Soul, Mind And Body - Platos Views Flashcards
What was Platos view of the relationship between the body and soul
Plato was the first philosopher to formally put forward a dualistic understanding of the soul and body, meaning the body and soul are two separate substances - he is therefore a substance dualist
What was Platos core views on the soul
-Plato said the soul is the real, essential, immortal part of ourselves that never dies
What did Plato suggest about the relationship between the soul and incarnation
- Plato said people’s souls are reincarnated after death, at which point the soul leaves the body and moves to another body
- Prior to incarnation and between incarnations, the soul goes to the World of the Forms where it witnesses true knowledge and has thought and intelligence
What does Plato say about the role of the body in these reincarnations
-Plato says the body is simply the temporary physical part of a person -in fact the soul is trapped or imprisoned in the body and longs for liberation to the World of the Forms at death
What happens to the soul in the afterlife
In the myth of Er, through the mouth of Socrates, Plato attempts to explain what happens in the afterlife to the soul
- The myth describes how there are judges who reward or punish the souls of those who have died
- Those souls who have lived morally good lives went upwards towards a place of reward whereas those who were immoral were punished with pain equal to ten times the amount they had inflicted on earth
- Er witnessed the way in which souls chose their new life on earth. Those who had been rewarded chose lives of great power and dictatorship whilst those who had been punished chose more wisely
- Once the souls had chosen their destinies they were given a special liquid to drink which made them forget their afterlife previous life and afterlife experiences
- Only the philosophical who understood the importance of living a good life of peace and justice benefitted from the cycle , everyone else ricocheted between reward and punishment
How does Plato evidence the existence of his soul
Plato uses the argument of opposites to claim the existence of the soul and to educate about its qualities
- He says firstly everything comes into being from its opposite ( something is light due to darkness, hot due to cold)
- He then concludes the body and soul are opposites , which offers an insight into the qualities of the soul e.g the body is temporary so the soul must be eternal
- He also uses this as evidence to conclude the body and soul are separate substances
What other argument does Plato use to claim existence of the soul
- Further evidence that the soul is a separate substance from the body is the fact that we remember the Form of something when we see the particular version of it in our physical world ( Plato claims this is because the soul has experienced the form in between incarnations )
- For example we recollect the form of beauty when we see beauty in this world ( e.g a beautiful flower in this world or we know what is fair/ unfair because our souls remember the form of justice
- This is called the argument from recollection
What issues do philosophers raise with the argument from recollection
Modern Philosopher Peter Geach critiqued the argument as he questioned how a disembodied soul can see and recognise the forms when seeing is a physical process
How does Plato try to illustrate his argument from recollection
Plato demonstrates his argument from recollection with a story about a slave boy who has no education and is given a geometry puzzle to solve. Through questioning by Socrates, the boy is able to solve the geometry puzzle
-Plato says this is evidence that the boy is using knowledge he had already gained before birth, and therefore from his soul (as the boy did not have the education necessary in order to solve the puzzle by himself)
What questions have been raised with the story of the slave boy
-Philosophers have suggested the boy is not using knowledge from his soul but simply learning from Socrates questioning
What does Plato say about different aspects within the soul
-Plato says there are three aspects within the soul : reason, emotion and appetite (desire) ~and these three aspects are in conflict
What metaphor does Plato use to describe the soul
Plato says the soul is like a charioteer with two wayward horses. The charioteer represents reason and the two wayward horses represent our emotions and our appetites
-Plato is suggesting by this that the emotions and appetites pull us along and motivate us. However if we let our emotions take the lead they can get the better of us and if we let our appetites drive us we can over indulge in pleasure and be driven by greed
When does Plato describe the soul as being in harmony
- Plato says the soul is in harmony when reason is in control. A good person is one who’s reason is in control as this brings wisdom and order
- The desires of the body can be overcome using reason
