Plato (PhD Edit)

Greece-Corfu from Earth Sciences

Plato (PhD Edit)

2010 Theodicy and Practical Theology: PhD thesis, the University of Wales, Trinity Saint David, Lampeter

Originally published on March 11, 2015, this article presented my very limited referencing of Plato, and related within my Wales, PhD.

That remains, but for an entry on academia.edu, I decided to add some material and republish on April 8 2023.

Platonic Philosophy

Platonic philosophy was largely created by Plato (427-347 B.C.).[1]  Richard Kraut (1996) notes Plato was a preeminent Greek philosopher who conceived the observable world as an imperfect image of the realm of the unobservable and unchanging forms.[2]  Plato, in Timaeus, written in 360 B.C, viewed these forms as divinely moved objects.[3] 

Neoplatonism

Mark D. Jordan (1996) notes Augustine was primarily affected by Neoplatonism before his conversion to Christianity.[4]  Augustine (398-399)(1992) states in Confessions he examined Platonist writings that supported his Biblical understanding of the nature of God.[5]  Jordan states the Platonic writings helped Augustine to conceive of a cosmic hierarchy in the universe in which God was immaterial and had sovereign control over his material creation.[6]  However, Jordan states Augustine saw philosophy alone as being unable to change his life as only God himself could do.[7]  Augustine’s use of Plato does not in itself invalidate his understanding of Biblical writings where the two may happen to be in agreement.[8]

Platonic Demiurge

Mill theorized of a God that resembled the ‘Platonic Demiurge.’[9] A demiurge is a Greek term meaning ‘artisan’, ‘craftsman.’  It is a deity that develops the material world from ‘preexisting chaos.’ Plato introduced the concept and term in his text Timaeus. The perfectly good demiurge wishes to present his goodness and shapes the chaos as best he can, and the present world results. Wainwright (1996: 188).  The demiurge is a limited, non-omnipotent God, that did not create original matter. Wainwright (1996: 188).  Blackburn (1996: 98).

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Website work

Plato: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: First published Sat Mar 20, 2004; substantive revision Sat Feb 12, 2022

Cited

'Plato’s central doctrines '

'Many people associate Plato with a few central doctrines that are advocated in his writings: The world that appears to our senses is in some way defective and filled with error, but there is a more real and perfect realm, populated by entities (called “forms” or “ideas”) that are eternal, changeless, and in some sense paradigmatic for the structure and character of the world presented to our senses. Among the most important of these abstract objects (as they are now called, because they are not located in space or time) are goodness, beauty, equality, bigness, likeness, unity, being, sameness, difference, change, and changelessness. (These terms—“goodness”, “beauty”, and so on—are often capitalized by those who write about Plato, in order to call attention to their exalted status; similarly for “Forms” and “Ideas.”) 

The most fundamental distinction in Plato’s philosophy is between the many observable objects that appear beautiful (good, just, unified, equal, big) and the one object that is what beauty (goodness, justice, unity) really is, from which those many beautiful (good, just, unified, equal, big) things receive their names and their corresponding characteristics. Nearly every major work of Plato is, in some way, devoted to or dependent on this distinction.' End citation

I personally do not find 'forms' as eternal as very helpful, philosophically. For me, philosophically and theologically, there is the infinite, which is of God, his attributes and his characteristics, and the finite, of which God created with logically, limited attributes and characteristics.

Citation

'Although these propositions are often identified by Plato’s readers as forming a large part of the core of his philosophy, many of his greatest admirers and most careful students point out that few, if any, of his writings can accurately be described as mere advocacy of a cut-and-dried group of propositions. Often Plato’s works exhibit a certain degree of dissatisfaction and puzzlement with even those doctrines that are being recommended for our consideration.' End citation

'cut-and-dried group of propositions'

I reason that for reasonable premise (s) and conclusion, there needs to be a clear distinction between the infinite and the finite. Although I have significant knowledge of the difference; I have no have exhaustive knowledge of either, and this shall remain so.

Citation 

'There is no mechanical rule for discovering how best to read a dialogue, no interpretive strategy that applies equally well to all of his works. We will best understand Plato’s works and profit most from our reading of them if we recognize their great diversity of styles and adapt our way of reading accordingly. Rather than impose on our reading of Plato a uniform expectation of what he must be doing (because he has done such a thing elsewhere), we should bring to each dialogue a receptivity to what is unique to it. That would be the most fitting reaction to the artistry in his philosophy.' End citation

Plato is a key, historical, philosophical source, and significantly speculative.

Blackburn

Concerning Platonism, British Philosopher, Blackburn writes that this was especially developed in the 'middle dialogues' (289). Plato reasons that 'abstract objects' such as those in mathematics (289) or justice (289) are timeless and objective entities. (289). I can grant that God had/has infinite understanding of mathematics and justice, but that does not equate to a finite understanding of the same, that to various degrees would be the understanding of any significantly, conscious, rational, entities which would be able to ponder on such.

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PhD, Wales

AUGUSTINE (388-395)(1964) On Free Choice of the Will, Translated by Anna S.Benjamin and L.H. Hackstaff, Upper Saddle River, N.J., Prentice Hall.     

AUGUSTINE (398-399)(1992) Confessions, Translated by Henry Chadwick, Oxford, Oxford University Press.

AUGUSTINE (400-416)(1987)(2004) On the Trinity, Translated by Reverend Arthur West Haddan, in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series One, Volume 3, Denver, The Catholic Encyclopedia.

AUGUSTINE (421)(1998) Enchiridion, Translated by J.F. Shaw,  Denver, The Catholic Encyclopedia.

AUGUSTINE (426)(1958) The City of God, Translated by Gerald G. Walsh, Garden City, New York, Image Books.

AUGUSTINE (427)(1997) On Christian Doctrine, Translated by D.W. Robertson Jr., Upper Saddle River, N.J., Prentice Hall.

AUGUSTINE (427b)(1997) On Christian Teaching, Translated by R.P.H. Green, Oxford, Oxford University Press.

BLACKBURN, SIMON (1996) Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, Oxford, Oxford University Press.

CAREY, GEORGE W. (2002) ‘The Authoritarian Secularism of John Stuart Mill’, in On Raeder’s Mill and the Religion of Humanity, Volume 15, Number 1, Columbia, University of Missouri Press.

JORDAN, MARK D. (1996) ‘Augustine’, in Robert Audi (ed.), The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, pp. 52-53. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

KRAUT, RICHARD (1996) ‘Plato’, in Robert Audi (ed.), The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, Cambridge, pp. 619-629. Cambridge University Press.

MILL, JOHN STUART (1789-1861)(2003) Utilitarianism and On Liberty, Mary Warnock (ed.), Blackwell Publishing, Oxford.

MILL, JOHN STUART (1825-1868)(1984) Essays on Equality, Law, and Education, John M. Robson (ed.), University of Toronto Press, Toronto, University of Toronto Press.

MILL, JOHN STUART (1833)(1985)(2009) Theism: John Stuart Mill, The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, Volume X - Essays on Ethics, Religion, and Society, Toronto, University of Toronto Press.

MILL, JOHN STUART (1874)(2002) The Utility of Religion, London, Longman, Green, and Reader.

MILL, JOHN STUART (1874)(1885)  Nature the Utility of Religion and Theism, London, Longmans, Green and Co. 

PLATO (360 B.C.)(1982) ‘Timaeus’, in Process Studies, Volume. 12, Number 4, Winter, pp.243-251. Claremont, California, Process Studies.

POJMAN, LOUIS P. (1996) Philosophy: The Quest for Truth, New York, Wadsworth Publishing Company. 

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[1] Pojman (1996: 6).

[2] Kraut (1996: 619-620).

[3] Plato (360 B.C.)(1982: 35).    

[4] Jordan (1996: 52).

[5] Augustine (398-399)(1992).

[6] Jordan (1996: 53).

[7] Jordan (1996: 53).

[8] Augustine (398-399)(1992).

[9] Carey (2002: 116).  

Website

Plato: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: First published Sat Mar 20, 2004; substantive revision Sat Feb 12, 2022

Primary Literature Cooper, John M. (ed.), 1997, Plato: Complete Works, Indianapolis: Hackett. (Contains translations of all the works handed down from antiquity with attribution to Plato, some of which are universally agreed to be spurious, with explanatory footnotes and both a general Introduction to the study of the dialogues and individual Introductory Notes to each work translated.) 

Burnyeat, Myles and Michael Frede, 2015, The Pseudo-Platonic Seventh Letter, Dominic Scott (ed.), Oxford: Oxford University Press.