Socrates’ second speech in the Phaedrus includes the argument (245c6–246a2) that starts “all/every soul is immortal” (“ψυχὴ πᾶσα ἀθάνατος”).1 This argument has attracted attention for its austerity and placement in Socrates’ grand speech about chariots and love. Yet it has never been identified as a deliberately fallacious argument.2 This article argues that it is. Socrates intends to confront his interlocutor Phaedrus with a dubious sequence of reasoning. He does so to show his speech-loving friend how—rather than simply to tell him (...) that—analytic as much as imagistic speech can persuade without deserving conviction.It has been shown in recent years that on four other occasions Socrates deliberately utters bad .. (shrink)

Després del centre de El polític, dedicat a la justa mesura, el diàleg imposa el «retorn al polític» i ja no se separarà més d’aquesta comesa. Es procedirà, en primer lloc a depurar les arts concausants; després se separaran les diferents menes de servidors de la ciutat, per tal d’arribar a veure que els rivals del polític conformen un conjunt de difícil separació. Caldrà, abans de prosseguir amb la divisió, atendre als tipus de règim polític per veure quin paper hi (...) juga el saber polític. El resultat d’aquest primer moment del retorn al polític pren la figura de la descoberta dels fonaments de la ciutat. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that Plato conceives self-motion as non-spatial in Laws X. I demonstrate this by focusing on the textual evidence and by refuting interpretations according to which self-motion either is a specific type of spatial motion or is said to require space as a necessary condition for its occurrence. Moreover, I show that this non-spatial understanding differs from the identification of the soul’s motion with locomotion in the Timaeus. Consequently, I provide an explanation for this difference between (...) the Timaeus and Laws X by considering developmentalist and contextualist viewpoints. (shrink)

I argue that Plato believes that the soul must be both the principle of motion and the subject of cognition because it moves things specifically by means of its thoughts. I begin by arguing that the soul moves things by means of such acts as examination and deliberation, and that this view is developed in response to Anaxagoras. I then argue that every kind of soul enjoys a kind of cognition, with even plant souls having a form of Aristotelian discrimination (...) (krisis), and that there is therefore no completely unintelligent, evil soul in the cosmos that can explain disorderly motions; as a result, the soul is not the principle of all motion but only motion in the cosmos after it has been ordered by the Demiurge. (shrink)

I argue that Plato thinks that a sunaition is a mere tool used by a soul (or by the cosmic nous) to promote an intended outcome. In the first section, I develop the connection between sunaitia and Plato’s teleology. In the second section, I argue that sunaitia belong to Plato’s theory of the soul as a self-mover: specifically, they are those things that are set in motion by the soul in the service of some goal. I also argue against several (...) popular and long-standing interpretations, namely, that sunaitia correspond to Aristotle’s idea of hypothetical necessity, that sunaitia are the ‘how’ in an explanation (whereas the true cause is the ‘why’), and that Plato’s causal views should be read through Aristotle’s fourfold schema. I conclude the article by surveying the history of sunaitia after Plato’s usage. (shrink)

Plato's views on tragedy depend in large part on his views about the ethical consequences of emotional arousal. In the Republic, Plato treats the desires we feel in everyday life to weep and feel pity as appetites exactly like those for food or sex, whose satisfactions are ‘replenishments’. Physical desire is not reprehensible in itself, but is simply non-rational, not identical with reason but capable of being brought into agreement with it. Some desires, like that for simple and wholesome food, (...) are in fact ‘necessary’ and approved by reason. Other appetites, like lust and gluttony, are ‘unnecessary’ and anti-rational in that they are actively opposed to reason. According to the Republic, the satisfaction of these ‘unnecessary’ desires inevitably strengthens the elements in the soul that oppose reason. The desire to weep at the theatre is treated in this dialogue as just such an anti-rational desire. Even a temporary indulgence in tragic pity and fear has a permanent deleterious effect on the soul, although it does not lead directly to any action. This paper argues that a radically different psychological theory, with important aesthetic implications, appears in the discussion of wine-drinking in Books 1 and 2 of Plato's Laws. Though this long passage has been much scorned and neglected, it is of considerable philosophical importance. While in the Republic Plato condemns drunkenness and other anti-rational states, in the Laws he extols the benefits of a hypothetical ‘fear drug’ that could induce a temporary state of anti-rational terror and of wine to produce other anti-rational emotions and desires. (shrink)

Plato's views on tragedy depend in large part on his views about the ethical consequences of emotional arousal. In theRepublic, Plato treats the desires we feel in everyday life to weep and feel pity as appetites exactly like those for food or sex, whose satisfactions are ‘replenishments’. Physical desire is not reprehensible in itself, but is simplynon-rational, not identical with reason but capable of being brought into agreement with it. Some desires, like that for simple and wholesome food, are in (...) fact ‘necessary’ and approved by reason. Other appetites, like lust and gluttony, are ‘unnecessary’ andanti-rational in that they are actively opposed to reason. According to theRepublic, the satisfaction of these ‘unnecessary’ desires inevitably strengthens the elements in the soul that oppose reason. The desire to weep at the theatre is treated in this dialogue as just such an anti-rational desire. Even a temporary indulgence in tragic pity and fear has a permanent deleterious effect on the soul, although it does not lead directly to any action.This paper argues that a radically different psychological theory, with important aesthetic implications, appears in the discussion of wine-drinking in Books 1 and 2 of Plato'sLaws. Though this long passage has been much scorned and neglected, it is of considerable philosophical importance. While in theRepublicPlato condemns drunkenness and other anti-rational states, in theLawshe extols the benefits of a hypothetical ‘fear drug’ that could induce a temporary state of anti-rational terror and of wine to produce other anti-rational emotions and desires. (shrink)