- Thanks, I plan to get to this, but I also want to <link> to my last post in our discussion of Gerson.

I am mindful of that post.

In a twist of fate, the argument there is supported by Leo Strauss in his Natural Right and History.

I have problems with that book as an account of other thinkers. But I appreciate the effort made to make politics a part of the dialectic rather than all the other things that could be and has been said of it.

[the above was edited]

first became aware of Gerson because Apollodorus and Wayfarer appealed to him for support of their theological views of Plato — Paine

Thanks for that post, it helps me understand your approach. As I've explained, my background was syncretistic - I studied comparative religion and various strands of perennialism. Platonism has a place in that pantheon, specifically the Christianised Platonism of the mystics - Dean Inge and Evelyn Underhill. That is where I learned about Plotinus, although I never went into him in depth. But I would not describe my approach as 'theological', for the same reason that comparative religion is a very different discipline to 'divinity'. I used to think of the comparative religion department as the 'Department of Mysticism and Heresy'. (I might also add, I learned of both Leo Strauss and Lloyd Gerson from this forum or its predecessor.)

Getting back to Gerson:

If Plato’s philosophy is a version of Platonism, what Platonism is it a version of? And where can we find it? Since Platonism is not limited to Plato’s views as found in his dialogues, nor to other philosophers’ presentation of them (primarily Aristotle’s), nor to later philosophers’ contribution to what is found in Plato’s works, "Platonism", as a term, must be flexible enough to signify the above three aspects severally and collectively. To distinguish this all-inclusive meaning of Platonism from each of the individual renditions above, Gerson hypothetically construes the term Ur-Platonism as a matrix-like collection of all possible meanings of Platonism. In his words, Ur-Platonism “is the general philosophical position that arises from the conjunction of the negations of the philosophical positions explicitly rejected in the dialogues” (p. 9). These positions are anti-materialism, anti-mechanism, anti-nominalism, anti-relativism, and anti-skepticism. — Review of From Plato to Platonism

The predominant strains of naturalism are generally materialistic, mechanist, nominalist, relativist and skeptical. They are always well-represented on TPF.

Another thing that Gerson said in his lecture on Platonism versus Naturalism struck me as profound and important:

Aristotle, in De Anima, argued that thinking in general (which includes knowledge as one kind of thinking) cannot be a property of a body; it cannot, as he put it, 'be blended with a body'. This is because in thinking, the intelligible object or form is present in the intellect, and thinking itself is the identification of the intellect with this intelligible. Among other things, this means that you could not think if materialism is true… . Thinking is not something that is, in principle, like sensing or perceiving; this is because thinking is a universalising activity. This is what this means: when you think, you see - mentally see - a form which could not, in principle, be identical with a particular - including a particular neurological element, a circuit, or a state of a circuit, or a synapse, and so on. This is so because the object of thinking is universal, or the mind is operating universally.

….the fact that in thinking, your mind is identical with the form that it thinks, means (for Aristotle and for all Platonists) that since the form 'thought' is detached from matter, 'mind' is immaterial too.*

So what? Well, the "objects" of the intellect are immaterial, and as we're able to perceive them, we too possess an immaterial aspect - what used to be called the soul. We're not simply mechanisms or organisms. Of course, all Socrates' arguments for the reality of the soul in Phaedo can be and are called into question by his interlocutors but they ring true to me.

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* I suspect that what is translated as 'thinking' in the above excerpt is not what we generally understand as 'thinking' as an internal monologue or stream of ideas.

During our years of discourse, I have been trying to narrow definitions rather than explain differences in the most general terms. I accept your objection to the term "theological", as I used it, as a description of what the debates are about.

I ask you to consider that some of those who you have seen as fellow travelers need to be seen in a different light. The enemy of my enemy is not my friend in the world of thinking. Is that not also the quality so elegantly expressed in Daoist literature?

X wants to say it is all about Y. The separations needed for that become another problem. Is that an observation or a claim to a truth? In that set of arguments, the problem of logic is also a problem of boundaries.

I don't really understand what you're asking of me. I'm not conversant with nor particularly interested in the minutae of scholarly interpretations of Plato. I suppose the key point I've been interrogating since day one on forums (and I retain a copy of my first post in my scrapbook) is the nature of the reality of mind and a questioning of the reductionist view which attempts to explain mind and life in terms of neurology and evolution. I see glimmers of what I'm looking for in all kinds of places, Plato's dialogues included. The reason I choose that particular excerpt from Lloyd Gerson is because of its succinctness.

I understand your interests. You have repeated your thesis many times.

I admit that I'm a one-trick pony. Might be a good time to log out for a while, I've been intending to do that.

Something central to my understanding is something I learned from Klein - "the myth of anamnesis or recollection." A myth Klein points out that Socrates tells from hearsay. The significance of this should not be missed. It is something he has heard, a story, not something he knows from the experience of recollection. He shows how and why the story is problematic. — Fooloso4

The theory of recollection is a very small aspect of Plato's writing. And, where it is displayed in the Meno, it is a matter of interpretation as to whether Plato is supporting this idea, or is simply describing it. The theories of recollection, and participation, are the two principal supports of Pythagorean idealism. Socrates questions Pythagorean idealism endlessly, in the manner of skepticism. Plato exposes the weaknesses of Pythagorean idealism as the theories of participation, and recollection.

To be "Platonist", in the sense of supporting Plato as a very formative philosopher, it is is not necessary to follow Pythagorean idealism, or Neoplatonism. Aristotle rejected Pythagorean idealism, and is often claimed to have effectively refuted that form of idealism, to proceed with another form of idealism which he learned from Plato.

I appreciate the story about the pony. I am more of a donkey.

I support taking breaks.

I have been thinking about Burnyeat's view of utopia and wanted to make some comments outside of his project of undermining Strauss.

I agree with Burnyeat that the Republic is aiming to change our life for the better. Seeing that goal as executing a realized plan that comes into being runs afoul with other ways of reading how the 'city in words' works in the Dialogues. Plato delights in having a metaphor or a bit of discourse appear in a parallel role within a particular dialogue or connecting them with others. The allegory of the cave has the philosopher return to it. Whatever good is done there does not stop it from being a cave.

The later discussions of regimes in the Republic do not include the "city in words" as one of the options. They deal with the return to the cave.

That is where the battle between giants is happening as discussed in the Sophist:

Str: It will be easier in the case of those who propose that being consists of forms, for they are gentler people. However, it is more difficult, perhaps almost impossible, from those who drag everything by force 246D to the physical. But I think they should be dealt with as follows.

Theae: How?

Str: The best thing would be to make better people of them, if that were possible, but if this is not to be, let’s make up a story, assuming that they would be willing to answer questions more fully than now. For agreement with reformed individuals will be preferable to agreement with worse. However, we are not interested in the people: we are seeking the truth.

Theae: Quite so. 246E — ibid. 246c

The last sentence stands in sharp contrast with the concern to make good people in the Republic. But the job of the "friends" is directly involved with the effort. It seems Plato does not want politics to be too easy to think about.

I relate this to the Gerson thesis by noting that this tension between ways of life does not appear in Plotinus. At least to the best of my knowledge. I welcome correction.

Where does Burnyeat's (or anybody else's) desire for a change in society have a place in Plotinus?

Add that to my other objections to putting Plotinus on team Plato.

The allegory of the cave has the philosopher return to it. Whatever good is done there does not stop it from being a cave. — Paine

Good point. What might the reformed cave look like? Would the philosophers do the very thing that Socrates was found guilty of?

However, we are not interested in the people: we are seeking the truth. — ibid. 246c

The foundations of the city and the most fundamental beliefs of the people are destroyed by the truth, for the truth is that what they believe, what they trust, what they take to be the truth itself are only images of images. Twice removed from the truth. This is why Socrates takes the old charges brought by Aristophanes more seriously than the current charges against him. He is guilty as charged.

If the philosopher is to take an interest in the people as well as the truth he cannot simply replace the images on the cave wall with the truth. He must replace the images with images of the truth. The cave remains a cave.

If the prisoner's shackles are removed and they are forcibly dragged out of the cave (515e) and not permitted to immediately crawl back in, the city and life as they know it is destroyed. We should not be too quick to assume that most would regard this as a blessing. The cave offers safety and security. It is their home. Unlike the philosopher the people may not be more interested in the truth.

Good point. What might the reformed cave look like? Would the philosophers do the very thing that Socrates was found guilty of? — Fooloso4

Your first question is very tough to answer. In the context of the Sophist, The Stranger seems to suggest that the 'reformation" will keep changing the terrain of the struggle as time goes by. But I don't see him proposing it will end. He displays confidence that the grounds will change. It is clear who he is rooting for.

On the other hand, the Stranger seems to insist upon the same separation that his Eleatic teachers did. The dangers of using forms requires a kind of hygiene:

“For instance,” said Parmenides, “if one of us is the master or slave of someone, he is not, of course, the slave 133E of master itself, what master is; nor is a master, master of slave itself, what slave is. Rather, as human beings, we are master or slave of a fellow human. Mastery itself, on the other hand, is what it is of slavery itself, while slavery itself, in like manner, is slavery of mastery itself. But the things among us do not have their power towards those, nor do those have their power towards us. Rather, as I say, these are what they are, of themselves, and in relation to themselves, while things with 134A us are, in like manner, relative to themselves. Or do you not understand what I am saying?” — ibid. 133e

The "images of truth", as they relate to the cave allegory, receive a challenge outside of the allegory but not for the sake of cancelling it. In the spirit of refutation, most would have wiped the blood off their blade and re-sheathed it. Plato is saying Parmenides is doing something else.

That does not make your second question any easier but there are at least more clues in the text available to bring out contrasting themes. In my recent drive-by reading of the Sophist, I noticed two elements that previously shot over my head. One of them is the separation of class in society:

Socrates: In that case, Theodorus, are you unwittingly bringing in some god rather than a stranger, as Homer’s phrase would have it, when he says that the gods 216B in general, and the god of strangers in particular, become the companions of people who partake of true righteousness, to behold the excesses and the good order of humanity? So perhaps this companion of yours may indeed be one of those higher powers who is going to watch over and refute our sorry predicament in these arguments, as he is a god of refutation.

Theod: That is not the manner of this stranger, Socrates, no; he is more moderate than those who take controversies seriously. Indeed, the man does not seem to me to be a god at all, though he is certainly divine. For 216C I refer to all philosophers as divine.

Str: They certainly are, Theaetetus. However, it is of no particular concern to the method based on arguments whether purification by washing or medication benefits us much or little. For it endeavours to discern the inter-relation and non-relation of all the skills, with the aim of acquiring intelligence, 227B and to that end it respects them all equally. Indeed, because of their similarity, this method does not believe that one is more ridiculous than another, and it does not regard a person as more important if he exemplifies his skill in hunting, through general-ship, rather than louse-catching, though it will probably regard him as more pretentious. — ibid. 216a

This difference gets re-affirmed at other places in the dialogue. Sometimes as an unexplained reference, sometimes as a joke, sometimes as a direct confrontation:

Str: That they have shown no regard for common folk, and they despise us. For each of them pursues his own line of argument, without considering at all whether we are following what they say or are being left behind. 243B — ibid. 243a

The second element that stood out for me is the way the gentle relates to the violent, both in discourse and the possibility of 'reformation' as a process of change in the world of becoming. Note how Theodorus presents the Stranger as a minor player by saying: "Socrates, no; he is more moderate than those who take controversies seriously." The Socrates who confronts anyone who challenges him is set in contrast to this player who does not accept such terms. But the contrast between the gentle and the violent is a part of so many of the Dialogues that Theodorus must be heard as expressing a particular prejudice.

I am inclined to lean toward Klein's view of change over Strauss'. But I think Strauss is correct putting the beginning of political philosophy at the Meno rather than the Republic. Can virtue be taught? If one can ask that, the quality is manifest in some fashion. We have to start with the insistence upon it being evident.

Socrates gets Meno to accept that condition to some degree without necessarily getting him to understand much else and thus makes Socrates more 'gentle' than often represented. But Socrates also seems hell-bent upon antagonizing Antyus, representing a portion of those who did kill him.