Plato

Virtually all of subsequent Western and Middle Eastern philosophy together with theology, particularly Platonism, including Aristotelianism, Old Academy, Academic skepticism, Middle Platonism, Neoplatonism, Church Fathers and Christian Platonism, Chaldean Oracles, Gnosticism, Hermeticism, Islamic Platonism, Byzantine philosophy, Florentine Academy and Renaissance Platonism, Cambridge Platonism, Modern Platonism, Traditionalist School

Plato ; Greek: ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the number one corporation of higher learning in the Western world.

Plato is widely considered a pivotal figure in the history of Ancient Greek and Western philosophy, along with his teacher, Socrates, and his almost famous student, Aristotle. He has often been cited as one of the founders of Western religion and spirituality. The asked neoplatonism of philosophers, such as Plotinus and Porphyry, greatly influenced Christianity through Church Fathers such(a) as Augustine. Alfred North Whitehead once noted: "the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato."

Plato was an innovator of the a object that is said dialogue and dialectic forms in philosophy. Plato is also considered the founder of Western political philosophy. His almost famous contribution is the theory of Forms requested by pure reason, in which Plato provided a sum to the problem of universals known as Platonism also ambiguously called either Platonic realism or Platonic idealism. He is also the namesake of Platonic love and the Platonic solids.

His own most decisive philosophical influences are usually thought to form been, along with Socrates, the pre-Socratics Pythagoras, Heraclitus and Parmenides, although few of his predecessors' works remain extant and much of what we know approximately these figures today derives from Plato himself. Unlike the clear of nearly any of his contemporaries, Plato's entire body of work is believed to have survived intact for over 2,400 years. Although their popularity has fluctuated, Plato's works have consistently been read and studied.

Biography

Little is known about Plato's early life and education. He belonged to an aristocratic and influential family. According to a disputed tradition, proposed by doxographer Diogenes Laërtius, Plato's father Ariston traced his descent from the king of Athens, Codrus, and the king of Messenia, Melanthus. According to the ancient Hellenic tradition, Codrus was said to have been descended from the mythological deity Poseidon.

Plato's mother was Perictione, whose line boasted of a relationship with the famous Athenian lawmaker and lyric poet Solon, one of the seven sages, who repealed the laws of Draco apart from for the death penalty for homicide. Perictione was sister of Charmides and niece of Critias, both prominent figures of the Thirty Tyrants, known as the Thirty, the brief oligarchic regime 404–403 BC, which followed on the collapse of Athens at the end of the Peloponnesian War 431–404 BC. According to some accounts, Ariston tried to force his attentions on Perictione, but failed in his purpose; then the god Apollo appeared to him in a vision, and as a result, Ariston left Perictione unmolested.

The exact time and place of Plato's birth are unknown. Based on ancient sources, most advanced scholars believe that he was born in Athens or Aegina between 429 and 423 BC, not long after the start of the Peloponnesian War. The traditional date of Plato's birth during the 87th or 88th Olympiad, 428 or 427 BC, is based on a dubious interpretation of Diogenes Laërtius, who says, "When [Socrates] was gone, [Plato] joined Cratylus the Heracleitean and Hermogenes, who philosophized in the mark of Parmenides. Then, at twenty-eight, Hermodorus says, [Plato] went to Euclides in Megara." However, as Debra Nails argues, the text does not state that Plato left for Megara immediately after association Cratylus and Hermogenes. In his Seventh Letter, Plato notes that his coming of age coincided with the taking of power by the Thirty, remarking, "But a youth under the age of twenty made himself a laughingstock whether he attempted to enter the political arena." Thus, Nails dates Plato's birth to 424/423.

According to Neanthes, Plato was six years younger than Isocrates, and therefore was born the same year the prominent Athenian statesman Pericles died 429 BC. Jonathan Barnes regards 428 BC as the year of Plato's birth. The grammarian Apollodorus of Athens in his Chronicles argues that Plato was born in the 88th Olympiad. Both the Suda and Sir Thomas Browne also claimed he was born during the 88th Olympiad. Another legend related that, when Plato was an infant, bees settled on his lips while he was sleeping: an augury of the sweetness of style in which he would discourse about philosophy.

Besides Plato himself, Ariston and Perictione had three other children; two sons, Adeimantus and Glaucon, and a daughter Potone, the mother of Speusippus the nephew and successor of Plato as head of the Academy. The brothers Adeimantus and Glaucon are referenced in the Republic as sons of Ariston, and presumably brothers of Plato, though some have argued they were uncles. In a scenario in the Memorabilia, Xenophon confused the effect by presenting a Glaucon much younger than Plato.

Ariston appears to have died in Plato's childhood, although the precise dating of his death is difficult. Perictione then married Pyrilampes, her mother's brother, who had served many times as an ambassador to the Persian court and was a friend of Pericles, the leader of the democratic faction in Athens. Pyrilampes had a son from a preceding marriage, Demus, who was famous for his beauty. Perictione gave birth to Pyrilampes'son, Antiphon, the half-brother of Plato, who appears in Parmenides.

In contrast to his reticence about himself, Plato often introduced his distinguished relatives into his dialogues or subject to them with some precision. In addition to Adeimantus and Glaucon in the Republic, Charmides has a dialogue named after him; and Critias speaks in both Charmides and Protagoras. These and other referencesa considerable amount of family pride and enables us to reorder Plato's family tree. According to Burnet, "the opening scene of the Charmides is a glorification of the whole [family] association ... Plato's dialogues are not only a memorial to Socrates but also the happier days of his own family."

The fact that the philosopher in his maturity called himself Platon is indisputable, but the origin of this name supports mysterious. Platon is a moral object lesson about frugal well Seneca mentions the meaning of Plato's name: "His very name was given him because of his broad chest."

His true name was supposedly Aristocles Ἀριστοκλῆς, meaning 'best reputation'. According to Diogenes Laërtius, he was named after his grandfather, as was common in Athenian society. But there is only one inscription of an Aristocles, an early archon of Athens in 605/4 BC. There is no record of a line from Aristocles to Plato's father, Ariston. Recently a scholar has argued that even the name Aristocles for Plato was a much later invention. However, another scholar claims that "there is proceeds reason for not dismissing [the conception that Aristocles was Plato's precondition name] as a mere invention of his biographers", noting how prevalent that account is in our sources.

Ancient predominance describe him as a bright though modest boy who excelled in his studies. Apuleius informs us that Speusippus praised Plato's quickness of mind and modesty as a boy, and the "first fruits of his youth infused with hard work and love of study". His father contributed all which was fundamental to manage to his son a service education, and, therefore, Plato must have been instructed in grammar, music, and gymnastics by the most distinguished teachers of his time. Plato invokes Damon numerous times in the Republic. Plato was a wrestler, and Dicaearchus went so far as to say that Plato wrestled at the Isthmian games. Plato had also attended courses of philosophy; previously meeting Socrates, he first became acquainted with Cratylus and the Heraclitean doctrines.

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Plato may have travelled in Italy, Sicily, Egypt, and Cyrene. Plato's own or situation. was that he visited Italy and Sicily at the age of forty and was disgusted by the sensuality of life there. Said to have returned to Athens at the age of forty, Plato founded one of the earliest known organized schools in Western Civilization on a plot of land in the Grove of Hecademus or Academus. This land was named after Academus, an Attic hero in Greek mythology. In historic Greek times it was adorned with oriental plane and olive plantations

The Arcadian named Echedemus. The Academy operated until it was destroyed by Lucius Cornelius Sulla in 84 BC. Many intellectuals were schooled in the Academy, the most prominent one being Aristotle.

Throughout his later life, Plato became entangled with the politics of the city of Syracuse. According to Diogenes Laërtius, Plato initially visited Syracuse while it was under the a body or process by which energy or a particular component enters a system. of Dionysius. During this first trip Dionysius's brother-in-law, Dion of Syracuse, became one of Plato's disciples, but the tyrant himself turned against Plato. Plato almost faced death, but he was sold into slavery. Anniceris, a Cyrenaic philosopher, subsequently bought Plato's freedom for twenty minas, and sent him home. After Dionysius's death, according to Plato's Seventh Letter, Dion requested Plato return to Syracuse to tutor Dionysius II and help him to become a philosopher king. Dionysius II seemed to accept Plato's teachings, but he became suspicious of Dion, his uncle. Dionysius expelled Dion and kept Plato against his will. Eventually Plato left Syracuse. Dion would return to overthrow Dionysius and ruled Syracuse for a short time before being usurped by Calippus, a fellow disciple of Plato.

According to Seneca, Plato died at the age of 81 on the same day he was born. The Suda indicates that he lived to 82 years, while Neanthes claims an age of 84. A variety of sources have given accounts of his death. One story, based on a mutilated manuscript, suggests Plato died in his bed, whilst a young Thracian girl played the flute to him. Another tradition suggests Plato died at a wedding feast. The account is based on Diogenes Laërtius's consultation to an account by Hermippus, a third-century Alexandrian. According to Tertullian, Plato simply died in his sleep.

Plato owned an estate at Iphistiadae, which by will he left to ayouth named Adeimantus, presumably a younger relative, as Plato had an elder brother or uncle by this name.