Hi, my name is David Rehm, and I serve as
the Provost here at Mount St. Mary's
University, where I oversee our academic
programs, but I was trained as a
philosopher and today I'd like to talk
about a specific ancient Greek
philosopher, Plato. It's been said that
all of Western philosophy is a footnote
to be played out and if that's the case
then Plato's thought must be pretty
important. So, what does Plato think? Plato
believes that there's a realm of real
things that contain no matter and that
are not at all accessible to our senses,
he calls these forms, but let's be clear.
They have no matter and they aren't
available to our senses in any way, so in
order to understand this let's take an
analogous situation, let's talk about
geometry. Euclid, in his geometry, sets out
the notion of a line. For Euclid, a line
is a one-dimensional object, all it has
is length, it has no width, and no depth.
The only lines that you or I have ever
seen are three-dimensional, and yet we
all understand what a Euclidean line is.
Okay then, let's go back to Plato. Plato
believes that we see instances on an
everyday basis of beauty, courage, and
friendship, and that these instances put
us in mind of the form of beauty, courage,
and friendship, and our role as human
beings and, especially as philosophers, is
to better understand the form of beauty,
courage, or friendship, and lots of others.
And by understanding those forms better
we can then make better judgments about
things in this world, and what are true
examples of friendship or beauty or
courage, and what or not. So, it's that
relationship between the forms and the
sensible things and our mobility to
better discern what is a true instance
of what that is absolutely
central to Plato's thought.
