Platos The Symposium Essay - 2187 Words

nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;In Greek culture around the time of Plato, the perfect ideal person was considered. Plato’s idea that there was a perfect world of ideas affected this pieces subject and the subject’s action. Many works of his time period were sculptures that were meant to be viewed from all angles, attempting to be a closer match to that of the ideal. This idea that the ideal world was real and what matter not the physical also effect the actions depicted in many works of this time period. Most of the works are depicting an ideal Greek person performing a noble act not just a common act. Many of the works are also just a still image of a figure from a single moment in time. All of the male sculptures appear in the nude†¦show more content†¦nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;What is love? In his speech, Aristophanes engages in the discussion of love, encompassing human nature as whole rather than individualistic aspects. According to a myth, we were originally created as a single being, united with our beloved. As pairs, we were quite powerful and chaotic, such that the god had to split us into two. Thereafter, life became pursuit, a pursuit for the other half, a quot;pursuit for wholeness, to be complete.quot; And thesis what Aristophanes defines as love. He believes that love is innate: quot; love is born into every human beingquot;. He is expressing that the phenomenon of love is as natural and inherent to us as breathing itself. Like other amenities of life, Love fulfills us. quot;To be in love is to see the other individual as a special complement to ones existence.quot; Socrates, on the other hand, defines love as the desire to possess good and beautiful entities, which he presently lacks. By a dialectical method, questioning Agathon, he manifests that love cannot presently possess the object of affection. Even when he desires what he has, what he really desire is quot;the preservation of what he now has in time to come, so that he will have it then.quot; It follows then, that he wants, rather than has the good. Thus, Love itself is not beautiful. This however, does not imply that Love is ugly or evil. Rather, Love is in between; just as there is something between wisdom andShow MoreRelatedPlato s Symposium, By Plato1273 Words   |  6 PagesIn the book,† Plato’s Symposium,† by Plato, who was a philosopher in Greece, he illustrates the dialectic discussion at a party at Agathon’s to celebrate his triumph of his first tragedy. In the Symposium; the guests Phaedrus, an Athenian aristocrat; Pausanias, the legal expert; Eryximachus, a physician; Aristophanes, eminent comic playwright; Agathon ,a tragic poet and host of the banquet; Socrates, eminent philosopher and Plato s teacher; and Alcibiades, a prominent Athenian statesman, oratorRead MoreComparing Plato s The Symposium1704 Words   |  7 PagesIn one of his most accomplished works, Plato brings to light the topic of alcohol and the significance of drinking in The Symposium. Through this text, Plato is writing about philosophy is the setting of a narrative in order to reinforce the context of the story. Plato w as a metaphilosophist that supported the theory of forms. 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Thomas More introduces us to an island called Utopia which serves as a model of perfection in each facet of everyday life. In The Symposium, Plato and his friends contribute distinctive interpretations on the origin and meaning of love. Both author’s purposeRead MoreThe War And Plato s Symposium, And The Man Discussed1769 Words   |  8 Pageswork, and the effects of the depiction upon the rest of the specific work. These works are of course Thucydides’, The History of the Peloponnesian War and Plato’s Symposium, and the man discussed is the Athenian giant, Alcibiades of the Alcmaeonidae. The authors, of course, have their own aims and reasons for writing their works, Plato, writing an allegory on love likely to defend his t eacher Socrates, and Thucydides, to inform on what he believes to be the most significant war in history. The genresRead MorePlatoï ¿ ½Ã¯ ¿ ½s Symposium, And Ovids The Art Of Love1109 Words   |  5 Pagesattacks simultaneously the head, the heart and the senses.† Since the beginning of time, writers and philosophers have been trying to discover the origins of this â€Å"attack,† and many attribute different reasons for this immense feeling. In both Plato’s Symposium, and Ovid’s The Art of Love, Aristophanes and Ovid attempt to address the genesis of love by asking: what is the feeling that drives us towards another human: Is it physical attraction? Sexual desire? Experience in the field of dating? Or is thisRead MorePlato s Symposium : A Glimpse Into Antiquity Of Some Philosophical Conversations On Love762 Words   |  4 PagesPlato’s Symposium is a glimpse into antiquity of some philosophical conversations on love. The focus here is on two dif ferent perspectives between Aristophanes and Socrates. Aristophanes gives us his view on love by telling a mythical account on how human nature came to be. There were once three types of beings, male-male, female-female and male-female, which the later would be known as androgynous. They were each round with four arms, four legs, and two faces on opposite sides of their being and