Ancient Philosophical Influences- Plato

Question 1

What is Rationalism

Answer 1

-A Priori Knowlegde
-Reason is the most reliable source and test of knowledge
-Plato was a Rationalist because he mistrusted the senses

Question 2

What is Empiricism

Answer 2

-A Posteriori Knowledge
-All concepts originate in experience
-Aristotle was an Empiricist

Question 3

Plato’s views on knowledge

Answer 3

-knowledge should be permanent (2+2 should always equal 4)
-Therefore, knowledge can not be founded in our senses as they can decieve us
-

Question 3

Quotation that influenced Plato’s views on knowledge + reasoning

Answer 3

Heraclitus- “You can’t step into the same river twice.”
Demonstrates the world in a constant state of change (flux)

Question 4

How did Heraclitus’ line influence Plato’s views on knowledge

Answer 4

-showed the world in a constant state of change (flux)
-If the world is always changing, knowledge would be too
-Unless true knowledge was found outside of the world

Question 4

Which world does Plato believe we live in

Answer 4

The material world

Question 5

What are Forms

Answer 5

-The idea of what a thing is
-unchanging, fixed, permanent
-exist in the Realm of the Forms

Question 6

How do forms manifest in the Material World

Answer 6

eg. a cat:
-all cats that exist in the material world conform to the Form of a cat
-The Form of a cat is an everlasting concept
-it is fixed and permanent because the form exists in the Realm of the Forms, outside of our world

Question 6

Plato’s belief of the afterlife

Answer 6

-you die
-your soul goes to the Real of the Forms
-you experience all of the Forms
-your soul is reborn in the Material World
-you have anamnesis, a dim reccolection of what you saw in the Realm of the Forms
-This gives you an inherent sense of good, bad, beauty, justice etc.

Question 7

What are the rankings of the Forms

Answer 7

-Form of the Good
-Higher Forms
-Lower Forms
-Material Objects
-Images

Question 8

What is the Form of the Good

Answer 8

-Plato believed that some Forms are greater than others (justice, truth, beauty etc.)
-‘The Form of Forms’
-If you understand the Form of Good, you can understand all of the Forms, as they are all just extentions of goodness

Question 9

What is the Cave Analogy

Answer 9

-Prisoners are trapped in a cave, facing a wall
-behind them, other people are walking behind them with statues on their heads
-behind the statues is a flame, projecting shadows of the statues onto the wall that the prisoners are facing
-the prisoners believe that the shadows are reality as it is all that they can sense
-one of the prisoners is freed, and walks towards the sun

Question 9

What do each of the elements of the Cave Analogy represent

Answer 9

prisoners = humanity
cave = material world
shadows = sense experience
sun = form of the good
freed prisoner = philosophers

Question 10

where is the cave analogy found

Answer 10

‘The Republic’

Question 11

strengths of the Cave Analogy

Answer 11

-illustrates how empirical knowledge can be flawed (senses can decieve you)
-gives reason for the imperfections of our world,

Question 12

weaknesses of the Cave Analogy

Answer 12

-Unclear link between the World of Appearences and the Realm of the Forms
-If you have to die to go to the Realm of the Forms, how does the prisoner return to cave?
-no concrete proof that life both inside and outside of the cave is real, you can’t prove that anybody is right or wrong

Question 13

What is Descartes’ Wax Analogy

Answer 13

-If you were to leave a ball of wax by a fireplace, you would return to a puddle of melted wax.
-Your senses would tell you that the liquid is something different, but yout reason knows that it is the wax that you had left