/lit/ - Literature

>>22766056
>maybe I am underestimating Plotinus
I can't rule that out. I haven't read Proclus myself though, so I am no authority on him either. I only have this little chart. It does seem a bit funky though because it seems to posit that Life precedes Intellect when Plotinus seems to suggest that Intellect itself is Life, and that things attain Life to the extent that they attain Intellect... Reversing the relationship seems undesirable to me.

Oh shit, /lit/ is reading this. I started the Guthrie translation and read like half the book in a week but stopped reading because life sucks. Guess I can't let lazy bastards like you outdo me. Getting back into it.
>>21474179
>What are ideal forms?
tl;dr is matter considered in itself is diffuse and incoherent, it becomes coherent when it conforms to a form but these forms don't just pop out of nowhere, they already exist as subtle, spiritual/conceptual (depending on your interpretation) universal forms that are perfect, immutable and eternal and which stamp their character on all coherent material things
>What is an animate?
No idea. Is that actually a thing? Maybe in the Guthrie translation this is translated differently, or I haven't reached this point yet.
>Where do we have Discursive-Reasoning, Sense-Knowledge and Intellection?
I think the other anon gave an acceptable answer here.
>What is Intellectual Principle?
Depends on context but I assume you mean in a cosmological sense in which case refer to pic rel (and your other knowledge of Plotinus).
>Later sections makes distinction between Soul and Couplement- but isnt the couplement both the body and soul? Is this the higher/lower soul stuff?
I have never seen this term in the Guthrie translation but I think you are referring to the organism. In Guthrie, this issue is discussed in the sense of the body (lifeless and material) coming in contact with the soul (where life is) which results in the organism (a composite union of the two, which does not deny the independence, autonomy and primacy of the soul but certainly affects it).
>What is the midpoint talked about in section 11?
Never heard this term either.

>>21327321
>>21327332
Okay, I see. It would appear that reading Plotinus is going to be a huge headache! Well, it is what it is.
I am going to take the liberty of consulting this Proclus model I saw posted here a while ago and assume that the One in some manner is above Being or involvement in causal relationships, and, well, I have no idea about the First - I guess I'll have to do my best by trying to work with context.
I suppose there is also a further question about the One - I don't know if you are familiar enough with other traditions to offer comparisons, but I suppose the One would be analogous with Brahman (whether active or passive)? I have seen a lot of confusion on whether the One is the peak of Being (as with the upper limit of theistic religions), whether it is fully universal and transcendent as Brahman is, or whether it goes beyond/encompasses both being and non-being in some paradoxical sense (like the "Void", as some traditions posit it).

>>20982329
Did Hitchens ever read Plotinus' Enneads? Or Aristotles Metaphysics? Did he ever make the effort to try and understand a worldview other than his own pragmatic empiricist materialism? No he did not. He spoke to a mass of educated, but ignorant midwits who take their worldview for granted and are willing to poke holes in theism while deliberately blinding themselves to the flaws of their own worldview.

He was an ignoramus skilled in rhetoric.

>>20285695
It does, because you just stated that Plato was not a monist, in the attempt to imply that Vedanta is not monistic along the same lines. Plato (and Plotinus) are very obviously and famously monist philosophers. Plotinus's (and, according to Aristotle, Plato's) first principles were literally "The One", an undivided principle which still contains dualisms within itself, similar in an broad sense to Vedanta, which contains all oppositions within itself as illusions (so far as they are "fundamentally" opposite), yet is not present in any of them itself.
>>20285698
He does not identify the Unmanifested (= metaphysical Infinite) with Being though, not in a qualified or unqualified sense. All subtle and gross manifestation are encompassed in Being, but the Unmanifest is beyond all of this. Subtle manifestation, which is already beyond what we commonly consider to be "the world" or Maya is still Being. This is the realm even of essence or nama, which is transcended by the Unmanifest as it is beyond both essence and substance (nama/rupa). By virtue of Infinitude, he claims that it prohibits it from even being considered as Being in the unqualified sense, because that would limit it, which would then deprive it of its own significance as Unmanifest and Infinite.
>Guenon makes the idiosyncratic move of referring to unmanifested possibilites of maya as ‘non-being’
I guess this is where the confusion here is then. It's likely because of Aristotle's referring to potency as that which is not, because it is always set in contrast to actuality as that which is.

>>19698680
No, Soul IS life. Soul is what distinguishes a corpse from a living human being, it is the principle of self movement and vitality. Bodies are only made alive by the indwelling of souls, without the soul the body is nothing but inanimate matter.

>>18429501
Based Proclus poster

>>18279738
Now this is correct