Definition Of An Existence Of Absolute Truth

Plato separates reality into two spheres: one of appearance, which is a material world, and one of reality. Plato believes “in a transcendent world of eternal and absolute beings, corresponding to every kind of thing there is, and causing in particular things their essential

Plato is remembered as one of the worlds best known philosophers who along with his writings are widely studied. Plato was a student of the great Greek philosopher Socrates and later went on to be the teacher of Aristotle. Plato’s writings such as “The Republic”, “Apology” and “Symposium” reveal a great amount of insight on what was central to his worldview. He was a true philosopher as he was constantly searching for wisdom and believed questioning every aspect of life would lead him to the knowledge he sought. He was disgusted with the common occurrence of Greeks not thinking for themselves but simply accepting the popular opinion also known as doxa. Plato believed that we ought to search for and meditate on the ideal versions of beauty, justice, wisdom, and other concepts which he referred to as the forms. His hostility towards doxa, theory of the forms, and perspective on reality were the central ideas that shaped Plato’s worldview and led him to be the great philosopher who is still revered today.

To introduce the argument, Socrates explains the theory of Forms. Forms are the intangible and visible components of anything that exists. They are the larger ideas that compose the reasons for why something exists. This being said, these are merely concepts that cannot be changed but rather they stand concrete in their meanings and ideals. An example of a Form is beauty. We can only recognize things that are beautiful because “all beautiful things are beautiful by the Beautiful” and they belong to the Form of beauty (Plato, pg. 138). Beauty only exists because it is an idea in which things fall into a category. Something can be recognized as beautiful, and it is therefore placed under the Form of beauty, and therefore, all things beautiful share the same meaning. The meaning of beauty will never be changed because it is a permanent idea that holds to be true. This issue stems into the idea that forms can change between each other, while still possessing individual meanings. Take the forms of tallness and smallness for example:

We are introduced to the Forms in Plato’s dialogue the Phaedo. The Theory of Forms says that

He says these perceptions are deficient, as sensible things suffer from the compresence of opposites--being both F and not F (e.g., equal and unequal) in different respects, or compared to different things. Plato refers to a stick as an example of a sensible thing. For premise 1, imagine we have three sticks, the first two are the same length and the third is shorter in length. So, we can say the first two are equal to one another (in length) and both are not equal to the third stick. Therefore, sticks cannot be equal full-stop, but are equal to one stick and unequal to the other stick. This is the case for all things, they are both F and not F when compared to different things or objects. Just as Helen of Troy will be more beautiful compared to some women and less beautiful compared to other women. So, this deficiency shows there is a distinction between F and F-ness, (e.g., equal sticks and Equality itself). In essence, our perceived knowledge of equal things and objects are distinct from “Equality itself,” in premise 2. He says, “We say that there is something that is equal. I do not mean a stick equal to a stick or stone equal to a stone...but something else beyond all of these, the Equal itself.”

Plato fails to set out his theory clearly and allow the reader to realise it is a theory. Nowhere in his dialogues does he state that he is describing a theory of forms, and so people may have misunderstood his writing s and he may not have meant it to be a theory at all. He has elements of his theory in many different dialogues and is inconsistent. In Book I of the Metaphysics Aristotle claims that Plato had a "system" to the effect that "the many sensibles which have the same name exist by participating in the corresponding Forms." This quote from Aristotle's work suggests that Plato did have a theory of forms but this is not believed by all people.

Plato, being a Socratic apprentice, followed and transcribed the experiences Socrates had in his teachings and search of understanding. In Plato’s first work, The Allegory of the Cave, Socrates forms the understanding between appearance vs. reality and the deceptions we are subject to by the use of forms. In the cave, the prisoners’ experiences are limited to what their senses can tell them, the shadows on the walls, and their shackles; these appearances are all that they have to form their ideas. When one of the prisoners begins to question his reality he makes his way out of the cave and into the day light. This prisoners understanding of his reality has now expanded, thus the theory of forms; when he returns to the cave to spread the news, the others do not believe him. They have been deceived by their reality and what

Plato starts with the analogy of the sun, which points out the contrast between the visible and the intelligible worlds. Within the visible world man has eyes and objects to be seen, but man needs another object for the eyes to see the object. This object is the sun, which provides the light that is required by the eye to view the visible world. In correspondence, the Form of the Good in the intelligible world is equal to the sun by the way that the Good allows the forms to be known. Plato specifically states, “What gives truth to the things known and the power to know to the knower is the Form of the Good. And though it is the cause of knowledge and truth, it is also an object of knowledge” (508e). Along with

Plato, arguably one of the most famous philosophers in history is known for his dialogues and theory of Forms. The theory of Forms argues that ideas (non-physical forms) are more real than tangible objects or what our senses perceive. According to Plato, there is the visible realm and intelligible realm. Reality could be divided into three different levels; the level of appearances, the real level, and the ideal level which he explains through the analogy of the ‘Divided Line’ in The Republic.

What are your views on truth? There are three main views around the world. The first one is individual relativism. Individual relativism is the view that all beliefs, customs, and ethics are relative to the individual. For example, what is known as “proper” to one person, may be considered “erroneous” to someone else.

“Everything which exist in this world and all things that we see around us are not as they appear to us” this is the core idea behind plato’s theory of forms.From this idea only he moves towards explaining his world of forms or ideas.

What Socrates is attempting to explain to Glaucon in the above passage is that all the forms arise out of The Form of Good. The Form of Good is essentially the Ideal world. Everything in the Phenomenal world, or the world that each individual person and society as a whole exists physically in, is a less-Good representation of the Ideal Realm; in the allegory of "The Cave", the Phenomenal world is represented by shadows of actual things being thrown onto a wall. So, Socrates is saying to Glaucon that the Ideal realm is a perfected, real version of our own world, and that each thing contained within our world has an Ideal form, of which the physical objects are merely bad representations. Interpreters of Plato should be careful not to think of the Phenomenal world as evil in comparison to the Ideal realm; that idea would be akin to thinking of a broken bicycle as evil in comparison to a working bicycle. Neoplatonists do not believe in good or evil, only 'good' or 'less good'. Plato's forms have suffered many different interpretations over the years, but one can safely say in simple terms that The Forms result from the imagination taking a stab at perfection. Whether or not Plato considered their existence as a reality is beside the point. Many Renaissance philosophers, often called theologians by

The objects to which names (such as "Socrates" or "Napoleon") refer are individuals; but we have certain problems about the objects to which other terms (nouns, abstract adjectives and abstract nouns) refer. We call them UNIVERSAL terms because they do refer to a plurality of objects. For that reason Plato deduces there must be universal beings matching up those universal concepts of which there are plenty of individuals or examples; “The Green” would match the concept of "green", “The Kindness” would match the concept of "kindness", “The Beauty” would match the concept of "beautiful", “The Truth” would match the concept of "truth". Those beings which match universal concepts are called Ideas or Forms.

He was born in Athens into a very wealthy family and as a young man

Plato was interested in how we can apply a single word or concept to many words or things. For example how can the word house be used for all the individual dwellings that are houses? Plato answered that various things can be called by the same name because they have something in common. He called this common factor the thing’s form or idea. Plato insisted that the forms differ greatly from the ordinary things that we see around us. Ordinary things change but their forms do not. A particular triangle may be altered in size or shape but the form of a triangle can never change. Plato concluded that forms exist neither in space or time. They can be known not only by the intellect but also by the senses. Because of their stability and perfection, the forms have greater reality than ordinary objects observed by the senses. Thus true knowledge is knowledge of the forms.