内容简介
Socrates' ancient words are still true, and the ideas found in
Plato's Dialogues still form the foundation of a thinking person's
education. This superb collection contains excellent contemporary
translations selected for their clarity and accessibility to
today's reader, as well as an incisive introduction by Erich Segal,
which reveals Plato's life and clarifies the philosophical issues
examined in each dialogue. The first four dialogues recount the
trial and execution of Socrates-the extraordinary tragedy that
changed Plato's life and forever altered the course of Western
thought. Other dialogues create a rich tableau of intellectual life
in Athens in the fourth century b.c., and examine such timeless-and
timely-issues as the nature of virtue and love, knowledge and
truth, society and the individual. Resounding with the humor and
astounding brilliance of Socrates, the immortal iconoclast, these
great works remain powerful, probing, and essential.
作者简介
Plato (born 428/427, Athens, or Aegina, Greece-died 348/347
BC, Athens) Greek philosopher, who with his teacher Socrates and
his student Aristotle laid the philosophical foundations of Western
culture. His family was highly distinguished; his father claimed
descent from the last king of Athens, and his mother was related to
Critias and Charmides, extremist leaders of the oligarchic terror
of 404. Plato (whose acquired name refers to his broad forehead,
and thus his range of knowledge) must have known Socrates from
boyhood. After Socrates was put to death in 401, Plato fled Athens
for Megara, then spent the next 12 years in travel. Upon his
return, he founded the Academy, an institute of scientific and
philosophical research, where Aristotle was one of his students.
Building on but also departing from Socrates' thought, he developed
a profound and wide-ranging philosophical system, subsequently
known as Platonism. His thought has logical, epistemological, and
metaphysical aspects, but much of its underlying motivation is
ethical. It is presented in his many dialogues, in most of which
Socrates plays a leading role.