In Person Event: Plato’s vision of Philosophy, Rational Rule, and the Good life

INote this is an in person event. An online one is posted here) n our last meetup, we explored how Plato’s Republic is driven by a preoccupation with a crisis in Greek values. This crisis concerns the Meaning of terms like Dikaiosyne (Justice) and Arete (Virtue). The crisis emerged from an attempt to reconcile an archaic Homeric warrior ethic with the more refined ideals of parts of 4th-century Athens. In this meetup we attack the second half of the Republic. Having established that True Arete and True Justice are conditions of a soul and a city whose parts are in order, and in which the rational part rules, Plato sets himself three interconnected main tasks for the rest of the Republic. Firstly, showing how rational rule can be established in the city and how it can be shown to be the best kind of rule, secondly, clarifying more precisely the relationship of rationality and goodness, and thirdly, solidifying the claim that the life of the Just man is better than the life of the unjust man. Rational rule in the city, it turns out is the rule of the philosopher, and so Plato will suggest that in the ideal state it will be philosophers of the appropriate kind who rule. Thus, the nature of philosophy and the training of philosophers will need to be covered, but also the nature of rationality itself.