PLATO’S IDEAS

1. Unity and Multiplicity: The Greek Question

1.1 The world consists of many different things, each having its own particular characteristics
and properties.

1.2 These diverse things, diverse across time and space could not be so different from one
another as to constitute completely different worlds, for that would make things completely
chaotic and incomprehensible.

1.3 It seems that there is but one ordered rational world, subsisting through all these changes, one
world underlying all those seemingly different things.

1.4 The fundamental belief of the Greek Mind is that there is the Logos, or Reason, a kind of an
all-encompassing, self-instituting, self-governing order prevailing over all of reality.

2. Logos

2.1 One manifest effect of the Logos is the Cosmos, the ordered universe of earth, planets, and
stars, governed by eternal, immutable laws.

2.2 The problem was how to reconcile this unity and multiplicity of things, how to understand
the reason behind the seeming contradiction between the unity and diversity across time and
space.

2.3 Heraclitus emphasized transience, oppositeness of things, yet at the same time pointing out
that such diversities are constantly under the same lawful order of reason.

2.4 Parmenides emphasized permanence and unity of all being while allowing for the secondary
changes and differences.

2.5 It is obvious that this world is in constant flux, always changing, ever different from what it
was the moment before. The individual things that we perceive exist in space-time. They are
not real since they change, pass in and out of existence, and therefore are inconstant, unreal.

3. Idealism

3.1 The only thing that is Real is the Idea behind the changeable, individual and finite things –
being unchanging, universal and eternal.

3.2 The individual men that we see are, in this sense not real since they come and go. They are
only external manifestations, the reflections, and replicas of the unseen, universal and eternal
IDEA-MAN in the Realm of Ideas.

3.3 The philosopher must therefore always look for the one in the many, the universality
underlying individuality – in short, the Idea behind the things that we see. This is called
Idealism.
4. Theory of Forms or Ideas

4.1 For Plato, human knowledge is possible only insofar as man is able to grasp some stable
structures or relations in the midst of the entire changing sensible world.

4.2 It was clear for him that true or valid knowledge does exist, as exhibited by the sciences of
his time – arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, etc.

4.3 Plato theorized that there must be a world of permanent and immutable forms, which are the
proper object of human knowledge.

4.4 This will explain the fact that notwithstanding the flux of things, man is still able to know.
The fact of human knowledge therefore would seem to argue to the existence of another
world aside from the ever-changing sensible world, a world of spiritual and immutable ideal
forms.

4.5 This world of ideal forms is the source and foundation of the sensible or material world.

5. Participation

5.1 Plato argued that the sensible world, by metaphysical participation, is a pale copy or
reflection of the Ideal world. The sensible world proceeds from the ideal world as its source
of being and exemplary model.

5.2 We live in the sensible world which is changeable. Not only is there change here but there is
also a gradation of things. We see here more-more-more but we never see most. Insofar as
there is a gradation of everything, there must be grater or Ideal. This world thus participates
only in the ultimate world.

5.3 Within the World of Ideas, there is an ascending order of more and more inclusive and more
and more fundamental ideas. Which are subsumed under the ideas of Being and NonBeing.
All these Ideas fall under the Idea of the Good.

6. The Good

6.1 The Good therefore is the Idea of Ideas, source of all ideas and of all things, the Absolute
itself, excluding all limitations, the Light and the Ultimate Principle of explanation.

6.2 Everything is a participation of the Good.

6.3 If human knowledge is the grasping of the Ideal forms, which is a world other than the
sensible world, how does one come upon these ideal forms amidst the ever-changing sensible
world? How is it possible under these circumstances? The answer is through reminiscence.

7. Man: Body and Soul

7.1 Man, for Plato is a reflection of the duality of the sensible and ideal worlds. Man is
composed of body and soul.
 7.2 The body is made up of the four traditional elements: earth, water, air, fire.

7.3 The soul consists of three distinct faculties

Faculties Corresponding Desire of Attraction

Highest Intellect Will – Desire to become Attracted The immortal part of the
level (nous) in union with the Ideal to Good soul, the capacity for truth
Beauty and the Good and wisdom. The will is
Itself, which Eros has the soul’s tendency
been searching all along. toward the Good.
Opinion Spirit Desire – Desire to Attracted Not free from error but is
(doxa) procreate spiritual to Social sufficient for ordinary
offspring such as poetry, institutions practical matters such as
sciences, social and hypothetical sciences and
legal institutions the government of
communal life.
Lowest Sensation Sense Desire- Desire of Attracted Seeking satisfaction in the
level (aisthesis) the physically beautiful to Beauty, ever-changing and thus
Eros and the desire to formless endlessly
procreate the physically frustrating material things.
beautiful

8. Two Myths: The Pre-existence of the Soul and the The Fall of Man

8.1 Given this composition of man, Plato explains by way of a myth that there was a time when
the souls, living in the spiritual world of ideal forms, was not bonded to the body.

8.2 Due to some Fall of Man, consequent upon some evil deed, the soul was exiled to the
material world and thus imprisoned in the body.

8.3 The story itself of the Fall was not original in Plato. It was popular belief that was part of the
whole religious tradition of the Greek culture at the time. Plato originally integrated this Fall
of Man with his Theory of Ideas.

8.4 In this fallen state, man is forgetful of the World of Ideas in his previous existence.
However, insofar as the material world is a shadowy reflection or participation of the Ideal
world, the sojourn of the soul in the material world serves as an occasion for it to reminisce,
to recall the ideal forms of its previous state.

9. Theory of Reminiscence/ Recollection

9.1 We were once supposedly in am immortal world where the things of this world are pale
imitations, but we were separated from that world when we came into this world.
 9.2 Our task is to remember that world so that we may fully experience this world within the
context of its original perfection.

9.3 Turning away from this world traverses the path to that world into the inner world of the soul
– so that in the end, we can ascend back to our memory of that immortal world.

9.4 The encounter with the material world is an occasion for the soul to remember what in a
sense it had always known from the beginning.

9.5 Knowledge therefore is not really something totally new – it is just a matter of Remembering.
Knowledge is knowing something one has known before.

10. Moral Dimension of Man

10.1 The 2 myths allow Plato to explain the moral dimension of Man.

10.2 In the fallen state, man is torn between two tendencies:

10.2.1 On the one hand, by virtue of the imprisonment in the body, the soul finds itself
dragged down, as if by some leaden weight, toward a life of mere sense and
physical pleasure.

10.2.2 On the other hand, a fundamental yearning marks the soul for that which is
beyond – for the Ideal. This tendency of the soul is the expression of the soul’s
connaturality with the Good and its preexistence in the world of Ideas.

11. The Ideal Man

11.1 In consonance with his theory of Idealism, Plato propounded the view that man, in his
present earthly existence, is only an imperfect copy of his real original self, the perfect
man, in the realm of Ideas.

11.2 By knowing and constantly recalling his former self and his perfections, and by constant
imitation of his ideal exemplar by the practice of virtue, man can regain his perfection,
which he lost during his long earthly exile and his imprisonment in the body as a
punishment for sin.

11.3 Men now imperfect can be perfect again. Man’s perfection consists in constant
recollection and imitation of his former perfect self.

12. Purification

12.1 Due to the Fall and the Consequent Imprisonment in the body, man must die unto himself
bit by bit by a method of Purification.

12.2 Purification means gradually restraining his passions and gaining control of himself,
liberating himself, liberating the soul from the hold of the world and the body in order to
reunite with the Good.
 12.3 Man’s life is thus seen as a spiritual voyage that is really a return to one’s roots and
beginnings. It is a kind of a quest or pilgrimage in fidelity to this natural orientation of
man to that which is the Good.

12.4 The spiritual voyage leads man to an ascending path. It starts from Eros, and then moves
to higher desire of the more spiritually beautiful and finally union with the Ideal Beauty
and Good.

12.5 The final stage signifies a kind of mystical touch that is transcendent to man. Such a state
is incommunicable, capable of expression only in terms of the Good’s attributes such as
Truth, Proportion and Beauty. Here, the soul is liberated from all change and tribulations,
which was the point and goal of all the desire for physical and spiritual procreation.

13. Contemplation

13.1 Contemplation is the vital component of Plato’s idealism.

13.2 It is the union of the mind with universal and external ideas.

13.3 It is a way available to mortal man while serving life sentence on earth to free himself from
confinement to ascend to the heaven of ideas.

13.4 Contemplation does not mean passive thinking or inaction.

13.5 It means “constant doing of the good,” imitating the good exemplar and living the Good by
Leading the Good life.

14. Ethics

14.1 Applied to Ethics, Man is seen as a soul in a body.

14.2 There is tension, with the soul trying to go back where he was before.

14.3 Morality is a struggle to purify oneself from the body.

15. Morality and Politics

15.1 He who finds wisdom and finds the way to the Good owes it as his duty to the good to
enlighten others along the true path.

15.2 So the philosophers, those men of wisdom who have found the path to the Good, must lead
the community toward the one goal of life, that of the attainment of the Good.

15.3 They must see to the maintenance of the basic moral virtues in communal life.

15.3.1 temperance over sense pleasures

15.3.2 courage to overcome fear and face danger
15.3.3 defend city-states
 15.3.4 justice-that of giving each one his due
15.3.5 Wisdom in contemplation and discernment; familiarity with the good.

15.4 The whole purpose of the Polis (city-state) is to make possible, to enable men to lead the
life of moral virtue and wisdom.

16. Judgment and Reincarnation

16.1 He who at the end of his life has failed to attain the goal of life – by not going beyond mere
physical desires and pleasures of the sensible world will be brought to judgment.

16.2 After a period of expiation, he will be reincarnated wither as an animal or as a man,

depending upon the misdeeds of his past life. He is destined to remain reincarnated and
tied to the body until his soul has learned its way through the proper path of purification
and ascension. If necessary, there can be repeated reincarnation.

17. Brief Summary: Plato’s Philosophy views Man and the World as Having proceeded from the Good,
(metaphysically) Participating in the Good, and seeking ultimately to return to the Good.

18. First Basic Element of Platonist Ethics: Knowledge

18.1 Plato’s Position: If a person knows what a good life is, he will not act immorally.

18.2 Evil is due to lack of knowledge. If people can discover what id right, they will never act
wickedly.

18.3 The problem is to discover what is right, or as Plato calls it, the Good.

18.4 Finding the nature of the good life is an intellectual task like the discovery of mathematical
truths. Just as untrained people can’t discover the latter, so the former cannot be either.
There is a need of careful schooling, a long period of intellectual training.

18.5 Plato does not maintain that one must have knowledge in order to lead the good life. He
only says that if one does have knowledge, the person will lead the good life.

18.6 Even without the possession of knowledge, it is possible for some individuals to lead the
good life – but blindly or haphazardly.

19. How people can lead good lives?

19.1 In his instruction on how people can lead good lives, they can be instructed in two different
ways.
19.1.1 They must develop virtuous habits of behavior.

19.1.2 They must develop their mental powers – through study of mathematics and
philosophy.
 19.2 To begin with, some people may not have the intellectual capacity to acquire knowledge;
and they won’t be able to understand what the good life is.

19.3 What they must do is to imitate and be guided by those who have knowledge of the good
and who acted virtuously. If they do this, they will become virtuous even though they
don’t understand the essential nature of the good life.

20. Censorship

20.1 In line with this, Plato advocated the necessity of Censorship in what he calls an “ideal
society” portrayed in his famous book “The Republic.”

20.2 It is necessary to prevent young people to be exposed to certain sorts of experiences if they
are to develop virtuous habits.

20.3 It is necessary for some especially gifted people to develop their mental powers and
undergo intellectual training that will do more for them than to develop virtuous habits.
This is so because they must finally be the rulers of the ideal society.

21. Summary

21.1 Plato thus envisaged a ruling of both men and women – a society with rulers who have
developed their intellectual capacities,
21.2 And of course, also acquired knowledge.
21.3 Having acquired knowledge, they would understand the nature of the good life,
21.4 Guarantee their acting rightly or morally,
21.5 Ensure that they will become good rulers.

22. Second Basic Element of Platonist Ethics: Absolutism

22.1 According to Plato, there is fundamentally one and only one good life for all to lead.

22.2 This is so because goodness is something that is not dependent upon human’s inclinations,
desires, wishes, or upon their opinions.
22.3 Goodness is like a mathematical truth – like 2+2=4. Absolute truth exists whether anyone
likes this fact or not. It is not dependent upon mankind’s opinions about the nature of
mathematics.

22.4 Likewise, goodness exists independent of mankind, and remains to be discovered if people
can be properly trained.

22.5 In other words, Plato is arguing for the objectivity of moral principles as opposed to all
philosophies that contend that morality is merely a matter of opinion or preference.

22.6 In summary, he says that “A certain course of action is right or wrong absolutely and
independently of anyone’s opinion.” Example, that this is a typewriter is either right or
wrong independently of anyone’s opinion.
23. Criticism of Platonism

23.1 Platonism as a Moral Philosophy rests upon two basic assumptions:

23.1.1 If a person has knowledge of the good life, he/she will never act immorally

23.1.2 There is one and only one good life for all to lead, just as there is moral
alternative to the command, “Thou shalt not steal.”

23.2 Comment on # 1. (-) It says that if people have a certain kind of knowledge, they will
behave in a certain way. Example: I plan to embezzle money from the bank where I work.
I am told that stealing is wrong. If I say that it is not wrong, people would consider me
deficient in moral knowledge, since stealing is in fact, wrong. So I am mistaken. If I
proceed to steal money, it means that I have acted immorally because of deficiency in
knowledge, that I don’t understand what is meant by the right way of life. Thus, if you
apply Platonism here, it is in accord common sense view of morality.

But some people understand that stealing is wrong, but they still persist in stealing. Plato
says that they really do not understand what stealing means, since no people willingly
will do what they know to be wrong. But if we speak to those people, and if they give the
usual signs of understanding what it means to steal, and if they admit it to be morally
wrong, but still persist in doing it, it appears that Plato’s account must be rejected – since
it seems that some people will act evilly while knowing what the right course of action is.

23.3 Comment (+) What makes Plato’s view is that it attempts to supply a general solution to a
common type of difficulty that arises in daily life. There are some people who do not
know what is the right course of action to take. “Is it right to defend the country if it
means to kill?” Plato says that if we were trained, we would certainly know the answer.
Example: A doctor asks: “Should I operate now? What drug will I administer?” For the
layperson, this is a difficult situation. But for the doctor who has a training and
knowledge, this moral difficulty disappears. So moral difficulties can be eliminated or at
least theoretically solvable by the acquisition of knowledge.

23.4 Further objection: But moral questions do not seem analogous to scientific questions.
When all relevant facts have been gathered in scientific issue, we can in principle decide
what is the most suitable answer. But not so in moral situations. Sometimes, further
acquisition of information will solve, but not always so. (Ex. Nuclear Bomb being
dropped) Moral knowledge is not analogous to mathematical knowledge and Plato’s
mistake was to think that it is.

23.5 Further criticism: Plato regards Morality as a matter of knowledge. A prerequisite of

moral behavior is intellectual ability. Those who lack the ability can live good lives by
allowing themselves to be ruled or advised by others.
But it is not sufficient to say this, since we understand that an action is not truly moral,
unless it is the result of the free choice of the individual performing it. To make this
choice, the individual needs the kind of moral understanding that Plato says is possible
only for a few.