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[Individuality and Love in Plato]

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[Individuality and Love in Plato] Love and the Individual The Morality of Platonic Love and its Metaphysical Presuppositions by Hege Dypedokk Johnsen Thesis presented for the degree of MASTER OF PHILOSOPHY Supervised by Professor Øyvind Rabbås Department of Philosophy, Classics, History of Art and Ideas Faculty of Humanities UNIVERSITY OF OSLO Spring 2011 II Suppose you were molding gold into every shape there is, going on non-stop remolding one shape into the next. If someone then were to point at one of them and ask you, “What is it?”, your safest answer by far, with respect to the truth, would be to say “gold”, but never “triangle” or any of the other shapes that come to be in the gold, as though it is these, because they change even while you‟re making the statement. Timeaus, 50a–b “That,” he said, “is my speech about Love, Eryximachus. It is rather different from yours. As I begged you earlier, don‟t make comedy of it…” Symposium, 193d III IV Abstract What is it that we really love when we love an individual person, and to what extent are we egoistical in the search for happy love? Moreover, what/whom should we love, and for what reason? I approach the subject “Love and the Individual” by analyzing Gregory Vlastos‟ two main charges against Plato‟s theory of love: Firstly, that Plato‟s theory fails to give a satisfying account of love directed from one individual towards another individual; and secondly, that it is essentially egoistical. Throughout the thesis I underscore the points considered vulnerable to criticism, and highlight the phenomena subjected to insufficient treatment. As I assess Vlastos‟ charges, three Platonic dialogues will be discussed in depth: the Symposium, the Lysis and the Phaedrus. With a few passages from other dialogues, I hope to complete the picture. V VI Preface and Acknowledgements Soon enough I learned that one never finishes with Plato. The fusion of philosophical problems and disciplines, the variation of dramatic devices and the many characters: all together, this causes unforeseeable turns and difficulties of interpretation. On top of this, we naturally have the dialogue‟s original language, ancient Greek. In quotations from Plato I have consistently used the authoritative translations in John Cooper‟s edition Plato’s Complete Works (1997). I have also taken the freedom of transliterating the frequent use of Greek letters by scholars into Roman. As some of you may know, when studying Plato, the amount of secondary literature is overwhelming. In addition to Gregory Vlastos‟ article “The Individual as an Object of Love in Plato”,1 I have chosen to pay specific attention to the contributions by Martha Nussbaum, L.A. Kosman, Mary Margaret McCabe, Frisbee Sheffield, Terry Penner and Christopher Rowe, and Vlastos‟ former student Terence Irwin. Several other important scholars of ancient philosophy inherited the debate which followed from Vlastos‟ critique of Plato; and naturally, scholars also wrote on Platonic love before Vlastos published his well-known article. It would, however, be an impossible assignment to include them all. I therefore ask my reader to have sympathy on this point. As you may suppose, studying Plato has been challenging. But it was worth the effort; I hope the same goes for my thesis. And although I probably never will “finish” with Plato, I have many people to thank for having accomplished this paper: First of all I want to thank my fellow students at the Department of Philosophy, Classics, History of Art and Ideas at the University of Oslo, for contributing to an inspiring, exciting and challenging working environment. I also want to express my appreciation to my supervisor Professor Øyvind Rabbås, for his guidance and for being encouraging all the way. I am also grateful to Ingrid A. Evans, Morten Johansen, Ole Martin Moen, and Helga Forus for good discussions and critical comments. “For love is a difficult topic to think and write about at any time; and life does not always assist the investigation” (Nussbaum, 1990:314). To friends and family: Thank you all for love, support and good spirits throughout the gestation of this thesis, and at all other times. 1 “The Individual as an Object of Love in Plato” was first published in 1969. For a more detailed presentation of Gregory Vlastos, see appendix. VII Contents Abstract ..................................................................................................................................... V Preface and Acknowledgements .............................................................................................. VII Contents ................................................................................................................................. VIII 1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 1 1.1 Love as philosophical subject ...................................................................................... 1 1.2 Approach to the problem ............................................................................................. 2 1.3 Clarification of central terms ....................................................................................... 3 1.4 Reflections on method ................................................................................................. 5 1.5 Outline ......................................................................................................................... 9 2 Ideas and Individuals ........................................................................................................ 10 2.1 Particular objects and universal Ideas ....................................................................... 10 2.2 Placeholders and predicates ....................................................................................... 13 2.3 Individuals as objects of change ................................................................................ 15 2.3.1 Knowability, changeability and loveability ....................................................... 16 2.3.2 Individuals as embodied souls............................................................................ 17 2.4 Alcibiades‟ and Aristophanes‟ approach ................................................................... 21 2.5 Concluding remarks ................................................................................................... 25 3 Eudaimonic Love and Egoism ......................................................................................... 28 3.1 Is Lysis unloved? ....................................................................................................... 29 3.2 The mysterious proton philon.................................................................................... 33 3.3 Eudaimonism versus Vlastosian Kantianism ............................................................ 37 3.4 Self-love..................................................................................................................... 42 3.5 Longing and belonging .............................................................................................. 45 3.6 Concluding remarks ................................................................................................... 48 VIII 4 Friends, Lovers and Toys ................................................................................................. 52 4.1 Socrates and the Athenian paiderastia ...................................................................... 53 4.2 Love and relationships in the Phaedrus .................................................................... 60 4.2.1 Madness and moderation .................................................................................... 61 4.2.2 A satisfying account of interpersonal love ......................................................... 64 4.3 Concluding remarks ................................................................................................... 67 5 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................ 70 Appendix: Gregory Vlastos ...................................................................................................... 75 Abbreviations ........................................................................................................................... 77 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................. 79 Ancient texts: ........................................................................................................................ 79 Other literature: ................................................................................................................... 79 IX 1 Introduction We have all read Gregory on love so often, the paper has been so much discussed, debated, and perhaps even refuted, that we may easily fail to appreciate the courage required to write and publish it. In 1969 love was not a common topic for philosophy seminars. (Burnyeat, 1992:138) 1.1 Love as philosophical subject Love is often ignored by great philosophers. For how can love be the subject of a philosophical analysis? Indeed, the philosophical subject “love and the individual” might provoke those who believe that proper philosophy should be conducted in a way that is detached from personal issues. However, while it is true to say that subjects like “love” represent subjective matters in life and therefore
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