Greek Philosophers

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Greek Philosophers

• Philosophy love of knowledge/wisdom

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Sophists

• Teachers who taught the skills of rhetoric and
  legal argument
• Athens needed teachers for young men who would be
  joining the Assembly
• These teachers (sophists as a whole) were
  eventually criticized for being more concerned
  with winning arguments than with seeking truth.

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Socrates (469-399 B.C.)

• From the sophist movement, real philosophers
  emerged, paving the way for Socrates.
• Socrates never wrote down his philosophy. His
  ideas were recorded by other people, mainly his
  pupil Plato.
• The unexamined life is not worth living.
• There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil,
  ignorance.

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Socrates (469-399 B.C.)

• Socratic methodSocrates would ask a broad
  question and then keep asking questions to force
  the responder to consider all sides of the
  subject and defend his position without
  contradicting himself

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Socrates (469-399 B.C.)

• Socrates especially wanted Athenians to consider
  notions of justice and right and wrong.
• When accused of corrupting youth with his
  instructional methods, he chose to end his life
  with hemlock (Athens method of execution) rather
  than apologize or promise to cease his methods.
  He was definitely a man of conviction.

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Plato (429-347 B.C.)

• Coming from an aristocratic family, he was sent
  to school to study rhetoricand his teacher was
  Socrates.
• Plato recorded many of Socrates teachings and
  philosophical ideas in his Dialogues, in which
  the debates between speakers raise philosophical
  points.

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Plato (429-347 B.C.)

• The RepublicPlatos ideal state ruled by
  philosopher-kings, trained at the highest levels
  of knowledge
• The AcademyPlatos school founded in 380 B.C.
• AristotlePlatos pupil

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Plato (429-347 B.C.)

• PlatonismTranscendent Truth is the only truth.
• Everything on the physical plane is a poor
  representation of the eternal, perfect idea which
  resides in the spiritual plane.
• Plato used as an example the ideal of table
  versus various examples of table in the
  material world.

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Plato (429-347 B.C.)

• Plato believed people should rely on reasonwhich
  he saw as the innate part of us that is in tune
  with Godto find Truth.
• He believed that in the material plane, truth can
  be manipulated, so trying to prove something with
  an example doesnt necessarily make it true. He
  believed that our physical perceptions can be
  unreliable.

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Aristotle (384-322 B.C.)

• Aristotelian philosophy is more systematic,
  empirical, and logical than Platonism.
• While Plato can be seen as an idealist, Aristotle
  can be seen as a realist.
• While Plato believed our physical perceptions can
  be unreliable, Aristotle believed we must use our
  physical senses to study/observe the world.

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Aristotle (384-322 B.C.)

• PoeticsAristotles views on the components of
  effective tragedy, including catharsis, hamartia,
  reversal, etc.

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Aristotle (384-322 B.C.)

• Invited by King Philip II of Macedon to tutor his
  son Alexander the Great
• LyceumAristotles school founded in 335 B.C.