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Plato
was the first person to organize and record the issues and
questions that define philosophy. As Socrates'
student, Plato preserved the teachings of his great mentor in
many famous "dialogues"; these deal with classic issues
like law and justice, perception and reality, death and the
soul, mind and body, reason and passion, and the nature of love.
The dialogues also discuss the value of moral principle vs.
the value of life itself; how to achieve virtue; and how each
of us can fulfill our true nature.
The
most famous of all Platonic doctrines is the "theory
of forms." This theory that any object's true reality
is found in its rational form or structure rather
than in its material appearance. And Plato's Republic
presents his distinctive (and much criticized) vision of the
ideal state.
Plato
believed that philosophy begins in the sense of wonder. With
Socrates, he sees philosophy as reason, unhindered by
feelings, emotions, and the senses. And from these two great
thinkers we have received perhaps the most well known of all
philosophical utterances: "the unexamined life is not worth
living."
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