Plato an Interdisciplinary Perspective
Author: R.N. Sharma
Publisher: Atlantic Publishers & Distri
Published: 1991
Total Pages: 192
ISBN-13:
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Plato: A Very Short Introduction
Author: Julia Annas
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Published: 2003-02-13
Total Pages: 128
ISBN-13: 019157922X
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis lively and accessible introduction to Plato focuses on the philosophy and argument of his writings, drawing the reader into Plato's way of doing philosophy, and the general themes of his thinking. This is not a book to leave the reader standing in the outer court of introduction and background information, but leads directly into Plato's argument. It looks at Plato as a thinker grappling with philosophical problems in a variety of ways, rather than a philosopher with a fully worked-out system. It includes a brief account of Plato's life and the various interpretations that have been drawn from the sparse remains of information. It stresses the importance of the founding of the Academy and the conception of philosophy as a subject. Julia Annas discusses Plato's style of writing: his use of the dialogue form, his use of what we today call fiction, and his philosophical transformation of myths. She also looks at his discussions of love and philosophy, his attitude to women, and to homosexual love, explores Plato's claim that virtue is sufficient for happiness, and touches on his arguments for the immortality of the soul and his ideas about the nature of the universe. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.
Incomprehensible Certainty
Author: Thomas Pfau
Publisher:
Published: 2022-06
Total Pages: 784
ISBN-13: 9780268202484
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThomas Pfau's study of images and visual experience is a tour de force linking Platonic metaphysics to modern phenomenology and probing literary, philosophical, and theological accounts of visual experience from Plato to Rilke. Incomprehensible Certainty presents a sustained reflection on the nature of images and the phenomenology of visual experience. Taking the word "image" (eikōn) not only as the essential medium of art and literature but as foundational for the intuitive ways in which we make contact with our "lifeworld," Thomas Pfau draws in equal measure on Platonic metaphysics and modern phenomenology to advance a series of interlocking claims. First, Pfau shows that, beginning with Plato's later dialogues, being and appearance came to be understood as ontologically distinct from (but no longer opposed to) one another. Second, in contrast to the idol that is typically gazed at and visually consumed as an object of desire, this study positions the image (eikōn) as a medium whose intrinsic abundance and excess reveal to us its metaphysical function, namely, as the visible analogue of an invisible, numinous reality. Finally, the interpretations unfolded in this book (from Plato, Plotinus, pseudo-Dionysius, John Damascene via Bernard of Clairvaux, Bonaventure, Julian of Norwich, and Nicholas of Cusa to modern writers and artists such as Goethe, Ruskin, Turner, Hopkins, Cézanne, and Rilke) affirm the essential complementarity of image and word, visual intuition and hermeneutic practice, in theology, philosophy, and literature. Like Pfau's previous book, Minding the Modern, Incomprehensive Certainty is a major work. With over fifty illustrations, the book will interest students and scholars of philosophy, theology, literature, and art history.
From Plato to Plantinga: an Introduction to Philosophy
Author: Carey Ford
Publisher:
Published: 2017-09-02
Total Pages: 163
ISBN-13: 9781549656903
DOWNLOAD EBOOKA short book about the methods and history of philosophy. This book describes the philosophies of some of the most important philosophers in history, especially since the time of Descartes; it also analyzes those viewpoints. However, instead of trying to persuade the reader to a certain viewpoint, it attempts to lay the facts out and show the strengths and weaknesses of each viewpoint. This book takes a middle approach to philosophy as opposed to the two extremes you find in most introductory books to philosophy. The first extreme just merely describes what the philosophers wrote and then presents a portion of their writings for review. The second extreme takes a more analytical approach criticizing viewpoints which differ from its own and never admitting, much less addressing, challenges or weaknesses that this viewpoint may have of its own. Next, this book focuses on some of the major world religions. The standard approach to introductory books to philosophy is to concentrate on the claim that God exists and also challenges to that claim, and leave it at that. The god of philosophers just simply doesn't exist. He will either be the God of Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, etc. So why spend an inordinate amount of time on a god who does not exist at the expense of the study of the God who just might exist? This book also focuses on narrative, the story element in life as it addresses these major issues. There is a trend in philosophy today to focus on the logical element in philosophy. This is a much-needed corrective to the unbridled intuitive approach. To help understand the way philosophy undergirds so many of the other disciplines, this book will take an interdisciplinary approach to philosophy.
Philosophy in Dialogue
Author: Gary Alan Scott
Publisher:
Published: 2007-08-17
Total Pages: 300
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKTraditional Plato scholarship, in the English-speaking world, has assumed that Platonic dialogues are merely collections of arguments. Inevitably, the question arises: If Plato wanted to present collections of arguments, why did he write dialogues instead of treatises? Concerned about this question, some scholars have been experimenting with other, more contextualized ways of reading the dialogues. This anthology is among the first to present these new approaches as pursued by a variety of scholars. As such, it offers new perspectives on Plato as well as a suggestive view of Plato scholarship as something of a laboratory for historians of philosophy generally. The essays gathered here each examine vital aspects of Plato’s many methods, considering his dialogues in relation to Thucydides and Homer, narrative strategies and medical practice, images and metaphors. They offer surprising new research into such much-studied works as The Republic as well as revealing views of lesser-known dialogues like the Cratylus and Philebus. With reference to thinkers such as Heidegger, Gadamer, and Sartre, the authors place the Platonic dialogues in an illuminating historical context. Together, their essays should reinvigorate the scholarly examination of the way Plato’s dialogues “work”—and should prompt a reconsideration of how the form of Plato’s philosophical writing bears on the Platonic conception of philosophy.
Plato's Caves
Author: Rebecca Lemoine
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Published: 2020
Total Pages: 289
ISBN-13: 0190936983
DOWNLOAD EBOOKMonths before the 2016 United States presidential election, universities across the country began reporting the appearance of white nationalist flyers featuring slogans like "Let's Become Great Again" and "Protect Your Heritage" against the backdrop of white marble statues depicting figures such as Apollo and Hercules. Groups like Identity Evropa (which sponsored the flyers) oppose cultural diversity and quote classical thinkers such as Plato in support of their anti-immigration views. The traditional scholarly narrative of cultural diversity in classical Greek political thought often reinforces the perception of ancient thinkers as xenophobic, and this is particularly the case with interpretations of Plato. While scholars who study Plato reject the wholesale0dismissal of his work, the vast majority tend to admit that his portrayal of foreigners is unsettling. From student protests over the teaching of canonical texts such as Plato's Republic to the use of images of classical Greek statues in white supremacist propaganda, the world of the ancient Greeks is deeply implicated in a heated contemporary debate about identity and diversity. 0In Plato's Caves, Rebecca LeMoine defends the bold thesis that Plato was a friend of cultural diversity, contrary to many contemporary perceptions. LeMoine shows that, across Plato's dialogues, foreigners play a role similar to that of Socrates: liberating citizens from intellectual bondage. Through close readings of four Platonic dialogues-Republic, Menexenus, Laws, and Phaedrus-LeMoine recovers Plato's unique insight into the promise, and risk, of cross-cultural engagement. Like the Socratic "gadfly" who stings the "horse" of Athens into wakefulness, foreigners can provoke citizens to self-reflection by exposing contradictions and confronting them with alternative ways of life.
Why Plato Wrote
Author: Danielle S. Allen
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Published: 2010-11-15
Total Pages: 246
ISBN-13: 1444334484
DOWNLOAD EBOOKWhy Plato Wrote argues that Plato was not only the world’s first systematic political philosopher, but also the western world’s first think-tank activist and message man. Shows that Plato wrote to change Athenian society and thereby transform Athenian politics Offers accessible discussions of Plato’s philosophy of language and political theory Selected by Choice as an Outstanding Academic Title for 2011
Plato's Academy
Author: Paul Kalligas
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2020-03-12
Total Pages: 447
ISBN-13: 1108426441
DOWNLOAD EBOOKA comprehensive, interdisciplinary history of Plato's Academy, the most prominent philosophical school in antiquity, which lasted for about 300 years. Also includes the first complete annotated translation in English of Philodemus' History of the Academy, preserved on a papyrus from Herculaneum.
Myth and Philosophy in Platonic Dialogues
Author: Omid Tofighian
Publisher: Springer
Published: 2016-11-15
Total Pages: 261
ISBN-13: 1137580445
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis book rethinks Plato’s creation and use of myth by drawing on theories and methods from myth studies, religious studies, literary theory and related fields. Individual myths function differently depending on cultural practice, religious context or literary tradition, and this interdisciplinary study merges new perspectives in Plato studies with recent scholarship and theories pertaining to myth. Significant overlaps exist between prominent modern theories of myth and attitudes and approaches in studies of Plato’s myths. Considering recent developments in myth studies, this book asks new questions about the evaluation of myth in Plato. Its appreciation of the historical conditions shaping and directing the study of Plato’s myths opens deeper philosophical questions about the relationship between philosophy and myth and the relevance of myth studies to philosophical debates. It also extends the discussion to address philosophical questions and perspectives on the distinction between argument and narrative.
Hartford's Ann Plato and the Native Borders of Identity
Author: Ron Welburn
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Published: 2015-04-21
Total Pages: 314
ISBN-13: 143845578X
DOWNLOAD EBOOKWho was Ann Plato? Apart from circumstantial evidence, there's little information about the author of Essays; Including Biographies and Miscellaneous Pieces, in Prose and Poetry, published in 1841. Plato lived in a milieu of colored Hartford, Connecticut, in the early nineteenth century. Although long believed to have been African American herself, she may also, Ron Welburn argues, have been American Indian, like the father in her poem "The Natives of America." Combining literary criticism, ethnohistory, and social history, Welburn uses Plato as an example of how Indians in the Long Island Sound region adapted and prevailed despite the contemporary rhetoric of Indian disappearance. This study seeks to raise Plato's profile as an author as well as to highlight the dynamics of Indian resistance and isolation that have contributed to her enigmatic status as a literary figure.
