Plato
Teacher: Socrates
Nativist (knowledge is innate). Idealist. Dualist. Metaphysical realist. Rationalist.
Human beings have a capacity for abstract knowledge. Animals respond to concrete
stimulus.
Other worldliness: Socrates would converse with, and try to teach virtue to, anyone
willing to undertake the elenchus. Plato was an elitist, reserving academic education for
an innately wise ruling class, the Guardians
Epistemology: the study of knowledge.
Truth lies in the realm of being: eternally and unchangeably true. Reality is within the
soul.
If I know more about a cat, in my previous life exposed to more, I was more virtuous.
Greatest of Heaven. Megan was reincarnated much more quickly. Learning as
remembering: The knowledge is within us. Souls see the forms in Heaven, before
coming to this world. Less virtuous ascend less high in heaven and more quickly
reincarnated.
Knowledge cannot be derived from material senses. Perception is not the path to
knowledge since physical things can change over time.
Observations are tainted by individual differences and cultural perspectives.
Form of things: perfect objects in the realm of being. e.g., form of beauty: could differ
between cultures but real judgements are universal and independent from local taste.
o Metaphysical realism: forms are nonphysical objects, outside of the physical
realm.
o Idea: forms exist outside human minds as fixed universal objects of thought.
o Idealism: thinks the truth consists of ideas and is not a physical thing. Therefore,
an idealist is also a monist.
Skepticism
Knowledge is true only if: it is true in all times & all places absolutely AND if the
knowledge is rationally justifiable (provable = geometry).
Imagining the Forms
Metaphors of forms, since imagining forms itself is
very hard.
“Third realm” distinct from the subjective and physical
realms.
Exist out of human mind as fixed and universal objects
of thought. Only elite minds can achieve this state.
1. The simile of sun: form of good is to the intelligible
world of the forms what the sun is to the physical
, world of objects. We need light to see objects. We need a reason to see the form of the
good.
2. The simile of the line: hierarchy of opinion & knowledge. Imagining: lowest level of
cognition. Thinking: mere opinion real knowledge. World of appearances: Shortest
line: imagination. Intelligible World (can only be reached by reasoning) : Then belief and
then thinking. Longest line is the knowledge.
3. The allegory of the cave: child of goodness. Each soul is imprisoned in an imperfectly
fleshy body, forced to look through imperfect physical eyes at imperfect copies of the
Forms illuminated by the sun. Soul is the victim to the conventional beliefs of the society
which it lives in. Through philosophy we can escape from the cave and the opinion &
appearances of knowledge and reality. World of being & forms: are seen when people
decide to see the outer part of the cave.
4. The ladder of love: Drawn to the good. Love of beauty easiest path from this World
to forms. Change from the profane physical love to the sacred love of the form of beauty
itself. Greeks: erotic connection between a teacher and student is essential for the
education of the youth. Love of woman was inferior to homosexuality. Not physically
being pregnant, but rather being pregnant in respects to one’s soul. Soul beauty is more
important than physical beauty. One can move to enlightenment beginning with physical
love. Ladder is metaphor of physical beauty to inner beauty. Ladder = metaphor for the
climb a lover makes from physical attraction to actual contemplation of the Form of
Beauty itself. The love of one beautiful person is an invitation to step on ladder, that if we
follow upwards with thoughtfulness and dignity will lead us to an appreciation of bigger
things. He does not want one to be stuck on that part of the ladder, we start off with the
love of the physicality of the person to then move to a love of beauty of people in
general. We move onwards to an intellectual form of beauty. When you have come this
skillful at perceiving this sort of beauty, you are then able to appreciate a beautiful mind,
even in an ugly body.
Motivation
2 classes according virtue of innate greatness of soul.
1. Guardians: seek knowledge out of a special kind of eros, not drawn to physical bodies.
2. Auxilaries: desiring and spirited souls have a reason.
3. Productive class
Rational soul: The highest, only immortal soul. Located in the head because this soul,
being perfect, must be round and thus be located in the roundest and highest part of the
body. The rational soul rules each Guardian, who are thus the most fit to rule the
Republic. (Charioteer in the example. Homonculus problem: who guides the rational
soul? A mini man?)
Spirited soul: Located in the chest and dominant in the Auxiliaries. The spirited soul
represents the old Homeric virtues, being motivated by glory and fame. Because of its
quest for noble things like glory and the immortality of fame, because it can feel shame
and guilt, the spirited soul is superior to the third soul, the desiring soul. Knows honor.
(Good horse in the example)
Desiring soul: Located in the belly and genitals. The desiring soul is a disparate grab bag
of irrational wants. Bodily desires such as hunger or lust are appetites of the desiring soul
, shared with animals, but desire for money is also located there. Self-interests. (Bad horse
in the example)
o Bad behavior can stem from ignorance or insufficient mastery.
Reasoning will influence the actions. (Rational soul controls the spirited & desiring soul)
Aristotle
Teacher: Plato
Perceptual realist. Naturalistic.
Rationalism and empiricism.
Empirically inclined observer of nature. Perceptions and senses are important.
Not otherworldly.
Discovering nature, natural philosopher. Did not interrogate nature through
experimentation. (Theoria)
Defined science.
Four fashions of explanation
Observed what a thing is rather than the change dynamics of the object.
Form: what makes a thing that which it is, defining characteristics of an object. What
guides a development of something. Dynamic, directing development.
o Essential/Material cause: form defines what something is in its essence. What is
it made up of.
o Efficient cause: form includes how things come into existence or are made.
Chipping the marble.
o Final cause: form includes the purpose for which a thing exists. (Honoring a
person)
o Bronze statue, bronze door.
Matter: sheer, undifferentiated physical existence.
o For matter to be knowable: it has to be joined with something to form the “form”.
o What something is made up of. (Bronze statue: bronze material in it)
o Bronze is the matter.
Mind receives the form of an object but not its matter.
Eternal forms do not mean anything. (Opposite of Plato)
Rejects the separability of the forms which is supported by Plato.
Rejects materialism: without a soul, body has no definition
Causes: natural behavior of things given their essences.
Potentiality and actuality
Everything in the universe has both potentiality and actuality.
Exceptions: pure matter and unmoved mover (God fully actualized).
Sheer matter without form of any kind is pure potentiality, capable of becoming anything.
The more fully actualized a thing is, the nearer it is to the unmoved mover.
Great chain of being: the hierarchy among everything, from perfectly unformed neutral
matter in a state of pure potentiality up to the unmoved moved.
Psychology (Soul & Body)
Living things have souls.
, Soul: actually something and also has actuality.
Soul: the form of a natural body having life potentiality within it.
o Nutritive soul: Maintaining the individual plant through nutrition, maintaining the
species through reproduction, and directing growth. (Plants)
o Sensitive soul: Awareness of surroundings, have sensations. Experiencing pleasure,
desire to seek pleasure or avoid pain. Imagination and memory. Movement. (Animals)
o Rational soul: Gaining knowledge starts with perception of objects and ends with
general knowledge of forms.
Sense perception: Understanding the form not the matter.
Special senses: The first stage in perception is the reception of aspects of an
object’s form by the special senses. Each special sense is dedicated to reception
of a particular information about objects (sound, taste, vision).
Interior senses: Information from special senses move here.
1. Common sense: Combines information from each special sense. We sense
something and we judge what something is. Binding problem (?)
2. Imagination: the ability to represent the form of an object in its absence.
Imagination and common sense together judge what an object is.
SENSING AND JUDGING WHAT SORT OF OBJECT THAT
IS, IS DIFFERENT SINCE SPECIAL SENSATIONS ARE
FALLIBLE.
3. Memory: storehouse of the images created by common sense and
imagination. Association: similarity, contiguity and contrast. Separated
memory (episodic) from knowledge (semantic).
Soul is the actuality, directing force of any living organism, fulfilling the body’s potential
having of life.
Soul: essential, efficient and final cause
Essential cause: the soul is what defines an animal or plant—a cat is a cat because it has
a cat’s soul and therefore behaves like a cat.
Efficient cause of bodily growth and movement and of life processes generally. Without
soul, the body is not actualized and is dead, mere matter.
Final cause of an organism, for the body serves the soul and the soul guides its purposive
development and activity.
Matter: what the body is made
Form: soul, essence.
Mind
Rational part of the human soul.
Separated from the interior senses.
Acquires knowledge of abstract universals.
As we experience different members of the same natural type, we note similarities and
differences, forming an impression of a universal. (35 cats essence of a cat)
Passive mind is potentiality. It has no character of its own, for it can take on the form of
experienced objects. Knowledge of universals in the passive mind is actualized, by the
operations of the active mind. Potentiality.
Active mind is pure thought, acting on the contents of the passive mind to achieve
rational knowledge of universals. Unchangeable, immortal, for death is a form of change.
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