ΠΑΛΙΝ ἘΞ ἈΡΧΗΣ: Resumption and Recollection in Plato

Framing the Dialogues: Reading Openings and Closures in Plato, ed. A. Tsakmakis, E. Kaklamanou, M. Pavlou (Leiden, Brill), 2020

This paper approaches the subject of Platonic beginnings and endings primarily from the perspective of the Phaedrus, the only dialogue in which questions of discursive form and unity, including the function of beginnings and endings, provide part of the work’s own theoretical subject-matter. After noting some neglected evidence for ancient sensitivity to the philosophical symbolism of the very first words of the Phaedrus, I offer selective observations on how the beginnings and endings of the dialogues are notable in general for their avoidance of strongly closed form and instead frequently dramatise a kind of tension between the contingency of life and the hoped for determinacy of philosophy. I then examine in detail the way in which the beginnings and endings of the dialogue’s own three set-piece logoi are drawn into a larger discussion of discursive form, including Socrates’ remarks on the desirable ‘organic unity’ of a good logos. But I reject the almost universal assumption that we can extract from the Phaedrus a definitive set of principles of discursive form which can be directly applied to the practices of Plato’s dialogues themselves. Platonic writing manifests a complexity which exceeds Socrates’ theorisation of discursive form in the Phaedrus.

This paper has appeared in "Philosophy and Dialogue. Studies on Plato’s Dialogues", ed. by A. Bosch-Veciana and J. Montserrat-Molas, Barcelonesa d’Edicions, Barcelona 2007, vol. I, pp. 15-31. --- The supposed disproportion between Plato and every other strictly contemporary writer of Socratic dialogues, reinforced as it is by an unbridgeable divide between the considerable knowledge available to us about the former (along with the immense interpretive work devoted to his writings) and the meagre knowledge available about the latter, has generally prevented the scholarly community from paying due attention to what Plato may have had in common with his fellows, and from appreciating how the availability of many Socratic dialogues for contemporary readers and the success of the Sokratikoi logoi (as a literary genre) may have affected the shaping of any new Socratic dialogue, his own included. This is mi starting point in search of a better balance betwen Plato and other Socratic writers of the same period.

The paper aims to explain the interpretation of Plato’s doctrine of ideas as advanced by Leo Strauss in one of his first works dealing with Hobbes (The Political Philosophy of Hobbes: Its Basis and Its Genesis, 1935). According to this interpretation, the theory of the separate existence of ideas is specifically justified by Plato’s awareness that ordinary language is the only gateway to the ultimate causes of things. This interpretation is based, among others, on two passages in the Platonic dialogues, Phaedo 99 c-e and Republic 472 c-e. In the former Socrates speaks of the need to “take refuge in the logoi” in order to avoid being blinded by the sight of sensible things. In the latter, Socrates claims that the purpose of the inquiry into the nature of ideal republic is “not to demonstrate the possibility of the realization of this ideal". The paper shows that Leo Strauss’s hermeneutics of Plato was influenced by the teaching of Husserl and Heidegger, particularly by the need for a critique of the modern way of conceiving the relationship between theory and practice. The excursus on Plato in the book about Hobbes shows in an exemplary way the 'phenomenological function' that Strauss assigns to the hermeneutics of the ancient classics. According to Strauss, the Platonic dialogues and in particular the figure of Socrates shows that philosophy, understood as the pursuit of truth, can never neutralize the conflict with the doxa, understood as the order established by authority. Hence, Platonic dialogues have an intrinsically ‘political’ nature, which requires the reader to perform the difficult task of reactivating the process of liberation from captivity in the world of doxa.

Academia Letters, 2021

In trying to address the question, "why did Plato write dialogues?" this reflection expands on Andrea Nightingale's claims concerning the way in which Plato adopted and adapted the ancient social practice of theoria in order to articulate the characteristics of philosophy as he conceived it. At the center of its building on Nightingale's insights is the following question: in what way did Plato's use of the dialogue form come to facilitate the transition 'from wander to wonder' that Nightingale claims was crucial for Plato's legitimization of philosophy? In unpacking the response to this interrogation, the present piece proceeds to explicate how Plato used dialogue to reproduce the transformative power of the liminal phase characteristic of physical journeys. In doing this it shows that the use of the dialogue form as a tool for philosophical development was not an option but a methodological necessity in light of Plato's drawing from the traditional social practice the Greek called theoria, a practice that not only embraced a disposition for "sacred visualization" but also demanded a capacity for estrangement and disorientation. In discussing our claim that Plato used the dialogue form as a way to instantiate liminality (a necessary move in light of the way in which his articulation of philosophy proceeded to draw from the practice of "traditional theoria"), the present reflection builds on Andrea Nightingale's claims concerning the ancient use of "traditional theoria," which the author shows to

So if the way round is a long one, don't be surprised; for it is for the sake of great things that the journey is to be made, not for those you have in mind (Plato, Phaedrus, 274a2-4 i )

Perspectives on Politics, 2011

PhD Thesis, 2015

The Epistemic Statesman and the Suppression of the Intermediate…………………..312 10. Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………………334 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………………………...340 I wish to thank also Hayden W. Ausland, Professor of Classics at the University of Montana, for his numerous critical comments, questions, and constructive suggestions, as well as the job he undertook of, at one stage or another, proofreading the entirety of this dissertation. Responsibility for the mistakes, inconsistencies, and lack of precision that might be left is entirely mine. My wife Sigrun has supported me unconditionally all the years it took to finish this work. By taking care of our children and doing a lot more than her fair share of the housework, she has given me the opportunity to work evenings, weekends, and holidays. A grant from the Poetry and Philosophy research project allowed me to put the finishing touches to this work. 6 The Intermediate Being of Socratic Philosophy and its Suppression in Plato's Theaetetus, Sophist, and Statesman 9 complete ignorance and absolute truth, human beings can at best hope to attain an incomplete, partial, and preliminary image of divine wisdom, an image that will always be a mixture of the true and false. This has the implication that the Socratic philosopher does not stop philosophizing, but must persist searching for the truth. A philosopher can never know with certainty whether his opinions are true. Awareness of this ignorance should make any philosopher humble and moderate, such as befits any human being, at least according to Plato's Socrates. The power (dunamis) of Socrates' midwifery consists in rendering his interlocutors at a loss in order to make them aware of their own ignorance. To those who fail to know what Socrates is about, Socrates appears as a very unsettling sort of person. He does not follow the traditional scheme of those who engage in intellectual and "philosophical" discussions. Such people should be in possession of knowledge and wisdom, and thus display this to potential students and clients, but Socrates renders other people at loss about certain things and at the same time claims to be ignorant about those very things. Those who are exposed to Socrates' midwifery experience something almost completely opposite to sophistical teaching. Socrates 14 dialogue is meant to be significant is suggested by Plato's very detailed and prolonged description of it. Perhaps nowhere else in Plato do we get so a comprehensive an account of the place of conversation. This geographical sense of place will take on a transferred and relatively abstract sense in the course of the dialogue. Atopia and related terms occur three times in the prologue. 9 The literal sense of the term is "without place", thereby implying "out of place", and so perhaps alluding to the fact that this is the only Platonic dialogue where Socrates converses outside the city walls of Athens. An exception is perhaps The Republic, where the conversation takes place in Piraeus. Piraeus is a place that is somehow in between being in Athens and outside of Athens, since the harbor of Athens is within Athens itself only via the extension of the fortified city called the "long walls". One plausible interpretation is that such a setting is particularly suited for philosophical conversations. Philosophy is a potentially dangerous activity because of its critical disposition. Being among friends in an intimate setting, Socrates can speak more freely. The Symposium also has a similar setting, but within the city. In this dialogue, Socrates is very direct about the situatedness of philosophy. Eros is described as a daimon and philosopher. The philosopher is situated between (metaxu) the wise and the ignorant, between ugliness and beauty as well as between human beings and gods. The parallels between Eros and Socrates are striking. 10 The philosopher's indeterminacy in being intermediate is experienced by Alcibiades as very out of place. In his encomium of Socrates, strangeness (atopia) is the key characteristic of Socrates "in himself and in his speeches" (221d2). 11 This strangeness is similar to the one the lover experiences in the Phaedrus, when he recalls the image of the beautiful beloved. But this is perhaps to get a little too far ahead of things. The interplay between topos and atopia in the Phaedrus is set in motion when Socrates and Phaedrus are on their way out of the city. I. The dialogue starts with the theme of Eros, when Socrates stumbles upon the beautiful Phaedrus in the city. In this encounter between the lover and the beloved another major theme in the dialogue is prepared, namely a movement from concealment to disclosure: Phaedrus is hiding a speech by the famous rhetorician Lysias under his cloak. He wants to practice his memorizing of the speech on Socrates. But Socrates discloses both Phaedrus' intentions and the hidden 9 229c6, 229e1, 230c6 10 See e.g. Hunter (2004), p. 80 and Bloom (1993) p. 133 11 215a2 and 221d1 15 speech. He will not let Phaedrus speak until "(…) first, my love, you show me what you have in your left hand under your cloak. I'll hazard (topazô) it's the actual text" 12 (228d6-8). Topazô means "guess" or "aim at" (LSJ). But there may also be a pun on the literal sense of "putting in a place". 13 In a metaphorical sense, this is exactly what Socrates is doing. He is placing the speech in a particular place by disclosing its place of hiding. 14 The place of hiding (under Phaedrus' cloak) has a strong symbolic meaning, being a dialogue about love and rhetoric. This same incident also playfully indicates another important and related theme; the one of image and original. Phaedrus is trying to trick Socrates into hearing his image of Lysias' speech instead of the original. But, as indicated above, Socrates exposes his intentions: "(…) bear in mind that, as fond of you as I am, I am not prepared to let you practice your speaking skills on me, not when Lysias is actually present among us" (228d-e). But this "presence" of Lysias is in reality only another image in the form of a written speech. In the discussion of writing in the last part of the dialogue, writing is considered only an image (eidôlon 276a9) of the spoken word. The theme of image/original and presence/absence is set in motion. II. Phaedrus and Socrates are now on their way into the countryside conversing. As they walk along the river Ilissus, Phaedrus brings up the myth about Boreas and Oreithuia. He asks Socrates whether he really thinks the mythic story is true. In his rather long response to Phaedrus, the first two instances of atopia occur. In the first part of his reply, Socrates makes an important distinction between himself and "the wise" (hoi sophoi): 15 What do you mean? If, like the wise men of our day, I didn't believe in these stories, I wouldn't be so out of place (atopos). 16 And in my wisdom, I would say that the Borean wind blew Oreithuia down from the rocks nearby while she was playing with Pharmakeia. 229c6-8 19 Socrates is "without place" or "out of place" in the sense that, in imitating, he is not himself. Imitating means being other than oneself, and this is yet another way of being possessed. If you don't know what you are doing, possession can be dangerous and lead astray. But, as we will see in the palinode, it can also lead toward transcendence in the sense of metaphysical being and truth. By the description of the grove (230b2-c5), which has become paradigmatic as a topos of love and seduction, 27 Socrates is communicating to both Phaedrus and the readers that there is a seduction taking place, and, as it turns out, a philosophical seduction carried out by way of imitations. The themes indicated by place in the prologue can be summed up as consisting of three interrelated aspects: (1) the prologue plays out a movement between concealment and disclosure in a way that points to the relation between image and original. (2) The grove is potentially a place of transcendence, (3) and it indicates a theme of seduction, pointing forward to the divine madness of the philosophic lovers. All these aspects draw attention to the movement upward, to the divine. Strangeness (atopia) is associated with ignorance, imitation and mixed images, elements that potentially represent a danger to the movement upward. As such these elements are the first intimation of a theme centering on human limitations and the limitations of philosophy. What follows from this is a tension manifest in Socrates' two paradigms of self-understanding: a beast more complex than the Typhon and something simple and divine. The two kinds of imagesthe mixed and strange as opposed to the simple and divineare linked to the pair place and placelessness or strangeness (atopia). Part two will explore how this pair is an important doublet for the organization of the dialogue. More particularly, it will ask, is the interplay between place and strangeness an image of that interplay between image and original, which points to the limits and transcendence in human nature? Part two: Place and Strangeness as Recurrent themes in the Phaedrus There are seven instances of place in the main body of the text. 28 All of them refer to some kind of divine place, either the sacred grove or some place in heaven. This can hardly be a coincidence possible when a direct vision of those beings is no longer fully accessible? If we assume that the difference between images and originals lies in the partiality of images in relation to their originals, a serious problem occurs for the activity of recollection. How can the viewer be sure that he recollects correctly? How can we be sure that we are not mistaking a false image for a true one and correctly identify the true? 37 The palinode does not solve the problem of original and image. On the contrary, it confirms that imitation poses a genuine philosophical problem within the dialogue. Even the genuine...

2022

Perspectives on Political Science, Vol. 40/4 (2011)

The 'problem of Socrates' in McNeill's subtitle refers contextually to Nietzsche's evaluation of Socrates as a decadent in a decadent phase of Greek culture but more thematically to the Socrates that appears in Plato's dialogues. McNeill's method is to use contemporary critiques of Socrates to orient his questioning and defence of Plato's Socrates. The text is thus primarily textually oriented toward a reading of Plato's Republic intended to prove that Socrates is not a decadent but a critic of the decadence of his time. The extensive textual interpretations are detailed, sensitive to the dramatic form of the dialogue, and make use of pertinent cross-references to other salient dialogues.