INTRODUCTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE HUMAN PERSON

WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?

Any attempt to coin an all-encompassing definition of Philosophy would fail

because humanity never shared a universal idea of what it is (Co, 2009). We have
established in our discussions that the term philosophy cannot be confined to a
single definition. Although one of our goals is to present a universal idea of what
Philosophy means, our challenge is to address a much more important question,
that is. “What does it mean to philosophize?” The assumption here is that
Philosophy is intimately connected with praxis. In other words, an idea is useless
if it is devoid of any practice. For the Greeks, the term "philosophy" or "philosophia"
translates to "love of wisdom." This comes from its roots: "philo," meaning "love,"
and "sophia," meaning "wisdom" but to know the idea of love and wisdom is not enough if one denies doing it
(Kenny, 2004). As we explore Western philosophy, we encounter the foundational figures of Socrates, Plato, and
Aristotle—each contributing uniquely to the philosophical landscape. Their ideas not only challenged the norms
of their time but also laid the groundwork for much of Western thought.
Socrates presents us with the dialectical method itself. Known for his assertion that “the unexamined life is not
worth living,” Socrates focused on questioning and dialogue as means to attain deeper understanding. He did not
write down his teachings but instead engaged in persistent questioning to stimulate critical thinking. His
approach invites us to ponder: Can true wisdom be achieved through questioning alone, or does it require more
than just inquiry?
Plato, Socrates' student, responded to this by emphasizing the role of ideal forms. His writings, particularly in
dialogues like "The Republic," explore the nature of justice, reality, and knowledge through his Theory of Forms.
Plato’s work challenges us to consider: Are our perceptions of the world mere shadows of a more profound reality,
and how do these ideal forms influence our understanding and actions?
Aristotle, Plato's student, takes a different path, focusing on empirical observation and categorization. His works
span various domains, including ethics, politics, and metaphysics, offering a more practical approach to
understanding reality. Aristotle’s emphasis on virtue ethics and practical reasoning prompts us to ask: How do
our actions and virtues shape our character and our lives?

Together, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle provide a rich dialectic framework that not only explores abstract
philosophical ideas but also grounds them in practical application. Their legacies challenge us to reflect on how
their concepts influence our own understanding and actions, thus bridging the gap between theoretical wisdom
and lived experience.
GREEK PHILOSOPHY (The Foundation of Western Philosophy)
SOCRATES (born c. 470 BC, Athens [Greece]—died 399 BC, Athens)
Socrates was a combat soldier during Peloponnesian War (P. Meineck & D. Konstan,
2014) His appearance was frequently described as grotesque. He was short, thick-set,
and ugly. His clothes were old and poor, which showed that he cared little or nothing for
external appearances. His looks were the least of his concern because one’s intellectual
activity is far more important for him. Indeed, his philosophy emanated from his way of
life, a life that was not concerned about wealth and worldly goods. Socrates, as some
scholars would argue, was never concerned about philosophy in the academic sense. His
way of doing philosophy was by making dialogues with various people. Thus, he would
spend most of his time in the agora (also serves as marketplace) and talk to people from
different walks of life. His concern was to discuss with them profound ideas, such as
justice, virtues, morality, life, and death. The philosophy of Socrates was focused on getting at the answers to the
questions that are important and relevant in everyone’s life. Consequently, he helped many people examine how
they lived and understood their lives because, for him, “An unexamined life is not worth living" (Tarrant, 2010).
 INTRODUCTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE HUMAN PERSON

Socratic Method: asking continual questions until a contradiction was exposed, thus proving the fallacy of the
initial assumption (Garrett, 1998).
Why Socrates hated Democracy?
We generally think very well of democracy. It’s interesting to discover that one of the Ancient Greece’s greatest
achievements, Philosophy, was highly suspicious of its other achievement, Democracy. The founding father of
Greek Philosophy – Socrates – is portrayed, in the dialogues of Plato, as hugely pessimistic about the whole
business of democracy. In Book Six of The Republic, Plato describes Socrates falling into conversation with a
character called Adeimantus and trying to get him to see the flaws of democracy by comparing a society to a ship.

If you were heading out on a journey by sea, asks Socrates, who would you ideally want deciding who was in
charge of the vessel? Just anyone or people educated in the rules and demands of seafaring? The latter of course,
says Adeimantus, so why then, responds Socrates, do we keep thinking that any old person should be fit to judge
who should be a ruler of a country? Socrates’s point is that voting in an election is a skill, not a random intuition.
And like any skill, it needs to be taught systematically to people. Letting the citizenry vote without an education
is as irresponsible as putting them in charge of a trireme sailing to Samos in a storm.
Socrates was to have first hand, catastrophic experience of the foolishness of voters. In 399 BCE, the philosopher
was put on trial on trumped up charges of corrupting the youth of Athens. A jury of 500 Athenians was invited to
weigh up the case and decided by a narrow margin that the philosopher was guilty. He was put to death by
hemlock in a process which is, for thinking people, every bit as tragic as Jesus’s condemnation has been for
Christians.

Crucially, Socrates was not elitist in the normal sense. He didn’t believe that a narrow few should only ever vote.
He did, however, insist that only those who had thought about issues rationally and deeply should be let near a
vote. We have forgotten this distinction between an intellectual democracy and a democracy by birthright. We
have given the vote to all without connecting it to wisdom. And Socrates knew exactly where that would lead to a
system the Greeks feared above all, demagoguery.

Ancient Athens had painful experience of demagogues, for example, the louche figure of Alcibiades, a rich,
charismatic, smooth-talking wealthy man who eroded basic freedoms and helped to push Athens to its disastrous
military adventures in Sicily. Socrates knew how easily people seeking election could exploit our desire for easy
answers. He asked us to imagine an election debate between two candidates, one who was like a doctor and the
other who was like a sweet shop owner. The sweet shop owner would say of his rival: Look, this person here has
worked many evils on you. He hurts you, gives you bitter potions and tells you he not to eat and drink whatever
you like. He’ll never serve you feasts of many and varied pleasant things like I will. Socrates asks us to consider
the audience response: Do you think the doctor would be able to reply effectively? The true answer – ‘I cause you
trouble, and go against you desires in order to help you’ would cause an uproar among the voters, don’t you think?
We have forgotten all about Socrates’s salient warnings against democracy. We have preferred to think of
democracy as an unambiguous good – rather than as something that is only ever as effective as the education
system that surrounds it. As a result, we have elected many sweet shop owners, and very few doctors.
 INTRODUCTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE HUMAN PERSON

PLATO (born 428/427 BC, Athens, Greece—died 348/347 BC, Athens)

Plato was born somewhere in 428-427 B.C., possibly in Athens, at a time when
Athenian democracy was already well developed. He belonged to a wealthy and
aristocratic family. Plato’s family were involved in Athenian politics, so it is likely
that Plato was no stranger to politics himself. He was also the founder of the
Academy in Athens, which can be regarded as the Western world’s first university,
and its first school of philosophy.

Theory of Forms

In his Socratic dialogues Plato argues through Socrates that because the material
world is changeable it is also unreliable. But Plato also believed that this is not the
whole story. Behind this unreliable world of appearances is a world of permanence
and reliability. Plato calls this more real (because permanent) world, the world of ‘Forms’ or ‘Ideas’ (eidos/idea
in Greek). But what is a Platonic Form or Idea?

Take for example a perfect triangle, as it might be described by a mathematician. This would be a description of
the Form or Idea of (a) Triangle. Plato says such Forms exist in an abstract state but independent of minds in their
own realm. Considering this Idea of a perfect triangle, we might also be tempted to take pencil and paper and
draw it. Our attempts will of course fall short. Plato would say that peoples’ attempts to recreate the Form will
end up being a pale facsimile of the perfect Idea, just as everything in this world is an imperfect representation
of its perfect Form. The Idea or Form of a triangle and the drawing we come up with is a way of comparing the
perfect and imperfect. How good our drawing is will depend on our ability to recognize the Form of Triangle.
Although no one has ever seen a perfect triangle, for Plato this is not a problem. If we can conceive the Idea or
Form of a perfect triangle in our mind, then the Idea of Triangle must exist.

The Forms are not limited to geometry. According to Plato, for any conceivable thing or property there is a
corresponding Form, a perfect example of that thing or property. The list is almost inexhaustible. Tree, House,
Mountain, Man, Woman, Ship, Cloud, Horse, Dog, Table and Chair, would all be examples of putatively
independently-existing abstract perfect Ideas (Macintosh. 2012).
Allegory of the Cave

Plato/Socrates considers dwellers in a cave. All their lives they’ve been chained up so that they cannot move their
heads to look around. The entrance to the cave – the exit to the daylight of truth – is behind them, and so is a fire,
with a walkway in front of it. People walk along this path, or things are paraded on it, and the shadows of these
people and things are cast by the fire onto the wall in front of the prisoners. Because they have no experience
which might suggest a different interpretation, the cave-dwellers assume that the shadows they see moving on
the cave wall are the reality of the people and things. This idea seems to be confirmed by the whispers of voices
or other noises they hear echoing around the cave in time with the movements or gestures of the shadows. In an
analogous way (the argument goes), we assume that the world we experience is absolute reality, never imagining
that there might be a hidden reality which is the source of our flickering experiences, but which is quite different
from them (Fraser, 2012).

To explain our relationship to the world of the Forms, in the Republic Plato uses the analogy of people who spend
their whole lives living in a cave. All they ever see are shadows on the walls created by their campfire. Compared
with the reality of the world of the Forms, real physical objects and events are analogous to being only shadows.
Plato also takes the opportunity to use the cave analogy as a political statement. Only the people who have the
ability to step out into the sunlight and see (recall) the true reality (the Forms) should rule. Clearly Plato was not
a fan of Greek democracy. No doubt his aristocratic background and the whims of Athenian politics contributed
to his view, especially as the people voted to execute his mentor Socrates (Macintosh, 2012).
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Achieving Eudaimonia

THINK MORE
We rarely give ourselves time to think carefully and logically about our lives and how to live them; sometimes we
just go along with what the Greeks call doxa, or popular opinions.
In the 36 books he wrote, Plato found common sense to be riddled with errors, prejudice, and superstition: things
like “fame is great,” “follow your heart,” “money is the key to a good life.” The problem is popular opinion edges
towards the wrong values, careers, and relationships.

Plato’s answer is we should subject our own ideas to examination vs. acting on impulse. In our discussion on class,
we talked about how our basic senses hinder us from thinking logically because our perception is linked to our
emotions. Plato suggested that we should access the world of forms (ideals) rather than relying on our senses.

LET OUR LOVER CHANGE US

In The Symposium, Plato said “true love is admiration.” In other words, the person we should seek out has the
qualities we lack. For example, brave, organized, sincere -- if we feel we miss those qualities. By associating with
them, we can then absorb some of those qualities.
The right person for us, helps us grow to our full potential. “A couple shouldn't love each other as they are right
now...” they should be committed to educating each other and weathering the process of doing so. Each person
should want to seduce the other into becoming a better version of themselves.

DECODE THE BEAUTY AROUND US

Plato was the first one to wonder why we like beautiful things. He found a fascinating reason -- beautiful objects
are whispering important truths to us about the good life. We find things beautiful when we unconsciously sense
in them qualities we need, but are missing in our lives.
For example, gentleness, harmony, balance, peace, and strength. Beautiful objects help us educate our souls.

Ugliness also plays a role. It parades dangerous and damaged characteristics in front of us, and makes it harder
to be wise, kind, and calm. Plato sees art as therapeutic and the roles of poets, painters, novelists, and nowadays
TV producers and designers to help us live good lives.

REFORM SOCIETY
Plato was the first utopian thinker; he spent time thinking about how society should be. His inspiration was
Sparta, a city-machine that had as its purpose to turn out citizens who were war-machines. Everything they did
in Sparta was tailored to that one goal. The city was hugely successful with its military.

The philosopher's concern was to understand how a society could become better at creating more fulfilled people
by using Sparta's example of focus. He identified a number of changes to be made in The Republic.
He found it really matters who we admire, because that has influence on our outlook. “Bad heroes give glamor to
flaws of character.” He wanted to give Athens new, wiser, celebrities who could become models for good
development.

For example, people with a good record of public service, who distinguished themselves by their modesty and
simple lives, the dislike of the limelight, and wide and deep experience.

He wanted to prevent people from voting until they could think rationally and for the leaders to be morally
upright. To start the process, Plato opened a school in Athens, the Academy, which lasted a good 300 years. His
ultimate goal was that politicians should become philosophers, because for him we cannot achieve a better world
without it’s kings knowing how to philosophize, hence the term Philosopher Kings.
 INTRODUCTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE HUMAN PERSON

References
B. Enaya, et al. (2020). Introduction to the Philosophy of the Human Person.
[Link]

Elizabeth Garrett, (1998). Becoming Lawyers: The Role of the Socratic Method in Modern Law Schools.
[Link]

P. Meineck & D. Konstan, (2014). Combat Trauma and the Ancient Greeks.

[Link]

Ed Fraser, (2012). Picking A Fight With Plato.

[Link]

David Macintosh, (2012). Plato: A Theory of Forms.

[Link]