Cause And Effect In Plato's The Speech Of Aristophanes

Plato's final argument in Phaedo for the immortality of the soul is one of the most interesting topics of all time. It goes hand to hand with the application of the theory of forms to the question of the soul's immortality, as Plato constantly reminds us, the theory of forms is the most certain of all his theories. The Phaedo is Plato’s attempt to convince us of the immortality of the soul by using several main arguments. These include the argument of forms and the law of opposites. In the final passage of the Phaedo, Plato provides his final proof, although it may be his last attempt to give his reasoning, it is not very convincing. Plato has some good points and reasoning to believe in the immortality of the soul, but his arguments often

Socrates attempts to justify homosexual relationships by quoting Diotima’s differentiation between heterosexual relationships ("those who are pregnant in terms of their bodies" and produce children) and homosexual relationships (those "who are pregnant in terms of the soul" and produce "prudence and the rest of virtue" in their partner) (Plato 271).2 This ideal of productivity in homosexual relationships is realized by the lover passing knowledge and wisdom on to his beloved. Thus, Socrates successfully justifies homosexual relationships; with this reasoning, he demonstrates to the other partygoers that their homosexual relationships must be productive to be justified.

Ignorance: the condition of being uninformed or uneducated; this basic definition is crucial to understanding one of the most controversial figures in ancient Athenian society: the philosopher Socrates. The man’s entire life was devoted to proving the fact that no one actually knew what they thought they did; that everyone lived in ignorance. This viewpoint earned Socrates many enemies, so many that even a renowned playwright, Aristophanes, decided to exploit the situation. He wrote his critiquing play of Socrates called The Clouds; a scathing criticism that the philosopher would partially attribute to his future indictment on charges of impiety and corrupting the

What was a good life like for a man in Ancient Greece, according to Plato’s four dialogs on The Trail and Death of Socrates? One might answer this question by examining what life in general was like for a man in Ancient Greece to determine what a good life was like. The Trial and Death of Socrates written by Plato a student of Socrates is the account of his life, defense and death. This novel is written in four dialogues “Euthyphro, Apology, Crito and Phaedo.”

When consideration is given to the status of philosophy in Greece at the end of the fifth century

In Plato’s work Symposium, Phaedrus, Pausania, Eryximachus, Aristophane and Agathon, each of them presents a speech to either praise or definite Love. Phaedrus first points out that Love is the primordial god; Pausanias brings the theme of “virtue” into the discussion and categorizes Love into “good” one or “bad” one; Eryximachus introduces the thought of “moderation’ and thinks that Love governs such fields as medicine and music; Aristophanes draws attention to the origin and purposes

In the Apology, Socrates was told by the Delphic Oracle that there was nobody wiser than him. With ancient Greece having been a prominent home of philosophy and art since

The writer Aristophanes wrote the play “The Acharnians” in 425 BCE. It is set during the Peloponnesian War, which is between the Spartans and the Athenians. The main character, Dicaeopolis, is an Athenian farmer that is part of the very small handful of people that actually want peace in Athens and to end the war with Sparta. After the general assembly, the government officials in Athens, refuses to make a peace treaty to end the war, Dicaeopolis take his problems into his own hands and creates a compromise with Sparta stating that he and his family can trade and live in peace while the rest of Athens is suffering under poverty and war. As the play goes on, Athens’ citizens are suffering and starving while Dicaeopolis can be seen living a wealthy life with fancy food and clothes. Aristophanes constantly spreads this theme throughout the play showing how peace brings way better rewards than being constantly in unnecessary wars.

In his speech, Aristophanes tells the story about the origin of the nature of human beings. He tells that once, there were no humans, but only creatures that were round, had four hands, as well as, four legs and two faces. There were three kinds of such creatures: males, females, and androgynous – the form that was made up of male and female elements. They made an attempt on the Gods, and that pissed Zeus off, so that he ordered to split them in half. That is, how according to Aristophanes, humans appeared. Those who belonged to the male creatures wanted to reunite with males, those who belonged to female creatures wanted to reunite with women and those who belonged to androgynous wanted to reunite with the opposite sex.

thesis what Aristophanes defines as love. He believes that love is innate: " love is born into

Plato, in addition to being a philosopher, wrestled at the Olympic level, is one of the classical Greek authors, mathematicians and the founder of The Academy, the first higher learning institute in the west. In short, Plato is one of the great thinkers in history and his contributions to philosophy, ethics and politics are many and varied. One of Plato’s main philosophical ideas is based on the idea that the world

In Plato's Symposium, Aristophanes and Alcibiades share a specific view on love, while Diotima and Socrates share another. Aristophanes sees love as a pursuit of wholeness and ultimately the desire for humans to be complete. Aristophanes explains the origins of how humans came to have two arms and two legs as well as one sex organ. Humans used to be creatures who existed with eight limbs as well as two sexual organs, however they were far too ambitious and had even made an attempt on the gods. When this event occurred, Zeus and other gods met in council, and in their meeting, they came to the conclusion to cut humans in half, to ensure they could still exist yet not be overly ambitious. Humans have been on the pursuit to find their literal other half ever since separation. In other words, to find their soulmate.

Plato is often criticized for preaching the gospel of me first. The claim is that his understanding of love is essentially egoistic, and this is seen as troublesome for the obvious ethical reasons. But there may be an even more troubling issue with Plato's understanding of love. In this paper I will attempt to argue that for Plato, love is in a sense impossible; that it can only ever be a desire for something out of one's grasp. The stakes are high but perhaps there is a way to understand this problem in a way that seems a little less damning. To do this I will analyze arguments from the Lysis and the Symposium, first questioning even the possibility of love and then attempt to show that love is in fact possible, all though in weaker

Born in Athens in 437 B.C, Greek philosopher Plato is one of the most powerful thinkers in history. Coming from Greek aristocracy, Plato had political ambitions as a young man and appeared to follow the family tradition. However, Socrates and his dialectical method of inquiry, which was to question and answer everything to show ignorance, soon captivated Plato.

In the Symposium on that night, Socrates’ speech is one of the most important of the night as he is clearly a central figure, admired by the other guests. Socrates begins by presenting his argument that if love is nothing, then it is of something, and if it is of something, then it is of something that is desired, and therefore of something that is not already possessed, which is then usually beautiful and good. Human beings begin by loving physical beauty in another person, then progress to love of intellect and from that level to see the connection among people and ultimately, the lover of beauty enjoys a kind of revelation or vision of universal beauty, which we find ourselves in the pursuit of during our own study of Plato’s work. The