In the Philebus, Plato elaborates an image of our soul as a book where a scribe and a painter are constantly at work. This book examines the implicit premises of this image and aims at overcoming the general polarity of ancient phantasia and modern imagination.

The Intelligible Living Thing, posited as the model of our visible and tangible universe in Plato’s Timaeus, is often taken for a richly structured whole, which is not a simple sum of its four major parts. This assumption seems unwarranted – most specifically, the dialogue contains no hint at any complex intelligible blue print of the world as a teleologically arranged whole, whose goodness is irreducible to the well-being and individual perfection of its parts. To construe the rich structure of (...) the world is necessary insofar as the Demiurge creates material likenesses of the austere immaterial species. While the life forms included in our universe conform to their intelligible paradigms, this is not, strictly speaking, true about the considerations guiding the Demiurgic activity which gives rise to the universe itself, whose goodness is also to be measured by comparing it to the disordered pre-cosmic matter. The paper discusses several implications of this austere interpretation of the model and its role in creation. It suggests that the Forms that compose the model should be understood as abstract particulars rather than universals, and critically discusses the relation of Timaeus’ account to the so-called Principle of Plenitude. (shrink)

: The article discusses two issues implied by the structure of De caelo I.9: Aristotle’s further defence of the uniqueness of the universe and, in more detail, the general question of whether the cosmology of De caelo overlaps, or is even compatible, with Aristotle’s theology including the notion of the Prime Mover. It offers an analysis of several long-standing difficulties including the question of whether the lines 279a18–22 imply an external mover of the heavens. The negative answer that I will (...) defend does however not solve the problem of how Aristotle conceives the source of natural cosmic motion. In this respect, the article pays close attention to the peculiar conception of the animate supralunary matter and to De caelo II.3, 286a7–21 as a text that complements I.9 by relying on the holistic self-motion that implies no Prime Mover, but requires the separation of the supralunary and the sublunary spheres. The article also concludes that Arist otle, despite his rejection of the unceasingly revolving world soul, inherits some Platonic difficulties that arise once we make the notion of the divine life irreducible to divine thinking. (shrink)

The article discusses several possible interpretations of Socrates’ suggestion that we cannot “understand the nature of soul satisfactorily without understanding the nature of the whole” (Phaedrus 270c1–2). Against those who take the “whole” implied here for the cosmic whole, it argues that nothing in the Phaedrus justifies this interpretation. In the light of both Socrates’ conception of rhetoric in this dialogue and his image of the tripartite soul in the palinode, the “whole” whose knowledge is prerequisite to knowing the soul’s (...) nature is better understood as either the whole of the composed soul or the whole soul-body compound. The real problem of the passage, the article concludes, is that we lack any clear criteria that would enable us to decide between these two readings. At the same time, the dramatic progress of the dialogue makes it possible to argue that Phaedrus briefly misunderstands Socrates’ meaning by reading in it some cosmological connotations. This possibility notwithstanding, it is more likely that, from the perspective of the tripartite soul and its actions and passions, “the whole soul-body compound” and “the whole soul” are two equally defensible solutions to the puzzle. (shrink)

In his 1906 book The problem of becoming and the notion of matter in Greek philosophy from its origins till Theophrastus, Albert Rivaud puts forward an entirely original (and nowadays largely forgotten) interpretation of the receptacle or chôra in Plato’s Timaeus. On his reading, Timaeus’ introduction of chôra signals the limits of the possibility to explain the formation of the cosmos by means of the opposition between the intelligible and the sensible. Opposing Aristotle and others in his wake, Rivaud firmly (...) rejects the understanding of chôra as matter, without however identifying it as space in the sense of a system of intra‑cosmic coordinates. Instead, he sees the receptacle as a notion borrowed from a philosophical system otherwise alien to Plato’s thought, namely the atomism of Leucippus and Democritus. Neither the atomistic void nor chôra are like the modern space ; rather, in virtue of evoking “the unchanging theater of all changes”, they are “like the chaos, immense, gaping, populated by the infinite crowd of forms”. Rivaud concludes that, by introducing chora as a notion irreducible to the concept of becoming, Plato recognizes that the cosmogonic processes cannot be fully explained either on the basis of the relation of the cosmos to its intelligible model or through the logic of opposites that governs all change in the sensible realm. At the same time, the introduction of chôra (described through a variety of mostly biological metaphors) marks the limits of the artisanal model preeminent in the Timaeus, a model that endows the cosmogonic story with a new transparency and ensures the teleological dimension of the fully formed universe. The aim of the article is to re‑evaluate Rivaud’s audacious reading of the Timaeus with an eye to larger issues pertinent to a variety of ancient cosmogonies. (shrink)

The paper reconsiders Aristotle’s criticism of Platonic forms as causes together with its wider implications for the differences but also similiarities between the two philosophers. Analyzing the relevant texts of Metaphysics A 9 and Generation and Corruption II, 9, where Aristotle addresses the hypothesis of forms as put forward in the Phaedo, it discusses two interpretative options : that Aristotle takes these forms for an imperfect anticipation of formal causes, and that he sees them as an aborted attempt at grasping (...) the efficient causation whose proper discovery Aristotle claims to be uniquely his own. Although both readings have their virtues and can be defended from the Aristotelian perspective, their check against the text of the Phaedo reveals that, in this context, efficient causation distinct from material causation is quite plausibly the issue Aristotle has in mind first and foremost. This, however, is only one side of Aristotle’s broader critical stance towards forms as causes : while he seems to detect a split in Plato’s own understanding of the relation between the forms and causation, he is equally critical of the craft-like model as personified by the demiurge of the Timaeus. However, other passages from the Metaphysics suggest that some features of precisely this model, once it is carefully stripped of its personal aspect, may ultimately bear on Aristotle’s own conception of efficient cause. (shrink)

The paper comments and elaborates upon five pages of P. F. Strawson’s Individuals , together with his ‘Entity and Identity’ and ‘Universals’. The focus is on Strawson’s understanding of individual non-particulars as types or universals, and on his contention that the most obvious non-particular entities are the broadly conceived artefacts including the works of art. The narrow focus is on the implications of Strawson’s suggestion that ‘an appropriate model for non-particulars of these kinds is that of a model particular - (...) a kind of prototype, or ideal example, itself particular, which serves as a rule or standard for the production of others’ . The paper analyzes the relation between Strawson’s position and the issue of artefacts and their ontology. It also asks about some less obvious affinities between the problem of the non-particulars and Strawson’s concept of a person. (shrink)

[Aristotle on Movers and the Prime Mover].

Depuis des années, Anca Vasiliu poursuit un projet de relecture des textes anciens, y compris les dialogues de Platon, avec une attention particulière à ce qui se montre à travers la parole philosophique, non pas à titre de description, mais par l’agencement des logoi qui agissent sur l’âme qui les organise en s’organisant ainsi elle-même. Afin de situer son dernier ouvrage dans un contexte plus ample, mais important pour bien saisir la démarche de l’auteur, on doit rappeler que son intérêt (...) p... (shrink)

Il est question de la connaissance de soi telle qu’elle est recommandée et analysée par Socrate dans le Premier Alcibiade de Platon. Tout en prenant en compte le double contexte de la littérature grecque (et plus spécialement de l’OEdipe roi de Sophocle) et des autres dialogues (surtout du Phèdre), l’article reconstruit la série de tensions entre l’effort de fournir une définition générale de ce qu’est l’homme et la tâche de se connaître soi-même en tant qu’individu. Sans perdre de vue le (...) progrès de la division par laquelle Socrate arrive à cerner la source commune, mais difficile à décrire comme telle, de notre capacité épistémique et de la tempérance dans nos actions, il prête attention au redoublement répété d’une méréologie de l’homme et de l’âme par le vocabulaire de la puissance, voire du pouvoir politique. Apparaissent ainsi dans une lumière nouvelle les articulations du schéma de l’activité instrumentale (technê) et le modèle catoptrique, ainsi que le rôle de l’analogie et de la synecdoque comme des figures partagées par la pensée et par la parole qui essaient d’en offrir une sorte d’anatomie descriptive, destinée à suppléer la définition de l’homme en captant le reflet du divin en son âme. L’article conclut que l’ambiguïté de toute description d’un tel reflet ne diminue pas l’impact de l’analyse de l’âme par Socrate. (shrink)

Il est question de la connaissance de soi telle qu’elle est recommandée et analysée par Socrate dans le Premier Alcibiade de Platon. Tout en prenant en compte le double contexte de la littérature grecque (et plus spécialement de l’OEdipe roi de Sophocle) et des autres dialogues (surtout du Phèdre), l’article reconstruit la série de tensions entre l’effort de fournir une définition générale de ce qu’est l’homme et la tâche de se connaître soi-même en tant qu’individu. Sans perdre de vue le (...) progrès de la division par laquelle Socrate arrive à cerner la source commune, mais difficile à décrire comme telle, de notre capacité épistémique et de la tempérance dans nos actions, il prête attention au redoublement répété d’une méréologie de l’homme et de l’âme par le vocabulaire de la puissance, voire du pouvoir politique. Apparaissent ainsi dans une lumière nouvelle les articulations du schéma de l’activité instrumentale (technê) et le modèle catoptrique, ainsi que le rôle de l’analogie et de la synecdoque comme des figures partagées par la pensée et par la parole qui essaient d’en offrir une sorte d’anatomie descriptive, destinée à suppléer la définition de l’homme en captant le reflet du divin en son âme. L’article conclut que l’ambiguïté de toute description d’un tel reflet ne diminue pas l’impact de l’analyse de l’âme par Socrate. (shrink)

En lisant la République et le Timée de Platon, ce livre propose une enquête sur les deux formes de temporalité irréductibles (celle de la cité armée, celle de l'âme immortelle) pour éclairer la question principale, celle de la nature et de la structure de l'âme, de la cité et du cosmos.

The article discusses two passages,Republic IX 571d6–572b1, andTimaeus71a3–72b5, where Plato does not use dream as a metaphor for the soul’s deficit in knowledge but, instead, focuses on the actual process of dreaming during sleep, and the origin and nature of the images involved. In both texts, Plato’s account is closely connected to the soul’s tripartition, with the resulting emphasis on reason’s capacity to control, and even to create, the dream images that influence the lower parts of the soul. While taking (...) a closer look at the differences between the two accounts (and, therefore, at the physiology of dreaming described only in theTimaeus), the article concludes that, despite these differences, both dialogues agree on the possible alliance between reason and dreaming, an alliance that presupposes a virtuous character and further reinforces the reason’s dominance over appetite.Republic IX and theTimaeusthus converge on the idea that dreams, in virtue of their continuity with waking thoughts, can convey and fortify a certain kind of knowledge, and especially self-knowledge, which is of an ethical rather than strictly epistemic relevance. This is also why Plato’s two accounts of rational dreaming anticipate the issue of our moral responsibility for the content of our dreams. (shrink)

[The fragmented reality of heterogenous ideas: Plato’s disturbing candour].

Aristotle's brief accounts of some swifts and hirundines in Hist. an. 1.1 and 9.30 list several species whose identification has always been taken for difficult, and continues to vary from translation to translation. This note clarifies this small issue on the basis of Aristotle's text alone. I therefore assume that both passages, each introduced by a slightly different use of the term ἄποδες, offer sufficient information for recognizing the species in question. I will first translate and briefly comment upon the (...) passage from Book 1, then do the same with the text from Book 9. (shrink)

Plato’s Timaeus–Critias juxtaposes a long description of our universe in the making with a discourse on human nature. The latter, confined to Critias, flanks Timaeus’ full-blown cosmogony without clearly articulating how, if at all, do the apparently so different stories fit together. By contrast to many precedent efforts at articulating their relation, the article tries to take seriously Timaeus’ distinction between the two kinds of divinities, whereby he opposes celestial bodies together with the ensouled physical universe to the traditional gods. (...) It seems possible that the two kinds of gods correspond to the duality of human nature itself, and thus to its peculiar position at the juncture of the immortal and mortal parts of the universe. Plato’s recourse to gods distinct from the celestial objects of intellectual assimilation then has nothing to do with theology in some doctrinal sense, but serves to indicate a link between divine and human capacities of deliberation and practical action. Reread in this light, the story told by Critias and several passages from the speech of Timaeus indicate the limits of theoretical knowledge and point towards the problematic ontology of the deliberating mind and the puzzling status of artefacts including man and the universe. In this context, the article re-examines the issue of human civilization and war, and also the question of great cataclysms. Presented by Critias, these issues are revelatory of the Platonic conception of human city not as an expression of man’s natural gregariousness but as a carefully composed artefact. The article concludes that, under the overlays of pseudo-history and cosmology, Socratic colours may well be more prominent than we usually assume. (shrink)

Review of Democritus: Science, The Arts, and the Care of the Soul. Proceedings of the International Colloquium on Democritus . Philosophia Antiqua. A Series of Studies on Ancient Philosophy, vol. 102., Edited by Aldo Brancacci and Pierre-Marie Morel, Brill, Leiden and Boston, 2007.

Review on Samuel C. Rickless, Plato’s Forms in Transition: A Reading of the Parmenides, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2007.

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the difficult task of balancing access to misinformation with respect for patient decision-making. Due to its innate antagonism, the paradigm of “physician paternalism” versus “patient autonomy” may not adequately capture the clinical relationship. The authors hypothesized that most patients would, in fact, prefer significant physician input as opposed to unopinionated information when making medical decisions. There is a lack of empirical data corroborating this in the United States. To that end, a survey was distributed to (...) 650 individuals through Amazon Mechanical Turk, of which 499 responses met pre-determined quality criteria. Most respondents believed their doctor's insight would be better than their own if injured or gravely ill. When asked to affirm preferences separately, a significantly higher proportion of respondents preferred guidance from their doctor when making medical decisions compared to being presented with unopinionated information ( p < 0.001). Encouragingly, 93.1% believed that the doctor's primary goal was their health. When asked directly to compare physician guidance to unopinionated information, 69.1% respondents stated they would prefer physician guidance. We found a consistent association between educational/economic background and affirmative responses ( p < 0.001), suggesting particular attention should be paid to patients that are disadvantaged with respect to these demographic factors. The belief in a shared goal, and a consistent preference for physician input, suggests that patients endorse a more collaborative view of the clinical dynamic than is suggested by the paternalism-autonomy paradigm. This pilot study suggests physicians should not be afraid to communicate conviction with regard to treatment decisions. (shrink)

Public debate on acceptable farm animal husbandry suffers from a confusion of tongues. To clarify positions of various stakeholder groups in their joint search for acceptable solutions, the concept of animal welfare was split up into three notions: no suffering, respect for intrinsic value, and non-appalling appearance of animals. This strategy was based on the hypothesis that multi-stakeholder solutions should be based on shared values rather than on compromises. The usefulness of such an artificial value distinction strategy was tested in (...) a small series of experiments. The results demonstrate that the chosen concept to distinguish between values is effective in a stakeholder context. Farmers’ views on doing good to animals appeared to be largely based on their value to prevent suffering and predominantly focused on the provision of regular care. Their priority for this value is clearly shared with other stakeholders, providing a basis for joint solutions. The concept of intrinsic value does not play a discernable role in farmers’ considerations. Based on the varying views on welfare, it can be inferred that there is a gradual rather than a principal difference between government legislation and farmers’ values, whereas public perception and acceptance of farm practices remains complicated. Distinction between value groups and focusing on a selected notion (such as no suffering) proved to be effective in bringing representatives of stakeholder groups together, but is unlikely to bridge the emotional gap between commercial farm practices and public ideals. (shrink)

Dostoevsky wrote that love in action is a harsh and terrible thing compared to love in dreams. That reality is particularly evident in medicine, where there is an almost universal, involuntary participation of physicians and other healthcare workers in the suffering of their patients. This paper explores this phenomenon through the paradigm of ‘mystery’ as explained by the French existentialist philosopher Gabriel Marcel. A mystery is different from a problem in the sense that the former requires the active immersion of (...) the person involved in order to be truly experienced. It is a ‘meta-problem’ that cannot be analyzed objectively and separately from the person that it affects, without changing the nature of the thing experienced. The authors contend that the human suffering encountered in medicine is one such phenomenon, and the paper draws on illustrations of this concept in art and literature. Awareness of the subtle but important difference between mystery and problem may help physicians better understand their personal entanglement with the suffering of patients. (shrink)

Pojem řádu má své veliké dějiny od předsókratiků až k H. Kringsovi, který v roce 1941 vydává knihu Ordo. U nás se pojmu řádu a řádovosti věnoval po celý život ze­jména brněnský a olomoucký myslitel J. L. Fischer (1894–1973). Idea řádu byla také jedním z pilířů jeho skladebné filosofie, jež měla základní problémy moderní společnosti vyřešit účinněji než marxismus. Současně s „laickým“ Fischerem usilovala v kritických 30. letech dvacátého století o nastolení kýženého řádu vyhraněně katolická skupina sou­středěná kolem tehdy nově (...) založené revue Řád. Oběma pólům šlo sice o podobný cíl (skoncovat s vládou neblahého kapitalismu), ale neporozuměly si pro různost svých věr. Toto osudové neporozumění bychom měli především na univerzitách v Brně a Olomou­ci napravovat využitím odkazu W. C. Smithe, který zásadně rozlišil setrvačnou tradiční víru (belief) a otevřenou víru všech opravdu tvůrčích lidí (faith). Takovou víru měl totiž podle autora také a snad především nový řád usilovně hledající Josef Ludvík Fischer. (shrink)