The SOPHISTS

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The SOPHISTS

• Sophists wise and informed persons
• They made a living by teaching the citizens for
  money.
• Theyre critical of traditional mythology
• For them philosophical speculations are
  fruitless, man cannot know the truth about nature
  and the universe. - skepticism
• Theyre concerned with man and his place in
  society. trying to replicate in the domain of
  ethics and politics what the Presocratics had
  achieved in the domain of physics.

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Sophists

• Cultural relativism to ethical relativism to
  epistemological skepticism
• Man is the measure of all things. Protagoras
• All opinions are equally true.
• Truth or good is a matter of preference.

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Socrates

• (470 399)
• Son of sculptor and midwife
• Married Xanthippe, but had probably fallen in
  love with Alcibiades, a young soldier.
• Extremely ugly short an stout, potbellied had
  bulging eyes and a snub nose.
• But inside he was perfectly delightful, the
  wisest, and justest, and best of all men whom I
  have ever known. - Plato
• He was irritated by the Sophists and their
  promotion of the idea that all things are
  relative.
• Never wrote down his ideas, thus he is known only
  through the writings of his student, PLATO.

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The Art of Discourse

• Socrates did not teach nor instruct people,
  rather he discussed with them.
• Playing ignorant He gave the impression that he
  does not know anything and that he desires to
  learn from others.
• Ideas or the truth is given birth through his
  questioning with his interlocutor. So, like his
  mother who was a midwife, Socrates assisted in
  giving birth to ideas which he believed is always
  within us.
• - this method is called MAIEUTICS.
• This is also called Socratic irony
• Athens is like a sluggish horse, and I am the
  gadfly trying to sting it into life.

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Right Insight to Right Action

• He who knows what good is will do good.
• When we do wrong it is because we dont know any
  better.
• He holds that there is a universally valid
  definition of right and wrong.
• The ability to distinguish between right and
  wrong lies in peoples reason and not in society.

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Plato

• (437 347) his actual name was Aristocles
• Son of a wealthy and powerful family.
• At about 20, became student of Socrates
• After Socrates death he wandered around Greece
  and Mediterranean.
• Founded the Academy in 386.
• Let no one ignorant of mathematics enter here.
• Died at the age of 80, in his sleep.

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Plato
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Two Worlds
World of Ideas
World of the Senses
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World of Ideas

• Ultimate reality
• Permanent, unchanging
• Eternal, immutable
• Spiritual
• Perfect

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World of the Senses

• Phenomenal world appearances, the manifestation
  of the ideal.
• Illusions
• Flowing, ever-changing
• Decay, corruption
• Like soap bubbles

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Example Idea horse vs. particular horse
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Idea (or form) horse is immutable and will
never pass away.
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TRUE KNOWLEDGE

• We can never have true knowledge of anything that
  is in a constant state of change. We can only
  have opinions about things that belong to the
  world of the senses, tangible things. We can only
  have true knowledge of things that can be
  understood with our reason.

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TRUE KNOWLEDGE

• We can only have inexact conceptions of things we
  perceive with our senses. But we can have true
  knowledge of things we understand with our REASON.

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• The real knowledge of anything (hence science)
  depends upon the recognition of the idea apart
  from sense objects which vary from place to place
  or from person to person.

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• Science (and knowledge in general) is a grasping
  of the universal Idea or Form, which is
  changeless and eternal through its various
  manifestations in physical things.

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• A person tied exclusively to the physical world
  gains only opinionat times illusionfrom the
  senses.
• Knowledge, on the other hand, is of universal
  ideas and gained through pure reason.

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Theory of Forms

• Form Gk. Eidos gt eidetic, idea

• 1. Forms as class concepts

A is x. B is x.
X is here a class concept.
PARTICULAR designating some individual
UNIVERSAL
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Theory of Forms

• 2. Forms as standards

A is more x than B. This woman is more beautiful
than that statue.
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The predicate X serves not merely to classify or
sort entities but also to rank them. Only the
beautiful itself is just beauty uncompounded
with any other properties. The beautiful woman
participates in or shares this beauty with
all other beautiful things, but both she and all
those other things can only be beautiful in
certain respects and to a certain degree.
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Theory of Forms

• 3. Our knowledge of forms

We cannot apprehend forms by our senses. We see
the beautiful person, but beauty itself is not
something we can see or hear. Thus, we apprehend
the forms with the MIND, and forms, like
Beauty, really exist.
Another example What is a circle?
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Theory of Forms

• 4. Reality

That which really exists is to be apprehended
only through thinking. Sensible objects could not
possibly be real they could at best be copies
or images of underlying realities. In short,
what we usually call the real world is not that
at all, but is rather just a world of appearance
or seeming.
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Theory of Forms

• 4. Reality

This woman is beautiful. Can this be genuine
knowledge?
In logic, knowledge can be expressed only in
universal propositions, not in singular
propositions. Thus, with Plato we say, scientific
statements are not about particular objects but
about universals.
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Other notion cosmology

• The heavenly bodies exhibited perfect geometric
  form.
• The world is created by the Demiurge.

FIVE REGULAR SOLIDS
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FIVE REGULAR SOLIDS
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Other notions

• The heavenly bodies exhibited perfect geometric
  form.

FIVE REGULAR SOLIDS

• Tetrahedron (4)
• Hexahedron (6)
• Octahedron (8)
• Icosahedron (20)
• Dodecahedron (12)

Represented the four elements.
Represented the universe as a whole