Rationalist vs Empiricist using senses to gain information -Aposteriori knowledge=knowledge gained after using the senses -Aristotle=Rationalist WOF= a world where nothing changes and the perfect form of all things exists Beauty reflections of the true form of beauty in our world what we see in our world are imperfect copies of the true form in the WOF Beauty
pros:
cons:
Plato
-Apriori knowledge=knowledge before the sneses -senses arent reliable -Plato=rationalist Key words epistome=true knowledge of the world of the forms epistemology=study of knowledge Neoton=WOF Horaton=WOS (our world) Eikasia=ignorance to the world of the forms -using reason to gain knowledge WOF + The Forms Plato used the logic of opposites to come up with the WOF,by saying becasue this world changes there must be an opposite world where nothing changes e.g. WOF Form=perfect expression of something that never changes Form of beauty (perfect), everyone has this concept
HIERARCHY OF FORMS
FORMS OF PHYSICAL LIVING
OBJECTS
concepts+ideas Truth justice Form of the good Plato explains his theory of forms with the hierarchy of forms with the form of the Good at the top and the perfect form of concepts underneath.
pros:
-the form of the good somewhat aligns with western ideas of God -it could be argued that Plato's theory of forms is not trying to explain an alternate reality but rater help us understand/excel in our own. Meaning the hierarchy helps us archive in our reality but striving for the Good e.g. Greek stone mason
cons:
-lacks empirical validity -Aristotle said that things should be confinable to a single subject, the form of the Good is not as there can be a many types of good things e.g. good war strategy involves how to most efficiently kill people but A Good medical system would be efficient at saving people -justice and beauty are subjective allegory of the cave -the cave analogy is what Plato uses to explain the world of appearances and world of the forms
-Helps us understand that there are imperfections in the world -Encourages us not to accept things at face value -Analogy of the cave is used to illustrate Plato's theory of Forms, Brian Davies says the explanation of the Form's must tell us there is more to reality than we think, because why would we be able to universally recognize the essence of these Forms.
-Impossible to prove Plato's theory -Not everyone will see the Form of Good the same way, it is subjective, not universal like Plato suggests -in the analogy the prisoner escapes his world of fakery to gain knowledge of the world of the forms however we cannot do that
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