Abstract

The limited instances in the Platonic corpus where Plato treats of history, and the limited number of scholarly works which treat of the relationship of Platonic philosophy to history, tend to provide a view of Plato as a theoretician whose work is antithetical to the use and purpose of history as a science. These arguments are generally made with the primary support of a consideration of Platonic epistemology and metaphysics, which prioritize the value of unchanging eternal entities, i.e. Forms, and discount as unproductive of knowledge any consideration of sensible objects. These arguments are secondarily buttressed by subsuming historical inquiry and historiography under the other types of intellectual activities Plato is most outspoken against, such as, poetry, sophistry, and rhetoric. ;The following project has two aims. First it proposes to clarify those elements of Plato's doctrines which support such an attribution of a negative view towards history, by examining Plato's middle dialogues, where such positions are first formulated and presented. Following this clarification, such an interpretation of Platonism will be shown to be open to challenge on account of a number of tensions in the Platonic corpus which would belie attributing such an a-historical or anti-historical point of view to Plato. If Plato is primarily concerned with effecting positive moral and social change in his own people, then it is incorrect to argue that he cannot have an interest in the affairs of man because of his ontic and epistemic beliefs, as they are variously expressed in his dialogues. Also, there is an important conflict between Platonic theory, as it can be extracted from his writings, and the actual use and awareness of human history and historical science which is also to be found in Plato's writings. A careful study of these conflicts will lead to a revaluation of the Platonic attitude to history, one which views Plato as a thinker who is not necessarily negatively disposed to such types of inquiry. This project then will examine three topics of Plato's middle period thought in relation to the possibility of historical science: Plato's epistemology in the Meno and Phaedo, the ontology of the Republic, his views on the function and value of poetry, rhetoric, sophistry, and writing in the Republic , Gorgias, Menexenus, and Phaedrus