/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.14596311]

What EXACTLY did plato/socrates get wrong in Republic?

And i don't mean their thought processes or their logical steps, or even the odd logical leaps they make once in a while- what about their reasoning style is FUNDAMENTALLY flawed?

Because on reading it again, I feel that I know they are wrong, but I cant for the life of me pinpoint why. Perhaps why they are wrong could be extrapolated to other philosophers- good to start with antiquities.

[Anonymous No.14596322]

because he doesn't explain why he is right, but rather why others are wrong. Incredebly childish approach.

[Anonymous No.14596364]

>>14596322
Learn how to read, Plato argues all of his points in the dialogue.
>>14596311
For a starter you might disagree with the theoretical claim taken for granted here by Plato, namely the Theory of Forms. If you don't think Ideas are intelleggible substances, Plato's answer to the question "what is justice?" will be unsatisfying

[Anonymous No.14596387]

>>14596311
Read Bertrand Russell's History of Western Philosophy. He discuss the same question regarding the ideas presented in The Republic if I recall well. First volume, Plato chapter.

He said something in the line of that model of society being viable (in fact is more or less based in what Sparta was at that moment) but with no real beneficial consequences in the long run, apart of being a military succesful country with very though and hard-working people (this is hyper-simplified though).

[Anonymous No.14596587]

>>14596387
Ignore this anon, never read anything on history of philosophy by Russell. In this regard, that man was a dog.

[Anonymous No.14596616]

>>14596387
That book is a dishonest piece of shit. Unironically the biggest flop in philosophical history

[Anonymous No.14596712]

>>14596587
>>14596616
Why

Not baiting, it's an honest question. Granted I read that a long time ago but I don't remember it to be bad.

[Anonymous No.14596750]

nothing it's an allegory of the constitution of heaven and not about big scope politics at all; it is a journey of reality, beginning in the lowest realm of body and individual mortal life all the way up through the nine worlds (which we find in the nine hypotheses of Parmenides) and to the ineffable wheel of the eternal whole.

Laws is Plato's major work of politics (and also the culmination of all the other dialogues, which are in perfect harmony).

[Anonymous No.14596780]

On a macro scale, it's always the macro scale these days with whiny shitters, remember that OP.

The ISSUE with Plato's Republic is not with any particular issue, but with the dogmatism of the work as a whole.

I think the criticism of it these days is exemplified within Benthamite moral science, his so called Deontology: Bentham believes that you have every right to decry Plato for saying that his moral system was 'the Good' or 'wholly good', but because he does not decry this himself, he may be permitted to expound his system of morals in an equitable fashion.

To the degree this is subjective that is fine, but for the objective things he at least agrees that his overall communications must be voiced. There is obviously no reason why they shouldn't, after all it is within our rights to assert (as Plato did, ironically) that we should not only remove pains, but increase pleasures. Obviously for Plato these pleasures were more intellectual and wholesome, and as opposed to disobeying the principle or even dictate of utility to perform sympathetic or benevolent actions, as told to us by Bentham in the Principles of Morals and Legislation, one should understand virtue within a framework of constant pleasure to the one who performs it.

Both Plato and Bentham, however, recognize that the best way to get this done for the entirety of society is through God. They each differ though in the particulars of their findings and for this reason they, and other people expounding rule of the majority or rule of the divine for differing parts of their moral systems, would have to differ as to where this concrete source of their particular actions' utility springs from :3

[Anonymous No.14596797]

>>14596311
>Because on reading it again, I feel that I know they are wrong, but I cant for the life of me pinpoint why.
It is not that he is wrong, it is that you were taught a different kind of morality.

>>14596387
Troll.

[Anonymous No.14596802]

>>14596712
He misrepresented other people's works in order to push his crappy opinions.

[Anonymous No.14596889]

>>14596311
>what about their reasoning style is FUNDAMENTALLY flawed?
The fundamental problem with Plato's philosophy is how it treats ideals.
For instance: There is sickness and there is health, doctors are those who know how to deal with the body's deficiencies to bring about health. This is really a description of a relation between relative, limited notions and forces: Doctor's have a limited understanding of what health means, and bring people relatively closer to it. According to Plato's reasoning, the art of medicine, if it were perfect, would have a definition of perfect health and know how to bring it about, but this position of absolute knowing and power is a phantom. New information doesn't just resolve old problems but creates new epistemological horizons and uncertainties - medicine will always be insufficient. In the same way, Plato's Republic, from the shoemaker to the philosopher king, is populated by modes of a false notion of perfection that has no counterpart in reality.

[Anonymous No.14597084]

>>14596712
Honestly, it's just inaccurate. Russell is of course an interesting thinker, knowing how he misread previous philosophers cn certainly be useful for people who are trying to improve their understanding of his thought. If, instead, your goal is to understand what previous philosophers thought (a legitimate goal,considering that this book is meant to be a summary of the history of philosophy aimed at student), then Russell's book becomes actively harmful. You'll genuinely won't know what Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, Scholastic philosophers, Leibniz, Kant, Fichte, Hegel and Nietzsche actually had to say (just to name a few extremely relevant authors that were basically parodized in that book).

[Anonymous No.14597105]

>>14596311
>that staircase leading from a square to the roof of someone's home
It must be annoying as hell with all the couples and tourists walking over your head

[Anonymous No.14597112]

>>14596322
t. low iq

[Anonymous No.14597150]

>>14596311
He just didn't have the knowledge required for complex societies. He's basically a well-intentioned tyrant who ends up turning his people into cattle, much worse than the democracy he describes.
An increase in information exchange would allow Plato to make better decisions and involve his citizens more rather than attempting to guide them to be one of his sheep.

[Anonymous No.14597164]

>>14596889
>The fundamental problem with Plato's philosophy is how it treats ideals.
For instance: There is sickness and there is health, doctors are those who know how to deal with the body's deficiencies to bring about health. This is really a description of a relation between relative, limited notions and forces: Doctor's have a limited understanding of what health means, and bring people relatively closer to it. According to Plato's reasoning, the art of medicine, if it were perfect, would have a definition of perfect health and know how to bring it about, but this position of absolute knowing and power is a phantom.
The art of medicine is not concerned with its own definition according to Plato, that's what philosophy (more specifically the dialectical method) is there for. That's why he actually gives a definition of Healthiness in Gorgias and Sophist (i cant remember it exactly, but it had to do with the harmonious movement of the parts).
Secondly, the fact that absolute determined knowing is impossible is not a problem for Plato, in fact it is even adopted in Phaedo. By Absolute determined knowing I mean knowing an Idea so well that you could, from it, derive every possible istantiation (i.e. to use your example, knowing the Idea of Healthiness so well that you could derive, from it, a perfect art and science of medicine). Plato thinks that this type of knowledge can be found only in the afterlife, until then we're stuck with having to rationally think things through. This doesn't mean that the system fails: although our knowledge is limited, it is still anchored on true Ideas.

>New information doesn't just resolve old problems but creates new epistemological horizons and uncertainties - medicine will always be insufficient. In the same way, Plato's Republic, from the shoemaker to the philosopher king, is populated by modes of a false notion of perfection that has no counterpart in reality.
New informations for Plato can only be our experience of objects that are participating with Ideas we hadn't remembered yet (i.e. when you discover a new animal, and with it a new Idea, corresponding to the specie of that animal). Also remember that an object can't have determinations in absence of any ideal participation. This means that what you've just said is fully accounted in Plato's system. Well, almost anything. It is not true that the ones you've mentioned are false notions, what you can say at best is that they're not perfectly instantiated. That's not a problem for Plato, since he thinks that perfect instantiations are impossible in sensible nature, since everything is moving and changing. Only Ideas can be properly called perfect, everything else is an imperfect copy.

[Anonymous No.14597268]

Greeks BTFO
https://youtu.be/8XJKUITfiv4

[Anonymous No.14597277]

>>14596750
No It's nothing of the sort.

[Anonymous No.14597335]

>>14597268
Is "Bill" a Judenkike?

[Anonymous No.14597560]

>>14597164
I don't think we're in disagreement about as much as you think we are.
>the fact that absolute determined knowing is impossible is not a problem for Plato (because) although our knowledge is limited, it is still anchored on true Ideas.
means that if that anchor is a phantom, then the only relatively determined, limited knowing of a ruler or a doctor can not be modelled on or justified by its connection to that absolute point. Plato's philosophy stands and falls with his notion of the ideal as objectively, positively determined.

[Anonymous No.14597601]

>>14596311
Because Plato isn’t explicitly wrong. His state works in a vacuum, not so much if people already have prior knowledge and experience. and to begin with, it’s a rhetorical idea. If the state was founded with the ideals mentioned it works. Taken out of context, for example in the modern western intellectual plain that covetes the idea of freedom, it would not.

Plato’s arguments work within a platonic system, once they are removed from it, you can more easily pick it apart, but just giving the logic within the dialogue, his arguments is super solid.

[Anonymous No.14597921]

>>14597105
It actually seems kino as hell.

[Anonymous No.14598282]

>>14597921
The thief can easily enter your home from there