Plato :: essays research papers

Platos works, perhaps the most consistently popular and influential philosophical writings ever published, consist of a series of dialogues in which the discussions amongst Socrates and others are presented with infinite charm. Most of our knowledge of Socrates is from these dialogues, and which views are Socrates and which are Platos is anybodys guess. (Plato guardedly never introduced himself into any of the dialogues.) Like Socrates, Plato was chiefly interested in honorable philosophy and despised natural philosophy (that is, science) as an inferior and horrifying sort of knowledge. There is a famous story (probably apocryphal and told similarly of Euclid of a scholarly person asking Plato the application of the knowledge he was creation taught. Plato at once ordered a slave to give the bookman a small coin that he might not remember he had gained knowledge for nothing, then had him dismissed from school. To Plato, knowledge had no concrete use, it existed for the abst ract good of the soul. Plato was fond of mathematics because of its idealized abstractions and its separation from the further material. Nowa daytimes, of course, the purest mathematics manages to be applied, sooner or later, to virtual(a) matters of science. In Platos day this was not so, and the mathematician could well consider himself as dealing solitary(prenominal) with the loftiest take change of pure thought and as having nothing to do with the gross and liberal everyday world. And so above the doorway to the Academy was written, "Let no one ignorant of mathematics enter here." Plato did, however, believe that mathematics in its ideal form could still be applied to the heavens. The heavenly bodies, he believed, exhibited perfect geometric form. This he expresses most clearly in a dialogue called Timaeus in which he presents his scheme of the universe. He describes the five (and scarcely five) possible regular solids -- that is, those with equivalent faces and wi th all lines and angles, formed by those faces, equal.Plato essays seek papers Platos works, perhaps the most consistently popular and influential philosophic writings ever published, consist of a series of dialogues in which the discussions amongst Socrates and others are presented with infinite charm. Most of our knowledge of Socrates is from these dialogues, and which views are Socrates and which are Platos is anybodys guess. (Plato guardedly never introduced himself into any of the dialogues.) Like Socrates, Plato was chiefly interested in incorrupt philosophy and despised natural philosophy (that is, science) as an inferior and deplorable sort of knowledge. There is a famous story (probably apocryphal and told in like manner of Euclid of a student asking Plato the application of the knowledge he was world taught. Plato at once ordered a slave to give the student a small coin that he might not appreciate he had gained knowledge for nothing, then had him dismissed from school. To Plato, knowledge had no practical use, it existed for the abstract good of the soul. Plato was fond of mathematics because of its idealized abstractions and its separation from the unless material. Nowadays, of course, the purest mathematics manages to be applied, sooner or later, to practical matters of science. In Platos day this was not so, and the mathematician could well consider himself as dealing only with the loftiest form of pure thought and as having nothing to do with the gross and corrupt everyday world. And so above the doorway to the Academy was written, "Let no one ignorant of mathematics enter here." Plato did, however, believe that mathematics in its ideal form could still be applied to the heavens. The heavenly bodies, he believed, exhibited perfect geometric form. This he expresses most clearly in a dialogue called Timaeus in which he presents his scheme of the universe. He describes the five (and only five) possible regular solids -- that is , those with equivalent faces and with all lines and angles, formed by those faces, equal.