Latest / Mahon McCann / Dr Peter Larsen - How Plato Explained the Universe: A Deep Dive into the Timaeus

Transcript

Dr Peter Larsen - How Plato Explained the Universe: A Deep Dive into the Timaeus · Mahon McCann

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Dr. Peter Larson, thank you very much for joining me today.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to discuss Plato's Timaeus.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: But first of all,
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: I wondered,
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: yeah,
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: if you could introduce people to you,
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: what's your background,
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: your interest in Plato and yeah,
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: where you're coming at it.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thank you, Mohan.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: So I did my PhD at Trinity College Dublin,
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: and I'm currently a lecturer in philosophy at Dublin City University.
• 0:27
  My specialism is Plato,
• 0:30
  ancient philosophy generally,
• 0:32
  but specifically Plato and Aristotle.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I work...
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_01: predominantly on Plato's theory of perception.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: That was what my PhD was on.
• 0:46
  And so I work broadly speaking on what we might call Plato's
• 0:50
  cognitive psychology.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: I also have a side interest.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's not so side anymore, but in George Barclay.
• 0:59
  And I'm currently working on,
• 1:02
  at the beginning of a project,
• 1:04
  looking at Barclay's Platonism.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: Awesome.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: That's another great topic as well.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: on,
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: so I suppose what we're going to talk about today,
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: it may need Plato and Plato's Timaeus,
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: which,
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: yeah.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: How do you think about the Timaeus?
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's a,
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: a very challenging book in a lot of ways for people.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: It is.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: It is.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I've been teaching the Tamias for a few years now, four or five years.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I actually, a couple of years ago, was going to stop.
• 1:36
  But the students seemed so interested that I decided to keep
• 1:40
  going with it.
• 1:41
  And I always start the module with this quote from Benjamin Jowett,
• 1:47
  which is from 1892.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: He said,
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: Of all the writings of Plato,
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: the Timaeus is the most obscure and repulsive to the modern reader.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: And again,
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: bearing in mind that he was writing in 1892,
• 2:01
  I always kind of take it as my task to try and convince the
• 2:06
  students that this is false.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: And,
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_01: he's couching it within the context of,
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: of the writings of Plato,
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: but I think the idea that the Timaeus is,
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: is obscure and repulsive is,
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: is actually not,
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: not true.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that,
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: that modern read that is modern readers in 2025,
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: not in 1892 can really,
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: get into the Timaeus,
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_01: because it has a lot of very interesting environmental ramifications.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: So just to give you a kind of short synopsis,
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: the Timaeus is Plato's account of the origin and nature of the cosmos.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: So how did the cosmos come?
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, first,
• 3:06
  making no assumptions,
• 3:07
  asking the question,
• 3:08
  has the cosmos always been or did it come to be?
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: Answering that question,
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: siding with the idea that it came to be,
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_01: and then asking,
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_01: how did it come to be?
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_01: Why did it come to be?
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: And what is its nature.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: And he puts the whole account in the mouth of this character,
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_01: Timaeus of Lakri,
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: who we now believe is a fictional character for many centuries.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: People thought he was a historical figure.
• 3:44
  But we now believe he's a fictional character presented as a
• 3:48
  kind of Pythagorean.
• 3:51
  And there are many Pythagorean elements to the account that's
• 3:55
  given in the Timaeus.
• 3:58
  But what I like about the Timaeus is that,
• 4:00
  as I mentioned,
• 4:01
  it doesn't assume anything.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: All of the conclusions are rigorously argued.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: And it combines empirical observation,
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: metaphysical principles,
• 4:16
  and uses different kinds of reasoning to adduce the conclusions
• 4:24
  that it arrives at.
• 4:26
  It also very strikingly,
• 4:27
  I think,
• 4:28
  incorporates the notion of revisability.
• 4:31
  So Tymia says at several points,
• 4:34
  this is the best account I'm able to give at the moment.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: But if somebody comes up with a better one, great.
• 4:42
  So it's open to reinterpretation and indeed revisability in the
• 4:48
  light of different
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_01: and perhaps better evidence.
• 4:53
  So I think that the Timaeus,
• 4:55
  although it can sometimes strike people as sort of overly...
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: mythological,
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 5:02
  you've got this stuff about the divine craftsmen and gods and
• 5:06
  things like this.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's also very rigorously scientific,
• 5:10
  certainly very rigorously scientific for two and a half
• 5:14
  thousand years ago.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_01: The other thing I think is really striking,
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: and I think we will get to this probably in our discussion,
• 5:26
  is the role that Plato envisions for natural science in that
• 5:32
  kind of whole scope of
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: human inquiry.
• 5:36
  So I think what the Timaeus does is it puts natural science at
• 5:40
  the heart of human inquiry.
• 5:42
  And to the extent that human inquiry and the acquisition of
• 5:47
  knowledge and understanding
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: for Plato is relevant to ethics, to how one lives.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: Natural science then becomes,
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: I think in a very interesting way,
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: important for thinking about ethical considerations.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: no,
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's definitely,
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: yeah,
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: to go back,
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: I suppose,
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: to the Timaeus initially,
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: which is like,
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: it's kind of Plato's account of creation in a sense.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: It's like his book of Genesis.
• 6:23
  And as far as I understand,
• 6:24
  it was his most popular work in the ancient world.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: Like the Republic now,
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: which is very popular,
• 6:30
  wasn't really taught in the Iamblican curriculum or for the Neoplatonists.
• 6:34
  And like the Timaeus would have been the big Plato's really
• 6:37
  significant work.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's right.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: And interestingly,
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_01: it's the only,
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: and actually only half of it,
• 6:47
  it's the only of Plato's works that was available in the West
• 6:51
  during the Middle Ages.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: And actually only the first half of it was available.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: So the rest of Plato's works were lost in the West.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: They were...
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: maintained in the East, in the Arabic world.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah,
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: so the Timaeus,
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: as you say,
• 7:12
  has certain interesting connections with the biblical account
• 7:20
  of creation,
• 7:21
  though I think it's substantially different and I think
• 7:27
  substantially more robust
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: in certain important ways.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: and it's,
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: but it,
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_01: but it did exert an impact over,
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_01: Western,
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: theological thinking,
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: given that it was,
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: it was the only a Plato's texts that were,
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: that was available in the West.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: It became integrated in that, in that way.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I'm actually reading St.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: Gregory of Nias' On the Making of Man at the moment.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_01: Very interesting.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: Which is John Baer, um, who's an Oxford scholar.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: I think he,
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: argues that it's actually a remaking of Plato's Timaeus,
• 8:03
  that he's actually correcting it essentially for a Christian
• 8:06
  kind of early Christian.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's interesting.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: When I was an undergraduate,
• 8:10
  I wrote my senior thesis on Gregory of Nyssa's On the Soul and
• 8:15
  the Resurrection,
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_01: arguing something very similar.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: Really?
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: Cause you can see,
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 8:21
  but Plato really just gets integrated into so many things and
• 8:24
  then you go back to
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: the source and people are like,
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: Oh,
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: this is this.
• 8:27
  And you're like,
• 8:27
  this is kind of the grammar of the West and our thinking on
• 8:30
  things in a way.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um,
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_00: so yeah,
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_00: even though,
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: as you say,
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: it can be kind of strange to our modern ears,
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: it's important to understand us really.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so it might, yeah, on the,
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_00: On the topic of natural science,
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: yeah,
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: you were talking about previously the two kinds of causes,
• 8:47
  like the divine cause and the necessary cause as relating to
• 8:52
  natural science.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe I might,
• 8:56
  I know you'd sent on a quote that I might read that now if you
• 8:58
  don't mind for just
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: to get us into this question.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I have it here.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, I can read it out.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: So his quote is 68A69.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: 68E to 69A.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: 68E to 69A, yeah, from the Timaeus.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: Such then being the necessary nature of all things,
• 9:17
  the artificer of the most fair and good took them over at that
• 9:20
  time amongst things
• 9:22
  generated when he was engendering the self-sufficing and most
• 9:26
  perfect God and their
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: inherent properties he used as subservient causes,
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: but himself designed the good and all that was being generated.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: Wherefore one ought to distinguish two kinds of causes,
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: the necessary and the divine,
• 9:40
  and in all things to seek after the divine for the sake of
• 9:43
  gaining a life of blessedness,
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: so far as our nature admits thereof,
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: and to seek the necessary for the sake of the divine,
• 9:51
  reckoning that without the former it is impossible to discern
• 9:54
  by themselves alone
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: the divine objects after which we strive,
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: or to apprehend them,
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: or in any way partake thereof.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: So, I mean...
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: So this is a passage, just to kind of situate it in context.
• 10:13
  This is a passage that comes...
• 10:15
  So the Timaeus is kind of divided into two halves,
• 10:21
  sort of.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: So there's the first half in which Plato talks about,
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: or Plato has Timaeus talk about,
• 10:28
  the elements of the cosmos that were crafted in accordance with intellect.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_01: And this includes...
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: the soul and body of the cosmos itself.
• 10:39
  So the cosmos has both a soul and a body,
• 10:42
  just as Plato thinks human beings do.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_01: And the immortal part of the souls of mortal creatures,
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: so the rational soul of mortal creatures.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_01: And then we turn to the things that were crafted by necessity.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and, and so you have these two, he calls them causes.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: It's hard to really,
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_01: it's,
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_01: it's,
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_01: it's a matter of,
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: of quite a robust scholarly debate,
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: what intellect and necessity,
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_01: really are.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: But,
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: what I think of them as is,
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_01: intellect is kind of accounting for,
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: what we might call the teleological,
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: or,
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: or the kind of,
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 11:33
  purposeful aspects of the cosmos,
• 11:36
  those aspects that are aiming at something.
• 11:39
  And necessity accounts for the more what we might think of as
• 11:44
  kind of mechanistic
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: aspects or physical aspects of the cosmos.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: And so this passage comes after a lengthy discussion of physical reality.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: So he talks about
• 12:01
  um uh the the the four elements earth air fire and water and he
• 12:06
  talks about the um
• 12:08
  the geometrical figures that he thinks make up those those four
• 12:12
  elements and he
• 12:13
  talks about how they how they interact with one another how
• 12:16
  they um transform into
• 12:18
  one another um and and this is all uh as a way of explaining
• 12:23
  necessity right so as
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_01: a way of explaining
• 12:27
  What I take to be kind of broadly speaking,
• 12:29
  what we might call physical causation,
• 12:31
  right?
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_01: Things that are not at least,
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_01: whereas they're kind of ultimately guided by mind,
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_01: by news,
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: because I think everything is for Plato.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_01: They're not, strictly speaking, sort of rationals.
• 12:51
  Would this be like equivalent to Aristotle's efficient cause of
• 12:55
  like billiard ball
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_00: causality and material causality in a sense of like material causality?
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: The pottery example,
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: the material causes,
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: the matter that you shape into the...
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: so this is something I've been struggling with a lot lately.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_01: How to think about,
• 13:12
  and whether it makes sense to think about Plato's account of
• 13:16
  causation along the
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: lines of the Aristotelian four causes.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm actually,
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_01: at the moment,
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sort of of the opinion that for Plato,
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_01: all causation is what Aristotle would call efficient causation.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_01: that's kind of another topic we can get into.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah,
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 13:38
  these would be like what Plato refers to in the Phaedo as
• 13:44
  unintelligent causes.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so what I see him doing in this passage is
• 13:56
  is really stating in very clear terms that we need to
• 14:00
  distinguish these two kinds
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: of causes,
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: which in this passage he calls divine and necessary.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: The divine, I think, are clearly the forms, right?
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: Those are the things that we seek after in all things,
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_01: as he says,
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_01: so that we may obtain a life of,
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_01: in your translation,
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_01: it was blessedness.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_01: The word there is eudaimonia, the Greek,
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: word,
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: which is often translated as happiness or flourishing,
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_01: so that we may be a well-functioning
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: You know, human beings.
• 14:39
  So so so so he's bringing in this this element of this ethical
• 14:45
  notion of eudaimonia.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_01: And he's saying,
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_01: like,
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: look,
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: the the the divine causes,
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_01: which I think are the forms,
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: those are the the true objects of knowledge.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_01: And those are the things we need to seek in order to to be happy.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_01: These other causes, and this is a really interesting part.
• 15:02
  I mean,
• 15:02
  that's just kind of the typical,
• 15:04
  what you would expect from Plato.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: The other causes, and this is what I think is really interesting.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_01: These are, if I'm right, physical causes.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: And the way I kind of think about them is like natural laws.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: The way that physical reality works,
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: all the stuff he was talking about,
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: the transformations of one element into another,
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_01: the kind of fine structure of those things.
• 15:34
  And he says we need and again,
• 15:37
  this is what I think is really striking about this passage.
• 15:39
  In this passage,
• 15:39
  he says we need to seek these things for the sake of the divine.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_01: So.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, we need to look at physical reality.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: We need to study physical reality.
• 15:49
  We need to see how it works so that we may come to know the
• 15:53
  things we're really
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_01: concerned with,
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_01: things we're really serious about,
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_02: and that we must do this because on their own,
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_02: the forms can't be known,
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: basically.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: So...
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_01: I see in this passage.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: So so in dialogues like the Fido and things like that,
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: we get this impression that Plato really hates the physical world.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_01: He hates physical reality.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's always changing.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's never permanent.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: Let's just we just need the forms.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 16:27
  So he even says in the Fido,
• 16:29
  he even goes so far to say in the Fido,
• 16:32
  you know.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: We can only hope to have knowledge after we're dead.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: because this physical reality is so misleading.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: But what I see him doing in this passage is saying,
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_01: no,
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: no,
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: no,
• 16:48
  it's not that we don't hate the physical world and we can't
• 16:52
  hate the physical world.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: And not only that, but we need to go through it.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: We need to do science.
• 16:59
  We need to do natural science in order to do the things that
• 17:03
  we're really interested in.
• 17:05
  does that make sense yes yeah and I'm like so fascinated
• 17:11
  there's so many things
• 17:11
  there in terms of how I think first of all for people maybe how
• 17:16
  do you define the
• 17:16
  forms how are you thinking about the forms because then I might
• 17:20
  go into a little
• 17:21
  bit because I'm thinking of the divided line essentially like
• 17:24
  that there's this
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: kind of hierarchy from
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: the shadows and echoes and images to the objects,
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: to the images of the forms,
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: to the forms,
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: and that you have to kind of scale those.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that's the thing.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: So, so that, that, yeah.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_01: So, um, just, I'll get to your, your question.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: What do I think of the form?
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_01: But just to pick up on that, because I was thinking about that earlier.
• 17:43
  Um,
• 17:45
  so this path,
• 17:46
  so the divided line just kind of tells us,
• 17:49
  as you say,
• 17:49
  um,
• 17:49
  you
• 17:51
  here here is a way of of of thinking about the the the
• 17:56
  structure of reality what
• 17:58
  the divided line doesn't say i i don't think at least in my my
• 18:02
  memory of it is that
• 18:03
  you have to go through like so you have to start with shadows
• 18:08
  and then you move on
• 18:09
  to the and reflections of water and then you move on to the to
• 18:12
  the actual physical
• 18:13
  things themselves and then you move on to the mathematical
• 18:16
  entities and then you
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: move on to the forms um
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think it says you have to do that.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: Really,
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: I would read it that way in terms of like that the cave,
• 18:25
  I think the cave narrative kind of spells it out that way in a
• 18:28
  sense of like,
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: this is actually the journey that he's specifying.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, that's a dramatic representation of something.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, maybe, maybe.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's not exactly the same.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: I think he says we do do this, right?
• 18:38
  We start with,
• 18:39
  but I don't think he says you have to,
• 18:42
  at least not in my memory.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_01: But here he's saying in absolutely clear terms,
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: It is impossible to do it another way.
• 18:53
  It is impossible to come to know the forms without knowing
• 19:02
  physical reality.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: So not just like,
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: and I read this as,
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_01: we're not just using it as a stepping stone like,
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: oh,
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: great.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I see physical reality.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_01: Now I'm able to jump up to the
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_01: But you have to actually know it really intimately.
• 19:18
  You have to understand it so that you can move up to the...
• 19:26
  Because you're right.
• 19:27
  I mean,
• 19:27
  in the cave,
• 19:28
  the freed prisoner is presented as going through this journey,
• 19:31
  right?
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: But what's so puzzling...
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_01: about the cave is how does the prisoner get freed in the first place?
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's like mysterious.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_01: Someone just frees him or something, you know?
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: So who's that?
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: What's going on?
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: But this might give us a way of thinking about that, right?
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: How do we free ourselves from the cave?
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_01: We really come to understand it, right?
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_01: We really come to see it for what it is.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_01: And the only way to see it for what it is,
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: I think Plato is telling us in the Timaeus,
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_01: is to come to understand it.
• 20:09
  and yeah because I'm thinking I mean if he's going like if
• 20:13
  you're understanding the
• 20:14
  path and think of like the form of the beautiful or something
• 20:16
  like the only way to
• 20:17
  get to the form of the beautiful would be through observing
• 20:20
  beautiful in other
• 20:23
  capacities like in other but then is beauty exactly physical I
• 20:27
  don't know if it
• 20:28
  could be it's like courage is you only see courage through
• 20:31
  examples of courageous
• 20:32
  people which are physical things but it implies a kind of
• 20:37
  non-visible like
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: Is the courage in the thing or is it a form that comes out of that?
• 20:42
  And then you can,
• 20:44
  through observing those things,
• 20:45
  you get to know the form of courage itself.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: That would be the way I think about it.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: How does that land?
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's a very difficult question.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: how do we move from these instances,
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: instance after instance of,
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: as you say,
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_01: beautiful thing,
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_01: beautiful thing,
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: beautiful thing,
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: to courage?
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_01: The form.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_01: How do we get beyond that?
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you asked me before, what do I think
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_01: of, of, of the forms.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: I think of the forms as,
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_01: as primarily,
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: following,
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: following,
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: Vasilis Politis to some extent as primarily essences,
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: right?
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: So the form of the beautiful is just what it is to be beautiful.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_01: it's,
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_01: it's that thing in virtue of which all beautiful things are beautiful.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and, um,
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: There are lots of difficult questions that that raises.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: there's the question of separation,
• 21:54
  which Plato thought was challenging since he problematized it
• 21:59
  himself in the Parmenides.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_01: There's the problem of scope, right?
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_01: So are there forms for everything?
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: as there as he implies there are in the in the 10th Book of the Republic,
• 22:14
  when he says we posit a form for everything for which we have a
• 22:18
  common name.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_01: Or are there a very limited number of forms,
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: as I think he indicates there may be in the Timaeus,
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_01: right?
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_01: So it may be that there's a core,
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_01: a small sort of core set of forms,
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: and then we can get everything out from combining those in various ways.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_01: But I think his point,
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: however we answer those questions,
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_01: however we think about those questions,
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: I think his point ultimately is,
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_01: look,
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_01: it's really important to do natural science.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_01: It's really important to inquire into the physical world.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: But the problem is that can't answer all of our questions.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:10
  We're inevitably going to be left with questions because the
• 23:17
  physical world is inevitable.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: basically,
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: I think he doesn't put it in these terms,
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_01: but I think because of the problem of induction.
• 23:25
  Because how do we know just because something has happened in
• 23:28
  10,000 cases that
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_01: it's going to happen in the 10,000th and first case?
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_00: and that's so,
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_00: because there's something that was going on,
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_00: even whenever you were describing it to me before,
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: because Plato seems to have,
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: or Socrates,
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_00: I know himself did,
• 23:42
  had this kind of issue with the natural philosophers who are
• 23:44
  doing the scientific
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_00: thing of trying to describe
• 23:47
  cosmologically,
• 23:48
  like what things are,
• 23:49
  what their substances are,
• 23:50
  where they came from.
• 23:51
  And Socrates seems to do something different than them in a
• 23:54
  sense that he wants wisdom.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: He wants transformation.
• 23:56
  He doesn't want to just describe,
• 23:58
  you know,
• 23:58
  the sun or something like that,
• 24:00
  like Anaxagoras.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so he changes the nature of that question.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: But here in the Timaeus, it is an account of cosmology.
• 24:10
  in the natural philosopher way,
• 24:12
  essentially,
• 24:12
  are kind of crossing lines,
• 24:14
  maybe.
• 24:14
  So does this connect the wisdom mission with the natural
• 24:17
  philosophy mission?
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: So, I mean, I see Plato as...
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: So if you think about many of the pre-Socratics,
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: their project was a kind of,
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_01: broadly speaking,
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_01: reductionist project.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_01: So they wanted to say, okay, what is the basic principle of all things?
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_01: Thales, it's water.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: Anaximenes, it's air.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: So they were just choosing whatever element that
• 24:47
  they thought was probably the best candidate and trying to
• 24:50
  explain everything in terms of that.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_01: That's not what Plato is doing.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_01: Plato's project is not a reductionist project.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_01: Plato's project is is an explanatory project.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 24:59
  So so what do we need in order to make sense of the phenomena,
• 25:04
  the things we see?
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I think so.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: So I think he was he was rejecting that reductionist project.
• 25:14
  But I think he was also grappling with this with this with how
• 25:20
  to make sense of
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_01: Heraclitus on the one hand and Parmenides on the other hand.
• 25:25
  Just thinking that literally the trying to ultimate status is
• 25:30
  ultimate change.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_01: So,
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: to put it,
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_01: it's much more complicated than this,
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_01: but to put it in a kind of caricatured way that we normally do,
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_01: Heraclitus thinks or seems to say that all things are constantly in flux,
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_01: right?
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: Panta Ray, right?
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: All things flow.
• 25:52
  And Parmenides thinks that everything is completely stable,
• 25:56
  that there is no change.
• 25:58
  And the question is,
• 25:59
  there seems to be some truth in both of these,
• 26:03
  but how can that be?
• 26:04
  How can it be that everything is flowing and nothing changes,
• 26:10
  that everything is stable?
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think what Plato is doing in many of his works and...
• 26:19
  in the Timaeus in particular is trying to find a way of
• 26:22
  mediating these things.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: So trying to find a way of stability in the face of change.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and he does it through, through the forms.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, the forms provide stability.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: The physical world is,
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: is,
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: is,
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: is,
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_01: change,
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: but,
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: but there's,
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: there's one thing that we need to say.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I want to say this now before I forget it.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_01: At the very beginning of Timaeus' account,
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_01: he says this really important thing,
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_01: which is that the cosmos is an image of something.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: The cosmos itself is an image, is an icon.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: What are images?
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_01: What is distinctive about images?
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: It's that they're dependent entities.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_01: No matter how you and I've grappled with this for a while,
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_01: thinking about in what sense is the cosmos an image?
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_01: So you can think of it as as as a reflection in a mirror.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 27:30
  In which case the image really strongly ontologically depends
• 27:34
  on its original.
• 27:36
  such that the original has to be present in order for the image
• 27:39
  to exist at all.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_01: Or you can think of it as like a painting or a photograph,
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_01: right,
• 27:45
  where the image itself doesn't strongly ontologically depend on
• 27:50
  its original,
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: but it does depend for what it is,
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_01: for understanding what it is,
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: namely an image of whatever on its original.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_01: But however you cash out that relation,
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: An image is a dependent entity.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's the really important thing for Plato,
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: that the cosmos and the things in it are dependent entities.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_00: Dependent on what?
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_01: The forms.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: And the forms are dependent on the good, the one?
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: I mean...
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_01: I tend to think of the forms as independent entities.
• 28:30
  Yeah,
• 28:30
  maybe if there's a hierarchy of forms,
• 28:33
  then perhaps they depend on the form of the good.
• 28:38
  Because I kind of think that's what Plato's getting at in the
• 28:42
  Republic in a sense,
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_00: that there's a reality beyond the forms as well that's this kind of...
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_01: The epikena te suzias,
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_01: the...
• 28:53
  good that's beyond being you mean but that's beyond being
• 28:56
  exactly that word beyond
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: being that there's
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_00: obviously which he uses with the analogy of the sun,
• 29:02
  that there's something even beyond the forms that is the
• 29:06
  ultimate reality that we
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_00: can gesture towards but can't actually prove.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 29:12
  that's something I take from it in the sense that it's the
• 29:15
  basis of truth and knowledge,
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_00: but it can't be argued for rationally because it is the basis of it.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: So any argument presupposes the validity of the good.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_00: Socrates calls it the unhypothetical first principle.
• 29:29
  which is obviously the basis of science and any kind of
• 29:33
  reasoning or argumentation
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_00: that that has to be the case.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_01: Right, right.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_01: to be honest with you,
• 29:43
  I haven't thought very deeply about the relation among forms or
• 29:50
  the relation of all
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_01: of the forms to the form of the good,
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_01: but you're right.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_01: In the Republic, he certainly does say,
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_01: in the sun analogy that,
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: that,
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_01: that,
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_01: that the,
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: the,
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: the good gives the other forms,
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: it makes the other,
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_01: makes it the case that the other forms can be known and can,
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: can,
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: can be what they are just as the sun gives,
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_01: gives,
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 30:20
  makes it the case that all things in the world uh can be seen
• 30:25
  and can exist uh
• 30:27
  nothing nothing would be able to to exist uh without the sun um
• 30:32
  yeah and do you
• 30:33
  think i mean because the good obviously natural science i
• 30:36
  suppose the way i'm
• 30:36
  interpreting natural science as well is like connected to
• 30:39
  physicalism and connected
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_00: very much to this kind of
• 30:42
  modern project in terms of like a reductionist nominalist
• 30:47
  physicalist kind of
• 30:47
  paradigm that physics I think really brought in and then it
• 30:51
  just became kind of
• 30:52
  applied to everything and so I think Plato's that really gets
• 30:56
  rid of the good in
• 30:57
  some sense like the good is the guarantor for Plato this
• 31:00
  connection between I've
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_00: heard John Verbecki describe it as the
• 31:03
  wedding of intelligibility and reality or the the continual
• 31:07
  promise of the wedding
• 31:09
  of intelligibility and reality like that there's some you know
• 31:12
  there's an order to
• 31:12
  the cosmos and there's an our mind is capable of grasping it
• 31:16
  and that that has to
• 31:17
  be true to do any investigation of reality um or to acquire the
• 31:22
  truth and that that
• 31:23
  was the basis of that that kind of platonic worldview but
• 31:27
  that's been thrown out in
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: I suppose, modern physicalist science.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_00: I think there's a real skepticism of Plato in that type of science.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I don't know what you think about that.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_01: No, I think you're right.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_01: And I mean, I think maybe that's...
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know what Jowett had in mind in 1892,
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: but maybe it's this idea that science was heading in that direction.
• 31:54
  Science was heading toward,
• 31:57
  I mean,
• 31:58
  it may be a little early to that,
• 32:00
  but I mean,
• 32:02
  you're right.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_01: Modern science is almost unreflectively physicalist.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_01: So just, you know,
• 32:14
  assuming that the only sort of entities that can exist are
• 32:18
  entities in space and time.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_01: But the problem is, I think, that's fine to do a lot of physics, right?
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_01: You could do a lot of physics with entities in space and time,
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_01: but it becomes difficult when you get to the peripheries.
• 32:43
  of physics so when you get to things like um we were talking
• 32:48
  before we came on
• 32:49
  things like dark matter and dark energy um things like um what
• 32:58
  was going on
• 32:59
  immediately before the big bang questions like that um human
• 33:04
  consciousness i would
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: add that's do as well
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, then we run up against difficulties with physicalism.
• 33:19
  And I think we at least have to start asking the question,
• 33:22
  is physicalism true?
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_02: And I think you're right.
• 33:32
  The problem,
• 33:33
  the modern scientific problem with Platonism is that it posits entities.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't just posit them,
• 33:39
  but it in fact thinks that the only real entities are entities
• 33:44
  that are not in
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_01: space and time.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, which kind of messes with the empirical aspect of it.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_00: I guess there's maybe another way to empirically investigate them,
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_00: but it would be some kind of,
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know,
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: exacting of the senses that doesn't exactly...
• 34:01
  I'm thinking of like a Pythagorean mystical tradition or
• 34:04
  something that you can do
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_00: these things that...
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't it's not going to.
• 34:09
  Yeah,
• 34:09
  that if we're trapped in space time,
• 34:11
  their perception is of space time objects.
• 34:13
  You know,
• 34:14
  if that's the only mode of investigation,
• 34:15
  you're not going to encounter the forms.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think the forms aren't physical in that sense.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_01: although there is this debate and mathematics and like,
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: that's heavily similar.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_01: there is this very interesting question about whether for Plato,
• 34:32
  knowledge of the forms is necessarily discursive or whether
• 34:38
  there can be intuitive
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_01: knowledge of the forms.
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_01: So whether you can...
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_01: Because he does,
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: when he talks about the forms in lots of places,
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_01: he uses all this perceptual language.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: He talks about seeing them in the cave,
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_01: in the cave thing when you get out of the cave.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_01: He talks about touching them a lot.
• 35:01
  And so there's a question as to how seriously,
• 35:03
  is that just allegorical language,
• 35:04
  right?
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_01: Are we just trying to...
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_01: think of a way of explaining cognition?
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_01: Or does he actually think that,
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_01: as you say,
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_01: through some sort of perhaps mystical process,
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_01: and again,
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_01: I don't have any,
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_01: Plotinus has quite a lot to say about this,
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_01: but can we actually have a kind of quasi-perceptual awareness or contact?
• 35:34
  Yeah,
• 35:35
  because like the contemplative tradition really seemed to be
• 35:38
  trying to do that.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_00: Like that was really,
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_00: Plotinus' like the various practices,
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: actual exercises,
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: like it was a very,
• 35:47
  they're trying to construct some kind of curriculum essentially
• 35:50
  where you could
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_00: practice these things to,
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_00: send levels of being pretty much.
• 35:57
  And that,
• 35:58
  well,
• 35:58
  I'm going off Pierre Hadot here,
• 36:00
  but the ancient philosophy was based in that.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_00: It was a particular kind of,
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_00: Almost more like a martial art or something,
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_00: or a practice,
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_00: then we'd recognize this modern kind of propositional argumentation.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's a lot to be said for that.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_01: It happens to be well outside of my own expertise, but yeah.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_00: Mm-hmm.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_00: but I guess to come back to what you were saying about the scientific,
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_00: so how do you see this Platonist necessary causes and divine causes?
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_00: How would you see that changing the scientific project?
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: Like after having said what we've said about physicalism and that stuff,
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_00: does it change it in that way?
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_00: Does it make it a different project?
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I think, so the question is, what is the aim of science?
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 36:45
  And if the aim of science is to to identify regularities and to
• 36:52
  be able to predict.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_01: then we get along fine with physicalist natural science.
• 36:58
  I mean,
• 36:58
  it's pretty good at identifying regularities and at allowing us
• 37:03
  to predict things.
• 37:04
  But if the aim of science is to come to some kind of
• 37:08
  all-encompassing ultimate
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: understanding of all things,
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_01: I think we may find limits to...
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_01: physicalist natural science.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_01: I just don't see that,
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_01: as I said,
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_01: when we get to the peripheries,
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_01: when we stretch it out and we think of,
• 37:33
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_01: and maybe I'm wrong.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe,
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 37:37
  it's just that we haven't been able to detect dark matter and
• 37:40
  at some point we'll
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_01: be able to detect it and,
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_01: find out it is also an entity in space and time and we move on.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_01: But it seems to me that what Plato is saying here is that
• 37:54
  natural science is great and can do a lot for us and can tell
• 37:58
  us a lot about the
• 37:59
  world about the physical side of the world but it can't tell us
• 38:04
  it can't answer um
• 38:07
  the the the the interesting questions that that he wants to
• 38:11
  answer which are um i
• 38:13
  SPEAKER_01: think ultimately what is it questions so um you know
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_01: When we say, what is water?
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_01: And we answer that water is H2O.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_01: I think Plato would say, is that a sufficient answer?
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_01: Is that a complete answer?
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_01: Or is that just breaking it down into some constituent parts?
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_01: Is there a more, you know what I mean?
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_00: Totally.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, 100%, man.
• 38:50
  That's landing so well in terms of stuff I've been thinking
• 38:53
  about as well.
• 38:54
  this um because a lot of people i mean sabine hossenfelder
• 38:57
  springs from island in
• 38:58
  terms of the last hundred years of physics of being like
• 39:00
  physics is basically stuck
• 39:02
  because of the philosophical commitments that it has obviously
• 39:04
  i'm not a physicist
• 39:05
  but that's i've heard physicists saying this and also even in
• 39:08
  neuroscience people
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_00: complain about neuroscience like
• 39:11
  was going to explain consciousness the entire time and you know
• 39:14
  it's been 75 years
• 39:15
  or whatever and it hasn't done it and there's all problems with
• 39:18
  it you know a lot
• 39:19
  of the stuff of trying to reduce like brain imaging stuff to
• 39:22
  like centers of mind
• 39:23
  hasn't panned out it turns out it's hard to predict there's
• 39:26
  assumptions about
• 39:27
  causality that goes into that so like it's pretty clear that a
• 39:30
  lot of those
• 39:30
  physicalist projects are breaking down and are running into
• 39:33
  obstacles based on
• 39:34
  these commitments so you're not the only one in terms of being
• 39:36
  like we need a
• 39:38
  platonic ontology to actually advance these things,
• 39:40
  which is very interesting.
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if I would say we need a platonic ontology to advance it,
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_01: but I think what we need to do is ask,
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_01: what is our aim?
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_01: What is the aim in science?
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_01: And again,
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_01: if the aim is just to predict,
• 39:57
  is just to come up with more and more precise and sophisticated
• 40:00
  ways of predicting phenomena,
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_01: yeah.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_01: Think about the cave.
• 40:07
  That's precisely what the smart prisoners in the cave are the
• 40:14
  ones who are capable
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_01: of predicting which shadows are going to come after.
• 40:19
  That's essentially,
• 40:21
  I think,
• 40:22
  how Plato would characterize the project of modern natural science.
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_01: We're becoming very good at predicting.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_01: And and that's that's good.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's useful that it has its purpose.
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_01: It's not to say, like, let's just throw it all out.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_01: And that's precisely what I think Plato is saying in this passage.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_01: We don't need to throw it out.
• 40:45
  We just need to understand where it sits in the in the kind of
• 40:50
  structure of things.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yes,
• 40:52
  and I think there's been a real shift in that in terms of like
• 40:55
  the increasing
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_00: secularization and the,
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_00: I suppose,
• 40:59
  the attempt to have an account of reality beyond any religious
• 41:03
  or philosophical
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_00: framework that is like,
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_00: and there aren't many alternatives to that in a sense.
• 41:08
  SPEAKER_00: Like I was raised as an atheist.
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_00: So for me,
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_00: when I started doing philosophy and learning about it,
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_00: I was like,
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_00: okay,
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_00: the default philosophy of atheism kind of is scientific materialism.
• 41:17
  Like there's not actually that many other options of like,
• 41:20
  you know,
• 41:20
  what,
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_00: what reality is when you just reduce it to the empirical and there's no
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_00: transcendence and there's nothing,
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_00: you know?
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that,
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_00: that question,
• 41:29
  cause I early signed it was like Galileo and probably Newton
• 41:31
  and they wouldn't have
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_00: thought that that it was trying to explain ultimate reality.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_00: Like,
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think that was their project,
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_00: um,
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_00: in a sense,
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: but it's become that probably down the line,
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: maybe for other reasons.
• 41:44
  I don't know how that lands for you,
• 41:45
  but that's certainly the way I see it.
• 41:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, that's interesting.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted to raise another passage,
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_01: if you don't mind,
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_01: one that I think is very related to the one we've been looking at,
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_01: but it's from Barclay.
• 41:56
  SPEAKER_01: So in his final published work,
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: Cyrus,
• 42:01
  SPEAKER_01: Barclay says a lot of weird things,
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_01: but he makes this point in section 160,
• 42:09
  which I think is really picking up on this passage that we've
• 42:14
  looked at in the
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_01: Timaeus 6080 to 69A,
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_01: So he says the mind of man acts by an instrument necessarily.
• 42:22
  The Tohegemonikon or mind presiding in the world acts by an
• 42:26
  instrument freely.
• 42:28
  Without instrumental and second causes,
• 42:31
  there could be no regular course of nature.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_01: And without a regular course, nature could never be understood.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_01: So,
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_01: I think what Barclay is saying here is,
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_01: I think he's kind of,
• 43:09
  or he's spelling out what I think is Plato's point in that 6080
• 43:13
  to 69a passage.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_01: He's basically saying, look.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_01: If the world,
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_01: if physical reality didn't have a regular course,
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_01: that is to say,
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_01: if these instrumental and mechanical,
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_01: whatever causes didn't exist,
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_01: then we would be totally at a loss.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_01: Human beings wouldn't know what to do with themselves.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so we need these things, right?
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_01: Not because they're what ultimate reality is,
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_01: but we need them so that we can think about what ultimate reality is.
• 43:58
  SPEAKER_01: Because otherwise, the physical world would be totally puzzling to us.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's because of the nature of our minds, Barclay says, right?
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_01: The mind of man acts by an instrument necessarily, right?
• 44:13
  So we act by these instrumental causes,
• 44:16
  by these physical causes necessarily.
• 44:19
  The Tohegemonicon or the mind presiding in the world,
• 44:21
  that's God for Barclay.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_01: But you might think,
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_01: yeah,
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_01: the world soul for Plato acts by an instrument freely,
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_01: right?
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_01: So the physical...
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_01: the mind governing the physical world uses these,
• 44:39
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_01: these,
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_01: these,
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_01: secondary causes,
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_01: not because that mind needs them,
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_01: but because our minds need them,
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_01: right?
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_01: Because we need them in order to,
• 44:51
  SPEAKER_01: and so just to,
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_01: just to bring it back to what I was talking about before,
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_01: I think these mechanical causes,
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_01: again,
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_01: make prediction and,
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_01: and,
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_01: and,
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_01: and,
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 45:08
  you know,
• 45:09
  identifying regularities possible and,
• 45:16
  you know,
• 45:16
  support us in that regard.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_01: But we need to ask ourselves again, is that everything?
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_01: Is that all there is?
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_00: And there's,
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'm kind of thinking,
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_00: I keep going back to the divided line here for some reason,
• 45:30
  SPEAKER_00: but because the forms,
• 45:33
  SPEAKER_00: there's a causal hierarchy there,
• 45:34
  SPEAKER_00: I think,
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_00: from the good,
• 45:36
  SPEAKER_00: causing the forms,
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_00: the forms causing the object,
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_00: the objects causing the shadows and the images.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_00: And so in that sense,
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_00: Plato describes as like when he uses the analogy of the sun,
• 45:46
  like the sun is in all of those things because like light
• 45:49
  illuminates the objects
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_00: in that sense.
• 45:51
  So like what I thought Plato was proposing there is that
• 45:54
  there's essentially a
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_00: ladder that you can climb.
• 45:56
  SPEAKER_00: from the physical objects to the forms.
• 46:00
  And that seems to really fit with this in that by observing the
• 46:03
  regularities and
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_00: the patterns of these things,
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_00: we can then get to the deeper layer.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_00: But science says that there is no deeper layer.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_00: Our physicalism says there is no deeper layer.
• 46:13
  SPEAKER_00: So we're just observing and predicting the regularities,
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_00: but without the,
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_00: let's say,
• 46:19
  ontological significance of those regularities for the nature
• 46:23
  of ultimate reality.
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's a nice way of putting it.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_01: I tend to think of the divided line the other way around.
• 46:31
  SPEAKER_01: So I think of it as articulating a series of dependency relations.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I like to think in terms of dependency.
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_01: So the shadows and the reflections depend on the physical things.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_01: They can't exist without them or can't be what they are without them.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_01: The physical things depend on the mathematical entities, say.
• 46:54
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not exactly sure why or how that is,
• 46:57
  but let's just say that we could say the physical triangle
• 47:03
  depends on the ideal
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_01: triangle as an approximation of it,
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_01: something like that.
• 47:10
  SPEAKER_01: And then the mathematical entities depend on the forms.
• 47:15
  SPEAKER_01: And then, as you say, maybe the forms depend on the form of the good.
• 47:20
  SPEAKER_01: I'm perfectly happy to.
• 47:22
  SPEAKER_01: And then the form of the good may be the only independent being.
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's kind of how the neopladeness would think of it, right?
• 47:28
  SPEAKER_01: That that's the one.
• 47:31
  SPEAKER_01: And that everything emanates from the one.
• 47:34
  So everything depends on the one in the sense that it's an
• 47:37
  emanation from it.
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_00: Like the emanation and emergence up and down.
• 47:41
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have the vertical causality and then you have also the
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_00: the other causality the other way.
• 47:46
  SPEAKER_00: And in some sense,
• 47:47
  I think the Neoplatonists don't root reality in either one of
• 47:50
  those to be like,
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_00: oh,
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_00: it's just this one or it's just that one.
• 47:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's actually both of them in an important sense.
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_00: And we've lost that polarity.
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you're familiar with Alicia Uraro's work,
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_00: her Dynamics in Action,
• 48:08
  SPEAKER_00: her recent book,
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_00: Context Changes Everything,
• 48:10
  SPEAKER_00: where she basically argues that
• 48:12
  SPEAKER_00: the efficient causality of science has lost constraint,
• 48:15
  SPEAKER_00: like top-down constraints that are governing constraints,
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_00: which would have been Aristotle's formal cause.
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if that imports to Plato,
• 48:22
  but she's tried to bring back through self-organization and
• 48:28
  self-organizing systems
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_00: really to bring back in that type of constraint thinking.
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_00: Like constraints are real causes in a sense.
• 48:34
  SPEAKER_00: They're not efficient causes,
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_00: but they constrain the possibility of things that can happen,
• 48:38
  SPEAKER_00: you know?
• 48:39
  SPEAKER_00: Like,
• 48:39
  SPEAKER_00: if I roll the pen along my desk,
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_00: if the desk is at a slant,
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_00: the slant of the desk is going to affect where the pen goes.
• 48:46
  SPEAKER_00: But it's not an efficient cause.
• 48:47
  It just shapes,
• 48:49
  you know,
• 48:49
  the outcome in a,
• 48:51
  you know,
• 48:52
  non-efficient cause way.
• 48:54
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_00: That's interesting.
• 48:57
  SPEAKER_01: But gravity is an efficient cause in that sense, wouldn't you say?
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I guess, well, the shape of the table...
• 49:05
  wouldn't be an efficient cause it's not pushing on it it's just
• 49:09
  facilitating the
• 49:10
  movement and similarly I think the conditions of the body as
• 49:14
  well afford a lot of
• 49:16
  those kind of things taking place like her was addressing the
• 49:20
  problem of free will
• 49:21
  and dynamics and action and how we can describe intentional
• 49:25
  action in a way that's
• 49:26
  scientific that's interesting yeah so trying to get that idea
• 49:32
  of teleology back
• 49:34
  SPEAKER_01: into
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_00: Totally.
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_00: And that's really what I think is happening.
• 49:37
  SPEAKER_00: The teleology has to be brought into biology.
• 49:40
  It's coming in in formal and final cause in a way because you
• 49:43
  actually just can't
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_00: explain living things without some sort of teleology.
• 49:47
  SPEAKER_00: But it's raising a lot of hairy questions about how that should work.
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 49:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 49:57
  Do you think teleologically...
• 50:00
  In terms of Aristotle's four causes and Plato's two causes...
• 50:05
  Do you think there's a connection between them,
• 50:07
  or is that totally off-face?
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_01: Plato's two, you mean formal and necessary?
• 50:13
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, the necessary, sorry.
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, yeah, yeah.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so that's something I've been really grappling with a lot lately.
• 50:24
  SPEAKER_01: I'm wondering whether it's misleading.
• 50:27
  SPEAKER_01: There has been a long debate about whether Plato just...
• 50:38
  SPEAKER_01: didn't identify these causes or whether he missed,
• 50:43
  SPEAKER_01: he only identified the formal and the whatever.
• 50:49
  I'm beginning to wonder whether it's a little bit misleading to
• 50:53
  try and think about
• 50:54
  SPEAKER_01: Plato's account of causation in terms of Aristotle's for causal account.
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_01: And my current view, though I haven't...
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_01: I need to refine this,
• 51:09
  SPEAKER_01: is that causation for Plato,
• 51:13
  SPEAKER_01: I think is primarily,
• 51:15
  SPEAKER_01: or Plato's notion of causation,
• 51:16
  SPEAKER_01: I think is primarily efficient causation.
• 51:18
  SPEAKER_01: That all...
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_01: He certainly seems to indicate for formal causation, right?
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_01: the forms are causes,
• 51:33
  SPEAKER_01: but I think he thinks of the forms as efficient causes in a sense,
• 51:39
  SPEAKER_00: as actually making- In a sense of like acting upon us.
• 51:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and making us what we are, making things what they are.
• 51:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I think the world soul is also an efficient cause for Plato.
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's really interesting.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 51:57
  SPEAKER_01: Again, it's tough.
• 51:59
  SPEAKER_01: And you have that passage in the...
• 52:05
  SPEAKER_01: In the Phaedo, that famous passage where he talks about forms as causes.
• 52:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
• 52:11
  SPEAKER_00: and with Socrates,
• 52:12
  I know when he's sitting down on his trial in terms of like you
• 52:15
  could describe the
• 52:15
  SPEAKER_00: cause of my knees bending.
• 52:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's the Phaedo passage.
• 52:19
  SPEAKER_00: Or you could say, yeah, the cause is my desire to pursue the truth.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 52:25
  SPEAKER_02: So...
• 52:29
  yes anyways um yeah because that's i mean this i think that
• 52:33
  really seems to be the
• 52:34
  question at the moment with scientists is that type of
• 52:37
  causality of bringing that
• 52:39
  in in a way that makes sense you know um that has been that was
• 52:44
  excluded by
• 52:45
  physicalism which reduced all causalities just to efficient
• 52:48
  causality but not in
• 52:50
  the way you're talking about efficient causality only in
• 52:52
  physical efficient
• 52:53
  SPEAKER_00: causality like billiard balls right
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_01: Or even material cause.
• 52:58
  SPEAKER_00: Material cause, yeah.
• 53:02
  SPEAKER_00: So do you think Plato has something to add to that?
• 53:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like, is this, you know... I don't know.
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, again, I think
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think maybe not that he has something.
• 53:17
  SPEAKER_01: I think he does have something to add.
• 53:19
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not exactly sure what it is yet.
• 53:20
  SPEAKER_01: I'm working on that.
• 53:21
  SPEAKER_01: But I think maybe more of my point is what I said before,
• 53:26
  SPEAKER_01: that perhaps we should stop trying to think about Plato's,
• 53:31
  SPEAKER_01: although I'm doing it as well.
• 53:34
  SPEAKER_01: It's hard to get out of that mindset.
• 53:35
  But maybe we should stop trying to fit what Plato says about
• 53:40
  causation into
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_01: Aristotle's account of causation.
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 53:44
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 53:47
  I know that the four causes have kind of come to shape Western
• 53:52
  thinking on...
• 53:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
• 53:54
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 53:55
  SPEAKER_00: because I'm thinking like pre-Newton,
• 53:57
  SPEAKER_00: like that Aristotle was the...
• 53:59
  SPEAKER_00: His causes were causality in a sense.
• 54:02
  I'd never really heard about these causes from Plato at all
• 54:05
  until he sent me this passage.
• 54:06
  SPEAKER_00: So that's why I'm kind of tipping away of being like, yeah, is there...
• 54:12
  SPEAKER_00: He certainly seems to bring in anyway the divine cause,
• 54:14
  SPEAKER_00: which is absent from the physicalist paradigm.
• 54:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_01: And again,
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_01: I think divine is just,
• 54:23
  SPEAKER_01: in this sense,
• 54:24
  SPEAKER_01: is just something that isn't in space and time.
• 54:28
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, something that isn't subject to change.
• 54:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I think, does this make sense?
• 54:35
  SPEAKER_00: So like if I have a goal,
• 54:37
  SPEAKER_00: a particular goal to become a professional soccer player,
• 54:40
  SPEAKER_00: I have a vision of myself as a soccer player.
• 54:43
  SPEAKER_00: That vision constrains the things that I can do in the present.
• 54:47
  SPEAKER_00: I have to go to soccer training today.
• 54:49
  SPEAKER_00: I have to eat well.
• 54:50
  SPEAKER_00: I have to do all these things.
• 54:51
  It's not an efficient causality,
• 54:52
  but it certainly has a causal impact on my career.
• 54:57
  SPEAKER_00: behavior in the present.
• 54:58
  SPEAKER_00: And it's a real cause in that sense of counterfactuals.
• 55:03
  SPEAKER_00: It's an explanation.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_01: I think,
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_01: and I think it's important to acknowledge that the word idea,
• 55:11
  SPEAKER_01: which is the word where transcend is cause,
• 55:13
  SPEAKER_01: can also mean explanation.
• 55:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I think explanation really works well in that particular example.
• 55:19
  SPEAKER_01: So you think your goal is
• 55:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's weird to say your goal is a cause of what you do.
• 55:28
  But you could say constraint is,
• 55:30
  but I think constraints are kind of causality.
• 55:34
  SPEAKER_01: But it's definitely an explanation.
• 55:36
  I mean,
• 55:37
  what explains why you're going to soccer training instead of
• 55:42
  going to McDonald's?
• 55:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's because you want to be, you have this goal, right?
• 55:47
  SPEAKER_01: The goal is explaining why it's explaining your behavior.
• 55:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 55:53
  SPEAKER_00: But I also think because if I select...
• 55:55
  SPEAKER_00: So if I select it versus the soccer player versus being,
• 55:58
  SPEAKER_00: say,
• 55:58
  SPEAKER_00: like a singer or something like that,
• 56:00
  if I have these two motivational drives that are in competition
• 56:03
  with each other,
• 56:04
  I can select one over another and they'll take me on very
• 56:07
  different paths in a way
• 56:10
  SPEAKER_00: that's like really...
• 56:12
  causally effective in our lives i'd say it's the basis of
• 56:14
  agency really is the
• 56:15
  ability to adapt yourself to these particular um abstract goals
• 56:22
  rather than your
• 56:23
  present circumstances or other ones like it's it's the basis of
• 56:27
  our uh free will in
• 56:29
  a sense um but that's the type of causality that's been
• 56:33
  excluded from from the
• 56:36
  SPEAKER_00: physicalist paradigm
• 56:37
  SPEAKER_00: Which is why you end up with,
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 56:39
  SPEAKER_00: determinism and...
• 56:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
• 56:40
  SPEAKER_01: and I mean,
• 56:42
  SPEAKER_01: and a scientist listening to this conversation would probably say,
• 56:44
  SPEAKER_01: well,
• 56:44
  SPEAKER_01: no,
• 56:45
  SPEAKER_01: the cause of your going to soccer practice is,
• 56:50
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 56:52
  SPEAKER_01: your brain,
• 56:53
  SPEAKER_01: certain,
• 56:54
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 56:55
  SPEAKER_01: brain chemicals caused,
• 56:57
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 56:58
  SPEAKER_01: neurons to fire.
• 56:59
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, that's the cause, right?
• 57:02
  SPEAKER_01: That's why you're, you know, that's what directly made you go there.
• 57:05
  SPEAKER_01: But then we get that...
• 57:07
  back to to to the fetal passage um you know plato would say
• 57:12
  well yeah i mean yes he
• 57:15
  wouldn't say no right he'd say yes but that's not the whole
• 57:20
  that that's not the
• 57:21
  whole thing and that's not the primary thing right so yeah he
• 57:25
  says in that passage
• 57:26
  SPEAKER_01: um the bones and sinuous passage he says um
• 57:30
  So to call my bones and sinews the cause of my sitting in
• 57:36
  prison is to mistake kind
• 57:39
  SPEAKER_01: of necessary condition for a cause,
• 57:43
  SPEAKER_01: right?
• 57:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, it's true.
• 57:44
  SPEAKER_01: Without my bones and sinews, I wouldn't have been able to do this.
• 57:48
  SPEAKER_01: I wouldn't be able to be sitting in prison.
• 57:51
  SPEAKER_01: But the reason that I'm sitting in prison,
• 57:53
  SPEAKER_01: if you really want to understand my sitting in prison,
• 57:58
  you have to understand that the Athenians condemned me and I
• 58:02
  thought it was better
• 58:02
  SPEAKER_01: to sit here than to leave.
• 58:04
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think that gets back to what we were talking about before.
• 58:08
  SPEAKER_01: What is it we're trying to explain?
• 58:10
  SPEAKER_01: What is the end goal?
• 58:12
  SPEAKER_01: Or, you know, if we're just trying to explain
• 58:16
  SPEAKER_01: the that without which not,
• 58:18
  as he puts it in that passage of being at soccer practice or
• 58:23
  sitting in prison or whatever,
• 58:24
  SPEAKER_01: then,
• 58:26
  SPEAKER_01: yeah,
• 58:27
  SPEAKER_01: okay,
• 58:28
  SPEAKER_01: brain chemicals and neurons firing and legs moving and bones and sinews,
• 58:35
  SPEAKER_01: that's going to be good.
• 58:36
  But that's not going to give us full explanation of why you,
• 58:41
  Mahan McCann,
• 58:44
  SPEAKER_01: opted to go to soccer practice instead of singing practice or whatever.
• 58:53
  SPEAKER_00: Totally.
• 58:53
  SPEAKER_00: So you think they're modes of description, in a sense?
• 58:55
  SPEAKER_00: So I think... No, I think they're... I mean... I think...
• 59:06
  SPEAKER_02: That there are different levels of explanation, right?
• 59:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I think one is the necessary and the other is the divine,
• 59:16
  SPEAKER_01: if you want to put it that way,
• 59:17
  SPEAKER_01: right?
• 59:20
  SPEAKER_01: explaining things purely in terms of physical constituents or,
• 59:28
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 59:29
  SPEAKER_01: entities and things in space and time,
• 59:32
  SPEAKER_01: that's the necessary.
• 59:34
  SPEAKER_01: And it's necessary.
• 59:35
  SPEAKER_01: It's important.
• 59:37
  SPEAKER_01: It's a that without which not, right?
• 59:41
  SPEAKER_01: But it's not the whole picture.
• 59:44
  SPEAKER_01: And the question is,
• 59:47
  SPEAKER_01: I think the question for science is,
• 59:48
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 59:49
  SPEAKER_01: do we want to stick with that?
• 59:51
  SPEAKER_01: which is important, or do we want to look for the whole picture?
• 59:56
  SPEAKER_01: Well, maybe I should step back and put it a little more cautiously.
• 1:00:01
  SPEAKER_01: Do we want to ask whether this is the whole picture?
• 1:00:09
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I think you brought up neuroscience, for example.
• 1:00:13
  SPEAKER_01: That's the question about consciousness.
• 1:00:15
  SPEAKER_01: Do we want to just map the brain
• 1:00:18
  SPEAKER_01: and correlate brain states with conscious states and get really,
• 1:00:23
  SPEAKER_01: really good at that and do all this fMRI stuff?
• 1:00:27
  SPEAKER_01: Or do we want to ask if that is the whole picture,
• 1:00:32
  SPEAKER_01: if that's answering all of the questions we have?
• 1:00:37
  SPEAKER_00: Such a good point.
• 1:00:38
  SPEAKER_00: And also,
• 1:00:39
  SPEAKER_00: can you,
• 1:00:40
  SPEAKER_00: because with the neuroscience thing,
• 1:00:42
  it's like you bring a kind of causality to the observations
• 1:00:46
  that you're making
• 1:00:46
  SPEAKER_00: about the brain.
• 1:00:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like,
• 1:00:48
  guys like robert sapolsky and like strict like no free will
• 1:00:52
  guys it's like i
• 1:00:52
  understand how they got there because if you do assume
• 1:00:55
  materialism efficient
• 1:00:57
  causality determinism that is that's what you're going to see
• 1:01:00
  like that's that's
• 1:01:01
  all there is and in some sense can science the scientific
• 1:01:05
  method itself is it
• 1:01:07
  locked into that paradigm or is it possible to actually detach
• 1:01:11
  it from that
• 1:01:12
  SPEAKER_00: Because empiricism,
• 1:01:13
  SPEAKER_00: if you think about it,
• 1:01:14
  SPEAKER_00: sense experience has to be reality for empiricism to be accurate.
• 1:01:18
  SPEAKER_00: It has to be the whole of reality.
• 1:01:21
  SPEAKER_00: It has to be the whole of reality.
• 1:01:23
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know how you would get out of that in a sense of mystical.
• 1:01:30
  SPEAKER_01: I'm laughing because I think that these are debates...
• 1:01:35
  this is the debate that I think Plato was having with the atomists,
• 1:01:39
  right?
• 1:01:39
  SPEAKER_01: So the atomists,
• 1:01:42
  SPEAKER_01: and then Epicureanism based on ancient atomism,
• 1:01:46
  SPEAKER_01: thought,
• 1:01:46
  SPEAKER_01: believed in determinism because they believed that in principle,
• 1:01:53
  SPEAKER_01: if you could know the position of every atom,
• 1:01:59
  SPEAKER_01: you would be able to predict
• 1:02:02
  you'd be able to know everything that happens because you'd be
• 1:02:05
  able to know the
• 1:02:06
  SPEAKER_01: trajectory of every atom and you'd be able to see.
• 1:02:09
  SPEAKER_01: And it's all mechanistic, right?
• 1:02:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's all so, you know.
• 1:02:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I think Plato was pressing back, pushing back against this idea.
• 1:02:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I think he does that in the Timaeus.
• 1:02:23
  Actually,
• 1:02:23
  that's a conversation we can have on another day in some
• 1:02:26
  interesting ways.
• 1:02:30
  SPEAKER_01: Saying like,
• 1:02:32
  SPEAKER_01: yeah, that's important.
• 1:02:33
  SPEAKER_01: But again, it's not going to be enough.
• 1:02:38
  It's not going to be enough to give a complete explanation of
• 1:02:44
  what's going on.
• 1:02:47
  SPEAKER_00: Peter, I think that's a perfect place to finish up.
• 1:02:50
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you very much.
• 1:02:50
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 1:02:51
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to have to go back and read the Timaeus again now.
• 1:02:54
  SPEAKER_00: Indeed.
• 1:02:54
  SPEAKER_01: We can read it together.
• 1:02:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:02:58
  SPEAKER_00: And definitely, I'd love to chat again.
• 1:03:00
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much.
• 1:03:00
  SPEAKER_00: Sounds good.
• 1:03:01
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks, man.