Plato's Dialogues

Nehamas (1999) emphatically stresses that Socrates is “not a teacher of arête,” but as educators know well, it is undeniably the case that Socrates is often “perceived as a teacher,” and beyond, held up as a paragon of pedagogy to be emulated and imitated (62). At his trial, Socrates is accused of “wrongdoing because he corrupts the youth and does not believe in the gods the state believes in” (Ap. 24c). Beyond these charges, he is accused, in the manner of Anaxagoras and other Greek physical scientists, of “investigating the things beneath the earth and in the heavens,” and also charged with, in the manner of the sophists, “making the weaker argument stronger,” importantly, Socrates is, according to his accusers, “teaching [/didaskon] these things to others” (Ap. 19b-c). In his defense (apologia), Socrates distances himself from both the natural philosophers and the sophists, such as Gorgias of Leontini, Prodicus of Ceos, and Hippias of Ellis, who all charge fees for their services and usually teach through speeches or didactic methods that communicate or transfer knowledge to their pupils. In light of these remarks, returning to Nehamas, although his accusers, and even his friends consider Socrates a teacher, this offers no valid reason or sufficient evidence for us “to refuse to take his own disavowal of that role as face value” (71). The Greek, “” (didaskalos) defines a “teacher or master” of one or another subject, such as rhetoric, medicine, craft making, or even poetry (Lexicon 2015, 169). With the understanding of the didaskalos related to the type of instruction in virtue (arête) offered by the sophists, it is against the charges of Meletus that Socrates emphatically denies that he is teacher, specifically of the virtues, claiming that he “was never anyone’s teacher” (Ap. 33a).

In this essay, I muse upon aporia’s value as a pedagogical technique in the philosophy classroom using as a guide examples of aporia that are found in Plato’s Socratic dialogues. The word aporia, translated as “without passage” or “without a way,” is used metaphorically to describe the unsettling state of confusion many find themselves in after engaging in philosophical discourse. Following a brief introduction in which I situate aporia as a pedagogy amicable to experiential learning, I examine various ways in which aporia appears in certain Platonic dialogues, which enables us to draw out some paradigmatic features of aporia. I then discuss how I apply aporia as a pedagogical technique in the contemporary philosophy classroom, taking up three specific concerns in detail: aporetic discomfort, right use, and potential misuse.

That i) there is a somehow determined chronology of Plato's dialogues among all the chronologies of the last century and ii) this theory is subject to many objections, are points this article intends to discuss. Almost all the main suggested chronologies of the last century agree that Parmenides and Theaetetus should be located after dialogues like Meno, Phaedo and Republic and before Sophist, Politicus, Timaeus, Laws and Philebus. The eight objections we brought against this arrangement claim that to place the dialogues like Meno, Phaedo and Republic both immediately after the early ones and before Parmenides and Theaetetus is epistemologically and ontologically problematic.

**OBSOLETE** Regardless, the author analyzes in detail the two (2) separate settings provided by Platon in his staging of the Symposium (the date of the gathering itself vs. the date of its recollection) and argues that the date of recollection has a profound and significant impact on our understanding of Sokrates' trial and, further, that a student of the dialogue should read the Symposium in the shadow of that trial.

DRAFT: Please do not cite. I remain (a bit) displeased with the final two sections of the paper (especially the clumsy transition to Sokrates' Trial), and the End Notes have grown ridiculously complex and labyrinthine -- so much so, that even I get a headache cross checking them (and I wrote the damn thing). Will soon be replaced.

This book is a quest for the real Plato, forever hiding behind the veil of drama. The quest, as the subtitle indicates, is Cartesian in that it looks for Plato independently of the prevailing paradigms on where we are supposed to find him. The result of the quest is a complete pedagogical platform on Plato. This does not mean that the book leaves nothing out, covering all the dialogues and all the themes, but that it provides the full intellectual apparatus for doing just that. It consists of two parts. The first is a general orientation in three chapters, one each pertaining to the life, thought, and works of Plato. The second is a dialogic companion covering the four dialogues built around the last days of Socrates, with a separate chapter devoted to each: Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, and Phaedo.

This paper aims to suggest a new arrangement of Plato's dialogues based on a different theory of the ontological as well as epistemological development of his philosophy. In this new arrangement, which proposes essential changes in the currently agreed upon chronology of the dialogues, Parmenides must be considered as criticizing an elementary theory of Forms and not the theory of so-called middle dialogues. Dated all as later than Parmenides, the so-called middle and late dialoguesare regarded as two consecutive endeavors to resolve the problems drawn out in there; an effort in the theory of knowledge through Theaetetus, Meno and Phaedo and another in ontology through the second part of Parmenides, Sophist and Republic.

"""Resumo: O artigo apresenta uma série de argumentos que apontam para a inexistência de uma “teoria” das idéias stricto sensu na obra escrita de Platão, sugerindo que, mais do que a obtenção de certezas, o objetivo dos diálogos é mostrar a eficácia do método dialético contra os principais inimigos da filosofia: as crenças e os preconceitos.
"""

I have been compiling this list for my own use, having failed to find a comparable tool anywhere, and with an eye toward lowering one small barrier to speakers of non-European languages entering the conversation in Platonic Studies.

Lists are intended to be sortable alphabetically by any language, though this functionality is best realized in the original google sheet. I'll be happy to share that link with interested parties.

Most entries are taken directly from the respective Wikipedia main articles on Plato in the various languages, by heuristic methods. Mistakes are extremely likely. Unfortunately, a randomly-assigned Wikipedia editor deemed it of insufficient general interest to be maintained as a list article on Wikipedia, as would have been my first choice for open- and crowd-sourcing. In this second-best format, I invite any users and perusers to tell me:

1) Whether this is useful / I should keep compiling it
2) To the contrary, whether it reduplicates efforts already freely available elsewhere
3) Of any additions and/or corrections they can make, (reasonable guesses welcome at this stage, expert knowledge not expected) which I'll acknowledge in the next release

J.

At the publisher's request, I am uploading only a few pages of my article.

In a paper read in the conference in Bar Ilan University on Plato and his legacy, I present some conclusions based on my previously published analyses of Hippies Minor, Hippias Major, and Politeia (= Republic) regarding Plato's initial steps in creating a dialogue (at least the early and middle ones). The process of concept -> aspects (including actual and apparent) -> paradeigmata (basic models reflecting these aspects) -> deigmata (the characters as particular models) -> necessarily perverse conversation is confirmed by the unusually explicit and neat presentation of the process in Politeia, obscured to some extent by the necessarily perverse nature of the conversation. I then outline how Plato would have gone about preparing the three dialogues already mentioned. While the dialogues are very different, the process from concept to conversation is essentially the same. I have made a read-through of Hippias Minor in my podcast The Plato Paradigm.

This is chapter 5 from my section on Plato's late group of dialogues.  It follows my posted chapters on the Phaedrus and Theatetus. I have completed but not yet posted my work on the early and middle groups.  This chapter sees the Parmenides as advancing middle group ideas into their final stage of teaching and learning about first causes and philosophical method.

This paper compares cultic traditions surrounding Asclepius, whereby the cultic mention of the god must be preceded by his father Apollo, with Plato's Phaedo, which parallels this cultic tradition by having an Apollinean opening (Socrates' conversion to poetry and composition of a hymn to Apollo) and an Asclepian closure (the puzzling 'cock for Asclepius' mentioned in dying Socrates'  last words). Accordingly, Socrates’ offering of a cock may be construed as prophesising the healing of philosophy through a new beginning, to be identified with the writing of the dialogues. With his eventual conversion,  Socrates 'the father' merely prefigures such new beginning, while Plato, his philosophical 'son', fully develops and realises it.

This gives a quick overview of the whole of  my section on Plato's late group dialogues, some of which have already been posted on Academia.Edu.  The Sophist, Politicus, and Philebus have been written but not yet posted.  A chapter on philosophical dialectic will follow. My work as a whole interprets each and al lof  Plato's dialogues in order of of reading based on the programme of teaching and learning described in them.

The Platonic dialogues are designed for reading. The audience they presuppose and to which they are addressed is, fundamentally, a reading public. In order to be performed as a dramatic work, the Platonic dialogue therefore demands a singular kind of reader, whose particular nature and function emerge as an effect of the inner functioning of the text as well as of the very act of reading. Accordingly, the present study aims to outline the platonic reader's profile, which is demanded and constituted by the dialogues. We take, as a starting point, an analysis of the Theaetetus' opening, important for presenting a sample of a reader's performance.

Through a study of nature and paternal power, this paper sheds light on the neglected theme of the relation between language and justice in Plato's Cratylus. The dialogue inquires after the correctness of names, and it turns out that no lineage leads us back to a natural ground of names. Every lineage breaks; nature is always disrupted by the monstrous. It does not follow, however, that names are mere conventions without significance: on the contrary, naming is best understood as a prayer to and for the just. The Cratylus reveals the insufficiency of language not to lead us to despair but to call us to the humility and the hope in which we must pray for justice.

The author argues that the accurate description of the Βενδίδεια's first celebration provided by Platon in the Republic's opening, when compared (and added) to the epigraphic evidence supplied by IG I3 136 and IG II2 1283 shows Athenians imported both Bendis' cults and her festival during the time of the Great Plague and that the inauguration took place the earliest days of June, 429 BCE.

Resumo:
As relações de Platão com o gênero cômico, quase sempre mencionadas por seus biógrafos e comentadores tardios – Diógenes Laércio, Olimpiodoro, Apuleio, Albinus –, estão enunciadas e circunstanciadas em vários diálogos – no Banquete, no Teeteto, no Filebo, nas Leis, por exemplo – em contraposição e aposição à figura do filósofo e às funções da filosofia. O presente estudo tem por objetivo discutir essa contraposição no diálogo entre Sócrates e Trasímaco, no Livro I da República, analisando na estrutura dos argumentos a dupla oposição entre o filósofo e o sofista, e, o filósofo e o retórico, articuladas a partir dos usos da poesia aristofânica na composição do diálogo.

Abstract: Plato's relations with the comic genre, often mentioned by his biographers and late commentators – Diogenes Laertius, Olympiodorus, Apuleius, Albinus – are listed and detailed in various dialogues – in the Symposium, in the Theaetetus, in the Philebus, and in Laws, for example – in contraposition and in apposition to the figure of the philosopher and to the functions of philosophy. This study aims to discuss this contraposition in the dialogue between Socrates and Thrasymachus in Book I of the Republic, analyzing in the structure of the arguments the double opposition between the philosopher and the sophist and the philosopher and the rhetorician, articulated by the uses of Aristophanic poetry in the composition of the dialogue.

The author argues the evidence presented by Platon concerning Sokrates' time during the Siege and Battles of Poteidaia, presented in both the Symposium and Charmides, does not conflict and that the Charmides indeed has a precise and accurate "dramatic date" (the last days of May, 429 BCE).

**DRAFT** UPDATED 23 January 2024. PREVIOUS VERSION COMPLETELY OBSOLETE.  Excerpt from The Athenian Year Primer Volume II. 2nd of 3 Chapters on the Apatouria. Previous Chapter, I argued the Apatouria played a fundamental role for Athenian πολιτεία (citizenship) in that the festival established the "official" ages of ancient Athenians. This Chapter I use Alkibiades son of Kleinias to illustrate the methodology and show it sound. All math and calculations redone from further research.

This paper analyzes the etymology of the name erōs (e[ rw") in Phaedrus (238c3-4, 252b8-9) and studies the function of the etymology in close relation to the Platonic theory of language. Its aim is to evaluate its function, in order to contribute to the understanding of its significance in the Dialogues as a whole. lov gou duv nami" tugcav nei yucagwgiv a ou\ sa "el valor de la palabra reside en su capacidad para guiar las almas." (Phdr. 271c10) 1. introducción la etimología griega, en particular la de Platón, no ha dejado de suscitar interpretaciones divergentes en las distintas épocas históricas en las que ha sido objeto de análisis. Durante toda la antigüedad las etimologías de los Diálogos fueron aceptadas al igual que sucedió en

Love of wisdom allows for the creation of that space where ethical and loving life is possible. This means that eros must remain to any understanding of the self, world, and politeia. It also means, however, that the energy of love be directed—though not subverted—to productive ends. Eros was on trial in Plato’s time. In the course of the dialogue, Plato attempts to defend and exonerate Eros from the de-mythologizers. We are left to judge if he succeeded.

Plato's Phaedrus is a work of strong contrasts: in the form and in the content. Thus, of the two parts mío which it is divided, one consists of discourses and the other of a dialogue; one is practical and the other theoretical; one is about ἒρως and the other about λόγος.
Nevertheless, the most signifteant antithesis appears between the extreme passages (prologue and epilogue) and the central one (the second discourse of Socrates), with regard to the structure as well as to the meaning, and in every aspect: space, time, movement, characters and, specially, in the ontologic level. In fact, the sensitive world of the images and appearances is opposed to the intelligible world of the Reality, in the same way as exterior and interior, nature and man, body and soul are opposed.

This is the first chapter of the first section of my unpublished 1980s PhD thesis.  It outlines the textual evidence for a new framework for understanding Plato's dialogues. The second chapter, to follow, examines what the dialogues say about the education and learning of soul, as it is this that they image.

The elenchus (gr. ἔλεγχος, literally “argument of disproof”, “refutation”, “cross-examining”) is the core of the Socratic method represented by Plato in his early dialogues. This enquiring technique, employed by Socrates to question his interlocutors about the nature or definition of ethical concepts, is the object of a never-ending scholarly debate, concerning especially its primary purpose: is it a positive method, leading to knowledge, or is it rather a negative method, aiming exclusively at refuting the interlocutor’s belief? This paper, through the analysis of some key passages in Plato’s early dialogues, focuses on the structural features of the elenchus in order to understand how the elenctic refutation is developed, why Socrates chooses a dialectical method often ending in aporia, and whether the Socratic method can be considered, not merely an instrument aiming at the recognition of one’s ignorance, but primarily a positive search for knowledge.