Comments on: Footnotes and Heresies?

By: PHB

PHB — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 01:43:18 +0000

But were the ideas original to Plato? When Socrates appears in Plato is he merely a mouthpiece for Plato or is Plato attempting to represent at least the character of the type of arguments that Socrates used to make?

The idea of originality as being a virtue is a very modern concept. There really was no reason for Plato to pass his ideas off as belonging to others or vice-versa.

When you get down to such fundamental issues as philosophy it is not so much the ideas themselves as the presentation that becomes critical. Plato’s theory of ideals is no so far from Russell’s typed set theory. the difference is that one is a workable basis for mathematics and the other is not.

By: john c. halasz

john c. halasz — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 08:53:14 +0000

“Kant … was … led to balance the world upon thought – oblivious to the scanty supply of thinking.” (P.R. p. 229) Eh, worthy of Nietzsche.

By: Delicious Pundit

Delicious Pundit — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 07:02:55 +0000

“No More Whiteheads! Whitehead Removal for under $25 Satisfaction Guaranteed.” Ha! You could never do that to Plato. True, but on the other hand I do believe that Socrates was Oxycuted.

By: John Quiggin

John Quiggin — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 06:13:04 +0000

Also this and of course this.

By: John Holbo

John Holbo — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 06:12:01 +0000

Thanks dan! (Sorry matt.)

By: Vish Subramanian

Vish Subramanian — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 05:53:34 +0000

To follow up my own post, you can find it with the search [inauthor:”Alfred North Whitehead” “safest general characterization”] on books.google.com

By: Vish Subramanian

Vish Subramanian — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 05:51:12 +0000

According to books.google.com, ‘The Yale Book of Quotations’ has this and cites “Process and Reality”, pt2, ch 1. The book itself has only snippet view, it seems, the appropriate snippet may be here:

http://books.google.com/books?ei=KcVpSLOgD4z-tAOS08i6Bg&client=firefox-a&id=qh0cAAAAMAAJ&dq=whitehead&q=%22safest+general+characterization%22&pgis=1#search

By: Dan Butt

Dan Butt — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 05:16:45 +0000

This page – http://www.alfred.north.whitehead.com/witwiz/witwiz2.htm – suggests that two different quotations are being conflated:

“When any eminent scholar has converted Plato into a respectable professor, by providing him with a coherent system, we quickly find that Plato in a series of Dialogues has written up most of the heresies from his own doctrines.” (Adventures of Ideas, p. 134)

and

“The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato. I do not mean the systematic scheme of thought which scholars have doubtfully extracted from his writings. I allude to the wealth of general ideas scattered through them.” (Process and Reality, p. 63).

By: Righteous Bubba

Righteous Bubba — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 04:36:53 +0000

You could never do that to Plato.

Living as a mouse’s pet is humiliating enough.

By: Matt

Matt — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 04:05:49 +0000

I’d gladly pay $25 if I didn’t have to hear that obnoxious “footnotes to Plato” line again!