Plato (see picture) was a philosopher born at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war which raged from about 430BC to 400BC. Plato is correctly given a lot of credit for being a very influential philosopher, indeed he thought and wrote about most areas of philosophy during his lifetime. For this he is very much admired, so much in fact that critical voices tend to drown in this ocean of admiration. However, since I started reading "History of Western Philosophy" by Bertrand Russell (one of my favorite philosophers by the way) I have gained a new perspective on Plato, one which I will share here.
In "The Republic" Plato writes about Utopia, that is, the ideal society. It is indeed a very charming and interesting book, much more engaging then many contemporary books that I have read. Socrates, the protagonist in The Republic is a man of great charisma and charm, and as a reader it is difficult not to be seduced.
Nevertheless, if you take away the the charm that is undeniably great in this book, what you are in essence left with is a state that would have made Josef Stalin and Hitler envious, had it ever been created. Society, we are told, is to be divided up into three different classes of citizens, guardians who are to rule, soldiers who will fight and workers who will (you guessed it), work. The guardians decide who, in the next generation, will become the guardian and who will be the worker/soldier. In other words, what Plato is advocating is that we decide at birth whether a child will be ruling over others, fight for the state, or carry out all the dirty work. We have A, B, and C citizens i.e. what we have is fascism, in its most pure form.
A short defense of Plato may be in order here. I do not think that he was being selfish when he advocated this fascistic society, it was not to make life comfortable for himself and other philosophers. Rather, his argument is that rulers should be chosen according to how good they are at ruling, not according to how many people like that ruler. Just like you want a shoemaker to make your shoes, or a soldier to fight your wars you would like a ruler who is educated in his/her profession. The problem with this, as Bertrand Russell points out, is that it is all but impossible to decide who is a good ruler, and if we get a bad ruler who we then cannot get rid of (in a democracy you would typically replace a bad ruler), then the consequences can be very serious indeed. I believe that there is no education that you can give a person that will ensure that he or she will be a good leader, therefore democracy is to be preferred.
Plato was also a fan of positive eugenics in which you arrange the society so that men judged as having desirable traits get more children as well as negative eugenics in which you prevent "inferior" people from getting children. We are told that when a child is born it is to be taken away from its mother so that she will never know which child is hers. If the child is judged by the doctors to be deformed or if it simply has inferior parents, it will be put away in a mysterious place "as it ought to be". Is it just me who thinks this sounds uncomfortably similar to Nazi Germany? Like I said, Hitler and Plato would have had a lot of ideals in common.
Strict censorship of information is another policy dear to Plato. We are told that any book that portrays Gods doing something un-virtuous are to be forbidden because Gods only do acts that are good (yeah right). This of course meant banning all works of Homer where you finds Gods that are jealous, envious, evil, cheating, you name it. As if that was not enough, Plato also want censorship of every book in which people are fearful or afraid to die. The reason is that the soldiers could be affected in a negative way if they read about the horrors of war.
To sum up, if Plato had been given free hands he would have created a fascist eugenic society society with very strict censorship. Hardly utopia for a modern person (I hope). Such a society, like the Christian-based societies that existed in the dark middle ages would also have a detrimental effect on creative thought and on science. All such a society can hope to achieve is success against other societies of roughly equal size (as long as that society does not start to encourage progress). Bertrand Russell suggests that Plato may have been influenced by the fact that he grew up during war-time. There is a clear tendency among people who live in turbulent times to desire stability, and as just mentioned, that is what Plato's Republic may potentially achieve.
Glad to see others recognizing this. Unfortunately it is true, Plato and the whole school of Stoics & Neoplatonics were very much in league with aristocracy and many were aristocrats themselves (like Plato and Aristotle)
SvaraRaderaThroughout Classical Greek history you will find them colluding with the Oligocracy of the Spartans or the Monarchy of the Macedonians and being steadfastly against democracy.
If you like ancient greek philosophers, you should check Epicurus for the truly good philosophy that era produced. A philosophy that, incidentally, was scrubbed from written history by the Christians.
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utvecklingsmodell
SvaraRadera"detektera detta jävla idiot"
Se igenom detta och fastna inte utan ta ett "kvant språng"
Skämt, ironi, brott mot mänskligheten
Spökfenomen= samma däri (även en ond varelse, satan)
Vetenskapen måste gå mot religionsförbud
http://strikeforcevetansvarreligionen.blogspot.com/
Precis som man förbjuder skadliga kemikalier, medicinsk och biologisk effekt och tex empiriska samband som a och b
För att kognitivt, utvecklingsmässigt (få upp många fler som studie visar= science kunskap) ta ett skutt som för alltid avgör och gör att vi blir vad vi är menade till (gudar som det tex står i bibeln= de vet inte mer än oss= självavslöjande likaså)
och rymdresenärer (babylon 5 tror jag vinner med då en del tekniska och vetenskapliga innovationer)
Kraften av vetenskaplig empirisk klarhet är allt
I have tried to say that perhaps 80% and not a white, yellow överlevnadsvärld (conclusions and democracy, etc.).
SvaraRaderaIn order to survive (democracy = most choose the truest, most överlevnadsflexibla = solutions that have the breadth and width of the tip but above all - more artistic).
As a matter
Tex replace coal in us (Germanium)
Plants and planter to replace, and make photosynthesis more efficient (only percent today to 25%)
Local democracy
Toquevilles analysis (best social sciences through and in all times)
Local democracy and a sufficient number of wins and voted for
Italy-USA-England one part
Otherwise, we go over (our leaders are capable sas is not this)
Just as Tolkiens world = kind of democracy
Experts (knowledge = implemntera and make on the basis of a policy). See paradigm which today replaced (and the judgement then made some wrong with that thinking).
See, all senior experts (Cambridge) judgement is as firm in thinking, etc. (and believe theories be right). Empirical and darwinism therein (choose above simply so you can manipulate a world - so it is doing and stand up for generations and centuries)
Tex da Vinci world paint a picture and get it designed (like trees) and stimulants that integrate the interface ml of our world and the states (perception).
Technical solutions that are most important
And ordinary people who say the truth = do this for överlevnadsvärdet (democracy)
And we are going into space (also överlevnadsvärde 2.0)
Egenintresset = so strong force
Turn on a sufficient number who actively take responsibility
Hmm, I'd just like to comment that this idea of"the Christian-based societies that existed in the dark middle ages would also have a detrimental effect on creative thought and on science." is really completely false. On the contrary, the christian middle ages were a period of astonishing intellectual, economic, technological and scientific advance. Do you have any examples in mind?
SvaraRaderahi again Anders, and thanks for your comments!
SvaraRaderaI must say they surprised me greatly, as they seem to be strikingly false.
The Middle Ages, say from 800-1500 were a period of profound advances in all sorts of areas: scientific, economic, legal, technological, philosophical, just to name a few. Let me give some examples:
The key thing about technology here is, I think, that the middle ages greatly expanded it, far beyond anything their predecessors in the western classical civilizations did. After all, the Romans knew about water mills, but hardly built many; the medievals built hundreds, even before c. 1050 when the moslems invaded spain and the mediterranean, leaving the west in an even more parlous state of poverty and deep economic depression. The doomsday book records about 6000 water mills in england alone in 1086. Furthermore, the population was thin and poor - no big towns, no important industries, feeble agriculture, after a succession of disasters. After this time, and for about two centuries, western europe underwent the most remarkable period of growth it has ever seen, and for the first time in its history started producing surpluses in all directions and the so-called "twelth century renaissance", no doubt partly or mainly fueled by this expansion, completely transformed the arts, learning and economy of europe in a remarkably short time. Like all periods of expansion, technology was one of the driving forces, especially in agriculture where the introduction of the heavy plough, the whipple tree, the artesian well, the percussion drill and so on were all helpful, much of which was actually sponsored by the Church (compare the invention of spectacles and the mechanical clock). And in England, the newly-founded university of Oxford quickly established itself at the forefront of scientific observation and theory, the Mertonian mathematicians; the astronomical observations of Walcher (writing around 1135), Adelard of Bath (translater of Euclid; and islamic astronomical works; and dealing with physics and biology); Roger de Hereford and Daniel of Morley (astronomy); Alfred of Sarashel (Aristotelian physics and psychology) and other famous names such as Grosseteste, Bacon and Bradwardine and their pupils in turn. It is during this era that magnetism was thoroughly investigated by Peter of Maricourt; following work of William of Auvergne, who was Bishop of Paris.
In Philosophy: in many ways, medieval philosophy was better than the cartesian world view that replaced it. Jorge Gracia has indeed argued that "'in intensity, sophistication, and achievement, the philosophical flowering in the thirteenth century could be rightly said to rival the golden age of Greek philosophy in the fourth century B.C.". What about Augustine and Boethius, and Aquinas and Anselm, or William of Ockham or Duns Scotus? What about Abelard or Adelard of Bath, or Peter Helias or Robert Grosseteste? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grosseteste).
As for the Spanish Inquisition; this is a Renaissance body, founded 1478! And, like all the inquisitions, it was designed to maintain orthodoxy, not suppress science and philosophy.
Here is Adelard of Bath (fl. first half of 12th century):
God rules the Universe but this does not mean that Man should not use the Reason with which God has endowed him to study Natural Causes.
From his treatise to his nephew:
This one thing, however, I will say. We must first search after reason, and when it has been found, and not until then, authority if added to it, may be received. Authority by itself can inspire no confidence in the philosopher, nor ought it to be used for such a purpose. Hence logicians have agreed in treating the argument from authority not as necessary, but probable only. if, therefore, you want to bear anything from me, you must both give and take reason.
And so on. Adelard was not writing about theology, and did not get into any trouble at all for writing this stuff.