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Plato's theory of the soul, which was inspired variously by the teachings of Socrates, considered the psyche (Ancient Greek: ψῡχή, romanized: psūkhḗ) to be the essence of a person, being that which decides how people behave. Plato considered this essence to be an incorporeal, eternal occupant of a person's being.
Protagoras acknowledges that Socrates is a notable opponent in dispute while being much younger than he and predicts that he could become one of the wisest men alive. Socrates departs for whatever business he claimed he had when he wanted to end the dialogue earlier.
In Plato's dialogues, the soul plays many disparate roles. Among other things, Plato believes that the soul is what gives life to the body (which was articulated most of all in the Laws and Phaedrus) in terms of self-motion: to be alive is to be capable of moving oneself; the soul is a self-mover. He also thinks that the soul is the bearer of ...
Plato relies, further, on the view that the soul is a mind in order to explain how its motions are possible: Plato combines the view that the soul is a self-mover with the view that the soul is a mind in order to explain how the soul can move things in the first place (e.g., how it can move the body to which it is attached in life). [10]
"As being is to becoming, so is truth to belief" (29c). Therefore, in a description of the physical world, one "should not look for anything more than a likely story" (29d). Timaeus suggests that since nothing "becomes or changes" without cause, then the cause of the universe must be a demiurge or a god, a figure Timaeus refers to as the father ...
Plato's most self-critical dialogue is the Parmenides, which features Parmenides and his student Zeno, which criticizes Plato's own metaphysical theories. Plato's Sophist dialogue includes an Eleatic stranger. These ideas about change and permanence, or becoming and Being, influenced Plato in formulating his theory of Forms. [54]
Plato uses this observation to illustrate his famous doctrine that the soul is a self-mover: life is self-motion, and the soul brings life to a body by moving it. Meanwhile, in the recollection and affinity arguments, the connection with life is not explicated or used at all.
Plato is depicted pointing upwards, in reference to his belief in the higher Forms, while Aristotle disagrees and gestures downwards to the here-and-now, in reference to his belief in empiricism. The topic of Aristotle's criticism of Plato's Theory of Forms is a large one and continues to expand. Rather than quote Plato, Aristotle often summarized.