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Plato
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Plato detail from School of Athens by Raphael Phaedo, by Plato, copied in ad 100 (London, Egypt Exploration Society, P. Oxy. 1809). Plato Plato conversing with his pupils mathematicians of the Greco-Roman world
View Yannis Simonides performing Socrates Now, a theatrical adaptation of Plato's Apology of Socrates, with remarks on Martin Luther King, Jr., and Nelson Mandela
Examine what is known about the ancient Athenian philosopher Socrates from Plato's dialogues and other sources
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Plato
Plato summary
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Marble bust of Alexander the Great, in the British Museum, London, England. Hellenistic Greek, 2nd-1st century BC. Said to be from Alexandria, Egypt. Height: 37 cm.
Ancient Greece
Portrait of Plato (ca. 428- ca. 348 BC), Ancient Greek philosopher.
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Agathon (centre) greeting guests in Plato's Symposium, oil on canvas by Anselm Feuerbach, 1869; in the Staatliche Kunsthalle, Karlsruhe, Germany.
Philosophy 101
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Aristotle (384-322 BC), Ancient Greek philosopher and scientist. One of the most influential philosophers in the history of Western thought, Aristotle established the foundations for the modern scientific method of enquiry. Statue
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Plato (left) and Aristotle, detail from School of Athens, fresco by Raphael, 1508-11; in the Stanza della Segnatura, the Vatican. Plato points to the heavens and the realm of Forms, Aristotle to the earth and the realm of things.
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Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), German philosopher. Print published in London, 1812. Profile portrait surrounded by Ouroboros ancient Egyptian-Greek symbolic serpent with tail in mouth devouring itself representing unity of material and spiritual in eternal...
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Plato uses the term dialectic throughout his works to refer to whatever method he happens to be recommending as the vehicle of philosophy. The term, from dialegesthai, meaning to converse or talk through, gives insight into his core conception of the project. Yet it is also evident that he stresses different aspects of the conversational method in different dialogues. The form of dialectic featured in the Socratic works became the basis of subsequent practice in the Academy—where it was taught by Aristotle—and in the teachings of the Skeptics during the Hellenistic Age. While the conversation in a Socratic dialogue unfolds ...(100 of 10147 words)

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