[Neurons] The Philosopher's Series # 6

[Charles DesJardins]

Charles DesJardins

 

The Philosopher's Series #6

 

July 18, 2008

 

 

PLATO AND NEURO-SEMANTICS # 2

 

 

The Construct that Plato Lived In

 

Plato, like the rest of us, did not develop his philosophy in a vacuum.
There were many things, social, political, religious, and philosophical.
Plato was frequently challenged with other philosophies and it was in this
'construct chamber' that he developed his meanings.

 

There were two major pre-Socratic philosophers: Heraclitus and Parmenides.
Heraclitus believed and argued for the philosophy that the basic character
of reality was that of change. Reality is change. Everything in reality is
constantly in flux and change. According to the philosophy of Heraclitus,
you can never step into the same river twice. This meant that there was no
fixed reality and that there is no permanence in, or of, the world.
Parmenides philosophy stood in stark contrast to that of Heraclitus. The
philosophy of Parmenides stated that the world was not a world of change,
but it was a world of permanence. Parmenides believed that change is an
illusion. Change is an appearance to the senses. This meant that, therefore,
truth is unchanging and is known by reason.

 

Ah, but we are just getting started. There was another philosophy that
challenged both that of Heraclitus and Parmenides (could each be operating
from the extremes of the matching/mismatching Meta Program?); that
philosophy was that of the Sophists. The Sophists concluded that if reason
led to such extremes in philosophical ideas, then one must doubt the power
of reason. Today, the current Sophists philosophers are the skeptics. The
Sophist and today's modern skepticism is a philosophy that doubts the
possibility of any true knowledge. The key Sophist philosopher was
Protagoras who believed that since there was no way to rationally understand
reality, reality must be whatever we say it is.

 

It was in this type of atmosphere in which Plato (also influenced by
Socrates) drew his frames of knowledge. Plato had intellectual contempt for
the Sophists and devoted a great deal of his philosophical thoughts to show
that the Sophist premise (drawn from their conclusion that knowledge is not
possible) were false. It may be that (as postulated by current philosophers)
Plato's philosophy, which weds a synthetic application of Parmenides and
Heraclitus philosophies, is an attempt to refute the philosophy of the
Sophists. 

 

Plato showed that the Sophist were wrong. He did this by saying that all one
had to do was to go up a level and show that the philosophies of change and
sameness were both true, just go UP a logical level and develop a synthetic
philosophy that showed that both can be true. 

 

Even though it can be suggested that Plato may have garnered philosophical
axioms that were predicated on his desire to prove the Sophists wrong, Plato
was a great synthesizer of truth; this is one of the characteristics of
Self-Actualizing individuals, they do not see dichotomies, but rather
synthesis. 

 

So, was Plato's philosophy born from a desire to develop a system of thought
that proved that the Sophists were wrong, and thus his frames were toxic
(toxic in intentionality), or was he self-actualizing and saw synthesis
rather than an un-crossable chasm of dichotomies? In either case, how did
Plato synthesize these two seemingly conflicting philosophies?

 

Plato built a system of philosophy that was able to synergize these
seemingly apparent contradictions by stating that reality is both. Reality
is not monistic, it is dualistic. There are two realities, one of change and
one of permanence. Plato claimed that there are two realities, one of
objects in space and time that could be known through the senses, and
another reality that could only be known through the mind. With this
philosophy Plato developed a metaphysic that synergized the two prevailing
philosophies and silenced the Sophists.

 

I have written most of this article to set the frames for the next three
articles. Even though there are glimpses in this article of the structure of
Plato's thoughts and the structure of Neuro-Semantics, glaring observations
are yet to come. 

 

The key take away from this article is that Plato developed a map of his
world as a response to a philosophy that he did not agree with. Because of
his map, he developed a philosophy that separated reality into two parts.
One part is that of the sensory world, things that we can touch, feel, hear,
smell, taste; things that are objects extended in space. And another reality
exists, namely the world of thought, concepts, ideas, forms or essence.
While this idea will be expanded upon in the next articles, here is a little
teaser. 

 

What does the Neuro-Semantic literature suggest about reality? Do we have
primary experiences that we represent in our mind and then go meta and
think, feel, and believe etc. about those experiences? Is the representation
of the primary experience a felt stimulus registered directly in our sensory
cortex, processed through the limbic system and then reflected on with meta
beliefs, meta values, meta interests etc.? Is there a common structure
between Plato's search for truth and the modern Neuro-Semantic explanation
of that search for truth?

 

 

Charles.desjardins at sbcglobal.net

 

 

 

 

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