PLATO

Known as the “Father of Idealism in Philosophy”

PROFILE
Plato was born in 428/427 BCE to a noble family and died in 348/347 BCE. He lived
primarily in Athens, Greece. Plato’s birth occurred near the end of the Golden Age of
Athens, and he grew up during the Peloponnesian War. He reached adulthood around
the time of Sparta’s final defeat of Athens. After traveling, Plato spent the remainder of
his life teaching at the Academy until his death in 348/347 BCE.
Plato was a philosopher during the 5th century BCE. He was a student of Socrates and
later taught Aristotle. He founded the Academy, an academic program which many
consider to be the first Western university. Plato wrote many philosophical texts—at
least 25. He dedicated his life to learning and teaching and is hailed as one of the
founders of Western philosophy.
Plato’s most famous work is the Republic, which details a wise society run by a
philosopher. He is also famous for his dialogues (early, middle, and late), which
showcase his metaphysical theory of forms—something else he is well known for. Plato
also founded the Academy, an academic program that many consider to be the first
Western university, where he stressed the importance of science and mathematics.
Because of this, he became known as the “maker of mathematicians.
What is the importance of Plato's philosophy?
Plato is considered by many to be the most important philosopher who ever lived. He is
known as the father of idealism in philosophy. His ideas were elitist, with the
philosopher king the ideal ruler. Plato is perhaps best known to college students for his
parable of a cave, which appears in Plato's Republic.

Platonic idealism is the theory that the substantive reality around us is only a reflection of
a higher truth. That truth, Plato argued, is the abstraction. He believed that ideas were more

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real than things. He developed a vision of two worlds: a world of unchanging ideas and a world
of changing physical objects

Moreover, a perfect idealist philosopher never believes the external reality apart from mind.
He believes that if any reality exists, it exists in the form of ideas in the mind. But Plato believes
that idea exists not only in our mind but also as entities outside our minds and exists by their
own right.
Philosophy is of great service to law; it not only helps in analysis but equally in organization
of thought and building of systems. There is reasoning in law known as 'legal reasoning' the
branches of philosophy known as logic and epistemology aid legal science in this area.
One of most influential philosopher's is Plato, an ancient Greek philosopher. Plato has created
many philosophies and ideas that we still look to today. One of Plato's quotes was,“Be kind,
for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle.” This is an idea that most people follow today
and that has been used for years.
Plato regards education as a means to achieve justice, both individual justice and social justice.
According to Plato, individual justice can be obtained when each individual develops his
or her ability to the fullest. In this sense, justice means excellence. For the Greeks and Plato,
excellence is virtue

What is the conclusion of Plato theory of justice?

Plato says that justice is not mere strength, but it is a harmonious strength. Justice
is not the right of the stronger but the effective harmony of the whole. All moral
conceptions revolve about the good of the whole-individual as well as social.

Justice is, for Plato, at once a part of human virtue and the bond, which joins man
together in society. It is the identical quality that makes good and social . Justice is an
order and duty of the parts of the soul, it is to the soul as health is to the body. Plato
says that justice is not mere strength, but it is a harmonious strength. Justice is not the
right of the stronger but the effective harmony of the whole. All moral conceptions
revolve about the good of the whole-individual as well as social.

What are Plato's three views of justice?

Plato, through Socrates, muses that his three views about justice are as
follows: Justice is a balance of reason, spirit, and appetite. Injustice occurs within
the individual when one virtue leads over the other.

Plato and Aristotle both developed important ideas about government and politics.
Two of the many political subjects that these men wrote about were tyranny and the
rule of law. Tyranny occurs when absolute power is granted to a ruler. In a tyrannical
government, the ruler becomes corrupt and uses his power to further his own
interests instead of working for the common good.

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The rule of law is the principle that no one is exempt from the law, even those who
are in a position of power. The rule of law can serve as a safeguard against tyranny,
because just laws ensure that rulers do not become corrupt.

Plato’s Republic
Plato’s most important work on politics is his Republic, published around 380 B.C. Written
as a dialogue among characters and set in a private home, the book describes a small
group of Athenians discussing political philosophy. The main character is Socrates, who
voiced Plato’s ideas. (The real Socrates never wrote down his ideas.)
The Republic examines the meaning of justice, looks at different types of government, and
outlines the ideal state. It touches on many subjects, including law and tyranny.
Plato looked at four existing forms of government and found them unstable. The best, in his
view, is timocracy, a military state, like Sparta, based on honor. But such a state will fall
apart:
The accumulation of gold in the treasury of private individuals is the ruin of
timocracy; they invent illegal modes of expenditure; for what do they or their
wives care about the law? . . . . And then one, seeing another grow rich, seeks to
rival him, and thus the great mass of the citizens become lovers of money. . . .
And so at last, instead of loving contention and glory, men become lovers of
trade and money; they honor and look up to the rich man, and make a ruler of
him, and dishonor the poor man.
An oligarchy, the rule of a few (the rich), leads to
a city of the rich and a city of the poor, dwelling together, and always plotting
against one another. . . . [The government] will not be able to wage war, because
of the necessity of either arming and employing the multitude, and fearing them
more than the enemy, or else, if they do not make use of them, of finding
themselves on the field of battle . . . And to this must be added their reluctance to
contribute money, because they are lovers of money.
The poor will overthrow the oligarchy and set up a democracy, the rule of the people (the
poor). Plato thought that democratic “life has neither law nor order.” An unquenchable
desire for limitless liberty causes disorder, because the citizens begin to
chafe impatiently at the least touch of authority and at length, . . . they cease to
care even for the laws, written or unwritten; they will have no one over them.
Stressing moderation, Plato warned that “the excessive increase of anything often causes a
reaction in the opposite direction,” such that the “excess of liberty, whether in states or
individuals, seems only to pass into excess of slavery.”
Like an oligarchy, a democracy pits the poor against the rich. The poor see the rich plotting,
and they seek protection:
The people have always some champion whom they set over them and nurse
into greatness. . . . This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs;
when he first appears above ground he is a protector. . . . having a mob entirely
at his disposal, he is not restrained from shedding the blood of kinsmen; . . . he
brings them into court and murders them . . . at the same time hinting at the

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abolition of debts and partition of lands. . . . After a while he is driven out, but
comes back, in spite of his enemies, a tyrant full grown.
Plato deemed tyranny the “fourth and worst disorder of a state.” Tyrants lack “the very
faculty that is the instrument of judgment”—reason. The tyrannical man is enslaved
because the best part of him (reason) is enslaved, and likewise, the tyrannical state is
enslaved, because it too lacks reason and order.

In a tyranny, no outside governing power controls the tyrant’s selfish behavior. To Plato, the
law can guard against tyranny. In the Republic, he called the law an “external authority” that
functions as the “ally of the whole city.”
Plato stressed the importance of law in his other works. In the Crito, a dialogue between
Socrates and his friend Crito, Crito offers Socrates a way to escape his impending
execution. Socrates refuses, explaining that when a citizen chooses to live in a state, he
“has entered into an implied contract that he will do as . . . [the laws] command him.” In
Plato’s Laws, his last book, he summarizes his stance on the rule of law:
Where the law is subject to some other authority and has none of its own, the
collapse of the state, in my view, is not far off; but if law is the master of the
government and the government is its slave, then the situation is full of promise
and men enjoy all the blessings that the gods shower on a state.
Plato’s ideal and just state is an aristocracy, the rule of the best. He believed leaders
needed to be wise and trained in how to run a state, just as captains of ships are
trained in how to run a ship.
He divided his ideal state into three classes. The lowest and largest class is the producers:
the farmers, craftsmen, traders, and others involved in commerce. The next class is the
warriors, those who defend the state. They are educated in sports, combat, and philosophy
and tested by both terrifying and tempting situations. From the best of warrior class, the
ruling class is drawn. Its members will study philosophy and be given government and
military positions until age 50, when the best of them become philosopher kings.
Plato believed every human’s soul is divided into three parts: appetite, spirit, and reason.
Each of his three classes matches one aspect of a person’s soul. The lower class is linked
to appetite, and it owns all the land and controls all the wealth. The warrior class is spirited
and lives by a code of honor. The ruling class is linked to reason and lives to gain wisdom.
The philosopher kings will prefer seeking truth to ruling, but a law will compel them to rule.
They will obey the law and take their turns as rulers.
[T]he truth is that the State in which the rulers are most reluctant to govern is
always the best and most quietly governed, and the State in which they are most
eager, the worst.
The warrior and ruling classes live in barracks, eat together, and share possessions. None
has families. All children of these classes are brought up without knowing their parents. In

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this way, Plato tries to keep these classes from gaining wealth or producing family
dynasties.
Plato concluded:
Until philosophers are kings, or the kings and princes of this world have the spirit
and power of philosophy, and political greatness and wisdom meet in one, . . .
cities will never have rest from their evils . . . .

Plato gives us his own theory of justice according to which, individually, justice is a
'human virtue' that makes a person self-consistent and good; socially, justice is a
social consciousness that makes a society internally harmonious and good. According
to Plato, justice is a sort of specialization.