IMPORTANCE OF PLATO

In the begining of the philosophy studies, every young philosopher must be

introduced with works of Plato. Plato is considered to be the greatest philosopher that
ever lived.His dialogues are some of the most important monuments of Greek culture and
philosophy too.They represent some of the greatest ideas in history of philosophy and
they are great works of literature too.In my opinion,dialogues are the best introduction to
philosophy.On my first year of philosophy studies i was amazed by these little stories in
which Socrates fights a battle for truth,love and soul.In my favourite dialogue, The
Republic, Plato depicts his famous theory of forms along with some of his political
thoughts.Socrates speaks with Platos brother Glaukon on the various themes which all
refer on two central questions: How to run society? How to live a life based on principles
of truth? Those questions were, are and will be the main questions of philosophy.I think
that we must read and at least try to understand philosophical ideas of Ancient Greece so
we can understand Middle Age theories and the modern ones too.In Platos works we can
feel the spirit of the Greek world and fall in love with philosophy.Plato was a great
mathematician as well.His works in geometry,aritmetics and stereometry were
extraordinary.Theory of forms is a theory of ontological dualism.There we have a world
thats divided in two dimensions( not two worlds like many people think! ), dimension of
forms, which are the causes and principles of the real, physical things.Forms can be also
called ideas or concepts.We find them by using our reason, which Plato calls
noesis.Noesis is not exactly what we call reason today, because it has wider range iof
seeing and finding the truth.When we say reason we often think of laws of thought which
represents logical functions of our brain.Noesis refers not only to the laws of thought but
also to the laws of heart.Only combined, these laws can see the truth.Real things and
objects are shifting and they dont have fixed and eternal logical ground so we can thinks
of forms but we cannot see them.Mathematical numbers are also an ideas.Ontologicaly,
numbers are not of this world.We use them to measure the real objects and operate with
their combinations which we have in our head.In this theory there are also some irational
and religious notes.For example, in book X of The Republic Plato operates with some old
religious myths of the greek world.He is also famous for his soul ressurection theory,and
that is pretty irational and it has nothing to do with his understanding of logical systems.
Nonetheless his teachings helped me to develop a different view on the world.
For now, Plato is my favourite philosopher and i hope that i will continue to read his
dialogues over and over again.