Plato'sBeauty, And The Concept Of Beauty?

What is beautiful? How do people define beauty? People view differently. Usually, we judge people, first, from his or her appearance then to their inherence. It is a common fact that appearance has an indirect

Eros, desire, and love. These three terms can be easily confused with one another. However, they contain various characteristics that sets each one apart from the other. In the Symposium, by Plato, the men create speeches in praise of “Eros”. In these speeches they explore Eros, love, desire, what is desirable, what is worthy of love and even the concept of romantic love that we are familiar with today.

Agathon hosted a gathering for a small group of philosophers to talk about how they perceive love and what their own unique ideas are of beauty, virtue, honor, or anything else that may fall under the category of love. Eros, or Love, is a god that the philosophers have decided to praise with a speech of their own perspective. You get to see each philosophers different style and way of thinking within their speeches. All philosophers have agreed to drink while each other is speaking, but there is no pressure from one another or one’s self to drink excessively. The first to kick off the speeches is Phaedrus, an idealist, who believes that being shamed upon who you love most is of the highest caliber of embarrassment, even compared to relatives

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.

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

Socrates dismisses the ideas and conceptions about love of the other guests of the symposium, namely Alcibiades, in favor of his own seemingly “better” conceptions. During Alcibiades’ speech, Socrates is depicted to be the embodiment of one who has ascended the “staircase” of love in which Diotima has described, and Alcibiades is depicted to be the embodiment of one who is at the bottom of this “staircase”(Plato, The Symposium, 49). Alcibiades states the numerous occurrences where Socrates has denied Alcibiades’ offer of sex, and it is established that Socrates has ascended so far up the staircase of love that he “regard[s] beauty of body as something petty”(Plato, 48). As in The Clouds, Socrates also looks down upon others in The Symposium. It is shown that Socrates finds material, “outside” things, such as sex, physical desire, and physical beauty, to be inferior to immaterial “inside” things such as internal beauty, and intellect and its beauty.

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

Plato’s Symposium attempts to define the eclectic theory of love, a theory that is often believed to be the universal principle that guides mankind’s actions. Plato introduces several narratives in the form of a dialogue that seek to characterize this multifaceted theory of Eros. The meaning of love naturally varies in each narrative. Yet, in this dialogue of love, Plato presents a metaphysical approach to understanding the ambiguous meaning of love. Ultimately, Plato values the perennial quest for knowledge above all else. In Symposium, Platonic love is exhibited in the relationship between virtue and desire, as expressed in Diotima’s ladder. Desire is the vehicle, or the means to an end. The six Athenians ultimately present different

What is beauty? Beauty have a lot of definition and very subjective. There are many kinds of beauty has given and loaned to us by the creators, ALLAH, such as the vast blue ocean, high mountains clawed the sky, the planets rotate in the orbit, the rainbow that appeared after the rain, the green forest, the fresh air and many others. All of this beauty will give the peace of mind and make everyone be grateful for this lovely creation especially for nature lovers.

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.

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

Throughout The Republic by Plato, the character of Socrates touches on many theories and ideas. One of the main ideas that carries all throughout the text, is the concept of beauty. Socrates comes up with specific rules on how beauty should be executed. Specifically concerning the type of music one may hear, the feelings one may share and how beauty is defined.

What is beauty? How do we decide who is attractive and who is not? Society is full of information telling us what is beautiful, but what fact is that information based on? The topic of beauty has been studied, analyzed and controversial for centuries. We all know the feeling you can have when you hear a beautiful song that brings joy to your heart, stand in a field of flowers that excites your eyes, or admire a face that is visually pleasing. As human beings, we are all drawn to beauty, but what is it that makes something beautiful? The controversial issue that surrounds beauty is that some believe that true beauty is defined by someone’s outer appearance, while others believe it is something that is experienced through a person’s

Plato’s Symposium is a group of written dialogues in which Plato records speeches from many distinguished men regarding love. One of these men, Socrates, tells a story in which he recalls a conversation he had with Diotima on the subject of beauty. Although Diotima and Socrates made some interesting points concerning the concept of beauty, in a modern interpretation, this passage can be easily read as homophobic. With the incorporation of heteronormative metaphors, the use of a male and a female narrator, and the promotion of what could be classified as unhealthy relationships, Plato’s approach to beauty should not be used in a modern setting due to the dated homophobic concepts.

Beauty could be defined as an outward apperience.According to William Shakespeare(1588) “Beauty is bought by judgement of the eye”. A lot of people cave into beauty as being a thing they look at. Beauty is something that brings their eyes happiness like Stendhal(1871)said, “Beauty is the promise of happiness”. They lust after someone because of the pleasure they