Understanding Plato’s Philosophy: Ideas, Knowledge, and Ethics

ITEM 2: Plato

1. The Constitution of the Universe

The great Presocratic cosmological system was mechanistic atomism. Plato and Aristotle rejected it because it entailed two implications:

• a) Knowledge of nature was impossible.
• b) The cosmos, the order cannot come from disorder.

The explanation of Plato radically rejects this last point: the order cannot be the haphazard result of disorder. It can only come from an ordering intelligence, which Plato called the Demiurge. The Demiurge acts on the eternal, chaotic matter, which Plato calls space, and is the substrate material report, equipped with irregular movements.

Plato approaches the atom to admit an eternal matter and eternally agitated disorderly movements.

Ordering intelligence and eternal matter, eternally in motion, lead to the third principle with which Plato sets: Ideas. Every intelligent being that creates something does so in accordance with a model. The Demiurge made the universe, and its function is to translate the ideas into the physical realm as perfectly as possible.

The central doctrine of Plato’s philosophy is the theory of ideas. Immaterial entities exist, absolute, immutable, and universal, regardless of the physical world. For example, justice itself, goodness itself… from them derive all that is right, good, etc., that exists in the physical world.

The term ‘idea’ deals with realities in the fullest sense, because everything derives from them what is real in the physical world. The Platonic conception of reality is dualistic; there is a world of ideas (intangible and immutable) and the physical world (material, subject to change and movement).

It is difficult to know whether the Demiurge must be regarded as a god who actually acts on matter, on the model of management ideas, or to be interpreted allegorically, in which case we would have a way of expressing the action set of ideas about matter.

In fact, the ideas impose an intelligible structure, consistency, and stability on matter, which has none in itself.

The four elementary bodies (fire, air, water, and earth) achieve consistency when the Demiurge’s own nature requires precise geometric structures of matter in accordance with the ideas. The Platonic Demiurge does not produce the world out of nothing but acts on a matter that he has shaped. The Demiurge is the computer, not the creator.

2. Reality and Knowledge

The Structure of Reality: The Ideas and the Physical World

– Origin of the Theory of Ideas

In pre-Socratic philosophy, Plato incorporates elements of his theory that influenced its formulation. This is the case with the doctrines of the Pythagoreans and Parmenides: they said that mathematical structures and relationships are the principle of intelligibility of the universe, which are mathematical entities, ideas in the Platonic doctrine. Parmenides distinguished between what really exists and the universe that we perceive through our senses. This distinction is also reflected in the Platonic doctrine: thus, there are ideas, and every idea has the same characteristics as the reality advocated by Parmenides.

The question of a virtue or moral concept (What is justice? What is the value?) presupposes that there is a common feature of all these actions. This feature will be, for Plato, the idea of justice.

Socrates separated the universal (not considered concepts such as self-subsistent realities), and it was Plato who separated them and called them ideas.

– Imitation and Participation of Ideas

Plato divided the ideas. The spread of the physical world and the expression of this separation is that ideas do not depend on their being or their truth or permanence of sensible things.

However, physical beings depend on the ideas themselves. What is the relationship of sentient beings with ideas? It can be summarized in two words: participation (individual sentient beings participate in the relevant ideas) and imitation (individual sentient beings imitate ideas). The ideas are models that seek to be imitated, but can never be fully equated (a physical sphere of wood or bronze will never be perfectly spherical, because that is just what the ideal sphere is).

The ideas are great; they do not come to fruition in the realm of the sensible.

– The System of Ideas

For Plato, the ideas are a system that is assembled and coordinated in a hierarchical gradation, whose top is the idea of the Good. The Good, as a primary idea, is an expression of order, meaning, and intelligibility of reality.

The Forms of Knowledge

The ontology is radically dualistic in Plato’s thought: first, ideas, which are actually true, and secondly, changing physical beings, which are corruptible.

– Knowledge and Opinion

Plato opposed knowledge and opinion. They have contrasting characteristics. An opinion may be wrong, while knowledge excludes the possibility of error. You can comment on something and be wrong; however, it is not possible to know something and be wrong because if one is wrong, then it cannot be said to know.

Opinions are unstable, while knowledge is stable and firm. Knowledge is based on reason, while mere opinions lack a solid foundation.

Wisdom is knowledge that is necessarily true and stable, contrary to opinion. Knowledge aims at intelligible structures, i.e., ideas, while opinion is designed for the physical world, the sensible. Knowledge of the ideas and their relationships is true knowledge, and to attain this knowledge, one must follow several steps: first, the study of mathematics, and then the study of the entire system of ideas, culminating in the knowledge of the Good. This ascent would be achieved through what is called dialectic.

– Understanding Intellectual and Sensory Knowledge

Plato insists that intellectual knowledge is only capable of capturing ideas, intelligible essences. However, the senses only give us impressions and changing images of the physical world in constant flux.

The opposition between knowledge and opinion is associated with the opposition between reason and the senses. Knowledge is based on reason, while opinion is accompanied by sensation.

– The Doctrine of Anamnesis

Sentient beings imitate ideas, trying to approach them. Plato attempts to connect sensitive knowledge to rational knowledge. Since sentient beings are images of the ideas, the vision can lead to recalling those ideas. That is why Plato said that learning is remembering, and this is what he calls anamnesis. This doctrine assumes that the soul has within itself the knowledge of ideas, knowledge that it forgets upon entering the body.

3. Platonic Doctrine of the Soul

Mind-Body Dualism

The Platonic conception of love is closely related to the theory of ideas. This theory is dualistic because there is a radical separation between the realm of ideas (the really real) and the realm of physical beings, which are subject to change and corruption. With this general dualism corresponds the anthropological dualism of Plato: the soul is akin to the ideas, while the body belongs to the world of physical beings. Dualism is the core of the Platonic doctrine of the soul:

• a) The soul is immortal.
• b) The union of soul and body is transient and accidental, and even unnatural, since the place of the soul itself is the world of ideas.
• c) While remaining attached to the body, the fundamental task of the soul is to purify itself, preparing for the contemplation of ideas. The soul is in a state of impurity, and these impurities stem from the body and its demands, which prevent the soul from attaining intellectual knowledge. The soul must therefore oppose the body and its demands, and this is true wisdom.

Three Parts of the Soul

The specific function of the soul is rational knowledge, and its conflict is against the body. The desires, tendencies, and passions are actually psychic phenomena and not merely physical. The conflict takes place within our psyche.

Plato realized this and divided the soul into three parts: reason, spirit, and appetite. Reason has the function of controlling and organizing appetite. Appetite contains irrational desires and the pursuit of pleasure, opposed to reason, while spirit is the strength that sometimes yields to the demands of appetite but can and should become the ally of reason to control those demands.

This tripartite conception of the soul is more appropriate to explain the complexity of the human psyche. However, this does not mean that he abandons his dualism; he continues to believe that only the rational soul is immortal, and that the other two parts (appetite and spirit) are added to the rational soul. When the soul is not in a body, these two sides are also separated from the rational soul (because it does not need them anymore).

4. Ethics and Politics

The Moral Order

Socrates was convinced that moral concepts can be established rationally, using rigorous definitions; for example, justice can be defined.

Plato attributed to these ethical and political concepts the status of ideas (justice itself, goodness itself), whose reality and objective validity is independent of the views that everyone can have about them.

It is possible to define justice in an objective manner, according to the Socratic-Platonic conviction. How do you define it? The sophists said that it is through analyzing human nature. Plato accepts this approach of the sophists but rejects the conclusions of their analysis. According to the sophists, the only natural law is the pursuit of pleasure and the mastery of the fittest. Plato considers this doctrine a misunderstanding of human nature, because it takes as a model the natural behavior of animals (which is dominated by the strongest) and children (who cry with pain and smile with pleasure). However, the sophists forget that neither animals nor children have the right. An analysis that does not take into account reason cannot serve to define justice.

To define justice, we must correctly analyze human nature, and Plato’s analysis involves the distinction of the three parts of the soul. Such ordering takes place when each part of the soul plays the role it deserves and possesses the virtue that corresponds: prudence is the virtue of reason, courage is the virtue of spirit, and moderation is the virtue of appetite, with spirit and appetite subject to the dictates of reason.

Political Order

– Justice in the State

Plato is primarily a political thinker. His political theory revolves around two principles:

• Structural correlation between the soul and the state. The state has the same tripartite structure as the soul. There are three social classes in a state: producers (economic activity, trade, and production of goods), auxiliary guards (defense and law enforcement, police), and rulers. These three groups correspond to the three parts of the soul: the producers represent appetite, the guardians represent spirit, and the rulers represent reason.
• The principle of functional specialization. Every individual and every social group must focus on their own role. Plato justifies this principle with practical reasons (if everyone performs their role, the results are better) and also with theoretical considerations: in any complex natural system, whether a soul or a state, every part is designed to realize a specific function.

Justice in the state is achieved when each social group plays the appropriate role (functional specialization) and performs adequately, possessing the virtue that is proper.

– The Government of the Sage

The doctrine that reason is the rightful ruler leads Plato to envision an ideal state (utopian) defined as the government of the wise. The knowledge of the Good is the culmination of all knowledge: theoretical knowledge because it allows one to capture the order and structure of all reality, and practical knowledge because it provides the moral standards for governance and politics.

Under the rule of the wise, there is no need for laws, as knowledge would enable the ruler to make the most appropriate arrangements in each case.

– Education

Plato believed that the purpose of the state is to promote virtue and justice both individually and socially. He continued to believe that happiness depends on virtue. Plato attached great importance to education. In the Republic, education is organized in two levels:

• At the primary level, which is common to all citizens, education is carried out through gymnastics and music (including art and poetry). It aims to educate not just the body but also the character.
• The second level is reserved for future leaders and continues with a detailed study of mathematics, leading to dialectic that culminates in the knowledge of the Good.

Plato proclaimed complete equality between men and women, suppressed the family, and eliminated private property for the auxiliary guardians and rulers. These last two measures aim to prevent selfishness from taking over the guardians and rulers, promoting a sense of community among them.

In his later works, Plato softened his views, replacing the government of the wise with the government of laws, but he did not relinquish his principles, as it corresponds to reason’s rule (the laws are an expression of reason, and this is an incarnation of the supreme good). The purpose of the state and government is to create better citizens, and ultimately, justice is the precondition for happiness.