… I would very much like to hear Dr. Farrell’s repudiation of Plato as well. So Is it the consensus of GDS (meaning the official policy) that Plato be cancelled? Just wondering and trying to get a feel for the metaphysical landscape.
Well done!
Excellent presentation.
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I’m trying to think of something witty about ‘cave dwellers’…no, nothing…
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Thank you Robert.
Hm. My response has to be 20 characters. Thank you very much Robert!
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“Is it the consensus of GDS (meaning the official policy) that Plato be cancelled?”…I sincerely hope not! No cancellations on GDS…or anywhere else…
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I can’t stand that “control-character”…
ANYTHING, that protends a coming: individual revolution…?
Is my cup of tea, or shot of whiskey; I’ll drink to individualism!
As opposed to:
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… while there are certainly questions to be asked about those IN the cave. There are just as many questions, if not more, to be asked about those who brought about the conditions of The Cave. … Who provides the firewood, who keeps the fire stoked, who makes the placards, who are those who run the placard parade, who determines the order of the procession of the placards, who is The Cave liaison who obviously ventured outside The Cave or who has contact with those outside The Cave to provide the “knowledge” necessary to produce the shapes of the placards, who came up with the idea of The Placard Predicting Contest … these and many others can and should be asked.
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Superiority requires a model of inferiority. Since Plato having come from a well do and educated branch of the existing social order, he would naturally be taught the principles that upheld the established order. Surely his ideas weren’t original. They reflected the existing social order. As for them being promulgated throughout history and perhaps molded to fit various ideas, well that’s what historians are hired to do by their paymasters.
Signs, signs everywhere signs….what do they mean? 
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Looks like a process loop to me…
… some forms of knowledge are better than others. But back for.a moment to Plato’s Fascism. If it is true that Plato is a Fascist and Fascism is a Natural Evil, then it is a Good that we should work to do everything within our power to avoid ourselves and or others being contaminated by Plato’s Fascist thought and by extension anyone who cites or claims any connection to Platonic thought. It is incumbent upon us to repudiate Plato in all forms. A Committee must immediately be formed to thoroughly review the History of Western Thought (including Western Theology, I hear there is quite a bit of Plato in there) and remove any material deemed Platonic in nature.
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Simple- everything’s “Daimons”- and they select the Elect…
Or maybe we could simply point the fascism out and let people react as they will.
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Agree. We need to tear apart western philosophy along with theology and start over to find the truth. This Plato guy has got to go…his thinking
may have permeated and corrupted major historical thought leaders.
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… that sounds like a very dangerous proposition. Is not the recent election for Mayor of New York an instance of pointing the _____________ out and letting the people _______ as they will?
Always heard good things about Montesorri, just depends on the staff I suppose- and the egg they’re trying to crack…
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What exactly are you saying? That if I see something wrong I should keep my mouth shut? I really don’t understand your point.
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Interesting, since for centuries, Public School system in UK (Harrow, Eton etc) are inculcated within the classics (Greek and Roman). An anthology of Elites, dictators and privilege. Now pepper your government and higher education institutions with such paradigms and mindsets.
… The Normative Sciences are generally thought to be Logic, Ethics and Esthetics. It could be the case that these sciences, or at least portions of them, became corrupted … Oh I don’t know possibly by some Thrasymachian Victorian World View involving Empire … and these corruptions percolated down through and into all levels of the Social Machine (including the school system) in the UK. Sadly, bad reasoning kills (many things). It would seem that this also happened here in the USSA and several other Western European nations following World War II.
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… No, you are free to “see” as you “see” and say anything you wish about that which you “see”.
If you “see” Plato as a Fascist you are certainly free to argue that point. Others are also free to “see” Plato differently and counter your argument. Inquiry does not end simply because someone expresses a belief (even a strongly held one). It is the case the your claim (belief) that Plato was a Fascist could be incorrect as well as any claim (belief) to the opposite. Fallibilism is always in play.
… as to the point I was attempting to make. You wrote, “Or maybe we could simply point the Fascism out and let people react as they will.” I replied that I found your proposition (that we let people react as they will) a dangerous one in that to do so makes several assumptions about “the people”. One of the most important assumptions being that the “reaction of the people” will be a rational one.
… It was pointed out to the people of New York that one of the 3 individuals that you are being given to consider for the Office of Mayor of New York City has the following properties and characteristics … and the people reacted by electing one of those 3. Experience will prove whether or not that “reaction” will turn out to be a sound and valid reaction. It could possibly be the case, as it is in any election, that “the people” did not in fact understand what they wanted (or needed) and which candidate could possibly best meet their wants and needs. Electorates often do vote against their own interests.
… Could it be that given the time in which Plato lived and given what he had seen (in the same way that Thomas Hobbes’ experience affected his writing in The Leviathan) that he was attempting to think through what conditions might give the Calliopolis the best chance for survival. Instead of understanding Plato as some kind of Proto-fascist it might be that we should view him as an early Social Contract Theorist. It is clear that Plato had reservations about “the crowd” and its collective reactions and I think that we might do well to have similar reservations.
… in The Laws, the “companion” to The Republic Plato does have nice things to say about a number of issues and questions in relation to Human Freedom.
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