Plato's Moral Psychology

Plato's Moral Psychology PDF Author: Rachana Kamtekar
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192519387
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
Plato's Moral Psychology is concerned with Plato's account of the soul and its impact on our living well or badly, virtuously or viciously. The core of Plato's moral psychology is his account of human motivation, and Rachana Kamtekar argues that throughout the dialogues Plato maintains that human beings have a natural desire for our own good, and that actions and conditions contrary to this desire are involuntary (from which follows the 'Socratic paradox' that wrongdoing is involuntary). Our natural desire for our own good may be manifested in different ways: by our pursuit of what we calculate is best, but also by our pursuit of pleasant or fine things - pursuits which Plato assigns to distinct parts of the soul. Kamtekar develops a very different interpretation of Plato's moral psychology from the mainstream interpretation, according to which Plato first proposes that human beings only do what we believe to be the best of the things we can do ('Socratic intellectualism') and then in the middle dialogues rejects this in favour of the view that the soul is divided into parts with some good-dependent and some good-independent motivations ('the divided soul').

Plato's Moral Psychology

Plato's Moral Psychology PDF Author: Rachana Kamtekar
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192519387
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
Plato's Moral Psychology is concerned with Plato's account of the soul and its impact on our living well or badly, virtuously or viciously. The core of Plato's moral psychology is his account of human motivation, and Rachana Kamtekar argues that throughout the dialogues Plato maintains that human beings have a natural desire for our own good, and that actions and conditions contrary to this desire are involuntary (from which follows the 'Socratic paradox' that wrongdoing is involuntary). Our natural desire for our own good may be manifested in different ways: by our pursuit of what we calculate is best, but also by our pursuit of pleasant or fine things - pursuits which Plato assigns to distinct parts of the soul. Kamtekar develops a very different interpretation of Plato's moral psychology from the mainstream interpretation, according to which Plato first proposes that human beings only do what we believe to be the best of the things we can do ('Socratic intellectualism') and then in the middle dialogues rejects this in favour of the view that the soul is divided into parts with some good-dependent and some good-independent motivations ('the divided soul').

Plato's Psychology (2nd Edition)

Plato's Psychology (2nd Edition) PDF Author: T.M. Robinson
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 9780802075901
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Plato’s Psychology, originally published in 1970 and reprinted in 1972, is still the definitive modern discussion of the nature and development of Plato’s concept of psyche. In a lengthy and detailed new introduction, T.M. Robinson surveys the scope and value of a number of contributions to Plato’s theory of psyche, individual and cosmic, that have appeared since 1970. He then offers his own ‘second thoughts’ on various aspects of the subject, revisiting inter alia such questions as the dating of the Timaeus, and the implication thereof, and the understanding and implication of the myth of the Politicus. Finally, he widens the whole discussion of Plato’s cosmic psychology to include an analysis and appreciation of the remarkably close relationship between much of Plato’s thinking about the universe and its origins and a good deal of twentieth-century theorizing, from Einstein to Hawking. (Phoenix Supplementary Volumes)

Essays on Plato's Psychology

Essays on Plato's Psychology PDF Author: Ellen Wagner
Publisher: Lexington Books
ISBN: 9780739102589
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 404

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Book Description
The last several decades have witnessed an explosion of research in Platonic philosophy. A central focus of his philosophical effort, Plato's psychology is of interest both in its own right and as fundamental to his metaphysical and moral theories. This anthology offers, for the first time, a collection of the best classic and recent essays on cenral topics of Plato's psychological theory, including essays on the nature of the soul, studies of the tripartite soul for which Plato argues in the Republic, and analyses of his varied arguments for immortality. With a comprehensive introduction to the major issues of Plato's psychology and an up-to-date bibliography of work on the relevant issues, this much-needed text makes the study of Plato's psychology accessible to scholars in ancient Greek philosophy, classics, and history of psychology.

Aristotle's On the Soul

Aristotle's On the Soul PDF Author: Aristotle
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 232

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Book Description
In this timeless and profound inquiry, Aristotle presents a view of the psyche that avoids the simplifications both of the materialists and those who believe in the soul as something quite distinct from body. On the Soul also includes Aristotle's idiosyncratic and influential account of light and colors. On Memory and Recollection continues the investigation of some of the topics introduced in On the Soul. Sachs's fresh and jargon-free approach to the translation of Aristotle, his lively and insightful introduction, and his notes and glossaries, all bring out the continuing relevance of Aristotle's thought to biological and philosophical questions.

A Wolf in the City

A Wolf in the City PDF Author: Cinzia Arruzza
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190678860
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
The problem of tyranny preoccupied Plato, and its discussion both begins and ends his famous Republic. Though philosophers have mined the Republic for millennia, Cinzia Arruzza is the first to devote a full book to the study of tyranny and of the tyrant's soul in Plato's Republic. In A Wolf in the City, Arruzza argues that Plato's critique of tyranny intervenes in an ancient debate concerning the sources of the crisis of Athenian democracy and the relation between political leaders and demos in the last decades of the fifth century BCE. Arruzza shows that Plato's critique of tyranny should not be taken as veiled criticism of the Syracusan tyrannical regime, but rather of Athenian democracy. In parsing Plato's discussion of the soul of the tyrant, Arruzza will also offer new and innovative insights into his moral psychology, addressing much-debated problems such as the nature of eros and of the spirited part of the soul, the unity or disunity of the soul, and the relation between the non-rational parts of the soul and reason.

Plato's Psychology

Plato's Psychology PDF Author: T. M. Robinson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Philosophy, Ancient
Languages : en
Pages : 248

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Book Description
Plato's Psychology originally published in 1970 and reprinted in 1972, is still the definitive modern discussion of the nature and development of Plato's concept of psyche. In a lengthy and detailed new introduction T.M. Robinson surveys the scope and value of a number of contributions to Plato's theory of psyche, individual and cosmic, that have appeared since 1970. He then offers his own 'second thoughts' on various aspects of the subject, revisiting inter alia such questions as the dating of the Timaeus, and the implication thereof, and the understanding and implications of the myth of the Politicus. Finally, he widens the whole discussion of Plato's cosmic psychology to include an analysis and appreciation of the remarkably close relationship between much of Plato's thinking about the universe and its origins and a good deal of twentieth-century theorizing, from Einstein to Hawking.

Plato on the Limits of Human Life

Plato on the Limits of Human Life PDF Author: Sara Brill
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253008913
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 273

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Book Description
“A book that is an ambitious, well-researched and provocative scholarly reflection on soul in the Platonic corpus.” —Polis By focusing on the immortal character of the soul in key Platonic dialogues, Sara Brill shows how Plato thought of the soul as remarkably flexible, complex, and indicative of the inner workings of political life and institutions. As she explores the character of the soul, Brill reveals the corrective function that law and myth serve. If the soul is limitless, she claims, then the city must serve a regulatory or prosthetic function and prop up good political institutions against the threat of the soul’s excess. Brill’s sensitivity to dramatic elements and discursive strategies in Plato’s dialogues illuminates the intimate connection between city and soul. “Sara Brill takes on at least two significant issues in Platonic scholarship: the nature of the soul, and especially the language of immortality in its description, and the relationship between politics and psychology. She treats each one of these topics in a fresh and nuanced way. Her writing is beautiful and fluid.” —Marina McCoy, Boston College

Plato's Cosmology and its Ethical Dimensions

Plato's Cosmology and its Ethical Dimensions PDF Author: Gabriela Roxana Carone
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107320739
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description
Although a great deal has been written on Plato's ethics, his cosmology has not received so much attention in recent times and its importance for his ethical thought has remained underexplored. By offering accounts of Timaeus, Philebus, Politicus and Laws X, the book reveals a strongly symbiotic relation between the cosmic and human sphere. It is argued that in his late period Plato presents a picture of an organic universe, endowed with structure and intrinsic value, which both urges our respect and calls for our responsible intervention. Humans are thus seen as citizens of a university that can provide a context for their flourishing even in the absence of good political institutions. The book sheds light on many intricate metaphysical issues in late Plato and brings out the close connections between his cosmology and the development of his ethics.

Plato on Pleasure and the Good Life

Plato on Pleasure and the Good Life PDF Author: Daniel Russell
Publisher: Oxford University Press on Demand
ISBN: 0199282846
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 283

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Book Description
Daniel Russell examines Plato's subtle and insightful analysis of pleasure and explores its intimate connections with his discussions of value and human psychology. Russell offers a fresh perspective on how good things bear on happiness in Plato's ethics, and shows that, for Plato, pleasure cannot determine happiness because pleasure lacks a direction of its own. Plato presents wisdom as a skill of living that determines happiness by directing one's life as a whole, bringing aboutgoodness in all areas of one's life, as a skill brings about order in its materials. The 'materials' of the skill of living are, in the first instance, not things like money or health, but one's attitudes, emotions, and desires where things like money and health are concerned. Plato recognizes thatthese 'materials' of the psyche are inchoate, ethically speaking, and in need of direction from wisdom. Among them is pleasure, which Plato treats not as a sensation but as an attitude with which one ascribes value to its object. However, Plato also views pleasure, once shaped and directed by wisdom, as a crucial part of a virtuous character as a whole. Consequently, Plato rejects all forms of hedonism, which allows happiness to be determined by a part of the psyche that does not direct one'slife but is among the materials to be directed. At the same time, Plato is also able to hold both that virtue is sufficient for happiness, and that pleasure is necessary for happiness, not as an addition to one's virtue, but as a constituent of one's whole virtuous character itself. Plato thereforeoffers an illuminating role for pleasure in ethics and psychology, one to which we may be unaccustomed: pleasure emerges not as a sensation or even a mode of activity, but as an attitude - one of the ways in which we construe our world - and as such, a central part of every character.

The Republic

The Republic PDF Author: Plato
Publisher: The Floating Press
ISBN: 1775413667
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 720

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Book Description
The Republic is Plato's most famous work and one of the seminal texts of Western philosophy and politics. The characters in this Socratic dialogue - including Socrates himself - discuss whether the just or unjust man is happier. They are the philosopher-kings of imagined cities and they also discuss the nature of philosophy and the soul among other things.