Today’s Plan:
- Post blog URL’s to Canvas
- Two volunteers to read their blog post to open discussion
- Plato’s Republic VII
- Discussion posts (3:00-3:10)
- Homework (3:10-3:15)
Plato’s Republic
I’ll ask you to identify the major issues in the Republic. I also have a little task for you: to think of what kind of homework assignment Plato might give. What does he want his students to do?
Let’s revisit Plato’s objections to rhetoric (and politics) again. In Republic VI.
Homework
For homework you will be reading about Plato’s rival, Isocrates. Note: not Socrates, that was Plato’s teacher. He was a skeptic, who believed the task of the philosopher was to show others that certain knowledge was impossible; Plato grasped Socrates’ methods, but not his opposition to certainty. Socrates was executed for civil disobedience, or because many of his students started a civil war and were known as the tyranny of the 30.
But back to Isocrates. Isocrates wanted to unite the people of Greece, to turn waring city-states into a nation (one who could defend itself from barbarian invaders). Thus, he invented the concept of “paideia,” the idea that there is One True Greek culture. While this might seem tyrannical, it was actually progressive in his day–since it meant being a True Greek wasn’t a matter of birth or blood, but rather a commitment to certain cultural ideas and ideals (particularly individual freedom and social good).
For homework, you will read two essay on Isocrates, one by Haskins, one by Benoit. Please write a blog post that puts them in conversation somehow: so the first paragraph offers a summary of how they agree (who is Isocrates according to Haskins and Benoit), the second paragraph focuses on a single sentence from one of the articles (and perhaps your explication compares it to a sentence from the other article? Or not). The third paragraph is up to you.
