners were trying to interpret were meaningless. The freed man would attempt to go back to the cave to free the others, to enlighten them, but the prisoners will think he is a mad man. The prisoners will think he is a fool and talking nonsense of this outside world which doesn’t exist. This freed prisoner represents the philosopher. In search of ‘truth’ and his purpose is to try to teach the ‘truth’ to others.
The character Socrates in Plato’s ‘The Republic’ believes the cave analogy represents the human condition. Humans are in an illusory world of the ‘senses’, at the bottom of the cave. The ability to break free of the cave and discover the truth is contained in our very souls.
Realm of forms
‘Form’ is the widely accepted translation of the Greek term ‘eidos’. ‘Idea’ is more closely aligned to this word, but Plato believes it is independent of the mind and thus, this word is not quite applicable.
The Forms is in the world beyond that of the Shadows. We mistake the shadows for reality when it is in fact an illusion. The Forms is what is there but cannot be perceived by our senses of taste, touch, sight, smell or hearing. The world we are living in is not the real world, there is a world beyond.
I found it fascinating that the author then points out Christian beliefs draw a lot on Plato’s construct of this Realm of Forms, a real world beyond what is ours. It didn’t even occur to me till this was explicitly stated. I do kind of agree to this thought but I am not sure whether it is grounded in fact. I haven’t done any research.
We can examine the idea of Forms by considering what we consider ‘beautiful’. A woman? A flower? A crashing waterfall in a forest in a tranquil morning? Plato believes we understand beauty and our soul has this knowledge. We must be guided towards such knowledge. It is not just beauty, but there are other Forms. We can perceive many imperfect hand drawn oval or egg or round shapes as ‘circles’ even though they are not perfect. We all understand what a perfect circle is despite not able to draw one ourselves. This is the Form of a circle.
Plato believes there is a Form of Good. Mankind must be directed and guided to it, for we all understand it. The knowledge is already imbued in our souls.
Knowledge
Plato believes that what we think we know is not true knowledge. Here there are two philosophers that had two theses:
Theaetetus, a mathematician, believes knowledge is a perception. We know things when we perceive it, that is aquired through our senses. Plato is quick to point out that perceptions provided by the senses are relative. Dipping a hand in a bucket of room temperature water will feel warm if we were trapped in a blizzard outside. Would animals and beasts perceive things the same as a human? We can only see things through ‘human lens’.
Heraclitus believed everything was in a constant flux, nothing was truly static. If you step into the river, the water had already flowed away, new water was coming in and constantly changing at that. Rocks are being weathered, the physical you will not exist in several years as cells dying and being replaced over time. Plato criticises that if everything is constantly changing, nothing can be defined, the colour ‘white’ is constantly changing, in fact any answer to anything asked would be correct.
From Plato’s point of view, it wasn’t satisfactory that our understanding of the world was relative (Theaetetus) or constantly changing (Heraclitus).
The soul
The “soul” is translated from the word Psyche from Greek, which in a truer meaning would be ‘life-principle’. His work Phaedo examines this. Socrates mentions we should look forward to death, when we can finally cast of the shackles of earthly desires and our bodies weak to temptations. Our soul is freed to finally reside in the eternal Realm of Forms. This is very close to the Christian belief indeed!
I love his depiction of our struggles on earth by the image of a chariot. The soul has three parts, a charioteer in a chariot and it the two winged horses (Pegasus?) pulling it. One Pegasus is black whilst the other is White. The charioteer is the ration, the white horse is spirit and energy and the black horse represents appetites. Reason (charioteer), and Spirit (white) must work together to over come the black horse (desires) that is trying to fly down.
the ideal state
Plato had some thoughts on how an ideal state or polis was supposed to be. Everyone in this city are philosophic-minded and would not chase possessions and wealth. People will specialise in their own trade and contribute to society: craftsmans, shepherds, farmers, blacksmiths or shoemakers. This polis will be small in size, consisting of only the bare necessary trades. People will live healthy lives free of desires and pursuits of luxuries. Arbitration between members will settle disputes, they would be self-governing.
Plato accepts our society is imperfect and such an ideal polis may not be the reality. If a government was to exist, there would be three classes:
Classes
- Rulers – Higher tier of the guardians, running the state, free of earthly desires, live to serve the state. Well read and philosophical in nature
- Auxilaries – Lower tier of the guardians, they are the military
- Money-Makers – Everyone else
Everyone would be told a ‘noble lie’, that their social class was determined at birth and it is part of the individual’s constitution, they were born with either gold, silver, or bronze in them. This could viewed as a somewhat a totalitarian state (Karl Popper 1902-94), and reminds me of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World!
Interestingly, Plato accepted slaves were necessary and wasn’t part of these classes, it contradicts the ideal he so abhors – moral relativism!
The way Guardians should live was very extreme. I found this really hard to wrap my head around. They are to be well educated, no personal wealth or property, won’t fight for these things nor get jealous. They are to live communally and have no family ties to divide a family house to another. Men and women are to be equal – a radical item at that time. Children of this class were to be brought up communally as well. This was similar to the Spartans, that razed Plato’s city – Athens. Such a society actually existed, although they lacked the philosophical nature. It would be hard to imagine any politicians subscribing to this extreme lifestyle!
The rulers were the charioteers, the auxiliaries were the white horse and the money-makers (appetite) were the black horses. This social structure would hold society in check.
education
I like the way Plato thinks in terms of education curriculum. He believes there should be three elements:
- Mouiske (liberal arts) – though works should always portray the hero as virtuous and avoid negative influences
- Gymnastike (physical education and good diet)
- Mathematics (sciences, reasoning and logic to rule)
Not too different to our schools!
Four Imperfect Societies
I found Plato’s construct of the four imperfect societies to be very plausible.
- Timography – rulers had honour. Much like Sparta, but they put too much emphasis on physical training and not the mental. They will grow old and begin to focus on wealth and property which turns into:
- Oligarchy – The wealthy rule and have power. By now, there is the rich and the poor. This results in excessive greed and division amongst classes. In time the poor overthrow the rich (French revolution?)
- Democracy – the whole society’s appetites are fulfilled. Those who persuade the masses or influence are the powerful, rather than the intellectual. Those who persuade the masses to follow will lead to:
- Tyranny – A leader will seize power illegitimately. The tyrant uses force and fear to rule.
Influences on Others
- Plato’s influenced his pupil Aristotle greatly. Aristotle was more practical in nature, he wanted ethical knowledge to guide society.
- Plotinus – founder of Neoplatonism (To research later!)
- St. Augustine – who contributed greatly to the Christian doctrine
- St. Aquinas – blended both Plato and Aristotle.
- Dame Iris Murdoch – novelist that incorporates a lot of his ideas in her work
- C.S. Lewis
Critic
Sir Karl Popper was a vocal critic. Reading his work The Open Society and its Enemies (1945) might be an interesting read!
Reading the primary texts
This concise summary of Plato’s works is just an interpretation through the lens of Roy Jackson. It will not substitute reading and interpreting Plato’s works myself.
I want a good translation of Plato’s works. I believe “Plato: Complete works”, edited by John Cooper and Hutchinson is a good one. I’ll re-read this short summary I’ve written after studying his works to see if I’ve mistaken anything or changed my perspective! Hopefully it has!
