Philosophies

[poopipe]

Its just bullshit really.....

only to people who can't get their head around reading it.

There'd be bugger all in the way of psychology, religion, mathematics and science in general if it weren't for bearded freaks like pythagoros taking a break from forming funny pseudo religious sex cults, eating some funny herbs and having a nice think on the bog once in a while.

I'm not saying they aren't speaking out of their arses half the time but without somebody asking the odd important question you don't get any important answers do you?

[tomass666]

What I mean is that most of the population dont need to think about philosophy like aristotle(?) did. Unless you mean thinking about ideals to live your life by, but thats not really philosophy.

[Urpedigreechumdog]

^ Bullshit.

The philosophy is bullshit or you think it's bullshit about copy and pasting?

That the last third of my most recent philosophy essay, could post the rest, then maybe it'll all make more sense cos you'd know all about the anaolgy of the cave then.

Here's the whole of it so you can make some more sense of it (hopefully), got me a b anyhoo, so it can't be too bad....

Plato's Analogy of the cave describes a group of prisoners who have spent their whole lives chained up at the back of an underground cave. They were unable to turn around and were facing a wall. Behind the prisoners by a fair distance was a fire and in between the fire and the prisoners was a small wall and some people who were able to move around. These people used puppets to cast shadows onto the wall of the cave, which is all the prisoners could see and because the prisoner cannot turn around and see behind them, the shadows seem real.

Plato said that if one of the prisoners were to be set free then he would be blinded by the light of the fire and would not be able to see the puppets clearly, at this point the shadows would still appear to be more real than the puppets. But if he were to be dragged out of the cave into the sunlight, he would be even more confused, but slowly he would get used to seeing the clarity of real objects and creatures. The prisoner would also see the sun for what it really is, the source of all life, for the first time he would understand the truth.

This prisoner would not care about the shadows since he had made this incredible journey and now knows the truth. He also would not want to go back and tell the other prisoners as he feared that they would not believe him. The other prisoners would have also noticed that his journey through the natural light has weakened the prisoner's ability to see the shadows, because back in the darkness he would find it harder to see them. We are told by Plato that if that prisoner was to try and convince to others to follow him, then he would be killed to stop him from doing so.

The Analogy of the cave, overall, tries to show the differences between the appearance of the world (represented by the scene inside the cave) and the reality which Plato believed is happening behind this appearance (represented by the outside world with the sun, animals etc). Every detail in the Analogy help to provide a contrast between these two things, to try and convince the reader about the importance of making the effort to discover reality. There are six main things which hold some importance in the analogy and need to be explained.

The prisoners in the cave represent people in the world today who have been deceived by what they see and believe that there is nothing beyond the 'shadow play', which for the prisoners is the full extent of reality, we can relate to this in our world, our senses convince us that there is nothing beyond what we see, hear, smell, touch and so on. According to Plato, our mistake is the same as the prisoners' and just as obvious to those who know the truth.

The 'shadow play', puppets making shadows on the wall in front of the prisoners, represents the illusion created by our senses that there is nothing beyond what we can see and hear etc. Just as the shadows seemed real to the prisoners, the sights and sounds we experience seem genuine to us, according to Plato. He says that we cannot access reality through our senses.

In the Analogy, the cave represents our visible world, where the shadows (representing appearances) seem more real than the truth itself. The cave could also be interpreted as representing the human body, which imprisons the soul. Just as the cave gives rise to the shadow play, so the body provides us with illusions from our senses and since these illusions seem more real than the 'truth', the body prevents the soul from seeking true knowledge.

We can relate the journey of the prisoner out of the cave into the outside world, to a philosopher's discovery of true knowledge. We know the prisoner had to loosen his chains and escape from the cave before he could see 'true reality'. In the same way, a philosopher would need to free himself from the illusion created by his senses by using his mind to gain knowledge. Plato describes this process as painful and confusing because (according to Plato) we would need to reject everything that is familiar to us in order to see 'true reality'. Plato believes that we are frightened and dazzled by reality, like the prisoner in the Analogy, and because reality is so unfamiliar it seems less believable than the illusion being created from our senses. According to Plato, it will take a while for us to discover the true reality to it's full extent, just like the prisoner could not look at the sun when he first came out of the cave.

The sun represents the most perfect of all realities which Plato calls 'the form of the good'. He believes that our ultimate goal is to gain knowledge of this form as it will enable us to understand everything else. Plato tries to emphasise to us that although the journey to true reality is painful, no one will ever want to return to their former 'lack of knowledge'.

Plato interprets the return of the prisoner to the cave as what would happen to a philosopher who had discovered true knowledge and wanted to share it with those who have not. But because the philosopher's old interests in his former ways of life are so far beneath him, he has lost the skills with them, being out of practice, in the analogy, this is interpreted as the prisoner returning and not being able to see the shadows properly.

Plato's Analogy of the cave is used to help interpret what he means by 'The Forms' and how it is only possible to access the forms via the soul. An example of this is the cave in the story, which as previously mentioned, could be interpreted as representing the human body, which imprisons the soul and stop it from accessing the world of the forms.

Bit that's already been posted....

Plato's Analogy of the cave is one attempt to try and explain his theory of the forms, but there are many strengths and weaknesses with this theory of the forms and sometimes Plato can be very vague, some might say that his theory is very unconvincing based upon the lack of explanation but Plato also raises some very interesting points.

Plato believed in a 'world of the forms', which is a world where everything is perfect. In this world there is a perfect 'form' for everything in our world, the world of the senses, where nothing is perfect. We only recognise a tree as a tree, because our soul has experienced the form of a perfect tree. The soul is the only part of us which can experience the world of the forms, but when it is born into a human body, it is supposedly trapped and unable to access the forms.

The world of the forms is invisible to us, we cannot see it therefore it can be frustrating and unconvincing to think that there is a world we cannot sense. However Plato seems to believe that it is simple to access the forms through the soul, if you can get into the frame of mind where you can free yourself from the illusions created by your sense's. Others would argue that to free yourself from your illusions by rejecting everything that is familiar to you in order to see 'true reality', could be interpreted as tricking yourself into thinking that there is an invisible world around us, when there is not.

Plato tells us that the forms cannot be taught, they are innate, we know them already but we do not acknowledge them. To acknowledge these forms would be too painful and confusing as earlier mentioned with the story of the analogy of the cave. But we could easily argue this by asking for evidence, how can Plato prove that we can access the forms through the soul? He cannot prove it but he would argue that we have an innate sense of all things perfect but we have never actually seen a perfect object, Plato would say that our soul has experienced the world of the forms and we can recognise things from the world of the senses because they resemble those from the world of the forms.

For a person to think that there is another world, that we cannot see, is mind blowing, why should we accept Plato's theory? As he said in his analogy of the cave, the illusions put forward by our sense's will seem more real than any 'true reality' at first. If person X were to say “seeing is believing, an invisible world cannot exist”, Plato could argue that what person X is seeing is only an illusion created by their own senses and that the true reality is the world of the forms.

Plato explains that everything in this world is a pale reflection of it's form, however there are bad things in this world such as violence, does Plato mean to say that there is a perfect form of violence or evil? If so, why? Surely a perfect form of violence would be even worse than the earthly examples of them. This is contradictory since the world of the forms is supposed to be perfect.

Btw, this is obviously copy and pasted from my documents, i'm not stupid enough to write an essay just for TF.

Edited October 8, 2005 by Urpedigreechumdog

[Ash-Kennard]

Btw, this is obviously copy and pasted from my documents, i'm not stupid enough to write an essay just for TF.

I found that hilarious. :P :P

[fredrico]

Eagles may soar but weasels dont get sucked up into jet engines

[MrMonkey]

Eagles may soar but weasels dont get sucked up into jet engines

I can't think of many eagles flying at 30,000 feet where theres a lack of oxygen.

[Ash-Kennard]

I can't think of many eagles flying at 30,000 feet where theres a lack of oxygen.

Your really funny too.

[MrMonkey]

Your really funny too.

If you're being sarcastic: I know, but I can only dream of your standards.

If you're being sincere: Thank you kind sir.

[Ash-Kennard]

I was being sincere. Your a f**king leg end mate.

[yoyoyo]

The only thing that is more a waste of time than philosophy is writing out that big paragraph thing :P

No offence but i hate all the philosophy stuff especially the people my age doing it and trying to sound like their 80

[mink]

I can't think of many eagles flying at 30,000 feet where theres a lack of oxygen.

Planes don't magically appear at 30,000 ft they have to ascend and descend, check this.

[MrMonkey]

Comments from Report: Aircraft struck over 400 birds just after take off.

LMAO. Dear me. That's hilarious.

[boris_on_trials]

iv got one if a tree falls in the woods and thers no one around to hear it does it make a sound but if thers no one aroundto hear it how do u know its fallen

Edited October 9, 2005 by boris_on_trials

[Urpedigreechumdog]

iv got one if a tree falls in the woods and thers no one around to hear it does it make a sound

Why should it not make a sound? It doesn't have the ability to decide whether or not it wants to make a sound.

but if thers no one aroundto hear it how do u know its fallen

Because it's on the floor.

[boris_on_trials]

well now its on the floor u can bunny hop an stuff on and over it it would be beter if it was leaning up a wall u could ride up it

Edited October 10, 2005 by boris_on_trials

[poopipe]

oo oo

every hole's a goal (Y)

[Urpedigreechumdog]

Not a 'philosophy' but it's along the same lines of what the thread maker is getting at....

Beauty is only a lightswitch away

A fat chick'll do the trick

[boris_on_trials]

I may be fat but your ugly and i can diet

[peterj20]

They aren't philosopical in anyway really are they.

And you got one of them wrong, "There's only 2 things to be sure of in life, Taxes and Death"

Taxes? what if youre a gypsy??...

[MrMonkey]

Taxes? what if youre a gypsy??...

You can't talk properly and you live like a turd. So it's a taxing ( :P ) life for them.

[JT!]

I may be fat but your ugly and i can diet

:P

Your radged.

[peterj20]

You can't talk properly and you live like a turd. So it's a taxing ( :P ) life for them.

You disproved your own point - it can't be taxing to live 'like a turd' and to not bother forming your speech properly. Can't think of anything easier!

Anyway, enough about gypsies. Who the hell brought them up...? :-

[Mark W]

Don't be too quick to mock Philosophy to be rendered pointless as our whole democracy was foundered through it. Now you can get all arsery with how you think modern politics is a load of crap with constant endless spin and liers but hey if you dont like it go and live in a dictatership for a while. Urpedigreechumdog- nice to try and introduce a bit of Plato but I think you would have been better to explain Plato's analogy of the cave with a bit more detail (with lots of reference to the Matrix) as it introduces the idea of why Philosophy is important.

Nice to introduce it, despite the fact that the majority of Plato's ideas are utter shite? In Philosophy they're typically built up just to knock them down. The way that the majority of his major ideas and concepts are based on the understanding that the idea of the Forms are actually correct (which it's hugely unlikely they aren't, to put it mildly) means that all of his ideologies are houses built on sand. I understand that his ideas are important to the development of Western philosophy, but the whole thing is is that his actual ideologies are totally irrelevant to modern life, as they're completely out of context to when he was writing them - plus, as I said, they are all turd :P

[Wilson_26_]

To ride or not to ride? That is a stupid question!

Wilson

[RicH_87]

not a philosophie more a quote from shawshank, and its also a song name

get busy living, or get busy dying.

it's a beast.

as for the ryan leech thing on page one, at work we have loads of 'motivational' posters, such as, "its takes years to find a customer, but just seconds to loose one" and one is "sucess is a journey, not a destination", not life you foo!

imo, philosophical sayings are just used by dumb people so make them sound clever.