Descartes 's Theory Of Love

Our human nature was not what we always thought of it to be, in simpler times two were made as one. We roamed the earth in unity with our other halves without the burden of trying to find them. However, Zeus did not find this to be in his best interest because of how we behaved so he split each being in two. As a result of this split we must now go about our lives in search of our other half. This is the speech that Aristophanes gave in Plato’s Symposium a book composed of various speeches from many different famous Greek people. Aristophanes’ view of love is compelling because it describes our very human nature to find our love, it justifies the reasoning of why there are different sexualities, and it gives an explanation as to why our bodies are the way that they are today.

The Symposium revolves around a Greek party made up of various men throwing around their views on love, building up to height of the evening by a speech from Socrates. Socrates knows the true way to obtain love, and tells of a tale between him and his mentor, Diotima. Through Diotima, Socrates is able to

Diotima, Socrates' great teacher from the Symposium, a work by Plato was one of the most influential women thinkers of all time, whether she was a real person or a literary fictional character. She related to Socrates the theory of love that he described to the partygoers at Agathon's banquet, a celebration of Agathon's victory at the competition of Dionysis in Athens and of Eros.

Clear your mind, if you will, of everything you have ever seen or known to be true. To begin understanding Rene Descartes’ method of doubt, you need to suspend all prejudice and prior judgments and start with a clean slate “for the purpose of discovering some ultimate truth on which to base all thought.” (Kolak, Pg.225). Discouraged with much skepticism from his own beliefs, Descartes was embarrassed of his own ignorance. He set out to try and accomplish the task of finding an absolute truth in which he would base his beliefs. Placing upon himself a task to find an axiom or absolute truth to base all thought, “he ventured as a youth in travel to collect a variety in experiences to derive some

Descartes has written a set of six meditations on the first philosophy. In these meditations he analyzes his beliefs and questions where those beliefs were derived from. The first mediation of Descartes discusses his skeptical hypotheses; questioning the validity of the influences of his knowledge. He has a few main goals that are expressed through the first meditation. First off, Descartes wants to build a firm foundation of knowledge that is also concrete. Through probing his mind for answers to all of his skeptical thoughts, he hopes to eliminate the skepticism and find true, unquestionable knowledge. Descartes has mapped out ways to

Descartes’ method of radical doubt focuses upon finding the truth about certain things from a philosophical perspective in order to truly lay down a foundation for ideas that have the slightest notion of doubt attached to them. He believed that there was “no greater task to perform in philosophy, than assiduously to seek out, once and for all, the best of all these arguments and to lay them out so precisely and plainly that henceforth all will take them to be true demonstrations” (Meditations, 36). The two key concepts that Descartes proves using the method of doubt are that the “human soul does not die with the body, and that God exists” as mentioned in his Letter of Dedication, since there are many that don’t believe the mentioned concepts because of the fact that they have not been proven or demonstrated. (Meditations, 35). In order to prove the above, he lays out six Meditations, each focusing on a different theme that leads us “to the knowledge of our mind and of God, so that of all things that can be known by the human mind, these latter are the most certain and the most evident” (Meditations, 40).

In the Symposium Plato places Socrates in a dialogue with the goddess Diotima. She says two things of interest to this paper about love. Firstly, at 206a that humans when they love long to possess the good and do so for ever, and secondly that at 206b that "To love is to bring forth upon the beautiful, both in body and soul (Hamilton 558)." The first statement makes a claim about what love is, a desire to posses the good, and the second a statement about what love does, bring forth the beautiful. I will now briefly analyze both claims.

Descartes believes that knowledge comes from within the mind, a single indisputable fact to build on that can be gained through individual reflection. While seeking true knowledge, Descartes writes his Six Meditations. In these meditations, Descartes tries to develop a strong foundation, which all knowledge can be built upon. In the First Meditation, Descartes begins developing this foundation through the method of doubt. He casts doubt upon all his previous beliefs, including "matters which are not entirely certain and indubitable [and] those which appear to be manifestly false." (Descartes, p.75, par.3) Once Descartes clears away all beliefs that can be called into doubt, he can then build a strong

     Descartes overall project is to find a definite certainty on which he can base all his knowledge and beliefs. A foundation that he will be able to prove without a doubt. To find a definite certainty he uses a methodical doubt, this states that anything that could be doubted must be taken as false. This is done to find an absolute certainty for

Through questioning the knowledge he had always believed to be true, Descartes comes to realize that many of his basic beliefs were founded on sensual knowledge. This leads him to question his very existence, and eventually to search for unconditional proof of his existence

Starting at 210a of The Symposium, Diotima speaks with Socrates about reaching the final vision of the mysteries. She starts talking about a young boy who is starting to be attracted to beautiful bodies. He first loves one body; and then, realizing that all bodies are relatively alike, he begins to love all beautiful bodies. After that, he comes to appreciate the beauty of minds, not caring anymore about physical attraction. After all stages, the boy will ultimately come to loving beauty itself and all beautiful things. This gradual climb to the final vision is similar to the climb out of the cave in Plato's "Allegory of the Cave."

with some very different views of love as brought to us by Agathon, Phaedrus and

Plato was a philosopher from Classical Greece and an innovator of dialogue and dialect forms which provide some of the earliest existing analysis ' of political questions from a philosophical perspective. Among some of Plato 's most prevalent works is his dialogue the Symposium, which records the conversation of a dinner party at which Socrates (amongst others) is a guest. Those who talk before Socrates share a tendency to celebrate the instinct of sex and regard love (eros) as a god whose goodness and beauty they compete. However, Socrates sets himself apart from this belief in the fundamental value of sexual love and instead recollects Diotima 's theory of love, suggesting that love is neither beautiful nor good because it is the desire to possess what is beautiful, and that one cannot desire that of which is already possessed. The ultimate/primary objective of love as being related to an absolute form of beauty that is held to be identical to what is good is debated throughout the dialogue, and Diotima expands on this description of love as being a pursuit of beauty (by which one can attain the goal of love) that culminates in an understanding of the form of beauty. The purpose of this paper is to consider the speeches presented (i.e. those of Phaedrus, Pausanias, Eryximachus, Aristophanes, and Agathon) in Plato 's Symposium as separate parts that assist in an accounting of the definition and purpose of platonic love.

Diotima tells Socrates that philosophers (lovers of wisdom) are in between the gods and the ignorant. She says Love is one of the philosophers, because he is in between wisdom and ignorance. This is because his father Plenty has wisdom but his mother does not. Diotima, who says wisdom is one of the most beautiful things, believes "Love is a love for the beautiful, so Love must necessarily be a philosopher" (99).

Under the influence of Diotima, Socrates has come to understand that Love must not be confused with the object of love, which is in contrast, extremely beautiful and extremely good. Diotima has explained to Socrates that if love desires, but does not possess beautiful and good things, then love cannot, as most people think, be a god (Symposium 5). However, though Love cannot be beautiful or good, this does not mean on the contrary that he is ugly and evil, but rather at some point in-between. So Diotima, taught Socrates that Love is not a god, but a daimon, or something like a spirit that not only conveys the prayers of man to the gods and the answers and commands of the gods to the minds of man alike (Symposium 5), connecting one who desires something with that which he desires. “He is by nature neither mortal nor immortal, … never in want and never in wealth; and, further, he