Re-reading Plato: the slow cure for knowledge

Smith, R.D.

Re-reading Plato: the slow cure for knowledge

Smith, R.D.

Authors

Professor Richard Smith r.d.smith@durham.ac.uk
Emeritus Professor

Contributors

M. Papastephanou
Editor

T. Strand
Editor

A. Pirrie
Editor

Abstract

What might be called the mainstream of western philosophy has sought to discover clear and distinct ideas on which accounts of truth, goodness and justice can be built with confidence. Plato has often been seen as central to this tradition, and even as the founder of it. In this paper I suggest that we should read him rather as a ‘light’ or ‘edifying’ thinker than as a ‘systematic’ one; that he offers us a kind of therapy, a way of dealing with the finitude of our human condition, especially our tendency to what I here call knowingness. To read him in this fashion requires us to engage with the many layers of his dialogues and to appreciate the distinctive kind of irony to be found in them.

Citation

Smith, R. (2014). Re-reading Plato: the slow cure for knowledge. In M. Papastephanou, T. Strand, & A. Pirrie (Eds.), Philosophy as a lived experience : navigating through dichotomies of thought and action (23-37). Lit

Online Publication Date	Feb 20, 2014
Publication Date	Feb 20, 2014
Deposit Date	Jun 2, 2014
Pages	23-37
Series Title	Studies on education.
Book Title	Philosophy as a lived experience : navigating through dichotomies of thought and action.
Publisher URL	http://www.lit-verlag.de/isbn/3-643-90290-0
Additional Information	Series: Studies on Education, Bd. 3.