Philosophy by the Book

Plato's Phaedrus is a great literary work concerning itself with the nature of love and the use of rhetoric. Socrates gives a defense of the virtues both of being in love and not being so and determines whether or not its worth writing down your thoughts or speeches.

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This extremely short piece details some problems that Clitophon has with the way Socrates teaches.

This week we discuss the nature of love with Socrates and friends in one of Plato's most famous dialogues, the Symposium.

This week we explain Socrates' final conversation and the nature of the soul as seen in Plato's Phaedo.

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This week we explore the natures of virtue and knowledge in Plato's Meno. Is virtue a type of knowledge and if so, can it be taught? How can we gain any knowledge if we must already have that knowledge in order to know when we have gained it? Is it possible to have knowledge at all? Do human's really learn, or are we simply recollecting things we already know from past lives. All of these questions and more are explored this week in Plato's Meno.

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Geometry link: http://www.socraticmethod.net/essays/meno_geometry/meno_geometry.html

Socrates gives a funeral oration detailing the history of Athens this week in Plato's Menexenus.

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Today we finish up the Gorgias with the debate between Socrates and Callicles over what is good and if man holds to different laws than the natural world.

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This week we tackle the first half of Plato's Gorgias, an ambitious dialogue concerned with oratory, justice, power and the good.

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Wordplay and not much wisdom abounds in this week's episode focusing on the foolishness of the Sophists as found in Plato's Euthydemus.

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Today we examine Plato's ideas on the philosophy of language in the Cratylus. Are names and words based on truth or on usage? Can we learn the nature of a thing by examining its name? How do letters work and where did they come from? All these questions and more will be answered.

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