Plato, 1990

• Apology
  The traditional beginning of Platonic philosophy. The reported statements made by Socrates during the trial at which he was condemned to death by the state.
    Recorded: January 4, 1990
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• Phaedo
  The Dialogue concerned with life after death during Socrates final hours of life in prison.
    Recorded: January 11, 1990
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• Gorgias
  Socrates dialogue with the famous teacher of Rhetoric who champions power as the greatest good for man leading to happiness.
    Recorded: January 18, 1990
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• Meno
  Can goodness or essential virtue be taught on the basis of remembrance from past lives? What teacher could do this? Socrates says: "Such a man would be a solid reality among shadows."
    Recorded: January 25, 1990
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• Protagoras
  Socrates questions the greatest Sophist of the day about what it is exactly that he teaches. One of Plato's most enduring portraits of men juggling the roots of ethics and social power. Is "Man the Measure of all things?"
    Recorded: February 1, 1990
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• Phaedrus
  The great conversation about love as the beginning of the understanding that we should seek "The Beyond" and about the nature and function of language in this seeking.
    Recorded: February 8, 1990
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• Symposium
  "The most brilliant of all Plato's achievements as dramatic artist.'' A. E. Taylor.
    Recorded: February 15, 1990
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• Republic
  In this greatest dialogue of the entire work Plato uses logic and myth to disclose the philosophic structure of Plato's Republic ''By what rules shall man live?''
    Recorded: February 22, 1990
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• Theaetetus
  What is Knowledge? Pythagorean in tone this Socratic dialogue finally characterizes the free man who "always has time at his disposal to converse in peace at his leisure."
    Recorded: March 1, 1990
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• Parmenides
  The most puzzling of all Plato's works. No consensus yet exists on the exact meaning of this mysterious excursion into truth and its way.
    Recorded: March 8, 1990
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• Sophist
  Plato's important clearing up of fundamental existential quandaries frequently enmeshed in unclear language. The first part of a two part dialogue.
    Recorded: March 15, 1990
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• Statesman
  Part two of the Sophist. Statesman tandem leading to "a picture drawn to perfection of the true king and statesman."
    Recorded: March 22, 1990
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• Timaeus
  Plato's cosmology. Perhaps the most profound single influence in Western Philosophy.
    Recorded: March 29, 1990
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Presentation Notes