According to Plato , the soul doesn't come into existence with the body; it exists prior to being joined to the body.
Etienne Surotama Explainer. What is the Meno problem? Value problems. In Plato's Meno , Socrates raises the question of why knowledge is more valuable than mere true belief.
Call this the Meno problem or, anticipating distinctions made below, the primary value problem. Santo Udaya Pundit. What does Plato illustrate in his allegory of the cave? Plato claimed that knowledge gained through the senses is no more than opinion and that, in order to have real knowledge, we must gain it through philosophical reasoning.
Imagine a cave , in which there are three prisoners. Diomedes Fulga Pundit. Did Plato believe in the afterlife? In ancient Western philosophy, Plato affirmed both a pre-natal life of the soul and the soul's continued life after the death of the body. Rosalinda Myachkov Pundit. What are the five parts of the soul? Patty Bruned Pundit. Where did the idea of immortality come from? Immortality in ancient Greek religion originally always included an eternal union of body and soul as can be seen in Homer, Hesiod, and various other ancient texts.
The soul was considered to have an eternal existence in Hades, but without the body the soul was considered dead. Mistie Garulo Pundit. What is the soul made of? Latter-day Saints believe that the soul is the union of a pre-existing, God- made spirit and a temporal body, which is formed by physical conception on earth.
Well; but let me tell you something more. There was a time when I thought that I understood the meaning of greater and less pretty well; and when I saw a great man standing by a little one I fancied that one was taller than the other by a head; or one horse would appear to be greater than another horse: and still more clearly did I seem to perceive that ten is two more than eight, and that two cubits are more than one, because two is twice one.
I should be far enough from imagining, he replied, that I knew the cause of any of them, indeed I should, for I cannot satisfy myself that when one is added to one, the one to which the addition is made becomes two, or that the two units added together make two by reason of the addition. For I cannot understand how, when separated from the other, each of them was one and not two, and now, when they are brought together, the mere juxtaposition of them can be the cause of their becoming two: nor can I understand how the division of one is the way to make two; for then a different cause would produce the same effect-as in the former instance the addition and juxtaposition of one to one was the cause of two, in this the separation and subtraction of one from the other would be the cause.
Nor am I any longer satisfied that I understand the reason why one or anything else either is generated or destroyed or is at all, but I have in my mind some confused notion of another method, and can never admit this.
Then I heard someone who had a book of Anaxagoras, as he said, out of which he read that mind was the disposer and cause of all, and I was quite delighted at the notion of this, which appeared admirable, and I said to myself: If mind is the disposer, mind will dispose all for the best, and put each particular in the best place; and I argued that if anyone desired to find out the cause of the generation or destruction or existence of anything, he must find out what state of being or suffering or doing was best for that thing, and therefore a man had only to consider the best for himself and others, and then he would also know the worse, for that the same science comprised both.
And I rejoiced to think that I had found in Anaxagoras a teacher of the causes of existence such as I desired, and I imagined that he would tell me first whether the earth is flat or round; and then he would further explain the cause and the necessity of this, and would teach me the nature of the best and show that this was best; and if he said that the earth was in the centre, he would explain that this position was the best, and I should be satisfied if this were shown to me, and not want any other sort of cause.
And I thought that I would then go and ask him about the sun and moon and stars, and that he would explain to me their comparative swiftness, and their returnings and various states, and how their several affections, active and passive, were all for the best. For I could not imagine that when he spoke of mind as the disposer of them, he would give any other account of their being as they are, except that this was best; and I thought when he had explained to me in detail the cause of each and the cause of all, he would go on to explain to me what was best for each and what was best for all.
I had hopes which I would not have sold for much, and I seized the books and read them as fast as I could in my eagerness to know the better and the worse.
What hopes I had formed, and how grievously was I disappointed! As I proceeded, I found my philosopher altogether forsaking mind or any other principle of order, but having recourse to air, and ether, and water, and other eccentricities. There is surely a strange confusion of causes and conditions in all this. It may be said, indeed, that without bones and muscles and the other parts of the body I cannot execute my purposes. But to say that I do as I do because of them, and that this is the way in which mind acts, and not from the choice of the best, is a very careless and idle mode of speaking.
I wonder that they cannot distinguish the cause from the condition, which the many, feeling about in the dark, are always mistaking and misnaming. And thus one man makes a vortex all round and steadies the earth by the heaven; another gives the air as a support to the earth, which is a sort of broad trough. Any power which in disposing them as they are disposes them for the best never enters into their minds, nor do they imagine that there is any superhuman strength in that; they rather expect to find another Atlas of the world who is stronger and more everlasting and more containing than the good is, and are clearly of opinion that the obligatory and containing power of the good is as nothing; and yet this is the principle which I would fain learn if anyone would teach me.
But as I have failed either to discover myself or to learn of anyone else, the nature of the best, I will exhibit to you, if you like, what I have found to be the second best mode of inquiring into the cause. Socrates proceeded: I thought that as I had failed in the contemplation of true existence, I ought to be careful that I did not lose the eye of my soul; as people may injure their bodily eye by observing and gazing on the sun during an eclipse, unless they take the precaution of only looking at the image reflected in the water, or in some similar medium.
That occurred to me, and I was afraid that my soul might be blinded altogether if I looked at things with my eyes or tried by the help of the senses to apprehend them.
And I thought that I had better have recourse to ideas, and seek in them the truth of existence. I dare say that the simile is not perfect-for I am very far from admitting that he who contemplates existence through the medium of ideas, sees them only "through a glass darkly," any more than he who sees them in their working and effects.
However, this was the method which I adopted: I first assumed some principle which I judged to be the strongest, and then I affirmed as true whatever seemed to agree with this, whether relating to the cause or to anything else; and that which disagreed I regarded as untrue. Since the moment of death is the final separation of soul and body, a philosopher should see it as the realization of his aim. Unlike the body, the soul is immortal, so it will survive death.
He bases the first, known as the Argument from Opposites, on the observation that everything comes to be from out of its opposite. For example, a tall man can become tall only if he was short previously. Since life and death are opposites, we can reason analogously that, just as the living become dead, so the dead must become living. Returning again to the prison scene, Socrates now uses this as the basis of a fourth argument that the soul is immortal.
One may reconstruct this argument as follows:. Nothing can become its opposite while still being itself: it either flees away or is destroyed at the approach of its opposite.
This is true not only of opposites, but in a similar way of things that contain opposites. When someone objects that premise 1 contradicts his earlier statement at 70da about opposites arising from one another, Socrates responds that then he was speaking of things with opposite properties, whereas here is talking about the opposites themselves.
Careful readers will distinguish three different ontological items at issue in this passage:. In like manner, what makes a body sick is not sickness but fever, and what makes a number odd is not oddness but oneness b-c. Premise 3 then states that the soul is this sort of entity with respect to the Form of Life. And just as fire always brings the Form of Hotness and excludes that of Coldness, the soul will always bring the Form of Life with it and exclude its opposite.
However, one might wonder about premise 5. Similarly, might not the soul, while not admitting death, nonetheless be destroyed by its presence? For readers who do not agree that such items are deathless in the first place, however, this sort of appeal is unlikely to be acceptable. Socrates says that this is only because their hypotheses need clearer examination—but upon examination they will be found convincing. The issue of the immortality of the soul, Socrates says, has considerable implications for morality.
If the soul is immortal, then we must worry about our souls not just in this life but for all time; if it is not, then there are no lasting consequences for those who are wicked. But in fact, the soul is immortal, as the previous arguments have shown, and Socrates now begins to describe what happens when it journeys to the underworld after the death of the body.
The ensuing tale tells us of. Doing so will keep us in good spirits as we work to improve our souls in this life. It also is complicated by a couple of difficult interpretative questions. After Socrates has finished his tale about the afterlife, he says that it is time for him to prepare to take the hemlock poison required by his death sentence.
When Crito asks him what his final instructions are for his burial, Socrates reminds him that what will remain with them after death is not Socrates himself, but rather just his body, and tells him that they can bury it however they want.
Next he takes a bath—so that his corpse will not have to be cleaned post-mortem—and says farewell to his wife and three sons. Crito tells Socrates that some condemned men put off taking the poison for as long as possible, in order to enjoy their last moments in feasting or sex.
Socrates, however, asks for the poison to be brought immediately. He drinks it calmly and in good cheer, and chastises his friends for their weeping. When his legs begin to feel heavy, he lies down; the numbness in his body travels upward until eventually it reaches his heart.
If these scholars are right, why does Plato depict the death scene the way he does? Tim Connolly Email: tconnolly po-box. Plato: Phaedo The Phaedo is one of the most widely read dialogues written by the ancient Greek philosopher Plato. Outline of the Dialogue The dialogue revolves around the topic of death and immortality: how the philosopher is supposed to relate to death, and what we can expect to happen to our souls after we die.
The Cyclical Argument 70ce Socrates mentions an ancient theory holding that just as the souls of the dead in the underworld come from those living in this world, the living souls come back from those of the dead 70c-d. He uses this theory as the inspiration for his first argument, which may be reconstructed as follows: 1. The argument may be reconstructed as follows: 1. The Objections 85cc Simmias prefaces his objection by making a remark about methodology.
Response to Cebes 95ab 1. For Socrates, however, this sort of explanation was simply unacceptable: To call those things causes is too absurd. The Final Argument bb When Socrates has finished describing this method, both Simmias and Cebes agree that what he has said is true. One may reconstruct this argument as follows: 1. But what does not admit death is also indestructible.
Therefore, the soul is indestructible. The Myth about the Afterlife ca The issue of the immortality of the soul, Socrates says, has considerable implications for morality. References and Further Reading a. General Commentaries Bostock, D.
Oxford, Includes a helpful chapter on the theory of Forms. Dorter, K. University of Toronto Press, Reading of the dialogue that combines both dramatic and doctrinal approaches does not include text of the Phaedo. Gallop, D. Plato: Phaedo. Hackforth, R.
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