Opinion of Plato

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Easily a Horrible Person. Big time.

[Insula Dei]

Easily a Horrible Person. Big time.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Easily a Horrible Person. Big time.

His ideal "Republic" is a pretty terrifying idea.

[The Mikado]

It's not really fair in my view to hold Plato to modern standards.  That said, his Republic would be a first-rate s**thole.

A few of Plato's habits annoy me.  "I'm going to ban all comedies because Aristophanes was mean to Socrates!"  Kind of reminds me of someone, actually, BRTD...

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Horrible person. Also, I failed my first philosophy exam attempt because of that douchegab.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Says a lot of very true things. He is 100% right about democracy (just look at Berlusconi, Sarkozy, the Tea Party, for proof). The only problem of his philosophy is that his ideas of a "government of the wise" is totally irrealistic. But after all, a philosopher hasn't to be realistic.

[courts]

That was satire, in case you missed it guys.

[Gustaf]

Only one of the greatest minds in human history, so I guess he's worthy of being called an HP by BRTD.

He was, of course, wrong on a lot of things, democracy amongst them.

[Roemerista]

FF.

One of the principle lessons of the Republic is the failure of the Perfect City in Speech. And one must remember that Plato undertook the project for the defense of his teacher and the philosphical life in general.

See the concept of the Noble Lie, and the general need to supress different aspects of the 'soul' (in the classical sense of the word) , for the dominance of one.

[Boris]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjUAJXDfj54

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Boris again won the thread.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Only one of the greatest minds in human history, so I guess he's worthy of being called an HP by BRTD.

He was, of course, wrong on a lot of things, democracy amongst them.

So wait, you attack opebo and yet you defend PLATO now? LOL.

[Kaine for Senate '18]

Probably both.  Certainly some of his ideas were wrong, but his influence subsequently cannot be understated.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

He was also obviously an ego-filled douchebag (then again name a philosopher that wasn't.)

[Gustaf]

Only one of the greatest minds in human history, so I guess he's worthy of being called an HP by BRTD.

He was, of course, wrong on a lot of things, democracy amongst them.

So wait, you attack opebo and yet you defend PLATO now? LOL.

Before your nipples explode with lust at the thought of Opebo you might want to step back and realize that a middle-aged spoiled creep who likes to mock and exploit poor people with crude humour is slightly less important in the course of human history then one of the greatest philosophers of all time. Just as an FYI.

[patrick1]

Only one of the greatest minds in human history, so I guess he's worthy of being called an HP by BRTD.

He was, of course, wrong on a lot of things, democracy amongst them.

So wait, you attack opebo and yet you defend PLATO now? LOL.

Before your nipples explode with lust at the thought of Opebo you might want to step back and realize that a middle-aged spoiled creep who likes to mock and exploit poor people with crude humour is slightly less important in the course of human history then one of the greatest philosophers of all time. Just as an FYI.

But Gustaf, BRTD read a whole wikipedia entry on The Republic and disagreed with it.  Obviously he was a disgusting HP whose life work and contributions should be erased from memory.

[Gustaf]

Only one of the greatest minds in human history, so I guess he's worthy of being called an HP by BRTD.

He was, of course, wrong on a lot of things, democracy amongst them.

So wait, you attack opebo and yet you defend PLATO now? LOL.

Before your nipples explode with lust at the thought of Opebo you might want to step back and realize that a middle-aged spoiled creep who likes to mock and exploit poor people with crude humour is slightly less important in the course of human history then one of the greatest philosophers of all time. Just as an FYI.

But Gustaf, BRTD read a whole wikipedia entry on The Republic and disagreed with it.  Obviously he was a disgusting HP whose life work and contributions should be erased from memory.

Quiet so. His post rather neatly summed up the 3 most disturbing qualities about himself - the mancrush on Opebo, the lack of self-awareness and the inability to comprehend that one can have both agreements and disagreements with someone.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Only one of the greatest minds in human history, so I guess he's worthy of being called an HP by BRTD.

He was, of course, wrong on a lot of things, democracy amongst them.

So wait, you attack opebo and yet you defend PLATO now? LOL.

Yeah, some people prefer philosophers who brought an enormous contribution to the universal thought, to hypocritical hacks with totally uncoherent positions whose only goal is to look controversial. How strange, isn't it ?

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Only one of the greatest minds in human history, so I guess he's worthy of being called an HP by BRTD.

He was, of course, wrong on a lot of things, democracy amongst them.

So wait, you attack opebo and yet you defend PLATO now? LOL.

Before your nipples explode with lust at the thought of Opebo you might want to step back and realize that a middle-aged spoiled creep who likes to mock and exploit poor people with crude humour is slightly less important in the course of human history then one of the greatest philosophers of all time. Just as an FYI.

But Gustaf, BRTD read a whole wikipedia entry on The Republic and disagreed with it.  Obviously he was a disgusting HP whose life work and contributions should be erased from memory.

Not true. I have read all of The Republic. I took an Ancient and Medieval Political Philosophy class around 2006 (BEST. YEAR. EVER. Totally.) and it was one of the assigned books. Most of the class seemed to agree he was a douche too by the way.

Quiet so. His post rather neatly summed up the 3 most disturbing qualities about himself - the mancrush on Opebo, the lack of self-awareness and the inability to comprehend that one can have both agreements and disagreements with someone.

You do realize that this statement contradicts itself? The two bolded sections can not both be true as am I a religious who doesn't like Gaddafi.

[patrick1]

Only one of the greatest minds in human history, so I guess he's worthy of being called an HP by BRTD.

He was, of course, wrong on a lot of things, democracy amongst them.

So wait, you attack opebo and yet you defend PLATO now? LOL.

Before your nipples explode with lust at the thought of Opebo you might want to step back and realize that a middle-aged spoiled creep who likes to mock and exploit poor people with crude humour is slightly less important in the course of human history then one of the greatest philosophers of all time. Just as an FYI.

But Gustaf, BRTD read a whole wikipedia entry on The Republic and disagreed with it.  Obviously he was a disgusting HP whose life work and contributions should be erased from memory.

Not true. I have read all of The Republic. I took an Ancient and Medieval Political Philosophy class around 2006 (BEST. YEAR. EVER. Totally.) and it was one of the assigned books. Most of the class seemed to agree he was a douche too by the way.

Quiet so. His post rather neatly summed up the 3 most disturbing qualities about himself - the mancrush on Opebo, the lack of self-awareness and the inability to comprehend that one can have both agreements and disagreements with someone.

You do realize that this statement contradicts itself? The two bolded sections can not both be true as am I a religious who doesn't like Gaddafi.

So the class thought Plato was a douche? Is that the type of withering and insightful criticism you guys learned from your analysis of the Socratic method. 

You can disagree with someone's philosophy and at the same time realize that this was written 2500 years ago.  He was asking questions that had never been pondered or at least formulated into theories. His and Aristotle's philosophy is really the starting point for Western thought. I personally find his political philosophy the least interesting, but then again I found Political science courses tedious.

[Gustaf]

Only one of the greatest minds in human history, so I guess he's worthy of being called an HP by BRTD.

He was, of course, wrong on a lot of things, democracy amongst them.

So wait, you attack opebo and yet you defend PLATO now? LOL.

Before your nipples explode with lust at the thought of Opebo you might want to step back and realize that a middle-aged spoiled creep who likes to mock and exploit poor people with crude humour is slightly less important in the course of human history then one of the greatest philosophers of all time. Just as an FYI.

But Gustaf, BRTD read a whole wikipedia entry on The Republic and disagreed with it.  Obviously he was a disgusting HP whose life work and contributions should be erased from memory.

Not true. I have read all of The Republic. I took an Ancient and Medieval Political Philosophy class around 2006 (BEST. YEAR. EVER. Totally.) and it was one of the assigned books. Most of the class seemed to agree he was a douche too by the way.

Quiet so. His post rather neatly summed up the 3 most disturbing qualities about himself - the mancrush on Opebo, the lack of self-awareness and the inability to comprehend that one can have both agreements and disagreements with someone.

You do realize that this statement contradicts itself? The two bolded sections can not both be true as am I a religious who doesn't like Gaddafi.

Not really, it merely makes you hypocritical or self-contradicting. Your basic attitude seems to be that it's ok to hold whatever bigoted, horrible views imaginable as long as you've decided that the person in question is one of the good guys. Opebo gets a free pass from you on wanting to slaughter innocent Arabs because he wants to exploit Thai women, for instance.

I can't say that I particularly care about the thought-process behind all that, but you tend to give anyone self-identifying as a left-winger (or anti-Catholic, or anti-suburbs) a free pass whereas anyone on the right or who's Catholic is completely worthless. And you don't seem to realize that other people may not view things as equally black-and-white.

For example: I say Plato contributed a lot to philosophy. You seem to think that this means putting him in the "good" category - a category where you think Opebo belongs while I wouldn't put him there. It's an extraordinary binary approach to complex issues that is pretty dangerous. It fits well with the forum memes of "moderate hero" "freedom fighter v horrible person", of course. But that doesn't really make it less stupid.

[opebo]

Highly overrated, and though in his favor he did poo-poo democracy, I don't find his reasons for doing so all that great.

[All Along The Watchtower]

FF for his time, HP compared to now.

[The Mikado]

Euthyphro and the whole Socratic death cycle (Apology, Crito, and Phaedo) are my favorites.  Not a huge fan of Meno.  Liked Symposium quite a bit.  Had qualms with Republic, like most 21st century types.