| Plato on Justice & Power: Reading Book I of Plato's Republic Contributor(s): Lycos, Kimon (Author) |
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ISBN: 0887064167 ISBN-13: 9780887064166 Publisher: State University of New York Press OUR PRICE: $33.20 Product Type: Paperback - Other Formats Published: August 1987 |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Philosophy | Ethics & Moral Philosophy - Philosophy | Political - Philosophy | History & Surveys - Ancient & Classical |
| Dewey: 321.07 |
| LCCN: 86019166 |
| Series: Suny Philosophy |
| Physical Information: 212 pages |
| Themes: - Chronological Period - Ancient (To 499 A.D.) - Cultural Region - Greece |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: Most commentaries on the Republic rush through Book I with embarrassment because the arguments of the participants, including Socrates, are specious. Beginning with Book II, the arguments are brilliant, so why did Plato write Book I? Lycos shows that the function of Book I is to attack the view that justice is external to the soul--external to the power humans have to render things good--and is merely instrumental to a good society. The dramatic situation in Book I presents justice as internal, requiring not laws, but discrimination and virtue. After this introduction, the rest of the Republic serves to sketch out what virtue is and how to practice discrimination. Plato on Justice and Power ends with some illuminating contrasts between this sense of virtue and that characteristic of our modern liberal politics which takes an external view of justice similar to the Athenians view at the time of Plato. |
