The Theory of Ideas

The Theory of Ideas From the conclusion of Book V until the end of Book VII, the middle portion of the Republic is mostly engaged with desire concerns of pure philosophy rather than political issues. The following rather abrupt statement introduces these questions: Cities, and, I believe, the human race, will never have rest from these evils until philosophers become kings, or until kings and princes of this world have the spirit and power of philosophy, and political greatness and wisdom meet in one, and those commoner natures who pursue either to the exclusion of the other are compelled to stand aside. Only then will this our State have a possibility of life and behold the light of day. If this is the case, we have to define "philosophy" and define who qualifies as a philosopher. The debate that follows is the most well-known and maybe the most significant aspect of the Republic. It contains moments of breathtaking literary beauty; even if the reader disagrees (as I do) with what is stated, they will still find themselves touched by it. The foundation of Plato's philosophy is Parmenides' division between appearance and reality; in the topic we are now engaged in, Parmenidean words and arguments reappear often. However, there is a somewhat Pythagorean rather than Parmenidean religious tone to reality, and Pythagoras' followers are directly responsible for many aspects of music and mathematics. This synthesis of Parmenides' logic with Pythagoras' and the Orphics' otherworldliness resulted in a doctrine that satisfied the religious emotions as well as the intellect. It was a very potent synthesis that, in various forms, influenced most of the great philosophers, including Hegel. But Plato had an impact on more than just philosophers. Why did the Puritans take issue with the beautiful liturgy, music, and paintings of the Catholic Church? The Republic's ninth book has the solution. Why is learning math in school a must for students? The seventh book contains the explanations. Plato's notion of ideas may be summed up in the paragraphs that follow. We want to know: What exactly is a philosopher? The first response makes sense given the etymology: a philosopher is someone who values wisdom. However, this is not the same as being a lover of knowledge in the same way that a guy who is curious may be called to be a lover of knowledge; superficial curiosity does not equate to philosophical understanding. As a result, the definition is changed to read, "A man who loves the "vision of truth" is a philosopher." But what exactly is this vision? Imagine a man who appreciates beauty and who goes out of his way to witness tragedies, fresh images, and new musical compositions. Because he just appreciates beauty, this individual is not a philosopher; on the other hand, a philosopher appreciates beauty in and of itself. The guy who understands perfect beauty is awake; the man who simply loves beautiful things is dreaming. While the latter has information, the former merely has opinion. What distinguishes "opinion" from "knowledge"? A knowledgeable guy is knowledgeable about something, that is, about something that is real, since nothing exists that is not real. Because it is illogical for knowledge to be incorrect, it is thus infallible (this reminds me of Parmenides). However, opinions might be wrong. How is that possible? It is not conceivable for opinion to be of what is not, or of what is, since that would be knowledge. Opinions must thus be based on both what is and is not. However, how is this even possible? The reason is that certain things constantly have contradictory qualities: what is right is sometimes unjust; what is beautiful is sometimes ugly; and so forth. According to Plato, all specific sensory objects have this paradoxical quality, making them appropriate as objects of opinion but not knowledge since they are halfway between being and notbeing. We thus arrive at the conclusion that knowledge is of a supersensible eternal world, whereas opinion is of the world presented to the senses; for example, opinion is concerned with specific beautiful things, whereas knowledge is concerned with beauty in and of itself. "But those who see the absolute and eternal and immutable may be said to know, and not to have opinion only." The sole defense offered is that it is selfcontradictory to believe that anything may be both just and beautiful, or both lovely and not attractive, but some things do appear to combine these seemingly incompatible qualities. As a result, certain things are not genuine. Plato's conclusion is reached by combining Heraclitus's statement, "We step and do not step into the same rivers; we are and are not," with Parmenides. However, one significant aspect of Plato's philosophy that cannot be linked to his forebears is the conception of "ideas" or "forms," which is both logical and metaphysical. The meaning of broad terms is the subject of the logical portion. What do we mean when we say "cat"? There are a lot of specific creatures about whom we can declare with certainty, "This is a cat." Every single cat is obviously distinct from the others. It appears that an animal is a cat if it engages in a general activity shared by all cats. General terms like "cat" are essential to language, and they are clearly not meaningless. However, if the term "cat" has any meaning at all, it refers to a general cattyness rather than a specific type of cat. This is neither born along with the specific cat, nor does it die along with it. The logical aspect of the idea is that it is "eternal," meaning it has no place in space or time. Regardless of the doctrine's metaphysical component, the reasons supporting it are compelling and compelling. The word "cat" refers to a certain ideal cat, "the cat," who was made by God and is unique, according to the metaphysical portion of the theory. Specific cats share the feline character, but somewhat poorly; their multiplicity is only due to this imperfection. The cat is genuine; certain cats are only seen. A very explicit explication of the notion of ideas or forms precedes a condemnation of artists in the final book of the Republic. Here, Plato discusses that, for example, even if there are numerous beds, there is only one "idea" or "form" of a bed. Whenever a group of people share a name, they also have a common "idea" or "form." Similar to how a bed's reflection in a mirror is only visible and not "real," so too are the numerous individual beds unreal; they are merely duplicates of God's "idea," which is the sole true bed. There can be knowledge about the one bed that God made, but there can only be opinion about the numerous beds that carpenters have constructed. As a result, the philosopher will only be interested in the one perfect bed and not in the other beds that may be found in the reasonable world. someone will be somewhat uninterested in everyday humdrum activities, asking himself, "How can someone who is the observer of all existence and time, with such majesty of intellect, think much of human life?A young person with the potential to become a philosopher will stand out from the rest of his peers because they are kind and compassionate, like education, have excellent recall, and have a naturally peaceful mind. Such a person will receive education to become a guardian and a philosopher. Adeimantus now interrupts with a protest. He claims that every time he makes an attempt to refute Socrates, he gets taken a bit further down the way and ultimately has all of his preconceived ideas completely disproved. Regardless of Socrates' assertions, it is evident to everybody that those who adhere to philosophy end up turning into bizarre creatures, if not outright madmen; even the most brilliant among them are rendered worthless by philosophy. While acknowledging that this is true in the real world, Socrates argues that other people, not the philosophers, are to blame. In a community of smart people, the philosophers would not be viewed as silly; the wise are only considered to be lacking in knowledge by idiots. In this predicament, what should we do? Our Republic was to be ushered in in one of two ways: either by philosophers becoming rulers or by rulers becoming philosophers. The first approach appears unfeasible at first since philosophers are not well-liked in a city that isn't already philosophical. But Plato hoped that he had found such a prince in the younger Dionysius, tyrant of Syracuse, but the young man proved disappointing. "One is enough; let there be one man who has a city obedient to his will, and he might bring into existence the ideal polity about which the world is so incredulous," Plato said, adding that a born prince might be a philosopher. Plato addresses two issues in the sixth and seventh volumes of the Republic: first, what exactly is philosophy? Secondly, what kind of education is necessary for a young person with a proper temperament to become a philosopher? According to Plato, philosophy is a form of vision, the "vision of truth." It is not just knowledge; it is also the joy of knowledge. This close combination of thinking and feeling is basically the same as Spinoza's "intellectual love of God." Anyone who has engaged in any form of creative endeavor has, to varying degrees, encountered the mental state in which, following a protracted effort, beauty or truth manifests itself—it may be regarding a little issue or the cosmos—or appears to do so in an abrupt and magnificent manner. Right now, the experience is incredibly compelling; doubt could creep in later, but for now, everything is definite. Such a time, in my opinion, produced the majority of the greatest creative works in philosophy, science, literature, and the arts. I can't say if it applies to other people as much as it does to me. Personally, I've discovered that in order to write a book about a subject, I have to first thoroughly understand every aspect of the subject until, if I'm lucky, I can see the entire thing and how its many components are linked. I only need to record what I've observed after that. The closest comparison is like trekking a mountain in a mist first, getting to know each route, ridge, and valley separately, and then looking up at the mountain in bright sunshine and seeing it all at once. I think this sensation is important, but not sufficient for excellent creative work; in fact, the subjective assurance it confers could be dangerously deceptive. According to William James, a man had an encounter with laughing gas whereby, while under its effect, he learned the secret of the world; yet, upon awakening, he had lost it. Finally, after much struggle, he managed to write down the secret before the vision disappeared. He hurried to examine what he had written as soon as he was fully healed. The statement was, "There is a strong petroleum odor throughout." What may appear to be a flash of insight might be deceptive and should be carefully examined once the heavenly euphoria has subsided. In the end, a parable—the story of the cave—is necessary to let Plato's vision, which he fully trusted when he penned the Republic, explain itself to the reader. However, a number of preparatory talks are included to help the reader understand the importance of the intellectual realm. Initially, the realm of the intellect is separated from the realm of the senses; subsequently, the intellect and sense-perception are further separated into two categories. The two types of intellect are referred to as "reason" and "understanding," respectively, and they do not necessarily need to worry us. Of these, reason is the superior sort as it deals with pure concepts and employs a dialectic approach. Mathematical intelligence is based on understanding, which is less sophisticated than reason as it relies on untestable propositions. It is forbidden to question whether ABC truly is a rectilinear triangle in geometry, for example, even if, if it is a figure we have drawn, we may be certain that it is not since we are not able to draw perfectly straight lines. Instead, we say, "Let ABC be a rectilinear triangle." As a result, mathematics can only ever tell us what would be possible if... Since there are no straight lines in the sensible world, we must discover proof that super-sensible straight lines exist in a super-sensible universe if mathematics is to have any real significance beyond theory. Plato asserts that reason—which demonstrates that there is a rectilinear triangle in heaven—can do this instead of understanding, and that geometrical claims made of it may be verified definitively rather than speculatively. This brings up a problem that, while obvious to contemporary idealistic philosophers, appears to have missed Plato's notice. Given that God only created one bed, it stands to reason that he also created one straight line. However, he ought to have drawn at least three straight lines if there were a divine triangle. Even if they are perfect, geometry's objects must exist in several instances; for example, two circles must be able to intersect. This implies that geometry should be rejected as a branch of appearance studies rather than having the ability to reveal ultimate truth in accordance with Plato's thesis. But let's not bother with this topic. Plato uses the sense of sight as an analogy to try to illustrate the distinction between the clear intellectual vision and the clouded vision of sense-perception. He claims that because sight depends on light in addition to the eye and the object, it is different from the other senses. Things that get sunlight are plainly visible to us; at twilight, visibility is hazy, and in complete darkness, it is nonexistent. The world of passing objects is now a muddled twilight world, whereas the world of ideas is what we perceive when the item is illuminated by the sun. The sun is equated to truth or kindness, and the eye to the soul because it is the source of light. The soul is like an eye: it is bright with intelligence and perceives and understands when it is resting upon that which is radiant with truth and being. However, when the soul is turned toward the twilight of becoming and perishing, it is only opinionated, blinks, and appears to be devoid of intelligence. What I would have you call the notion of good, and this you would believe to be the source of science, is now what gives truth to the known and the power of knowing to the knower. This brings up the well-known metaphor of the cave or den, which compares people who lack philosophy to captives in a cave with a wall in front of them and a fire behind, who are confined and can only stare in one way. There is nothing between them and the wall; all they can see are shadows cast by the fire on the wall by themselves and the items behind them. They inevitably believe these shadows to be genuine and are unaware of the items they belong to. When a guy eventually makes it out of the cave and into the sunlight, he realizes that he has been fooled by shadows all along and sees things clearly for the first time. If he is the kind of philosopher who is qualified to serve as a guardian, he will feel obligated to return to the cave, teach the people who were once his fellow inmates the truth, and lead the way out. However, he will find it hard to convince them since, after leaving the light, he will perceive shadows less clearly than they do, making him appear even more foolish than he was before he fled. "And now, I replied, let me illustrate with a figure how enlightened or not our nature is: Look! Humans living in a subterranean den with a mouth open to the light that stretches the entire length of the den; they have been in this den since they were young children, and their necks and legs are chained, preventing them from moving and limiting their vision to what is in front of them. A fire is burning well above and behind them, and there is a high walkway between it and the captives. If you look, you can see a low wall erected along the walkway that resembles the screen marionette performers use in front of them to display their puppets. "I understand. "And do you notice, I said, men walking along the wall carrying a variety of containers as well as sculptures and animal figures that emerge over the wall made of wood, stone, and other materials? While some are silent, others are speaking. "They are strange prisoners, and you have shown me a strange image." The place of the good in Plato's philosophy is special. "Like ourselves, I replied; and they see only their own shadows, or the shadows of one another, which the fire throws on the opposite wall of the cave." He claims that truth and science are like the good, but the good is more important. In terms of dignity and force, "the good is not essence, but far exceeds essence." Dialectic brings the idea of the ultimate good to an end. Dialectic is capable of doing away with the mathematician's conjectures because of the good. The fundamental premise is that reality is entirely good, unlike appearance, and that to sense the good is, therefore, to comprehend reality. The same combination of intellect and mysticism that exists in Pythagoreanism also exists in Plato's philosophy, but at this ultimate point mysticism manifestly triumphs. Plato's theory of concepts has several glaring flaws in it. Despite these drawbacks, the theory represents a significant philosophical advancement since it is the first to highlight the issue of universals, which has continued into the modern day in many forms. Although beginnings are often unpolished, their uniqueness shouldn't be disregarded for this reason. Even after making all the required changes, there is still something to be said about what Plato said. Even the most anti-Platonic thinkers agree that there is only one essential thing left: we cannot communicate in a language made up only of proper names; we also need general terms like "man," "dog," and "cat"; if not, we also need relational words like "similar," "before," and so forth. These are not just meaningless sounds, and it is hard to see how they can have any significance if the universe is made up only of certain objects, such those with names attached to them. Although this argument might potentially be circumvented, it provides a preliminary argument in support of universals. I'll take that for now as somewhat legitimate. However, the remainder of Plato's arguments by no means follow when so much is conceded. First of all, Plato does not comprehend philosophical syntax. I might assert that Socrates, Plato, and other figures are human. One may presume that the term "human" has the same meaning in each of these sentences. Whatever its meaning, however, it is not the same meaning as Socrates, Plato, and the other members of the human species. Plato makes the error of thinking that beauty is beautiful; he believes that the universal "man" is the name of a pattern man created by God, of whom actual men are imperfect and somewhat unreal copies. "Human" is an adjective; it would be absurd to say "human is human." He completely misses the enormous difference between universals and particulars; his so-called "ideas" are actually just more particulars that are better than the norm in terms of ethics and aesthetics. Later on, he started to recognize this challenge for himself, as seen by the Parmenides, which is one of the most notable examples of philosophical self-criticism in history. Antiphon, Plato's half-brother, is the one who is meant to tell the Parmenides; he is the only one who recalls the talk and is now only focused on horses. They discover him wearing a bridle and struggle to get him to recount the well-known dialogue between Parmenides, Zeno, and Socrates. We are informed that Parmenides was rather elderly (about 65 years old), Zeno was in his middle years (around 40 years old), and Socrates was still quite young. In elaborating on the theory of ideas, Socrates states that there exist ideas of likeness, justice, beauty, and goodness, but he is unsure whether there is an idea of man. He also angrily rejects the idea that there could be ideas of things like hair, mud, and dirt, even though there are moments when he believes that nothing exists without an idea. He flees from this viewpoint out of fear of plunging into an endless maze of absurdity. Parmenides responded, "Yes, Socrates; that is because you are still young; the time will come, if I am not mistaken, when philosophy will have a firmer grasp of you, and then you will not despise even the meanest things." Socrates acknowledges that, in his opinion, "There are certain ideas of which all other things partake, and from which they derive their names; that similars, for example, become similar, because they partake of similarity; and great things become great, because they partake of greatness; and that just and beautiful things become just and beautiful, because they partake of justice and beauty." Parmenides then raises some issues, including (a) Does the individual partake of the whole idea, or just a part of it? There are arguments against either viewpoint. If the former, something is multiple places at once; if the latter, the idea is divisible, and something with a portion of smallness will be smaller than something with absolute smallness, which is ludicrous; (b) When an individual consumes an idea, the idea and the individual are similar; hence, another idea that encompasses both the specifics and the original idea will be required. And so on ad infinitum, there will need to be another, incorporating the details and the two concepts. Every concept therefore becomes an infinite succession of ideas rather than a single notion. (c) Parmenides emphasizes that thoughts must be of something, whereas Socrates speculates that ideas could just be thoughts (this is similar to Aristotle's argument of the "third man"). (d) Concepts cannot resemble the details that comprise them, for the same reason as previously said (b). (f) If God's knowledge is absolute, He will not know us and so cannot control us. (e) Ideas, if any, must be unknown to us because our knowledge is not absolute. The theory of concepts is not entirely abandoned, though. According to Socrates, logic would be destroyed in the absence of concepts since there won't be anything for the mind to rest on. He is informed by Parmenides that his problems stem from his lack of prior training, but no clear resolution is established. Plato's logical arguments against the existence of sense particulars, in my opinion, won't stand up to close inspection. For instance, he asserts that everything that is double is also half, that everything that is lovely is also ugly in some way, and so on. However, analysis will always allow us to say, at least in theory, "this part or aspect is beautiful, while that part or aspect is ugly," when we describe a work of art as being both beautiful and ugly in different contexts. Likewise, the terms "double" and "half" are relative; there is no contradiction in saying that 2 is half of 4 and double of 1. Because he doesn't comprehend relative words, Plato keeps running into problems. He perceives a contradiction in that if A is both more than B and smaller than C, then A must be both great and tiny. These problems are among philosophy's infantile illnesses. The implications that Parmenides, Plato, and Hegel assign to the divide between appearance and actuality are not possible. This is a proper Parmenidean argument: if appearances are real, they are not nothing and are thus a component of reality. Why bother worrying about appearance if it never actually appears? However, it is possible that someone will respond, "Appearance does not actually appear, but it appears to appear." This won't help since we will still need to question, "Does it truly appear, or does it merely appear to appear?We must eventually arrive at something that truly appears and is therefore a part of reality if appearance is even to appear to appear. Even if there is only one actual bed—the one created by God—Plato would never consider disputing that there appear to be several beds. However, it appears that he has not considered the ramifications of the truth that there are several appearances and that this multiplicity is a given. Any attempt to distinguish between two parts of the world, one of which is more "real" than the other, is bound to fail. This is related to another intriguing perspective of Plato's, which holds that knowledge and opinion should focus on distinct subjects. It would be more accurate to state, "If I believe it will snow, that is opinion; if I later see it snowing, that is knowledge," as long as the topic remains the same. But according to Plato, something that can ever be a matter of opinion can never be a subject of knowledge. Opinion presupposes the reality of what is simply appearance, making it incorrect. In contrast, knowledge is certain and unfailing. All of this is a repetition of Parmenides' earlier remarks. There appears to be one area where Plato's and Parmenides' metaphyses diverge. Whereas Plato saw several concepts, Parmenides saw only one. Not only are there kindness, truth, and beauty, but as we have seen, there is also the heavenly bed that God made; throughout the entirety of Noah's ark, there are heavenly dogs, heavenly cats, and so on. But in the Republic, it appears that none of this was given enough attention. Even if it could be the subject of a thought, a platonic concept or form is not a thought. It is hard to see how God could have made it, as its existence is eternal, and he could not have chosen to make a bed unless his decision had as its goal the same Platonic bed that we are informed he built. Eternal things need to be uncreated. We arrive at a problem that has confounded several theologians who specialize in philosophy. It is only possible for the contingent world—the world in space and time— to have been; however, this is the reality of daily existence, which has been decried as both evil and unreal. It would appear that the Creator could only have created evil and delusion. Some Gnostics were so consistent as to hold this opinion; nonetheless, Plato seems to have never realized the dilemma because it is still hidden from view in the Republic. According to Plato, the guardian philosopher must go back into the cave and dwell among those who have never seen the sun of truth. A Christian Platonist may see the Incarnation in this way: it would appear that God Himself must act similarly if He desires to change His creation. However, there is still no way to understand why God could not be satisfied with the intellectual universe. The philosopher discovers the cave and is moved by kindness to visit it again; however, if the Creator had created everything, one would assume that He would have avoided the cave entirely. It's possible that this issue solely stems from the Christian concept of a Creator and is unrelated to Plato's claim that God only created good things. According to this perspective, there would be a source for the multiplicity of the sensible world besides God. Furthermore, the concepts might not have been so much made by God as components of who He is. Thus, the multiplicity of ideas' seeming pluralism would not be ultimate. At the end of the day, the concepts are adjectival to God, the Good. This is one possible reading of Plato, anyhow. Plato then goes on to give a fascinating overview of the right kind of education for a young man who will be a guardian. As we've seen, the young man is chosen for this honor based on a blend of moral and intellectual attributes. He needs to be kind and fair, enjoy education, have a sharp memory, and have a peaceful mind. The young man selected on the basis of these merits will study the four Pythagorean subjects—arithmetic, geometry (plane and solid), astronomy, and harmony—for the next twenty to thirty years. The goal of these studies is to prepare his mind for the vision of eternal things, not to be pursued in a utilitarian manner. For instance, in astronomy, he should be more concerned with the mathematics of the motion of ideal celestial bodies than he is with the real celestial bodies. This may seem ridiculous to modern ears, but oddly enough, it turned out to be a useful perspective in relation to empirical astronomy. This has an interesting origin story that is worth thinking about. The apparent movements of the planets, until they have been very carefully analyzed, appear to be erratic and convoluted, and not at all such as a Pythagorean Creator would have selected. It was evident to every Greek that the skies needed to exhibit mathematical beauty, which would only be the case if the planets traveled in circles. This would be especially clear to Plato, given to his concentration on the good. The challenge therefore arose: is there any explanation which can convert the seeming disorderliness of planetary movements to order and beauty and simplicity? If there is, the notion of the good will justify us in claiming this proposition. Aristarchus of Samos found such a hypothesis: that all the planets, including the earth, move round the sun in circles. This notion was rejected for two thousand years, partially on the authority of Aristotle, who gives a very similar hypothesis to “the Pythagoreans” (De Coelo, 293 a). It was revitalized by Copernicus, and its success could appear to vindicate Plato’s aesthetic bias in astronomy. Unfortunately, however, Kepler found that the planets travel in ellipses, not in circles, with the sun at a focus, not in the centre; subsequently Newton discovered that they do not move even in precise ellipses. And thus the mathematical simplicity sought by Plato, and apparently found by Aristarchus of Samos, was in the end illusory. This bit of scientific history shows a common maxim: that any theory, however ludicrous, may be valuable in science, if it helps a discoverer to perceive things in a new manner; but that, after it has served this goal by luck, it is likely to become a hindrance to future growth. The belief in the good as the key to the scientific understanding of the world was beneficial, at a particular point, in astronomy but at every later step it was damaging. The ethical and aesthetic bias of Plato, and much more of Aristotle, did much to destroy Greek science. It is notable that current Platonists, virtually without exception, are ignorant of mathematics, in spite of the tremendous significance that Plato paid to arithmetic and geometry, and the immense effect that they had on his philosophy. This is an illustration of the drawbacks of specialization: a guy must not write about Plato unless he has spent so much of his childhood studying Greek as to have had no time for the things that Plato regarded vital.