1)
Parmenides (excerpt
from On
Nature (peri physis)):
And the goddess received me with sympathy [….] ‘[I]t is not an evil
fate
[moira
kake] that has sent
you to travel on this way [odon] - and truly this
way is apart from men,
outside their (trodden) path - but, rather, rule and order [Themis
te Dike te]. There is,
however, a need
for you to experience everything [pantha], both the
stable heart of
well-enclosing unconcealment [aletheies],
as well as the appearing in its
appearance to mortals [broton doxas],
where there
is no relying on the unconcealed [tes ouk eni pistis
alethes]. Also this, however, you will learn to
experience: how the appearing (in the need) remains called upon to be
apparent,
while it shines through everything and (hence) in that way brings
everything to
perfection (4, emphasis mine).
Why
are the concepts
of peras, apeiron and
“the
essential elements” (i.e., “platonic solids”) important for the early
Greek
philosophers? How did the early Greek philosophers deal with these
concepts?
What manner of thinking were they reacting/responding to (i.e., discuss mythos - logos)?
2)
How is Socrates influenced by a “divine
manifestation” or ‘daimon’ (Apology
33c, 40a, 41d), Euthyphro
(3b)?
3)
What does Socrates mean when he asks, “Why
should we care so much for
what the majority think?” (Crito, 44c)? Relate this
to Socrates’ feelings about
democracy which come out in the Apology ?
(especially 24d-25c)
4)
How is ‘Lethe’ (the “concealed,”
“oblivion,” “forgetfulness”) revealed
to us as ‘Aletheia’
(“Truth”) according to various Pre-Socratics?
Relate this to techne.
5)
What does Socrates mean when he says, “A good man cannot be harmed either in life or in
death” (Apology,
41d)?
Connect
this with:
“It is the greatest good for a man to discuss virtue (arete)
every day and those other things about which you hear me
conversing and testing myself and others, for the unexamined life is
not worth
living ” (Apology, 38a).
Relate
this also to the “Myth of
Er”: The
myth
begins at 613a and finishes at the “Plain of Oblivion” [Lethe],
where each takes a drink, in varying amounts, from
the “River of Oblivion” before being reborn into his/her next life [at
621d].
“The point is that the gods
never neglect anyone who is prepared to devote
himself to becoming moral and, by practicing virtue [arete],
to
assimilate himself to God [theos] as much as is
humanly possible”
(613b).
Note how,
despite the role of Necessity, one has a certain amount of
choice, “No deity [daimon] will be assigned to you:
you will pick your
own deities. […] goodness makes its own rules: each of you will be good
to the
extent that you value it. Responsibility lies with the
chooser, not with God
[617e].”