Jem said:
According to plato, Truth and Good are Beauty. And Beauty is True and Good. And Good is Beautiful and True. And Truth is both Good and Beautifl. By Definition. hehehe...
Plato discussion? Or truth vs beauty?
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Plato discussion? Or truth vs beauty?
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Jem said:
Jem said:
"Fortunate circumstances do not equate to high ideals."
"Mostly muffins sir."- My answer in response to the question posed by the officer, "Son, do you have anything on you I should know about?"
His response: "Holy $&!^. He's not kidding! Look at all these muffins!"
"Mostly muffins sir."- My answer in response to the question posed by the officer, "Son, do you have anything on you I should know about?"
His response: "Holy $&!^. He's not kidding! Look at all these muffins!"
Then Av said:
Not everything Beautiful is True, and not all Truths are Beautiful.
"Fortunate circumstances do not equate to high ideals."
"Mostly muffins sir."- My answer in response to the question posed by the officer, "Son, do you have anything on you I should know about?"
His response: "Holy $&!^. He's not kidding! Look at all these muffins!"
"Mostly muffins sir."- My answer in response to the question posed by the officer, "Son, do you have anything on you I should know about?"
His response: "Holy $&!^. He's not kidding! Look at all these muffins!"
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Plato is the second greatest philosopher in human history.
I think his beauty is entirely subjected, but then again it is perfection. The problem is that he argues that perfection is within the realm of ideas and not tangible. I think beauty is tangible, AND an idea? God? Science? Both.
I think his beauty is entirely subjected, but then again it is perfection. The problem is that he argues that perfection is within the realm of ideas and not tangible. I think beauty is tangible, AND an idea? God? Science? Both.
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I certainly think that Beauty is tangible, no matter how we define it. It is something that we agree exists. Of course, as with so many things, that definition probably varies from peson to person.
And as LoreMaster suggests, Beauty is an idea as well. An idea that we carry with us. Whether or not Beauty is always True is the question though.
In a sense, and despite what I said earlier, I think it may be. But only in the sense of some objective truth, where it is true that something can be, or is, beautiful.
In the sense that all Truth is beautiful, I'm not sure. Although again, we could say that in a way, Truth has its own beauty, a lot of truth is brutal, ugly, or unkind.
While it may fit in with the ideal of truth being beautiful in and of itself, the facts of truth may be an altogether less pleasant thing.
LoreMaster-- Who do you consider the greatest philosopher?
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And as LoreMaster suggests, Beauty is an idea as well. An idea that we carry with us. Whether or not Beauty is always True is the question though.
In a sense, and despite what I said earlier, I think it may be. But only in the sense of some objective truth, where it is true that something can be, or is, beautiful.
In the sense that all Truth is beautiful, I'm not sure. Although again, we could say that in a way, Truth has its own beauty, a lot of truth is brutal, ugly, or unkind.
While it may fit in with the ideal of truth being beautiful in and of itself, the facts of truth may be an altogether less pleasant thing.
LoreMaster-- Who do you consider the greatest philosopher?
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Ok, let's get into this...
How I understood and came to accept the idea that truth and beauty are both good, and that the words can be interchangable (in the way Plato used them) is pretty complicated. It's almost solely in the realm of the Platonic dialogues as far as that goes, as opposed to the Socratic dialogues.
First of all, Truth: Plato says you can only KNOW true things, that you can never really KNOW things that are not true. He then goes on to say (forgive me for not having the dialogues and notations available) in effect that if there is a possibility of doubt in something, that you can never truly be sure of it, then it is not true.
For example, to plato it would be incorrect to say "Abe Lincoln was the 16th president of the united states" because it would be possible that you could have been duped into believing this, that we could all be lied to and fooled about it. Thusly, the Abe factoid would never be able to have the weight of truth to Plato.
Things that are 'true' exist. He felt that abstract concepts held the only real truth, and that things like "beauty" did in fact exist. Some of his arguments for this were pretty good... there's the sticks to sticks argument....
Looking at two sticks from an equal distance away, it appears to us that they are equal in length. If one is moved forward, that stick looks 'large' in comparison to the other. If that stick is then moved away, it looks 'small' in comparison to the other. Therefore the ideas of large and small do not exist in the sticks.
He thought that the ideas did exist, in a non-spatial, non-temporal reality. That reality is where he thinks that true things exist.
Plato believed that the only way to happiness was in perfecting the 'art' of being happy, which is often referred to as virtue. However, in the Laches, he gives a VERY convincing argument that all virtues could be reduced to the one virtue of Wisdom. I don't have the time or memory to recreate the whole thing now, but it's very short and I'll link to it later if I can find it somewhere. Wisdom then would be the art of attaining maximum fulfillment. It would be applied by having knowledge of the consequences of ones actions, and used to ensure that those consequences lead to happiness.
SO
Wisdom would be KNOWledge of consequences. To him, we can only Know true things. Wisdom would be the knowledge of true things, which leads us to the Good.
Now, the Good is what he puts at the center of human behavior, and human life in general.
He felt that humans acted by combining their ideas of what would make them happy, ie the ideas of the good, with a constant desire that all humans share for happiness. AKA The good.
So: Humans act when they have an idea of what can make them happy. Hedonistic Egoism.
So we have Wisdom=Knowledge of the Truth=Happiness=Good.
The happiness he's talking about is spelled with a capitol H, also, and it seems he's referring to total fulfillment of human potential.
The idea is persuasive because it sets up the idea that if we all keep learning the truths of the universe, someday it will make us happy. Wouldn't that be nice?
Obviously everything that is true exists. Because otherwise it wouldn't be true at all. But if there is no divine Truth to lincoln being the 16th president, or that my name is Phil (because it could very well be anything else, and what kind of truth is that?) what are we left with for existance?
Well, he thinks that spatial/material objects (This is really into plato's metaphysics of course) come into being based on our ideas, on our perspectives. We 'apply' various interconnected non spatial-material objects to create the visible and physical world around us, and that the world that we create is not necessarily the same as the world that someone else might create.
I think that last bit, the part about how the worlds could be different, is really obviously true. I used to think that thin pretty girls, like the ones in american magazines, would be obvious sources of a lot of happiness. Alas, I learned that many girls look like that because of incredibly unhealthy behaviors, and they have a very specific idea of happiness that relates to physical beauty. In that case, basing a long term relationship decision on physical beauty would probably damage me in the long run, and that made them seem a lot less attractive. This translates into my view of the world. Girls that look that way, now, do not inspire attraction the same way they used to. In effect, I learned better. Reality changed its appearance to reflect my ideas of it.
SO, the more 'truth' we know about the 'good' which is happiness in the long run, the happier will be. In other words, if we looked at the world in the right way all the time, we would see the beauty in it, and would be happy regardless of the circumstances.
So that's the specific read of plato that I was very recently a subscriber of, and a lot of the ideas I still really enjoy.
Beauty=Truth=Good
How I understood and came to accept the idea that truth and beauty are both good, and that the words can be interchangable (in the way Plato used them) is pretty complicated. It's almost solely in the realm of the Platonic dialogues as far as that goes, as opposed to the Socratic dialogues.
First of all, Truth: Plato says you can only KNOW true things, that you can never really KNOW things that are not true. He then goes on to say (forgive me for not having the dialogues and notations available) in effect that if there is a possibility of doubt in something, that you can never truly be sure of it, then it is not true.
For example, to plato it would be incorrect to say "Abe Lincoln was the 16th president of the united states" because it would be possible that you could have been duped into believing this, that we could all be lied to and fooled about it. Thusly, the Abe factoid would never be able to have the weight of truth to Plato.
Things that are 'true' exist. He felt that abstract concepts held the only real truth, and that things like "beauty" did in fact exist. Some of his arguments for this were pretty good... there's the sticks to sticks argument....
Looking at two sticks from an equal distance away, it appears to us that they are equal in length. If one is moved forward, that stick looks 'large' in comparison to the other. If that stick is then moved away, it looks 'small' in comparison to the other. Therefore the ideas of large and small do not exist in the sticks.
He thought that the ideas did exist, in a non-spatial, non-temporal reality. That reality is where he thinks that true things exist.
Plato believed that the only way to happiness was in perfecting the 'art' of being happy, which is often referred to as virtue. However, in the Laches, he gives a VERY convincing argument that all virtues could be reduced to the one virtue of Wisdom. I don't have the time or memory to recreate the whole thing now, but it's very short and I'll link to it later if I can find it somewhere. Wisdom then would be the art of attaining maximum fulfillment. It would be applied by having knowledge of the consequences of ones actions, and used to ensure that those consequences lead to happiness.
SO
Wisdom would be KNOWledge of consequences. To him, we can only Know true things. Wisdom would be the knowledge of true things, which leads us to the Good.
Now, the Good is what he puts at the center of human behavior, and human life in general.
He felt that humans acted by combining their ideas of what would make them happy, ie the ideas of the good, with a constant desire that all humans share for happiness. AKA The good.
So: Humans act when they have an idea of what can make them happy. Hedonistic Egoism.
So we have Wisdom=Knowledge of the Truth=Happiness=Good.
The happiness he's talking about is spelled with a capitol H, also, and it seems he's referring to total fulfillment of human potential.
The idea is persuasive because it sets up the idea that if we all keep learning the truths of the universe, someday it will make us happy. Wouldn't that be nice?
Obviously everything that is true exists. Because otherwise it wouldn't be true at all. But if there is no divine Truth to lincoln being the 16th president, or that my name is Phil (because it could very well be anything else, and what kind of truth is that?) what are we left with for existance?
Well, he thinks that spatial/material objects (This is really into plato's metaphysics of course) come into being based on our ideas, on our perspectives. We 'apply' various interconnected non spatial-material objects to create the visible and physical world around us, and that the world that we create is not necessarily the same as the world that someone else might create.
I think that last bit, the part about how the worlds could be different, is really obviously true. I used to think that thin pretty girls, like the ones in american magazines, would be obvious sources of a lot of happiness. Alas, I learned that many girls look like that because of incredibly unhealthy behaviors, and they have a very specific idea of happiness that relates to physical beauty. In that case, basing a long term relationship decision on physical beauty would probably damage me in the long run, and that made them seem a lot less attractive. This translates into my view of the world. Girls that look that way, now, do not inspire attraction the same way they used to. In effect, I learned better. Reality changed its appearance to reflect my ideas of it.
SO, the more 'truth' we know about the 'good' which is happiness in the long run, the happier will be. In other words, if we looked at the world in the right way all the time, we would see the beauty in it, and would be happy regardless of the circumstances.
So that's the specific read of plato that I was very recently a subscriber of, and a lot of the ideas I still really enjoy.
Beauty=Truth=Good
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This I really like, for reasons that I won't go into, lest we de-rail this thread as well. It certainly True thoughJemCheeta wrote:Reality changed its appearance to reflect my ideas of it.
Although this is true in the sense that Plato intended, my question is perhaps slightly less metaphysical. Are all things that are beautiful, necessarily true? Doesn't "falsehood" often wear a beautiful face? If something is True, does that automatically make it beautiful?JemCheeta wrote:Beauty=Truth=Good
And what do we mean by beautiful anyway? The Truth could always be considered beautiful in the sense that all truth is better than any lie, but that doesn't necessarily make the thing which is true beautiful in itself.
Perhaps this touches on another concept I've mentioned occaisionally, the difference between "subjective" and "objective" truth. Where "objective" truth is something independantly verifiable, such as Abe Lincoln being the 116th president, and subjective truths being...well...subjective. True to the observer but not necessarily to someone else.
All truth may well be "good", but how does that make it automatically "beautiful"?
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Yeah actually I pretty much faltered on the 'beautiful' bit... I can't remember the argument 
I don't know... to go with feeling for a minute, there was never anything that I got the impression of true beauty from that proved to be inherently false. That mystified, heart in your throat beautiful anyway. In as far as that reaction was concerned, there was truth in the beauty of it. A lie can be convenient, and attractive... ah I'm not even sure about this line of questioning. That reality changing with perception might be worth hijacking the thread over, btw. Almost definately.
I don't know... to go with feeling for a minute, there was never anything that I got the impression of true beauty from that proved to be inherently false. That mystified, heart in your throat beautiful anyway. In as far as that reaction was concerned, there was truth in the beauty of it. A lie can be convenient, and attractive... ah I'm not even sure about this line of questioning. That reality changing with perception might be worth hijacking the thread over, btw. Almost definately.
Start where you are,
use what you have,
do what you can.
use what you have,
do what you can.
perhaps he meant truth is beautiful in it's isolated absoluteness and purity as a concept - ie somehting that wholly "is" should be appreciated for it's entire "rightness" in that it is incontravertible, unassailable. I don't think that Plato was after qualifying truth by looking at what each truth meant.
I've just got up, it's a little after 6am, I have a huge and urgent piece of work to deliver by MOnday, and this forum has me debating the fineries of PLato!? Life is good, isn't it?
I've just got up, it's a little after 6am, I have a huge and urgent piece of work to deliver by MOnday, and this forum has me debating the fineries of PLato!? Life is good, isn't it?
He came dancing across the water...what a killer...
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hamako wrote:I've just got up, it's a little after 6am...and this forum has me debating the fineries of PLato!? Life is good, isn't it?
It sure is! I certainly agree with you that Plato was not considering the "circumstantial" nature of any given "Truth". And I know what JemCheeta is talking about when he says that true beauty is rarely, if ever, inherently false.
However, my position here is that not everything false is inherently ugly, and not everything true is automatically beautiful. There are ugly truths, but that makes them no less true.
As for reality being changed by your perceptions, there is a thread for it, sort of, in this forum, called "Is reality Real?"
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