Plato: The man who invented modern thinking

This episode explores why Plato remains one of the most influential thinkers in human history—and how his ideas continue to shape not just how we think, but how we live.

Starting with the historical context of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, the conversation traces a pivotal shift—from myth and scattered ideas to a more intentional, structured pursuit of truth. Along the way, we wrestle with questions that still matter today:

•  Did Plato help lay the foundation for the way we understand truth itself? 
•  Why do many thinkers say everything after him is, in some way, responding to his ideas? 
•  What can we learn from the life—and death—of Socrates? 
•  And how do we discern what is true, especially when voices overlap and interpretations differ? 

But this isn’t just a conversation about ancient philosophy.

It’s about what happens when truth moves from theory into practice.

Because if truth is real—if it can be known, pursued, and lived—then it inevitably shapes the way we see the world, the way we make decisions, and the way we carry ourselves in everyday life.

From this Episode:

The Republic of Plato - https://bookshop.org/a/104046/9780465094080

The Last Days of Socrates by Plato - https://bookshop.org/a/104046/9780140455496

The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis - https://bookshop.org/a/104046/9780060652944

Reading for Next Time:

Treatises on Friendship and Old Age by Cicero - https://bookshop.org/a/104046/9781805478270

Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics - https://bookshop.org/a/104046/9780140449495

Follow us Elsewhere:

Colton on Substack: https://substack.com/@coltoncauthen

Article on Plato’s Republic: https://open.substack.com/pub/coltoncauthen/p/platos-republic-and-the-problem-with

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:24

Welcome back to The Greats with Colton and Doc. Today we are going to be diving into the world of Plato.

SPEAKER_03 0:31

Which is a actually a huge world, which is why it's taken us a couple of months to uh to get back online because man, Plato is is the GOAT. I mean, like, he is the great among the greats.

SPEAKER_01 0:42

Yeah, yeah. There's this great and maybe overused quote. I think it's Alfred North Whitehead who says, You have Plato and the rest of philosophy as footnotes on him. Yeah. He really touches on just about everything. So this today we'll certainly not be having a comprehensive conversation, but I think we can give a sort of taste of Plato.

SPEAKER_03 0:59

Yeah, that's the hope is to really just put him at the table, as you will, and just bring you into, you know, everyone into the conversation to experience this great thinker who essentially, it is not an overstatement to say that perhaps he invented modern thinking. You know, like he he took the ancient world and literally transitioned it into the modern world. Instead of just random stuff, we're gonna think systematically about things, which was really he was the first one to do it, and we're still doing it.

SPEAKER_01 1:23

Yeah, it's really a quantum leap from what came before, yeah. So maybe give us a little bit of context on, you know, for people who aren't familiar, when is Plato? Yeah, you know, when did when did this happen?

SPEAKER_03 1:34

Yeah, like was he 4000 BC or 280? Like so just to orient, so Homer, you know, we did Homer who was about 700 BC coming, uh coming up. Now Socrates is coming in at uh 450, 400 BC, and Socrates was the first, really uh in Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, right in that order. Uh and uh Socrates was killed for his uh his philosophy in 399. Plato is writing the Republic right around 375, so about 25 years later. And so, you know, late fourth century BC, and in some ways, really the height of the Greek culture of thinking and and whatnot.

SPEAKER_01 2:15

Yeah, yeah, and it's important to note too, so Socrates doesn't write anything. Uh, so everything we know about Socrates comes from Plato and his dialogues, and so sometimes in talking about it, it's a little bit hard to say this is Plato or this is Socrates. Right. Uh but that's an important thing just to recognize that Socrates teaches Plato, who then so we think of Plato as being the goat. In a sense, Socrates is the one who really has this revolutionary thinking, at least per Plato. And then Plato's his student, who takes it and codifies it or puts it into some dialogues. Yeah. And then uh Plato teaches Aristotle, who then takes things even further. Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:48

Yeah. So those three, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, really changed the world, and we still are living in their shadow. And Plato, uh, you know, we'll get to uh to um Aristotle next time, but Plato is really, I think, the pinnacle. You cannot overstate his impact on the world and on our thinking today. Um, there was a story about him, the absolute uh monarch Dionysius invited Plato to come and teach him some philosophy and try to apply some of the things from the Republic. So Plato shows up and uh he's talking with Dionysius, and he's making a case that uh, you know, virtuous men are the happiest, and tyrants are are, you know, have the least virtue. And so the people who who do do well, they they do well. And then the the tyrants, you know, they're miserable. And and Dionysius says, you know, you're talking like a fool. And Plato says, You're talking like a tyrant. And he barely survived that actually, and escaped back uh to Greece. And um, and and so he he didn't do well in politics. He got into it a little bit, but got back into to philosophy. But it was if that's how groundbreaking it was. That's that story shows how how different it was that he literally was was uh barely escaped with his life for for for teaching this in in reality.

SPEAKER_01 4:02

Yeah. Yeah. Speaking of which, so Plato's thing is philosophy. I mean, that's what if you were to put him in a bucket, it would be a philosopher. I think it would be helpful for us to talk a little bit about philosophy, yeah. What it is, yeah, yeah. You know, is it dangerous? Is it something that uh who should approach it? And that and the republic deals with all those questions. Yeah. Maybe I'll just start out by saying philosophy, literally, philosophia, love of wisdom. Yes, is roughly what it is. And there's a a contrast maybe to be made between philosophy prior to roughly the 20th century, uh, where there's a sort of change. Yeah, one of the things that changes is that philosophers start stop writing for common people out of maybe a love of wisdom and helping other people engage with that and start writing for each other and really just focusing on hyper-technical questions.

SPEAKER_03 4:44

Yeah, and that unfortunately is a casualty of the academy, right? So um, as professors began to need to make their way in the world, like you say, in the 20th century, instead of writing for people loving wisdom, they wrote they wrote to make a name for themselves, to get their book published, to keep their tenure, to get the funding. And it really became a question of funding in the modern world. And so sadly, it it became its own insular thing rather than an actual outwardly focused discipline to help the world.

SPEAKER_01 5:12

Yeah, yep, great. And I think that's a huge that is a huge that would certainly be like the heart of Socrates or Plato's that philosophy is something that helps us think better so that we can live better.

SPEAKER_03 5:20

Yeah, and I mean Plato comes by honestly, right? Because Socrates literally died for his for his faith, if you will, in his philosophy. He he could have escaped, he could have taken the the back door and gone into exile, but he didn't. He said, I'm gonna drink the poison and and what and it was all trumped up, it was all ridiculous, and he knew it, but he stayed true to his principles and died for it. So this is literally the the the Plato's mentor is Socrates who died for his philosophy, and now here's Plato, who's gonna stick to stay sti stick true to his guns, and and we thankfully now benefit from that.

SPEAKER_01 5:54

Yeah, yeah, I think that gets also to this question of is philosophy dangerous, which uh for Socrates it was, you mentioned that. Yes. Um, and and I but I think this comes to color a lot of Plato's understanding, it comes out in the Republic. I mean, one way of thinking of the Republic is it's a defense of philosophy in the city, that philosophy not only has a role to play, but for Plato, you need a philosopher king if you're gonna have the development sort of this good republic. Um, but the fact that Socrates, who was doing true philosophy and got killed for it was essentially a martyr for philosophy, yeah, that comes to color, I think, a lot of Plato's attitude and his own experience, where, like you mentioned in the story, he he goes tries to get into politics, and politics and philosophy don't mix well.

SPEAKER_03 6:34

No, no, because the politicians don't want what they don't want wisdom, they want what they want. And so when when Plato was trying to stick up for wisdom, he got run out of town. And so that is the thing, and that's why philosophy is so beautiful and important, uh, because uh we it's in it's important for us to understand what's right, what's true, what's real, what's good, and and he was trying to answer the questions, what is good and what is the good life, what is real, and how do I, how do I live well? Like these are core questions to our humanity that he's trying to ask and honor, answer, answer honestly, not for his tenure, not for his paper, not to get himself on the docket at the next conference, but for real, right? And and to help help humanity understand those things. And so I love it that he he doesn't give up. He stays on his task. What is good? What is the good life? What is real, and how can we live that well? And and what is virtue? How can we have a good in the Republic, of course, how can we have a good state and all get along and basically improve our lives?

SPEAKER_01 7:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:36

Good questions to ask, important questions to ask, but they will get you crossways with guys that have a different agenda.

SPEAKER_01 7:41

Yes, absolutely. I think they're, I mean, it's asking the most important questions in life, which on its own is is kind of a dangerous thing to do, in that some questions are are maybe better left unasked than asked half-heartedly. And so when you get into asking these really deep and important questions, you need to be prepared to do it well. Because if you come up with the wrong answers to the most important questions, that's gonna harm you.

SPEAKER_03 8:05

Well, we all know now too how so much research is sponsored, you know, by interested parties, right? And they're expecting your research to skew to their thing. And that's where Plato stands apart. He says, I'm not going to be beholden to anything, I'm going to be beholden to the truth. And he was a true truth seeker. And so he is a good example for us. You know, there's a modern book that's famous now called Um uh Ideas Have Consequences. And essentially that's kind of where philosophy is, and that's where Plato was. Ideas have consequences. And they, if you if you get to a certain point of a line of thinking, and the line of thinking demands that conclusion, it makes it harder to deny. That's what is so powerful about Plato is he doesn't just kind of state his opinions or uh this is the way I think it is, or whatever. He's he he's he's questions, he gets there in such tiny steps, by the time you get to the end, you're like there's nowhere to go back to and reroute. Like it's it just is the obvious conclusion. So that's what's powerful and strong about Plato and helpful to the rest of us to learn that that model of get to someplace in tiny steps, not huge leaps.

SPEAKER_01 9:17

Yeah. Yeah, I think too, the the nature of Plato's work, which are dialogues, is really important. And it says something important about his view of philosophy and how it should be done, which is not necessarily here are these propositions we're gonna just lay out your premise, premise, conclusion, but it's something that happens in conversation. It's something that's living, it's a way that we live, and it comes to impact the way we live. I think of the dialogue with Euthyphro where tell us dialogues.

SPEAKER_03 9:43

Well, what's happening there? Because a lot of folks may not be familiar with like what is a dialogue of flavor.

SPEAKER_01 9:48

Sure, yeah. Yeah, because when I came to Plato, I kind of expected it's gonna be this dry, sort of dense philosophical work, but it's really a narrative and dialogue. Story. It's a story, and and he does the story primarily. There's a little bit of setting and context that comes out, but it's primarily multiple characters. Yes, there are characters, and those characters have they're real characters, you know, they're not just voice pieces, but it's a conversation. And so it's, you know, you think of it maybe like you would think of reading a play where it's you know the lines that the different people are saying. Right. And so that's roughly what the dialogue is, it's just back and forth conversation between human beings.

SPEAKER_03 10:20

Yeah, and what's interesting is Plato writes into the dialogues when the his uh his conversation partners, they disagree or they don't think that's true, or they challenge it. And and so, you know, you realize Plato's writing all this, but but he's writing uh, you know, but he it's easy to put yourself into the the the story because you're thinking the same thing. You're thinking, wait, I didn't see that. And then Plato goes, Oh, you didn't see that. And he, you know, and so he he kind of just walks you through it, and then even if he's like, he's like, I disagree, and like, yeah, and and so I found myself really uh it was easy to follow the story, and I'm so thankful that he wrote it that way.

SPEAKER_01 10:58

Yeah, yeah, it's a great, it is probably the best introduction to philosophy.

SPEAKER_03 11:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:02

Uh, if you want to, if you're kind of curious what philosophy is, what it's about, probably better than getting an introduction to philosophy textbook would be to far better. Right, yes, open up uh The Republic or one of one of Plato's other dials.

SPEAKER_03 11:14

And I do want to say one thing about that. That's that's exactly right, because it is so much easier and better to just read Plato. I know I know again, out of humility, a lot of folks like, oh, I couldn't read Plato. Let me just get some article about him, or you know, somebody wrote about a summary, et cetera. Fine, you know, but it just do it. Just just read Plato because he's great for a reason. And most of the professors writing about Plato are 10 times more confusing than Plato himself. Just go through it. Now, having said that, it's not simple. Like, um, one thing I uh experienced was how you know if you can digest an Oreo very quickly and a steak very long because the nutrients in a steak are much more layered and uh and complex. And that's the same as true for Plato. You're not gonna just blow through and go, whoo, I know Plato, you know, but you you can understand what he's doing and saying a lot easier than a lot of folks writing about it. So just you know, get face to face with Plato.

SPEAKER_01 12:09

Yeah. And I think I would challenge, you know, one of the reasons we have is this sort of rooted in humility, perhaps like, oh, this is too too much for me. And another one is that, well, I don't have time for that. And I think that the uh Euthyphro, which is a good one would be a good one to uh read as well, speaks to this. And that I won't get into the details of the dialogue. Okay, say that again. What was the name of that? The Euthyphro.

SPEAKER_03 12:28

Euthyphro.

SPEAKER_01 12:29

Yep. So the Euthyphro at the end of it, uh, yeah, and I think I can just get to get to the end without much context on it. But at the end, Socrates is having this dialogue with Euthyphro, I should say. And at the very end of it, Euthyphro basically is at an impasse. He doesn't, he can't answer the question, what is uh the pious or just or good? And he says, Well, I've got other things I've got to do. And the the main takeaway from that, at least when I read it, is he's too busy living to figure out how to live well. Right. And that is maybe a great description of the modern world. Too busy living to figure out how to live well.

SPEAKER_03 13:02

Yeah, you just get in a rut, you just get in your thing, and 40 years go by. And you don't think about it. You don't think about how do I want to be a great man or a great citizen or a great husband or father or friend? Uh, how do I want to develop my gifts? What are my gifts? What about God? What about eternity? And so many people come to me at the end of their lives and they have these big questions. I'm like, why I'm glad you're asking. But this should have been a conversation we had 50 years ago. And imagine the difference in your life if you would have done that and had the hard, difficult conversations 50 years ago rather than at the end when it's urgent and too late to make any course corrections. And so that's what I think Plato in philosophy is so good at is forcing us to do the hard the heavy lifting of thinking about our lives. And so it's so, so worth it.

SPEAKER_01 13:54

Yeah. Yep. And I would challenge and invite everybody to join us with this project, because I think this will be a great introduction to doing it.

SPEAKER_03 14:00

Absolutely. So here we go.

SPEAKER_01 14:03

So for the Republic, then, if you wanted to go ahead and dive into that, let's do it. Maybe what are some of your big takeaways or something you wanted to start out?

SPEAKER_03 14:12

Yeah, so real quickly, I want to give everybody an example of how it's so relevant. So James Clear wrote the uh atomic habits, you know, multi-million bestseller, New York Times. And um, one of his uh things he writes about is the Goldilocks principle that when you when you train, yeah, you can't train, you can't over-train or under-train. You, you know, you don't want to too hot, not too cold, you want to do it just right. You want to push yourself right to the edge, but um, but live in that middle. And what I found interesting was that he gets this, whether he knows it or not, from Plato. Plato was already there, right, in uh 2,500 years ago. So um Plato makes this comment, he says, there seem to be two causes of deterioration in the arts. So he's just kind of thinking about how what causes the arts, uh, and that's the arts of of any craft, right? To to go downhill. What are they? And his partner says, wealth and poverty. How do they act? So he saws when uh when when you get wealthy, you get slack. But when you have poverty, you feel hopeless and you give up. So the way to uh keep your arts growing and on the right track is to have neither poverty nor wealth, but just live right essentially in the middle class, be doing just enough because that will push you to grow. And I'm like, okay, James Clear, Goldilocks principle. Like he didn't have yeah, he didn't have that that that hand, but it's exactly what he's talking about. And so to make us think, all right, and in my own life, I think, yeah, that's right. When I'm when things are just off the charts, you let off. And when they're plummeting, you let off. But when they're in the middle, you're fighting for it. And so I thought, man, Plato is, and he goes on for pages and pages of, you know, to describe how how you how you then revitalize the arts or whatever your art is, whether it's whether it's uh your vocation or whether it's relationships or whatever. And I think that was super helpful. And you know, James Clear is selling millions of books on it here, but Plato was talking about it in 400 BC, right? Yeah, so things like that um I think are so encouraging to realize this again, technology goes on, but the humanities, Plato is probably smarter than your philosophy professor in college. Like he is ahead of the game.

SPEAKER_01 16:15

Yeah, yeah, it's interesting too. The to bring it into conversation with uh Proverbs, there's this proverb, uh, Proverb 38 and 9, which says almost the exact same thing. It's almost like a prayer that says, Give me neither wealth, yes, nor poverty. Neither riches nor poverty. Because if I have riches, then I'll forget you and say, uh, who is God? That's right. But if I have poverty, I'll I'll steal and dishonor the world. Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 16:37

Yes, yeah. And so give just give me just enough, give me my daily bread so that I will be thankful and keep going. So, yeah, exactly. So Solomon, you know, I I guess Solomon uh beat Plato to it.

SPEAKER_01 16:46

Yeah, yes, it was earlier, right? Yes, and then Plato teaches Aristotle. So we when we get to the Nicomachean ethics, I mean, this is the huge idea that comes out over and over again, the golden Aristotle's golden mean, you know, as we call it now. Yeah. Uh so okay.

SPEAKER_03 16:58

One thing before we jump in, you know, okay, so the the Republic, 10 books, uh, and I do want to get into a quote from each of the books because they're just all so great, just to kind of get to bring you, uh bring everybody into to conversation with Plato. But before we do that, it we will be remiss to say that the Plato is by far the most flaw famous philosopher of all time, and his cave illustration from book seven is the most famous illustration in philosophy of all time. And so the cave illustration, he is right here in the republic. Um, and it is so good, and it is still instructive for us today.

SPEAKER_01 17:36

Yeah, yeah. I, you know, I had heard of the cave illustration multiple times before ever coming to and reading the republic. And I'll just say again, you have to read it. You have to read what he says, you know, yourself. Yeah, that was definitely, you know, it's famous for a reason. It was one of the highlights of the the whole book for me.

SPEAKER_03 17:53

Yeah. And so um, in a nutshell, let me just summarize it because we we can't start and not start with the cave. So uh very briefly, he's describing this situation. There's a figure in a cave who's chained looking forward down into the cave, and there's a fire behind him and some figures holding up signs, like, you know, imagine like a bird or a tree on a pole. And the the people who are chained looking down into the cave, all they see is the shadow. It's kind of like the, you know, the bird or whatever. Yeah, they see the shadow of the tree, and they see the shadow of the bird and the shadow of whatever, and they for their whole lives, this is all they see. And they think that's what's real because that's all they've experienced. And then one of them becomes unchained and makes his way up out into the real world and sees wait, there's actual birds, actual trees, and uh there's a sun that gives light, not just this fire. And I see all these real things, and then he goes down back into the cave to tell them, and they laugh at him. I tell him he's ridiculous, he's a a maniac because this is what's real on the wall of the cave, these images. And he uses this illustration to show us about the nature of reality. How did it hit you?

SPEAKER_01 19:16

Yeah, so two things. One is I see the cave everywhere now. Yeah, see people in the cave. Yeah, you know, one low-hanging fruit is I see people just like looking at this screen all the time. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:27

Like that is not the real world. Right. Right. Uh, that is that's shadow, like you're looking into shadows, essentially. And like there's this actual real substance of reality with human beings and relationships. Uh, so it makes me think of that and wanting to pull people out of that cave and show them the sun, right? There's light out here in reality. Um, so that was a big one for me. And then education, which is what is you know, the cave is about education, essentially. So he starts out book seven saying, let us think about uh the manner of education. Actually, I should probably turn to it and read it, but but let us think about what education looks like in this ideal city that they're sort of formulating. Yeah. And what's down in the cave is sort of the nature of things, and what Plato wants to do is bring about education, which is the leading of those people out of the cave out to the out into the sunlight.

SPEAKER_03 20:14

Yeah. And so he says uh at the beginning of book seven, you know, let me show you how far our nature is enlightened and unenlightened. So he's gonna make this contrast of enlightenment and unenlightenment, and he goes through and he he talks about the cave, and he says, like you said, there's these images on the wall, but they're shadows, and then there's a second layer of reality, which are concrete objects that are actual real. And then there's a third uh layer, which is reflecting on the nature of those objects, and then there's a fourth layer of our experience, which is wisdom that comes from that reflection. So he's kind of breaking our experience down into four layers. One is the the the images, two is the forms, the real forms, three is reflecting on those forms, and then fourth is the wisdom that comes from that. So that's the progression he's hoping that you know towards enlightenment, towards the sun, if you will. Uh, and he says here at the end, um, uh, the light of the fire is the sun, and you will not misapprehend me if you interpret the journey upwards to be the ascent of the soul into the intellectual world, according to my uh poor belief, which at your desire I have expressed, whether rightly or wrongly, God knows. Uh but whether true or false, my opinion is that in the world of knowledge, the idea of good appears last of all, because it's the hardest to reach, and is seen only with effort. And when seen, it is also inferred to be the universal author of all things. So he he talks about God, but he also talks about good, and he almost uses those words interchangeably. Um, and the immediate source of reason and truth in the intellectual is this good, and that is the power upon which he who would act rationally, either in public or private life, must have his eye fixed. In other words, you must fix your eyes on God and good. And but that's gonna take work. It's hard to get there. I'm like, there's like a hundred verses for this. Like, I was like, Yeah, this is exactly. What the Bible teaches us that reality is like. It's hard, but good and God are the greatest things. And with work, we can, in observation and thought, and reflection, we can get to wisdom, but it's a journey and we have to work for it. And but I think you're right to the idea that this cave, there's so much shadow around us. And then when you see something that's real and you try to bring it back to the folks in the shadow, they just like it, you know, dis are so dismissive often and it's disheartening. But the beautiful thing is if you've been enlightened, you know, you know this is true, you know it's real. And that's what I love about Christ and Christianity is that um we have we have seen a light of truth of God, the original, the highest good, the origin of everything that's good, true, and beautiful, and are able to enjoy and delight in that and share it with others, and some will get it, some won't, but we get to enjoy it in either way. So I love the cave.

SPEAKER_01 22:56

Yeah, yeah. Socrates is also sort of an evangelist, you know. So uh for his ideas, and this comes out in the world. Socrates or yeah, Socrates. I guess he's talking about Socrates in the Yes, because every and this is where it's yeah, it's a little bit heady. It is, but this comes out in the Apology as well, where Socrates says it's out of his love for humanity that he's going around examining people and trying to lead them to this truth. Right now, but he asks in the chapter on the cave, uh, in the conversation, would that man who's gone out and seen the light essentially, shouldn't he go back down into the cave and tell the people who are down in there about it? And the response is, of course he should. And today, you know, there's sort of pushback, like you shouldn't be sharing, you know, the your beliefs about the most important greatest truths in the world with other people.

SPEAKER_03 23:39

Well, that's the that and man, this is the this is one of the biggest points in play, so one of my biggest takeaways was how he believes that certain things are true for everybody, not just for you or for me. And we live in a world where, yeah, if you discover something good for you, don't bother me with it, don't impose it on me, don't shove me into your box. So, you know, there's so and there's so much defense we put around our opinions. And and and and and Plato is writing, you know, about about the Socrates. So Socrates is the character in the Republic, having these dialogues, and he's writing about that, saying, but if you discover this light, yes, you must tell people and live according to it and encourage them to be a part of it, and which is completely the opposite of the modern narrative, which says basically, whatever you know about you, shut up and keep it to yourself. You know, um, and so it's it's there's a real love-hate relationship the modern world has with truth because we have to have it and we long for it and we hunger for it, but um, most people deny that hunger. Whereas I think Plato is willing to be honest and saying, there's something is out there, let's work for it. Yeah, so I love that about it.

SPEAKER_01 24:53

Yeah. One more thought on the cave that it gave to me or made me think about is how education is fundamentally moral for uh Plato, and this comes out throughout the Republic. Yeah, uh education is a major theme throughout the Republic because for Plato, you have to, if you want to be good as an individual and if you want to have a good society or polis, education is a sort of keystone of that. But for Plato, education is fundamentally and inherently a moral thing. It isn't about teaching information or getting people to uh have knowledge of facts in their mind. It's about transforming who they are. And this he comes out in the cave, this this movement from darkness to light isn't just a shift in something intellectual, it's a it's a moral shift.

SPEAKER_03 25:36

Yeah, because for for Plato, again, the the questions are what is good, what is the good life, what is real? And once we figure out what is good, what is the good life, what is real, which so what is real is ontology, right? Or metaphysics, what is the being of things, what is the way things are? And once you get that, then you'll know how you should live, which is ethics. So you start with being and metaphysics, ontology, and then you go to ethics, how you should live. And from there, and in the middle, somewhere he had he says, Well, how do you know, right? The epistemology. So you have ontology, being, epistemology, how do you know that? Which is the whole thing for the dialogues. Like this is how we know, because we've asked these tiny questions and caught in there a centimeter at a time. And then lastly, okay, so if we know what is, and we know that how we knew that, we figured that out and we're sorted and solid on that, then it becomes clear how we should live in ethics. Because, you know, if you think, uh, for example, let's just, you know, say I had a tool on the table and I said, What should how should this tool live? Like, what should it do? Well, the answer is, what is the tool? Well, why did they make it this way? And and then once you know why they made it a certain way, you understand its design, its ontology, its being. Well, it it exists for this purpose. And we know because the craftsmen have described it to us and we've understood all the different properties of it, and we realize it's useful for that. So now we know how to use it. So we know it's a hammer or a screwdriver or whatever. And we and so that's what he's saying is until we know who we are and how we know that's true, then we'll then we'll go. So ontology, then uh epistemology, and then ethics. And honestly, it's pretty hard to argue with that.

SPEAKER_01 27:18

Yeah, it is. And and this is maybe a great summary of what Socrates does in pretty much all of the Socratic dialogues that Plato writes, yeah, which is he finds somebody who's making claims about something, ontological claims, right? This is what's good, this is what I should do. Some claims often about ethics or morality. Yeah. And what Socrates does is shows them that they don't know the what. They're trying to say, like, what should how should we do this or what should or shouldn't happen with it.

SPEAKER_02 27:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 27:45

And what's so interesting is he he's basically exposing their, you know, a lot of times Christians are accused of sort of just parroting, you know, you just you just believe this because you were told this. And that's exactly what Plato is attacking. You're just saying that because you were told, you have short-circuited the whole pro, you've just skipped the whole process and you just gulp that down, and now you're just saying it and doing it. And that's why people come back at the end of their lives with these big questions because they've never thought about it. But Plato's trying to rescue them from the unexamined life. That's what he says, the unexamined life is not worth living because you're living it by accident. Everything you do, you know, you're doing by accident. You're you're making choices about the way you live your life, and you're you're not doing it thoughtfully, you're just doing it randomly by accident. That's what other people do, it's what I saw my parents do, it's what I saw on TV, you know, whatever, the Twitter feed. And he says, but that's the that you're just guessing unless you've thought it through for yourself. And that's what he's giving us this opportunity to do, is to think it through for ourselves.

SPEAKER_01 28:37

Yeah. Let's let's talk about the unexamined life. So this is this is probably alongside the cave, yeah the most famous thing from Plato or Socrates is this quote, the unexamined life is not worth living. On the face of it, I think there's good reasons to doubt that that's the case, that the unexamined life isn't worth living. Uh, maybe we could think of somebody who is just like doing all kinds of good things for people, but they're not really reflective and they're not examining a lot. Would we say their life isn't worth living? Uh so I think that's a question. What do you what did you make of it as you read, or do you have any thoughts on it?

SPEAKER_03 29:09

Yeah, I think, I mean, I'm I'm I'm not trying to say that the tortured life is better, you know, like to just like, ah, yeah. Um, so that they're off the bat. But I I think I think it's true. I I think it holds. I think the quote holds. But essentially, um, you want to know, and and that's where he he does differentiate simplicity. And I think simplicity is the key to this. So um let me think, where did he put that simplicity quote? Um I'll have to find it in a minute. But he he essentially says, um simplicity is the key to happiness in life. And by simplicity he means kind of like later philosophy, the will to to what to want one thing. Okay, I've kind of gone around and I've like Solomon in Ecclesiastes, I've I've tried this, I've tried this, I've tried this, I've tried this. At the end of the day, you know, fear God and keep his commands. This is the whole duty of man. You know, enjoy your work, enjoy your labor, give yourself to God and people, and that's that. You know, and there's a simplicity to that. So I don't think the uh examined life means you have to be torture yourself all the time with these big questions. I think, but I think it does mean that you need to work through the big rocks in the jar. You got to know what the, what the heck, why you exist, what you're trying to do, and uh and some things about yourself and how that is engaged. I do think that is important.

SPEAKER_01 30:22

Yeah, yeah, I agree. I I ultimately think it holds as well. I think what reading, both The Republican, especially the last days of Socrates, which is a collection of dialogues, the Euthyphro, Crito, and Phaedo, um, did was help me understand why that statement is true and what what Socrates meant by it and why it's true. And so I'll try to really quickly lay out a couple of things that I think underpin that statement for Socrates. Why is it so clearly true for him? Okay, while you're while you're while you're thinking that, um, I found my quote on simplicity.

SPEAKER_03 30:54

Sorry. No, no, go ahead by means, sure. Uh so here we are in the Republic. Um, the beauty and style and harmony and grace of good rhythm, he's talking about music, actually, depend on simplicity. I mean the true simplicity of a rightly and nobly ordered mind and character, not the other simplicity, which is only a euphemism for folly. Because even in the Bible, simple is used positively and negatively. It's used negatively of the person who just doesn't think about things, just gets in their little groove in their rut and just, you know, goes down their rut. Like they're not thinking, they're not prudent looking ahead. But simplicity is also used positively of a person who just has in the sense of a wholeness, right? A whole heart, not a divided heart going a lot of directions. So it's it's really not simplicity as opposed to complexity. It's again simplicity as opposed to duplicity. And so he's saying, um, let's not be duplicitous and have lots of things, you know, our heart going in many directions. Let's have uh a simplicity of heart, but it can also be complex in its thought and it in the way that it thinks about the things that are in front of it. So that's that's I thought that was an important distinction to make in Plato.

SPEAKER_01 31:59

Yeah, that's great. And on I guess you could say you can't be simple if you're a simple ton. You can't achieve the simplicity of heart in a good way if you're a simpleton. Because to do that, to have the one thing and it be good, you have to know what the one thing is. That's right. And this is what you know, the whole journey out of the cave is. It's like the final thing that you're sort of figuring out is what is that greatest good, coming to sort of know that. So I think the things that under underlies, relate to that, underlie the unexamined life not being worth living, is one that human beings are not wise, like we lack wisdom naturally. And this comes out, I mean Socrates goes around and saying, like, I'm the wisest person around only because I know that I'm not wise. Right. This is one claim. Uh so man naturally lacks wisdom. The second thing would be that it's better to not do something than to do it badly. And if you lack wisdom, you don't know how to do life well. And therefore, you're gonna do it badly. Right.

SPEAKER_03 32:54

And we all know that, like, you know, um, think about a game that you really enjoy. Chances are you play it well. Like, you know, we don't love the things we stink at. Right. And and so um if it life is the same. If you stink at playing life, it's not gonna be fun for you, it's not gonna be enjoyable for you. But the more wise you are, the better you see. You know, imagine playing a game, let's just say a soccer game, with very, very, very dark shades so you can barely see, versus just open eyes, right? And so I think that's what he's saying. Like, let's take the shades off and see clearly to enjoy the game.

SPEAKER_01 33:27

Yeah, yeah, 100%.

SPEAKER_03 33:32

So, one other thing about uh Plato, and this is this is again where life, unexamined life, I'm gonna I'm gonna bring it right back to today. Y'all, y'all, you remember this movie, The Matrix? And I remember uh a conversation I was having. I was watching The Matrix with a few people who had not seen it. It was their first time to see it. And you know, they get to that moment where the trader is meeting with the agent, and the trader is saying, Look, I'll turn Neo over to you if you give me, you know, whatever, whatever I want. And he's like, he's like, he's just enjoying the wine and the cigar and the steak, and he's just you know living this life. And the there were two people watching this with me. And one of them said, Man, I would totally do that. I would just, I would, I would take the steak and the wine and just live my beautiful fake life as if it were real. And the other person was like, Wow, but but it's not real, like it's fake. And the other person was like, I don't care, it feels real. And they're like, But it's not real, you know, like, and they were having this debate in this moment, like, which way would you go? And I think what Socrates and Plato are trying to say is it doesn't matter where the road leads, but you have to live on in reality um instead of creating your sort of fake world. And I think that's what the unexamined life is. It's this fake world. It's like it's just like, is my life as I conceive it, not really as it is. And he's trying to get us past our our conceptions and get us to what is, so we can understand what is this tool for, use it better, and he makes the case that you'll actually be happier for it.

SPEAKER_01 35:05

Yeah. Happiness is a really big thing to understand, also. And Plato, it'll definitely be important when we talk about Aristotle. Yeah. The difference in what Plato would mean when he uses the word happiness versus our modern conception of happiness. Yes. So, you know, our modern conception is essentially reduced to pleasant feelings that I feel good in the moment. Yep. Whereas for Plato, for example, and there's a quote I I would not be able to find it right now, but where he says that what's required for happiness is a healthy soul. And what a healthy soul is is a virtuous soul. Right. Virtue is uh health and well-being in your soul, and that is what leads to happiness.

SPEAKER_03 35:44

And he makes a case for that. He didn't just posit it, right? Sure, yeah. And he very long case, actually. All right, and so uh, but um, I I thought at this point I'd love to jump into my top ten quotes. Yeah, absolutely. So one from each of the 10 books of the republic. So here we go. Uh book one, uh, he's getting into it, and he gives us his reason for the pursuit of truth, you know, kind of which is which bridges to what you were just saying, why this is important. And so uh he says this. Um Are you going to run away before you have fairly taught or learned whether they are true or not? His statements, because he has an opponent who's just kind of dismissing him and walking away, is the attempt to determine the way of a man's life so small a matter in your eyes, to determine how life may be passed by each of us to the greatest advantage. So he's tying the pursuit of wisdom philosophy to a result, which is to live life to the greatest advantage. He's like, You've got one shot at life. Do you want to play you basically you want to play the game well or poorly? So would it not be worth pausing before you just jump in and 40 years go by to think about what you're doing? Is life not, is it is so if is it of so little importance that you're not willing to put that time into thinking about that?

unknown 36:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 36:58

So that's what he's trying to do. Yeah, it makes me think of an analogy of a ship, like where we're our life is us on a ship and we spend so much time trying to figure out how to make that ship go faster without thinking about the direction. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:11

Yeah. Exactly. Where is this going? So, speaking of the direction, um, book two, um, he is giving uh a case for the uh curation of wisdom to children. Um and again, to kind of your point about the power of education and the point of education, and I love this line. He says, and shall we just carelessly allow children to hear any casual tales which may be devised by casual persons? And by casual, he doesn't mean carefree. He means kind of random to us, right? Casual means they they they they have no thoughtful cause, they just pop in. So shall we j carelessly allow children to hear any casual tales which may be devised by casual persons and to receive into their minds ideas for the most part, the very opposite of those which we should wish for them to have when they are grown up. We cannot. And I thought, man, okay, so he's saying, parents or society or mainly parents, take responsibility for the care of your children and think, what tales are they hearing? And I think about children on phones these days and the immense amount of uh input they're getting from the world. And are we aware of it? Are we thinking about it? Are we curating it? Are we filtering it? And in some cases, maybe made the world would say, no, you shouldn't. Just let the world, let your child receive all that and develop as they will. And his point, and I believe our point and a biblical point is no, raise up a, you know, if if I if I plant a plant and just walk away, no, there's a reason why we put a stake in the ground and tie a young sapling to the stake because they need a rod, they need a cannon, if you will, a straight measurement by which to grow. And he's saying, why would we so careless? And so he reminds us not to be careless with the training of our children.

SPEAKER_01 39:01

Yeah, it's huge. And I mean, even think about it on a societal level, the founding fathers who had a much more platonic view of education than what we have today, they built a system that they acknowledged would only work if the citizenry were like pop properly educated in that way. Right. And so as we fail to do that, uh, it's not just our own, our lives and our children's lives that are at stake. It's the fate of the republic. I mean, it it really depends on having a citizenry that's been formed in this way. I definitely think about the phones, like you said, uh and the algorithms. You know, are you gonna let the casual, the casual people, in other words, in our day, the algorithms decide what to tell your kids?

SPEAKER_03 39:39

Because the algorithms they will disciple your children. They will mentor your children and they will, but they will disciple them in a direction that almost certainly you will despise. And they they will sicken and poison them.

SPEAKER_01 39:53

Yeah. One more thing on this, too, is one of Plato's big critiques of Homer was that his portrayal of the gods and heroes involved a lot of moral ambiguity. Yeah. More than just that, but there's moral ambiguity. They're they're lying, they're cheating, they're stealing, and he's saying, like, is this what we should be holding up as an example for the kids? And I think two things from that, from our culture today. One is we have the same problem that a lot of the times the celebrities or the popular people that are that'll that are held up before our kids are uh not good moral examples. Right. And if you were to ask, I mean I think one way of thinking about it is who are the heroes of a culture? There's a great quote actually from I want to Plato's dialogues to this effect. If you want to understand the direction of people are moving in, look at who they admire. Right. Who are their heroes, right? And who are who are our heroes today?

SPEAKER_03 40:44

Yeah, that's pretty depressing. But uh, I do want to um get back to your quote about God and uh Homer, because Homer, you know, 300 years before, Plato had a love-hate relationship with Homer. He he he respected him for his epic writing, he respected him for his artistry, for his craft, uh, and um, and he respected his his impact, his influence. And so he he did build on Homer. He disagreed with Homer on this, because Homer attributed sort of almost yin-yang, like you said, positive, negative. Uh in and in some ways, Homer, Homer was the last codifier of the ancient, if you will, almost barbarian world. This is how this is the gods have always been seen. And we then we transition into a modern world where now um Plato brings us essentially the God of the Bible, right? The God of Moses, the God of Solomon, who in whom there is no shifting shadow. He is very clear about this. And in fact, you know, I'll read you some quotes. Uh so he says here, um, uh, so we're in book two. This is honorable mention quote from book two. Uh, let this be one of our rules and principles concerning the gods to which our poets and reciters will be expected to conform. And when he says our poets and reciters, he means in the republic that we create that's great. Uh, that God is not the author of all things, but of good only. Okay. And then later he says, Then everything which is good, whether made by art or nature or both, is at least liable to suffer change from without. True, true. But surely God and the things of God are in every way perfect. Of course they are. Then he can hardly, God can hardly be compelled by external influence to make take many shapes. He cannot. And he and then later, then it is impossible that God should ever be willing to change, being as it is supposed the fairest and best that is conceivable. In other words, if God is already perfect, why would he change? Right? Why would he take on other forms? Yeah. Every God remains absolutely and forever in his own form. And so Plato is very clear about okay, there's God, the gods, whatever they are, you know, Homer was wrong. And and I appreciate his being willing to stand up for like, no, no, God is not the author of evil, he is the author of good. And so he had a very high view of the purity and the power of God.

SPEAKER_01 42:53

Yeah, one more thing on that, and then you can do your quote from book three. Yeah. In thinking about the way that we represent heroes, in particular in the training of children. One of the big conversations that I I see going on today is looking at the there's this trend in movies geared towards children to expose sort of the complexity of the villains. That yes, this person was bad, but it's really because of this and that. And yes, this hero was good, but actually, you know, they're not that good. There's all these problems. And we we present a much more morally ambiguous picture to children.

SPEAKER_02 43:26

Right.

SPEAKER_01 43:26

And there are people who defend that and say, but that's that's kind of what real life is like. I mean, if you meet a good person, they're not perfectly good. They have errors, they have flaws. If you meet someone who's bad and evil, probably some things have happened to them. There's some explanation, some threads of explanation for that. And so the the conversation there is should we present children with something that is perfectly as close to reality as possible, or do we try to give them examples to live by that are uh more purely good?

SPEAKER_03 43:52

Now, as I understood Plato, and I may have misunderstood it, that um he as he he talks about the training of children should morph with them as they grow. Early on, children should be given the best models, right? Clear pictures of virtue, justice, wisdom, uh, and and and these are the things we should be given. And as they get older and their questions get more complex and more sophisticated, that uh the picture of humans who are not God uh would be nuanced, uh, that your parents aren't perfect, the governors aren't perfect, um, but that their picture of God should remain unsullied.

SPEAKER_01 44:29

Yes, 100%. That is it. There's an order, a proper order to education. And if you present young children with something that's more appropriate for an older child, it's gonna harm them, or it's not gonna be helpful. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 44:42

One of the, so book three, one of the big takeaway from me from book three was actually his um making a case for music and for music education. Um, so we think about music education because oh, it'd be fun for you to play the trumpet, you know, or you you'll you'll enjoy playing the piano. Yeah, like it's it's about your enjoyment. For him, it was totally different. It was about learning math, it was about learning harmonies, it was about learning. So for Plato, um that you know, there's the trivium and quadrivium that came later in medieval learning, but he really anticipated that. So the trivium being the first three things, the only seven subjects that they studied in medieval Oxford and Cambridge were these seven. These first three were grammar, logic, and rhetoric, which in other words, what is their grammar, logic, how does it operate, and then rhetoric, how do you argue it? That's the the first three. And then the next four were based on that. So it was arithmetic, the numbers that are there, geometry, how they operate, music, how they operate in uh in in in space and time, and then astronomy, how they operate in the universe. And so it was really about how math came into life and then made life beautiful. And so uh it was understanding the the bits of life that were there, and then how we can understand the beauty and the goodness and the truth in front of us using those uh things. So music was really about starting with numbers and and math, and then understanding how harmonies uh relate to that. So he says this about his um why the virtue and the value of a musical education. Here it is. Um harmony find their way into the inward places of the soul, on which they mightily fasten, imparting grace and making the soul of him who is rightly educated graceful. So it's like it adds beauty to truth, right? Of him who is ill-educated, ungraceful, and also because he who has received this true education of the inner being will be most shrewdly perceive omissions or faults in art and nature, and with a true taste, while he praises and rejoices over and receives into his soul the good and becomes noble and good, he will justly blame and hate the bad, now in the days of his youth, even before he is able to know the reason why. And so he's saying that if you study music, it will take the things that you've learned in your mind and give it a grace and a beauty and a longing for the next thing. It'll pull you forward towards maturity, towards wisdom, uh, and and and help you uh engage the beautiful things of life. And what what a great way to see it.

SPEAKER_01 47:18

Yeah, that's my my like go-to quote from that book is in that same paragraph, which ends with something like this from the Alan Bloom translation. He would the person who gets what you just described, he would blame and hate the ugly in the right way while he's still young, before he's able to grasp reasonable speech. Yes. So before he's even able to understand arguments and speech, this music is sort of shaping his dispositions and and causing him to gravitate towards what's good and true. One thing I would say to parents is that just to understand, like the public education system does not understand this at all. It's not what it's doing. And so if you want this to happen in your child's life, you have to be the one that's gonna do it. It it blows my mind that people go through school to become educators and come away without much of an understanding of what the purpose of education really is, what it can do.

SPEAKER_03 48:11

Well, you know, RC Sproul tells the story one time of him going to uh an education meeting at their school, and the principal explained everything that they're doing, all these classes and all this, and and and and and what what they taught and the subjects and how they would deliver it, and it was too much applause. And he just says he raised this question and said, That's that's great. You know, I I see the system, I see the process. What is the goal? What are you trying to produce? And he said they had no idea, they're like, they had no answer for it.

SPEAKER_01 48:38

Yes, and so our sproll in that moment is the philosopher, right? Right. This is what Socrates teaches, uh, this is what Plato talks about in the Republic, that you have the people who are focused on the technique of producing some sort of art, but don't understand the ultimate aim of it or how it relates to the whole, yeah, which is why you need a philosopher who has considered what justice is, what is the good life, and knows what that aim is. Yeah. Now I think that I don't think we have to make a distinction between, well, you're either a philosopher or an educator. Right. You know, I think an educator can understand and has an obligation to understand the philosophy of education. Yeah. Like what is it actually?

SPEAKER_03 49:14

Because there is a philosophy. There is. There they are trying to produce something, right? Whether they've articulated it or not, or thought about it or not. They are producing something. And the question is, what is that? And are they doing it on purpose or is it by accident?

SPEAKER_00 49:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 49:26

And so that's that's what Plato is saying is whatever you're first figure out your ontology, your being. What are you trying to be? And then figure out the process, the ethics to get there. Uh and and and that's and and do it on purpose and not just by accident.

SPEAKER_01 49:43

So Yeah, I think our mod, I'm curious to get your thoughts on this. If I had to sum up our modern philosophy of education as it's actually practiced, I think it would predominantly be economic utility. And as I talk to young people, this is definitely the impression I get from them. If I ask them, well, why are you, you know, why are you in school? Why do you want to graduate high school? Why do you want to go to college? It's always so that I can get a job so that I can make money.

SPEAKER_02 50:05

Right.

SPEAKER_01 50:06

The whole point of education in our mind is to get a job to make money.

SPEAKER_03 50:10

Right. And almost all decisions in the, unfortunately, nowadays, um, almost all decisions in the Department of Education are made with one factor. What can they afford? It is about money. So um, you know, we we will have this program or we want that program because of money, or like you say, we're gonna just invest in STEM uh because it produces money. It's gonna, it's going to send it to stimulate, right? Our GDP is gonna go up. Yeah, our GDP exactly. And so the government is the government is is is doing that. And so the question is, do we have the same goals as the government? And and so we'd have to think about that as parents for our children. What are we trying to produce? Not as America, but as parents. And is the education our children are receiving, is it helping them to become lovers of what is true, what is good, and what is beautiful?

SPEAKER_01 50:57

And yes, make money, but right. Yes, it's not to the exclusion of that. It's not that money, you mean you need to be able to support yourself. You need to be able to get a job. That's that's important, but it's not the only thing, it's not the best thing or the most important thing.

SPEAKER_03 51:07

Or the virtuous and the happy thing, right?

SPEAKER_01 51:09

That's right, yes, exactly.

SPEAKER_03 51:10

Um, so one other quote from the again, an honorable mention from book three. Um, I just thought it was hilarious. He actually had this little scene, just kind of almost as an aside, where he talks about over-medicating. And, you know, in our day, like the the number of diagnoses that they give medical diagnoses for has exploded. And the number of medications they'll put you on is exploded because there's money to be made, you know, and if they can put a name on it and sell you something to to take for it, they will. And uh, and so what was funny is it was happening then. Listen to this. Well, I said, um, and to require the help of medicine, not when a wound has to be cured or on the occasion of an epidemic, but just because, by indolence and a habit of life, such as we have been describing, men fill themselves with water as in winds, you know, it's like the prescriptions, as if their bodies were a marsh, compelling the ingenious sons of Asclepius to find more names for diseases such as flatulence and Qatar. Is this not too a disgrace? Yes, he said. And they do certainly give very strange and newfangled names to diseases. Okay, this was in 400 BC, right? Yeah, like uh, and I thought, yes, and so they're they're they're finding new and newfangled names to throw on things so they can sell you a cure for it. It's like, it was happening then, you know.

SPEAKER_01 52:26

Yeah, yeah. There's a quote in there too about just people's obsession with health and taking care of physical care of their bodies to the neglect of their soul, yeah, which is also nothing new. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 52:38

Yes. All right, book five, book four, book four, definition of justice and injustice. I mean, this is he's really getting down to the meat of it now in book four. He's defining what is justice. Um, and uh, and and he divides society into three classes of people, which are legislators, kind of at the top, and he would put philosophers in that category of leaders, government, warriors, soldiers to protect the state. And then the third one is the traders and by trade, T-R-A-D-E-R-S, those who just kind of make make things happen, whether it's the artisans, uh crafts, you know, making leather goods and and whatever, or if it's the um uh farmers, just kind of in people that make things. So government or legislators, uh leaders, warriors, and traders. And he says that justice um is so is when everybody basically does their thing and doesn't hinder the other person. They stay in their lane and do their thing well. So the uh it injustice is the is the degree to which um you get out of your lane and uh and and and do someone and do harm to someone else's and meddle in their uh business. This then is injustice. And on the other hand, when the traitor and the soldier and the guardian or legislator each do their own business, that is justice, and will make the city just. And so it's interesting that he just said, look, basically, doing the thing for which you were made, that is just, it is just, it is right. And what he means when it this is a sense of uh without being without meddling in others and without being meddled in, you do what you're you know, unhindered, you do what you're supposed to do. It's an interesting way to look at justice.

SPEAKER_01 54:15

Yeah, it is. And one thing that'll be helpful to people if they begin to tackle the republic is to realize what's actually the whole book is to answer the question ultimately, what is justice and is it better to live a just life than an unjust life? And in order to get to that, to answer it as an individual, he goes into designing this republic. And then there's these amazing parallels between what the good republic looks like and what the good soul looks like. Right. And so, like with what you just mentioned, this idea of the three and them staying in their lanes, this mirrors perfectly his anthropology, yes the head, the chest, and the appetite. And each of these have a role to play, right? And they can all be for our good, but only if they're in the right order. Right. And so, yeah, go ahead.

SPEAKER_03 54:55

To connect those dots. So he's you know, he's got the legislators, the soldiers, the warriors, and the uh and the traders. And basically, like you say, he's like uh the the legislators kind of represent wisdom, right, in the mind or the head, the cerebral man. The warriors uh represent the heart, right? The courage. And uh, and then the traders represent the appetites, right? Or the gut, if you will. And so these are, you know, Lewis riffed on that and the abolition of man. Love that abolition of man. Uh the that that the heart is what sort of keeps the the mind, the cerebral man, because cerebral man just kind of with no with uh with with no gut is to is is over-spiritualized, and then gut man, if you will, with no mind is is just kind of over-passionate. Um and the heart is really the core of of the human soul, if you will. And so um Lewis definitely working off of Plato there uh to remind us that we have these three elements to us. So the society has these three elements wisdom, uh, and then courage and appetite. And then so does so does the individual person.

SPEAKER_01 55:58

And these also map exactly onto his cardinal virtues. Yes. Right? Wisdom for the mind, courage for the chest, um, moderation for the temperance for the appetites, and then justice is when all of those are in harmony, properly ordered.

SPEAKER_03 56:10

So a good, so justice, yes, is when each everybody stays in their lane in society, and when each human kind of stays in his lane, when when uh the mind is wise, when the heart is courageous, when the gut is temperate or moderate, uh, and then like you say, justice is all three staying in their lane and doing their thing and and not getting out of whack so that we're we're over seekers of pleasure, or that we're over seekers and over lovers of knowledge, which is where he gets off on the sophists, like for just being kind of doodlers with words and ideas. And uh, no time for that. Uh, and that that the cur that the heart is really this mediating um uh organ, if you will, between these two these three parts of man. So very important. Uh book five. Book five family roles.

SPEAKER_01 56:56

Um let's see, philosophers, uh things go off the rails a bit in book five. At least the translation I was reading, and as you just look for your quote, yeah, as I'm reading it, I'm seeing like eugenics, communism, pedophilia, incest. It was a wild chapter. Yeah, yeah, like really interesting.

SPEAKER_03 57:12

Just to warn you, um it it really is a wild ride. Like book book uh five is uh pretty crazy. He has this idea of family roles, which really is reminiscent of some of the dystopian modern novels. Yes, like where they take your children. Now, this was only this only applied to the top level, right? The government people, but um, they would literally there were they had no family units, they would have collective spouses and collective children, and that was only for the legislative people. And the reason that he did that was um he was trying to prevent um corruption. You know, it was a guard against preferring your children, giving them uh better whatever. And then it was also to prevent the corruption of uh being jealous of spouses and all the dirt. So he was thinking, how can we guard against the uh the evil appetites that lurk in us? And the his answer was just to take away the structures that create boundaries with that you want to cross. So let's just eliminate the boundaries, there's nothing to cross. And uh, which obviously um that's probably the most uh contested, if and if not destroyed, part of Plato's philosophy. Uh so yeah, very bizarre.

SPEAKER_01 58:26

And inconsistent with where he ends up later on, where he starts talking about a tyrant and freedom to access. He says that uh if freedom goes too far, it actually just becomes slavery. So he he respects that we do need boundaries and so on. But yeah.

SPEAKER_03 58:39

Yeah. So one good thing um that I took out of uh of chapter of book five were the idea of of objects uh with their subjects. In other words, that beauty, that you see something is beautiful, that it that uh there's something that it attracts inside of you, like it put it draws something out of you. And he's arguing that this is essentially a design given by God, and it should show us that there is a God and that there is a higher beauty that we will one day know um in the afterlife, but we have a hint of it now because there's something about that within us that is pulled out when we see something beautiful. So he says, take the case of another who recognized the existence of absolute beauty, right, in glory, and is able to distinguish the idea from the objects which participate in the idea. So we might see a tree that's beautiful, but that tree is passing, it will not last forever. But there's gotta be some concept of beauty somewhere on which that beautiful tree is based. Um, and so he says, there is, if you are able to realize that these objects that you think are beautiful are wonderful, but they're not ultimate, right? There is some ultimate beauty, and um distinguish the idea of the object uh which participate in it, neither putting the objects in the place of the idea, nor the idea in the place of the objects. Is he a dreamer or is he awake, right? Now he's the one who sees by the light of the sun that there is an object that we see that's beautiful, but it refers that has a referent in another place there that is uh an ideal that he talks, or or the or the object, the form on which the beauty around us is based. And that to me is is is is powerful because it it reminds us that as humans, all of us are drawn towards certain things and which should tell us that we were all made for something that we can only partially satisfy on earth, therefore there must be something greater to be satisfied with in heaven.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:44

Yeah. Yeah, the great things on earth are this signpost to something beyond, makes me think the thing you said about not confusing essentially like creator with creation, to use Christian terminology, is like Romans 1, right? You don't want to start worshiping and serving the creature more than the creator. You can enjoy the creature. The creation is good, it's for our enjoyment. Yep. But if we confuse it with what it comes from, that's gonna be a big mistake. Uh, one thing for me from book five, which kind of goes in line with that, was just this acknowledgement that a thing can't be truly understood without considering its relation to the whole.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:15

And maybe a quick application from that would just be as I try to find people to listen to in areas of their expertise. Ideally, I want to listen to somebody who has a pretty good grasp on the whole. Like they've got a pretty robust picture of the world because somebody can be brilliant in economics or brilliant in maybe like modern philosophy or epistemology, but if they don't have a good understanding of the whole, I question how how well or thorough they can understand even there, the thing that they're an expert on.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:47

Right. So you may understand how the back side of a hammer pulls out a nail, but do you know how to use the front side of a hammer, right? Like, do you do you understand otherwise you're just using half the hammer, your whole like you know, well, I use it to pull out nails, but I don't know what this front thing is for. You know, and and and Socrates would argue that you're living half your humanity if you only understand half of it. And so work it through to the end, understand the how the part relates to the whole, and understand the whole uh in order to understand your full humanity. And very important. So we have you know these three parts, this you know, and and so understand your mind, understand your heart, understand your gut and your appetites, and just understand how you operate as a human and how you operate with other humans. And so important to enjoy a life, to be virtuous, to be happy, to be fulfilled.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:32

So uh moving on to book six, yeah. So uh I think this is he talks about the he gets into this kind of form, this this perfect form, and then the uh symbol that we see here a little bit more in this book. And one thing he says here um uh the idea of the good is the highest knowledge, right? And um, all other things become useful and advantageous only by their use of this. In other words, you can learn a lot about a lot of things, but if you're not good, it doesn't help. I remember I had a friend once who told me, um, Adam, I am great at surgery. I'm a surgeon, I'm great at baseball. He was a scholarship athlete in college. He says, I'm great at fishing, I'm great at a lot of things. But, you know, he had multiple marriages and it was just a kind of a broken home life. And he said, the things that are most important, I can't seem to do. And and and and in other words, why the those, those, those all those other things were fine, but they weren't satisfying since the core wasn't settled. And I think that's what Plato is reminding us here that look, you can have you can learn about tons of things, but if you don't have, if you're not good or learn what goodness is, then those things will not help you.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:43

Yeah, this is a fundamental insight into Socrates and Plato, and it's so helpful today. The idea that it's simple, it's fairly obvious, but we don't somehow we manage to live without taking account of it. Extrinsic goods, money, honor, position, power, those things are only good for you if you are good and therefore know how to use them. Right? If you have wisdom, then money can be a good thing for you. If you have wisdom, then family can be a good thing for you. But if you aren't good, if you lack wisdom, then these extrinsic goods actually not only aren't good for you, they can actually be damaging, they can be harmful.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:17

Yeah, absolutely. So there's a lot to say there. Um, moving on, um, trying to keep us on track. Uh God, we've talked about the cave parable, so I'm gonna skip over that actually. Um, that's in book seven and hit on to book eight. Uh see where I'm at. So we're just cruising through. Okay, here we are. Book eight. From leader to tyrant. He says that the natural trajectory, if you do not oppose it, if you do not hit the brakes and intentionally redirect, is you will go from leader to tyrant. The natural trajectory of man is downhill, right? And um uh the protector of the people is like him. So we're now in book eight. Having a mob entirely at his disposal. So he that when the leader realizes, wow, I've got power, I've got money, I've got the mob, I've got, you know, I've got um lords, if you will, who kind of want certain things and I can I can maneuver and manipulate all this. Uh he is not restrained from shedding the blood of kinsmen by the favorite method of false accusation. He brings them into court and murders them, making the life of a man to disappear, and with unholy tongue and lips, tasting the blood of his fellow citizens, some he kills, others he banishes, at the same time hinting at the abolition of the debts and partition of lands. In other words, um, if you'll do this, I'll do this, and I'll help you get what you need, if you'll help me get what I need, and he can eliminate all of his enemies by giving gifts to all of his dubious friends. And uh um after this, what will be his destiny? Must he not either perish at the hands of his enemies or from being a man become a wolf? That is a tyrant. In other words, he himself he will reap what he sowed, right? He will will he not himself perish or become a beast? Uh, in other words, not a man, because he's lost all of his virtue, all of his humanity. Uh, but unless he unless Unless we try uh we are intentionally cultivating virtue, we will go in the direction of non-virtue.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:07

It almost seems like something like that has happened before in history a few times. Yes. Yes. There's uh the quote that I was trying to think of earlier, which is from that same section. He says, Too much freedom seems to change into nothing but too much slavery, both for private man and the city. Yeah. So the tyrant gets all this freedom, because he has all this power, but ultimately it ends in his own slavery and ultimately his own destruction is death.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:29

Yes, that's right. And so uh he reminds us to be um lovers of of wisdom, lovers of honor, uh, and lovers of of profit. Not like in terms of like, ooh, I want to get rich, but lovers of um taking uh a dime and making it a quarter, you know, improving the value, value maybe is a better word for that. So uh, you know, and that's and he kind of drills down on these three cast classes of men in book nine. Um, and he says that that we should be the the philosophers or the leaders should be lovers of wisdom, that the warriors should be lovers of honor, and that the traders should be lovers of value. And that if and that all of us are doing all three, but we if we if we focus on, you know, as an individual, now I take those three things, and I'm not just a class of one of these three people, but I'm a full person myself loving wisdom, honor, and value. That that and if all the people in all the classes are loving those things, that society will be just or work well together. So again, he keeps coming back to these core issues that are still issues today. He mentions a heavenly city in 377. Um, and it reminded me of Hebrews, you know, talking about that that Abraham was looking for a city with a sure foundation whose architect and builder is God. And uh he says, you know, I understand that you mean that he will be a ruler in a city of which we are the founders and which exists for an idea only. I do not believe that there is such in anywhere on earth. In other words, there's surely there's no perfect place on earth. In heaven are applied. There is laid up a pattern of it, methinks, which, in other words, there it, you know, we can see shadows of it down here, and suddenly we we we we see what we see, but honestly, even earth, we're trying to get enlightenment, trying to get wisdom, which is the perfect city of and and and form of everything that's good here is in heaven, which he desires to behold. And beholding, he may set his own house in order. In other words, when he becomes enlightened with wisdom from heaven, he can try to imitate what's perfect and beautiful there, but it's gonna happen with effort. And so he must try. So there's so many um parallels in the Republic and in Plato to the scriptures and to to Solomon, to Moses, uh, and and and and even even um to to later writers, but we we see those Old Testament connections in Plato for sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:53

Yeah, in book nine, he talks about love without knowledge is becoming tyrannical. So love without knowledge is tyranny. Yep. And this reminds me of Paul's prayer in Philippians for the church of Philippi, that they would abound or grow more and more in love according to knowledge and discretion.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:09

It's not enough just to be ultra loving, just have all this love. You need uh love according to knowledge with discretion and discernment.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:16

And even like uh in his his conversation uh about Homer, you know, saying that Homer said the gods had these shadows, and he says, No, that God has no shadows, that God has no darkness, that God is only light and only good. It reminds me of first John, you know, God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. Now, John writing, of course, much later, but this concept that he had gotten from uh, you know, the even the Hebrews, the Lord is my light and my salvation, uh, whom shall I fear? And so clearly, you know, Plato is able to to to reject even part of his own cultural heritage in Homer and receive what was uh the the Hebrews gave monotheism to the world, like they introduced this concept and and he was he and and as as a god that wasn't in the image of man, but man that was in the image of God, right? And so this is something that that Plato really begins to settle on, and and you almost wonder, you know, what was he familiar with the Hebrew scriptures? Because he codifies a lot of those ideas in his own philosophy.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:17

So I I think it was good to read Plato. Final thoughts on Plato.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:21

Yeah, oh man, it was really, really helpful for me. There's so much left out there, you know, uh, but really enjoyed having a conversation about it. Maybe one quote I would I would end on from my standpoint, and this comes from the apology. So Socrates is making his defense. He's on trial, and this is what he says to those who are accusing him and to the audience there. Aren't you ashamed of caring about acquiring the greatest possible amount of money together with reputation and honors, while not caring about or even sparing a thought for wisdom and truth and making your souls as good as possible?

SPEAKER_02 1:10:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:58

Aren't you ashamed of going after everything else in the world while leaving behind the thing that is most important, which makes me think of what shall a man gain? Or what what share what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?

SPEAKER_03 1:11:08

Yeah, what will it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul? And lose his own soul. And, you know, actually the very closing words of the Republic, um, you know, in book 10, I think I'll finish on this quote also. And so, and thus, Glaucon, the tale has been saved, and thus uh not perished, and will save us if we are obedient to the word spoken, right? So we don't just want to hear the word, but obey it. That echoes familiar. And we shall pass safely over the river of forgetfulness, and our soul will not be defiled. Wherefore, my counsel is if we that we hold fast ever to the heavenly way and follow after justice and virtue always, considering that the soul is immortal and able to endure every sort of good and every sort of evil, thus shall we live dear to one another and to the gods, both while remaining here and when like conquerors in the games who go round to gather their gifts, we receive our reward. Interestingly, and it shall be well with both of us in this life and in the pilgrimage of a thousand years, which we have been describing, in other words, in the afterlife. And so, and that's how he ends. Like, let's stick to virtue and justice and trust the gods to reward us in their time. So I say amen to that. Amen.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:10

All right, yeah. Great. So next time we're gonna dive into Nicky Mechanic ethics by Aristotle and I think some Cicero as well. Make sure if you're watching, check the description. We'll put links to those where you can, if you want to read along, uh, some helpful resources to check out in advance of our next recording.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:25

Looking forward to it. We'll see you there.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:27

Thanks.