Plato

Phaedrus

• Gebundenes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

The awe with which Plato regarded the character of 'the great' Parmenides has extended to the dialogue which he calls by his name. None of the writings of Plato have been more copiously illustrated, both in ancient and modern times, and in none of them have the interpreters been more at variance with one another. Nor is this surprising. For the Parmenides is more fragmentary and isolated than any other dialogue, and the design of the writer is not expressly stated. The date is uncertain; the relation to the other writings of Plato is also uncertain; the connexion between the two parts is at first sight extremely obscure; and in the latter of the two we are left in doubt as to whether Plato is speaking his own sentiments by the lips of Parmenides, and overthrowing him out of his own mouth, or whether he is propounding consequences which would have been admitted by Zeno and Parmenides themselves. The contradictions which follow from the hypotheses of the one and many have been regarded by some as transcendental mysteries; by others as a mere illustration, taken at random, of a new method. They seem to have been inspired by a sort of dialectical frenzy, such as may be supposed to have prevailed in the Megarian School (compare Cratylus, etc.). The criticism on his own doctrine of Ideas has also been considered, not as a real criticism, but as an exuberance of the metaphysical imagination which enabled Plato to go beyond himself.

Produktdetails

• Verlag: 1st World Publishing
• Seitenzahl: 136
• Erscheinungstermin: 1. Oktober 2008
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 222mm x 145mm x 11mm
• Gewicht: 326g
• ISBN-13: 9781421894898
• ISBN-10: 1421894890
• Artikelnr.: 25843297

Autorenporträt

Plato was an ancient Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. In Athens, Plato founded the Academy, a philosophical school where he taught the philosophical doctrines that would later become known as Platonism. Plato (or Platon) was a pen name derived, apparently, from the nickname given to him by his wrestling coach - allegedly a reference to his physical broadness. According to Alexander of Miletus quoted by Diogenes of Sinope his actual name was Aristocles, son of Ariston, of the deme Collytus (Collytus being a district of Athens).Plato was an innovator of the written dialogue and dialectic forms in philosophy. He raised problems for what later became all the major areas of both theoretical philosophy and practical philosophy. His most famous contribution is the Theory of forms, which has been interpreted as advancing a solution to what is now known as the problem of universals. He is also the namesake of Platonic love and the Platonic solids.His own most decisive philosophical influences are usually thought to have been, along with Socrates, the pre-Socratics Pythagoras, Heraclitus, and Parmenides, although few of his predecessors' works remain extant and much of what we know about these figures today derives from Plato himself.Along with his teacher, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato is a central figure in the history of philosophy.[b] Unlike the work of nearly all of his contemporaries, Plato's entire body of work is believed to have survived intact for over 2,400 years. Although their popularity has fluctuated, Plato's works have consistently been read and studied. Through Neoplatonism Plato also greatly influenced both Christian and Islamic philosophy (through e.g. Al-Farabi). In modern times, Alfred North Whitehead famously said: "the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato