Plato – Biography, philosophy, Works, Contribution

Biography

Plato is one of the most brilliant and far-reaching writers to have ever lived. Our very conception of philosophy—of rigorous thinking concerning the true situation of man, the nature of the whole, and the perplexity of being—owes a great debt to his work. No area of inquiry seems foreign to him: his writings investigate ethics, politics, mathematics, metaphysics, logic, aesthetics, and epistemology in tremendous depth and breadth. In the words of Alfred North Whitehead, “The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.”

There are few contemporary sources for the life of Plato. According to Diogenes Laertius, who lived many centuries later than the philosophers about whom he was writing, Plato was born to Ariston, an Athenian aristocrat who traced his lineage to Codrus, the king of Athens, and to Melanthus, the king of Messina. The family of his mother, Perictione, boasted a relationship with the great Athenian legislator Solon. Diogenes Laertius also reports that the philosopher’s name was Aristocles, for his grandfather, but that his wrestling coach dubbed him “Platon,” meaning “broad,” either on account of his robust physique, or the width of his forehead, or eloquence of his speech. And yet modern scholars are in doubt, since the name “Plato” was not uncommon in the Athens of Plato’s day.

 

Well before his encounter with Socrates, Plato was known to accompany philosophers such as Cratylus, a disciple of Heraclitus. Later in life, after the death of Socrates, Plato traveled around Egypt, Italy, Sicily, and Cyrene, Libya. Upon his return to Athens at around 40 years of age, Plato founded the first known institution of higher learning in the West, the Academy, named for its location in the Grove of Academus. The Academy was open until its destruction by Sulla in 84 BCE. It counts among its illustrious alumni many fine minds, but none more renowned than Aristotle.

After founding the Academy, Plato became involved in the politics of Syracuse. According to Diogenes, Plato visited Syracuse while it was under the rule of Dionysius. While there, Dionysius’ brother-in-law, Dion, became Plato’s disciple. Dion, however, later turned against Plato, selling him into slavery. During this time, Plato nearly faced death in Cyrene. Fortunately, chancing upon an admirer who purchased his freedom, Plato was spared and found his way home.

Upon the death of Dionysius, according to Plato’s account in his Seventh Letter, Dion requested that Plato return to Syracuse to tutor young Dionysius II. In another reversal of fortune, Dionysius II expelled his uncle Dion, and compelled Plato to remain. Plato would eventually leave Syracuse, while Dion later returned to Syracuse and overthrew Dionysius II, only to be usurped by Callipus, another disciple of Plato.

Ancient sources offer differing accounts of Plato’s death. According to one source, Plato died peacefully in his bed listening to the sweet sounds of a Thracian flute girl. Another source reports that he died while attending a friend’s wedding feast. Still another account simply says he died in his sleep.

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Plato Contribution to Sociology

  • First of his writing was an apology which he wrote after the death of Socrates.
  • Crito: it is said to be a dialogue by an ancient philosopher Plato. Crito contains a conversation between Socrates and his rich friend Crito regarding justice and injustice.
  • Phaedo one of the work done by Plato. It contains the description of Socrates last few days in the cell alone. It was a mixture of drama and philosophy linked with the immortality of the human soul.
  • Platonic love: We also became familiar with the Platonic love:  Spiritual and emotional companionship or relationship between two people of the opposite sex that doesn’t require sexual desire. This type of relationship is rare in today’s world. He believed that this type of relationship help us reach our highest potential. Plato also disliked the physical expression of love.
  • The Book: Republic If you haven’t got the chance to grab a copy of Republic written more than 2,400 years ago then this article will help you a lot. The author is none other than Plato himself. The book contains how to deal with the nature and conditions of a just republic and with the misuse of justice by man and society. It largely talks about the division of labor.

In his book, Republic II Plato uses macro approach to analyze justice. He has talked about social organizations because he believes here he see a larger image of the problem that is justice which also exists at a micro-level as well. This is why he used mental experiments, with the emergence of the political city. Firstly, he talked about simple cities then magnificent cities.

Plato began with an identified satisfaction of human need as the fundamental cause of the association. He said that people live together and provide each other with support associate as everyone believes it to be in one’s self-interest. To organize productive efforts of these associated Plato explained three main reasons for the division of labor.

  • he believed that every individual has different natural productive differences and therefore one might be good in one occupation and others might be good in something else. For example, one might be a good tailor and others might be better as a chef.
  • Specialization in the different field improves one’s workmanship.
  • Many things need to be done at the same time which requires the availability of some people fixed for some tasks.

In simple words according to Plato division of labour increases the physical productivity of people and facilitate their efforts and get to full potential.

He says us not to engage in the materialistic conception of the significance of these associations. He goes on explaining that division of labor is not only about consumers good but also about producers goods. From the production of tools used by consumers is also related to producers goods. Hence, as the labor of division increases so does the number of citizens also increases.

Born: c. 427 B.C.E.
Athens, Greece
Died: c. 347 B.C.E.
Athens, Greece

Greek philosopher

The Greek philosopher Plato founded the Academy in Athens, one of the great philosophical schools of antiquity

Plato.
Courtesy of the

Library of Congress

.

(ancient times). His thought had enormous impact on the development of Western (having to do with American and European thought) philosophy.

Early life

Plato was born in Athens, Greece, the son of Ariston and Perictione, both of Athenian noble backgrounds. He lived his whole life in Athens, although he traveled to Sicily and southern Italy on several occasions. One story says he traveled to Egypt. Little is known of his early years, but he was given the finest education Athens had to offer noble families, and he devoted his considerable talents to politics and the writing of tragedy (works that end with death and sadness) and other forms of poetry. His acquaintance with Socrates (c. 469–c. 399 B.C.E. ) altered the course of his life. The power that Socrates’s methods and arguments had over the minds of the youth of Athens gripped Plato as firmly as it did many others, and he became a close associate of Socrates.

The end of the Peloponnesian War (431–04 B.C.E. ), which caused the destruction of Athens by the Spartans, left Plato in a terrible position. His uncle, Critias (c. 480–403 B.C.E. ), was the leader of the Thirty Tyrants (a group of ruthless Athenian rulers) who were installed in power by the victorious Spartans. One means of holding onto power was to connect as many Athenians as possible with terrible acts committed during the war. Thus Socrates, as we learn in Plato’s Apology, was ordered to arrest a man and bring him to Athens from Salamis for execution (to be put to death). When the great teacher refused, his life was threatened, and he was probably saved only by the overthrow of the Thirty Tyrants and the reestablishment of the democracy (a system of government in which government officials are elected by the people).

Death of Socrates

Plato welcomed the restoration of the democracy, but his mistrust was deepened some four years later when Socrates was tried on false charges and sentenced to death. Plato was present at the trial, as we learn in the Apology, but was not present when the hemlock (poison) was given to his master, although he describes the scene in clear and touching detail in the Phaedo. He then turned in disgust from Athenian politics and never took an active part in government, although through friends he did try to influence the course of political life in the Sicilian city of Syracuse.

Plato and several of his friends withdrew from Athens for a short time after Socrates’s death and remained with Euclides (c. 450–373 B.C.E. ) in Megara. His productive years were highlighted by three voyages to Sicily, and his writings, all of which have survived.

The first trip, to southern Italy and Syracuse, took place in 388 and 387 B.C.E. , when Plato met Dionysius I (c. 430–367 B.C.E. ). Dionysius was then at the height of his power in Sicily for having freed the Greeks there from the threat of Carthaginian rule. Plato became better friends with the philosopher Dion (c. 408–353 B.C.E. ), however, and Dionysius grew jealous and began to treat Plato harshly.

His dialogues

When Plato returned to Athens, he began to teach in the Gymnasium Academe and soon afterward acquired property nearby and founded his famous Academy, which survived until the early sixth century C.E. At the center of the Academy stood a shrine to the Muses (gods of the arts), and at least one modern scholar suggests that the Academy may have been a type of religious brotherhood.

Plato had begun to write the dialogues (writings in the form of conversation), which came to be the basis of his philosophical (having to do with the search for knowledge and truth) teachings, some years before the founding of the Academy. To this early period Plato wrote the Laches which deals with courage, Charmides with common sense, Euthyphro with piety (religious dedication), Lysis with friendship, Protagoras with the teaching of virtues, or goodness, and many others. The Apology and Crito stand somewhat apart from the other works of this group in that they deal with historical events, Socrates’s trial and the period between his conviction and execution.

Plato’s own great contributions begin to appear in the second group of writings, which date from the period between his first and second voyages to Sicily. The Meno carries on the question of the teachability of virtue first dealt with in Protagoras and introduces the teaching of anamnesis (recollection), which plays an important role in Plato’s view of the human’s ability to learn the truth.

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The Republic

Socrates is again the main character in the Republic, although this work is less a dialogue than a long discussion by Socrates of justice and what it means to the individual and the city-state (independent states). Just as there are three elements to the soul, the rational, the less rational, and the impulsive irrational, so there are three classes in the state, the rulers, the guardians, and the workers. The rulers are not a family of rulers but are made up of those who have emerged from the population as a whole as the most gifted intellectually. The guardians serve society by keeping order and by handling the practical matters of government, including fighting wars, while the workers perform the labor necessary to keep the whole running smoothly. Thus the most rational elements of the city-state guide it and see that all in it are given an education equal to their abilities.

Only when the three work in harmony, with intelligence clearly in control, does the individual or state achieve the happiness and fulfillment of which it is capable. The Republic ends with the great myth of Er, in which the wanderings of the soul through births and rebirths are retold. One may be freed from the cycle after a time through lives of greater and greater spiritual and intellectual purity.

Last years

Plato’s third and final voyage to Syracuse was made some time before 357 B.C.E. , and he tried for the second time to influence the young Dionysius II. Plato was unsuccessful and was held in semicaptivity before being released. Plato’s Seventh Letter, the only one in the collection of thirteen considered accurate, perhaps even from the hand of Plato himself, recounts his role in the events surrounding the death of Dion, who in 357 B.C.E. entered Syracuse and overthrew Dionysius. It is of more interest, however, for Plato’s statement that the deepest truths may not be communicated.

Plato died in 347 B.C.E. the founder of an important philosophical school, which existed for almost one thousand years, and the most brilliant of Socrates’s many pupils and followers. His system attracted many followers in the centuries after his death and resurfaced as Neoplatonism, the great rival of early Christianity.

For More Information

Kahn, Charles H. Plato and the Socratic Dialogue: The Philosophical Use of a Literary Form. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996.

Shorey, Paul. What Plato Said. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1933.

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উক্ত আর্টিকেলের উক্তি ও বাণীসমূগ বিভিন্ন ব্লগ, উইকিপিডিয়া এবং plato রচিত গ্রন্থ থেকে সংগ্রহ করা হয়েছে।

 

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