This is the first of three talks exploring Whitehead’s famous claim that western philosophy is mostly footnotes to Plato. They will focus on quotations from Plato’s writing, and indicate threads of thinking which have subsequently either deferred to Plato, or reacted against him. We will particularly examine how the original problems arose, and Plato’s first attempts at solutions.
This first talk will focus on the ideas of Plato on psuché (mind/soul, esp. in Phaedo), and on knowledge (esp. in Theaetetus). The modern territory will cover ideas about thought, mind-body relations, the self, philosophy, reason, truth, argument, explanation, language, mathematics, justification, scepticism, and human action. We will encounter the problem that Plato may be addressing our familiar modern problems, but starting from quite different presuppositions, or using an ancient technical vocabulary that doesn’t precisely map onto modern English. We will also try to pick out modern thoughts which would have fascinated or startled Plato.