Utopia 1 reading experience
I remember in the class of the history of western philosophy, when I talked about Plato, there was a remark by Whitehead on the teacher's slide: the whole history of western philosophy is just a comment on Plato. From this sentence, we can see Plato's lofty position in western philosophy and even the shrewd civilization of the whole mankind. Plato's most famous work, or his masterpiece, is the well-known Republic. Therefore, when I hold up this masterpiece that has been admired by generations, I don't expect to understand it at once. I just hope to get some enlightenment and understanding from this book which embodies the wisdom of Plato and Greece.
The Republic is Plato's masterpiece in his prime, and it can also be said that it is his peak work. Plato's works are mostly presented to readers in the form of dialogues featuring Socrates, and this book is no exception. I know that I can't understand the essence of it only by reading it once, so when I have some doubts in the reading process, I will rush by, just to have a clue. The introduction to the translator gives me a general understanding of the profoundness of this book and also talks about all aspects involved in the book. Because of my ignorance and haste makes waste, I really can't understand the true meaning of this book, so I just recalled the main contents of this book and the help and inspiration it brought me.
In the introduction, the translator mentioned that the book discussed a series of issues such as eugenics, birth control, freedom of marriage, dictatorship, autocracy, communism, democracy, religion, morality, literature and art, education and so on. However, this is the conclusion that scholars have summed up after studying this book many times. For my reading style without any academic foundation and rough reading, it is really impossible to draw so many detailed conclusions. I can only briefly recall the general content of this book.
In the first volume, after Socrates started a dialogue with several characters in the book, he quickly introduced a main line discussed in this book-the definition of justice. Salazar Máthōs first expressed his views. He asked Socrates not to just ask questions, but to directly define justice. And his definition of justice is: justice is the interest of the strong and the interest of the government at that time. Socrates refuted this definition.
From the second volume to the fourth volume, it is easier to see justice from a city-state than from a person, thus discussing the justice of a city-state. Then in the third part, what kind of guardians the polis needs to cultivate and how to cultivate them. Then it goes on to say that all citizens should do their best, that the justice of the polis lies in wisdom, courage and temperance, and that the three kinds of people in the polis do their own thing well is justice. From justice of polis to soul, there are three characteristics: rationality, passion and desire.
In the fifth volume, Socrates talked about marriage and put forward a point: the best man must combine with the best woman, and the worst should combine as little as possible to maintain the best variety.
Then a series of discussions talked about what kind of people are the best philosophers, and put forward the famous argument that philosophers are the perfect guardians, that is, philosophers are the best kings.
The seventh volume goes on to talk about the metaphor of prisoners looking at shadows. The soul should look at the brightest of all realities, which is what we call goodness.
The eighth volume summarizes the conditions that an ideal country should have. And talked about four bad political systems: Sparta and Crete; Oligopoly system, democracy system, tyrant system.
Five kinds of people correspond to five political systems.
Ideal political system-goodness and justice.
Spartan political system-competitive, enjoy honor.
Oligopoly-love money, save money.
Democratic political system-a diverse group with happiness and equality, disorderly and unrestrained life, egalitarianism and the most habits.
Tyrant political system-a person who is full of evil and can do things in his sleep when he is awake.
The ninth volume talks about the basic types of people: philosophers or people who love the wise, people who love success, and people who love profits.
Comparison of three kinds of happiness: philosophers can experience the other two kinds of happiness and learn the essence of things. The happiness of the part of the soul used for learning is the truest happiness.
The middle state between happiness and pain, when you are in pain, you want to be calm for happiness, and when you are happy, you stop for pain. This is an image of happiness and pain, and it is a kind of deception. The so-called greatest happiness transmitted to the mind through the body is actually a feeling of liberation from pain.
The tenth volume is about the imitation of ideas. Who is the real imitator, painter, bed maker or God? Everything has three technologies, the technology of users, the technology of manufacturers and the technology of imitators.
The above are some key points recorded in reading, and I feel a little sorry for Plato's masterpiece. The main line of this book is mainly around the main line of justice, a series of plans for the ideal country, and the justice that the corresponding people should have. There are many inspirations in the process of reading, but now I want to sum up but I don't know where to start. Plato's series of expositions on justice made me realize that in life, we should be strict with ourselves, control our unwanted desires, let reason guide us, stay away from all evil and enter the real good. We should pursue truth, knowledge and wisdom all our lives, constantly enrich ourselves and become truly wise people.
Plato's exposition of the king of philosophy, only after reading this book, knows that the previous concept that philosophers are kings is very one-sided. Plato's definition of philosopher is very strict. Not any philosopher can become the king of the ideal country, but a philosopher in the true sense can become the king of the ideal country.
In my opinion, the questions about marriage and childbearing in the book are not in line with human ethics. For example, the idea that children are public is impossible to realize in real life. The same is true of eugenics, and abandoning those offspring with poor quality violates the law of equality of all beings.
The description of the political system in the book has also changed my ignorant view of the previous democratic political system, and found that the democratic political system is not as perfect as expected, but there are indeed many problems. Excessive freedom and tolerance, and the multifaceted and complex nature of democracy are indeed a question worth pondering.
Plato's exposition on happiness also inspired me greatly. It turns out that the happiness and pain we originally took for granted are not as simple and simple as we thought, but often just the illusion of happiness and pain. Sometimes happiness is just the stop of pain, and sometimes pain is just the stop of happiness. This allows us to look at everything we face with a broader mind and a far-sighted vision in life and in the journey of life.
And Patentou's idealism has also brought me a lot of horizons. Let me know more about finding the essence of things, rather than staying on the surface of things. Of course, Patentou's idealism is very profound, and only a little contact is not enough to fully understand it, but it has also helped me a lot.
Finally, I managed to finish reading the book. Although the process is very hard and tangled, I have gained a lot. Some people say that reading Plato at the age of twenty is different from reading Plato at the age of forty. I believe that in the future, we should not only seek wisdom from Plato's books, because Plato's wisdom is really a wonderful flower in the history of human civilization for thousands of years, and it is the jewel in the crown of philosophy.
Reading Experience in Utopia 2
Simone had to say, "Justice is debt repayment".
Socrates for example: for example, you have a friend who once gave you a weapon when he was sober; If he goes crazy later, he will let you go back; Everyone will say you can't give it back to him. It is unfair to give it back to him. It is also unfair to tell the madman the whole truth. When the original owner is delirious, he should not be returned to him under any circumstances.
From this point of view, Simonidade's "justice is debt repayment" means something else. If the two parties are friends, if the money is returned to the original owner, it will hurt the recipient or the repayment party, which is not debt repayment. So, should we return what we owe the enemy?
Some people understand that friends should be good to others and not bad to others. What the enemy owes the enemy is nothing but evil, because it is just right.
Socrates understood that justice is to give everyone a proper reward, which is what he called "paying off debts."
This paragraph can be regarded as a temporary recognition of "what is justice".
Then, it is to gradually discuss "when justice is useful and when it is not."
Socrates' view is that justice is useful in "concluding contracts and partnerships" to meet these needs and obtain these benefits.
Socrates tends to be "quiet" or "peaceful" when justice is useful. He makes the interlocutor's thoughts tangled: when you want to make money, shields, pianos or other things "quiet" for a while, people are partners, and just people are good partners, but when using these things, the skills of businessmen, soldiers and pianists are more useful. You can think that justice is useful for people or things you trust, such as friends.
So Socrates asked: So, is everything like this? They are useful, justice is useless, they are useless, justice is useful? If justice is only useful for useless things, then justice is nothing.
At this point, what I see is still a bit irrelevant and specious. Can't justice exist in the state of "confrontation", "discord" and "war"? Although there have been many wars, from the perspective of a third party, there is no just war. All wars have no "justice"?
Then Socrates explained from another side: for those who don't know good or bad, it just hurts their friends and helps their enemies-because some of their friends are bad people and some of their enemies are good people. So, the conclusion we get is just the opposite of Simone's meaning.
Socrates seems to have naturally magnified "enemy" and "friend" without trace. In this way, the relationship here is absolutely one-to-one, it is the position of both sides, and there is no neutral cube. For example: A and B are rivals, C, D and E. . There are only two choices, either at the A end or at the B end?
Reading Experience in Utopia 3
The dialogue style in The Republic naturally reminds me of Confucius in China. Although the ideas in the Republic are all Plato's own, we can't deny that as a disciple of Socrates, his thoughts were deeply influenced by Socrates and written in Socrates' tone. Justice has always been the object of discussion in the book, and by reducing to absurdity, we first put forward the imprecise definition of justice, and then find the true meaning of justice through induction and abstraction, following Socrates' way of seeking wisdom, so we often think that it is Socrates himself when reading it. The same great philosopher who lived almost at the same time had a similar experience. Confucius has The Analects written by his disciples and his re-disciples, and Socrates has The Republic, which was used by his disciples to spread the early exploration of ancient Greek philosophy.
When I was in junior high school, I heard of the Republic through some simple channels. In my mind, I defined the Republic as Moore's utopia, such as Tao Yuanming's Peach Blossom Garden. I didn't know the real source of the Republic until I really got this book. Compared with fantastically depicting an ideal society, this book shows us the fascinating debate era of ancient Greece. Because I didn't read carefully enough, I dare not really understand how much, but I did feel the rational mystery, logical twists and turns, and mysterious words that philosophers have always admired and worshipped. I once saw those ancient Greeks who were similar to the Wise School in the history class of middle school. They were keen on arguing. In the fields, streets and alleys, they used various rules of debate, either laughing or gloating, or gloating or ashamed, and always had infinite reverie about one of the ancient countries that gave birth to the earliest civilization. So I am glad that I really had the opportunity to enter the book and enter the mysterious world at an early age.
"What is justice?" This is the center that Plato, Glaucon, Bole Máthōs, Salah Máthōs and Simonides have been discussing in the first volume. "Paying off debts is justice", "Justice is to give everyone a proper reward", "Justice is to give good to friends and evil to enemies" and "Justice is the interest of the strong", and then they began to discuss the justice of the polis, thinking that a good polis should be brave and fearless. In this country, everyone fulfills his duty. Like Confucius' view of "sexual similarity", Socrates believes that education can stimulate the potential ability and knowledge in human nature, and Plato also follows this view to some extent. When the rulers, guardians and laborers in the city-state perform their duties, do not cross each other and work in harmony, the city-state will have the "virtue of justice", and then from the city-state analogy to the individual, that is, the relationship between "big", "small" and "inner". A just individual is to arrange his own affairs, dominate himself, be friendly to himself, and at the same time in some political and private affairs.
Justice is always happy, but non-justice is not. On the contrary, kingship is the best, and oligarchy, democracy and tyranny do not conform to the definition of justice like the rulers of philosophy. From the social point of view, the discussion also involves women's education, the birth and cultivation of children, and contains the democratic glory of equality between men and women. A country can also produce outstanding women, and they can also defend the polis. "Idealism" is also an important supporting part of Plato's thought. He believes that the king of philosophy should be the ruler of a just city-state, because he can "grasp the eternal things" and "always love the knowledge that can let them see the eternal entity that is not affected by the process of production and destruction". "A gifted scholar has a good memory, a sensitive understanding, an open mind, a gentle manner, and likes and approaches truth, justice, courage and moderation." In this paper, "Socrates" uses the metaphor of the captain to illustrate the situation of a real philosopher in the city-state.
After reading the middle part, my mind seems to begin to outline the "ideal country" described by Socrates, but as far as he is concerned, "only when certain inevitability happens to force those few uncorrupted philosophers who are now called useless to take charge of the city-state and make citizens obey their management, or only when the son of the authority, the son of the king or the authority, and the king himself are influenced by God, can they really fall in love with true philosophy. At the same time, Plato also used a series of metaphors to demonstrate the knowable world and the sensible world, which seems to be the starting point and principle of Plato's philosophy. So I also deeply understood the so-called "Japanese metaphor", "line metaphor" and "cave metaphor", and Plato constructed his ideal world.
Regarding the country, there must be a king of philosophy, so Plato also tried his best to discuss the importance of geometry, including astronomy, music, gymnastics and dialectics, and discussed the importance of these. His educational thoughts on these courses still have great reference significance for us today. "Philosophers should be politicians, and politicians should be philosophers" is the core of his idea of creating an ideal country. Plato's ideal blueprint for our descendants provided a blueprint for utopians in the19th century.
The Republic involves many issues such as morality, democracy, education, literature and art, equality and so on. A series of seemingly ordinary dialogues are extensive and informative, but they are seamless, comprehensive and coherent. I think philosophy should be the greatest subject in human history, not only because the sages pursued it diligently, but also because many later disciplines were branched from philosophy, but because it is the crystallization of the wisdom of predecessors and the essence of theory and practice. Depth of thinking, pursuit of beauty, attitude towards things, meticulous way of thinking, etc. Are closely related to philosophy. We want a better life and a different perspective on academic issues, all of which need our philosophical foundation, and we need to talk with philosophers and collect the rich flowers of their thoughts.
Reading Experience in Utopia 4
I didn't expect a book I read casually to let me know this great ancient Greek philosopher; It never occurred to me that he gave me a new understanding of many things around me. It even gave me a new definition of happiness, happiness, pain, kindness, justice, courage, passion, desire, wisdom and love. It is these new definitions that make me more or less sweep away those old ideas and start to move towards another tortuous road. Moreover, because I didn't live more than 2000 years ago, I am an atheist, and I can choose what I need more truly.
So I agree that wisdom is happy, justice is good, desire and passion are evil, and idea and passion are the best combination to pursue wisdom. Love should be like Socrates' or Plato's love. Courage needs good wisdom as a companion, doing just things, and not being alone. . . . . But I don't agree that heaven and hell will accept good people and bad people, and the soul will not exist without the body, let alone be immortal. Moreover, rulers are not necessarily philosophers. Although he may not mean our present philosopher, he is definitely not the smartest person. . . . . .
Now I can say why I should thank him. Actually, I've been ambivalent these two days. On the one hand, I agree that material and money are the best happiness. On the other hand, I put myself on a kind of happiness that does not belong to the default of most people now, and regard it as a pursuit. How can I put it? As Plato wrote in the Republic, I am a mixture of gold, silver and copper. Although this is not true, it is the best metaphor. They are out of harmony in my soul. However, Socrates said that it is feasible to let good control the other two. Of course, which one I want is one of my ideas.
Reading Experience in Utopia 5
Reading this book will be impressed by Socrates' wise and profound thinking. His sophistry not only makes it difficult for opponents to parry, but also makes it difficult for readers to keep up with his quick and witty thinking. Plato expressed his objective idealism philosophy step by step through Socrates' debate. At the same time, he established a series of systems and regulations by debating the philosophy, morality, politics, economy, culture and art of the city-state, and constantly improved them in the debate, gradually established his blueprint of "ideal country" and showed his political ideal to the world.
The Republic conveys the author's political ideal. Plato's ideal country should be essentially a slave country of feudal nobles. This country must be wise, brave, gentle and just. In this ideal city-state, people are divided into three classes: aristocratic rulers who master philosophy, samurai classes who master force, and ordinary people who are slaves. Plato believes that state power should be in the hands of philosophers, and philosophers must be people who have the wisdom and ability to protect the country and really care about national interests. Only in this way can it be beneficial to the justice of the polis. Brave soldiers should strive to maintain the security of the city-state and safeguard any decision of the rulers. At the same time, he believes that the relationship between the ruler and the ruled should be harmonious and unified, and the ruled should obey all the policies of the ruler, so as to realize the doctrine of the mean and justice. This ideal blueprint described by Plato is full of longing and is yearned for by later idealists.
When reading this part, I feel that many statements are familiar. As early as Xia, Shang and Zhou Dynasties, China had a systematic ritual system to bind its subjects. The enfeoffment system requires slaves to obey the rule, and the vassals enjoy all the hard work in the fief, but they are obliged to pay taxes to the monarch regularly. When the king calls, he should gather troops to protect the monarch. Confucian culture, which has been passed down in China for thousands of years, is similar to many propositions of Plato. Through a series of comparisons and reflections, I understand that these are all for the needs of maintaining feudal autocratic rule. The ultimate goal of this series of education indoctrination, moral restraint and use of providence is to maintain feudal rule and fool the people. So through the political debate in the book, I found many Plato's views that I don't agree with. For example, in order to maintain the rule, the authorities can deceive the people with lies, and even fabricate the so-called "Phoenician legend" to prove that people are born with dignity under the guise of God's will. "When God cast them, gold was given to some people, so these people are the most precious rulers. Money is added to the helper (soldier). The addition of iron and copper to farmers and other technicians reflects the essence of Plato's "ideal country"-a slave country full-time by feudal nobles, with rampant privileges, strict hierarchy, heavy oppression and serious inequality between people. I think Plato was born in that era and was already a wise man with innovative consciousness, foresight and reform thinking. However, due to the limitations of the times and classes, Plato represented the interests of the feudal aristocracy, which determined that all his policy propositions were for the feudal aristocracy. His thoughts have lost objectivity and impartiality to a certain extent, and many of his ideas are not necessarily correct, and his ideas are not necessarily true justice.
The Republic shows the author's extraordinary educational thoughts. Plato attached great importance to education. Many rules, etiquette and morality he set for the ideal country have not been made into law, but he hopes to guide people's behavior and direction through education from an early age. As the book says, "the education a person received from childhood leads him to where he will go and can determine where he will go in the future." Plato believes that education in an ideal country should start from childhood, including simple music education and physical education. "Simple music and literature education can produce mental restraint, while simple physical exercise can produce physical health." He hopes to supervise poets, force them to cultivate good images in their poems, and supervise other artists at the same time, and forbid depicting evil and despicable spirits. He hoped that in this way, the guardians of the polis would stay away from the evil image, be subtly influenced and edified, and be integrated with beauty and reason from childhood. These ideas of attaching importance to education from childhood are undoubtedly far-sighted and grasp the key point of the problem. It must be the most thorough, effective and stable ruling method to exert influence from an early age and root the belief of obeying the rule in your heart. These educational thoughts have a great influence on the educational development of later generations.
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