It is well-known that Plato's Republic introduces a tripartition of the incarnate human soul: yet quite how to interpret his 'parts' (a term, greek, that is neither recurrent nor emphatic) is debated.' On a strong reading. they are psychological subjects---much as we take ourselves to be, but /unnuncull, not homnies. On a weak reading, they are something less paradoxical: aspects of ourselves, identi-fied by characteristic mental states, dispositional and occurrent, that tend to come into conflict. Christopher Bobonich supports the strong reading in his Plato's Utopia Recast: His Later Ethics and Politics (2002). In his The Brute Within: Appetitive Desire in Plato and Aristotle (2006), Hendrik Lorenz agrees with Bobonich that the parts of the soul are 'the subjects or bearers of psychological states' (23). Any ascription to my Menial Conflict (1995) of the opposed, weak view needs qualification: my Plato is highly ambivalent (56-57).2 But my inten-tion here is less to defend an earlier self---though I predict failing to escape it---than to reconsider tripartition in the Republic in the light of Bobonich's virtuosity and Lorenz's lucidity. They persuade me of the inexhaustibility of the text. notably within from iv 436 to 439. About these pages we may indeed disagree: they find them decisive in favour of their view, as I do not. When Socrates remarks, 'Let us have our understanding still more precise. lest as we proceed we become involved in dispute' (436c8-9). he was not anticipating the dissensions of interpreters.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Article
Morelli, Eric J.;
(2011)
Plotinus' Two Interpretations of Timaeus 35a
(/isis/citation/CBB001211445/)
Article
Young, Douglas;
(2013)
Soul as Structure in Plato's Phaedo
(/isis/citation/CBB001213473/)
Article
Nyvlt, Mark J.;
(2009)
Plotinus on Phantasia: Phantasia as the Home of Self-Consciousness within the Soul
(/isis/citation/CBB001211439/)
Book
Frede, Dorothea;
Reis, Burkhard;
(2009)
Body and Soul in Ancient Philosophy
(/isis/citation/CBB000932343/)
Article
Hoffman, Paul;
(2003)
Plato on Appetitive Desires in the Republic
(/isis/citation/CBB000530281/)
Article
Buckels, Christopher;
(2013)
Compulsion to Rule in Plato's Republic
(/isis/citation/CBB001251910/)
Article
Mason, Andrew;
(2013)
The Nous Doctrine in Plato's Thought
(/isis/citation/CBB001213463/)
Chapter
Marzano, Michela;
(2004)
L'ordre des idées et la théorie platonicienne de l'âme: le cas du Phédon
(/isis/citation/CBB000774982/)
Article
Petraki, Zacharoula A.;
(2008)
The Soul “Dances”: Psychomusicology in Plato's Republic
(/isis/citation/CBB001021131/)
Article
Moore, Christopher;
(2014)
How to “Know Thyself” in Plato's Phaedrus
(/isis/citation/CBB001420146/)
Book
Fine, Gail;
(1999)
Plato 2: Ethics, politics, religion and the soul
(/isis/citation/CBB000110607/)
Article
Ionescu, Cristina;
(2010)
Dialectical Method and the Structure of Reality in the Timaeus
(/isis/citation/CBB001211463/)
Article
Kessler, Eckhard;
(2011)
Alexander of Aphrodisias and his Doctrine of the Soul: 1400 Years of Lasting Significance
(/isis/citation/CBB001034172/)
Article
Arenson, Kelly E.;
(2011)
Natural and Neutral States in Plato's Philebus
(/isis/citation/CBB001250011/)
Article
Georgoulas, Elias;
(2012)
The Psychological Background of the First Education in Plato's Laws
(/isis/citation/CBB001251237/)
Article
Carelli, Paul;
(2015)
Psychic Representation in Plato’s Phaedrus
(/isis/citation/CBB001202193/)
Article
Maria Michela Sassi;
(2023)
Blood and the Awareness of Perception. From Early Greek Thought to Plato’s Timaeus
(/isis/citation/CBB816845058/)
Chapter
Ward, Ann;
(2009)
The Immortality of the Soul and the Origin of the Cosmos in Plato's Phaedo
(/isis/citation/CBB001201152/)
Chapter
O'Brien, Denis;
(2005)
Matière et émanation dans les Ennéades de Plotin
(/isis/citation/CBB000775236/)
Article
Dylan B. Futter;
(2018)
Spiritual Pregnancy in Plato’s Theaetetus
(/isis/citation/CBB137166866/)
Be the first to comment!