OK - based on a preliminary read, I don't buy it.
I know I said I was busy, but I couldn't resist.
First, the stuff about mathematics in there is trivial. Yes, mathematics is very important for Plato, and he has some odd ideas about the soul that reasonably frequently get lumped alongside his mathematical stuff. But, really, so what? (I'm not going to sweat this, though, because I'm by no means a Plato scholar.)
Second, one has to ask oneself why this paper hasn't appeared in a mainstream philosophy or history of philosophy journal. The fact that it hasn't isn't evidence of the paper's scholarly qualities... but, still, there's a whiff about it.
But here's the real reason why I don't buy it. Plato is, at times, a really good writer. As the Aperion paper makes clear, he's not averse to throwing in a good pun or joke now and again. As a dramatist, he's not bad - again, unsurprisingly, given the importance of the drama in Greek education and religion at the time.
BUT... If the hypothesis of the paper is true, it'd seem to imply that Plato sat down with a piece of paper before composing each dialogue, and planned to the line what would go where. And that doesn't seem plausible. After all, it'd mean that the arguments advanced would have to play second fiddle to their place in the dialogue, and be stretched or cut to fit. That is not the way to generate a philosophical system that was influential for two and a half milennia. You might be able to write an opera like that - but not philosophy.
To give an analogy: a philosopher (or scientist) might try to structure an essay by deciding to devote 10% to the introduction, 10% to the conclusion, and to share the remainder between the premises and different parts of the argument. But if that's the only criterion for what goes where, he probably won't generate an essay of a standard that's anything more than... well, barely undergrad. The chances that this essay would still be read 2500 years later are slim. And the chances that he could pull the same trick with tens of different essays of different lengths defies belief.
Yet this seems to be exactly the strategy that Kennedy ascribes to Plato. There's a serious credibility gap.
EDIT: Right, have to go now. There's a bloke here who wants to do things to my computer. I might add more comment later.
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Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Tue 29 Jun 2010, 10:29,
Reply)
It does seem a bit like he wants Plato to be Hari Seldon-ish
I could buy that he wrote using a particular form, but when it comes to placing punctuation in mathematically pre-ordained places, he's getting a bit thin on the plausibility.
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Hellzapoppin, Tue 29 Jun 2010, 11:00,
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Writing using a particular vague template is one thing.
But for it to be that precise, and for it to generate anything worth reading... naaah.
Props for the Seldon reference, though: I keep meaning to re-read those...
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Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Tue 29 Jun 2010, 11:42,
Reply)
hehe
You should organise a secret Santa in your department this year, and buy him a copy of 'The Da-Vinci Code' :-D
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Hellzapoppin, Tue 29 Jun 2010, 12:00,
Reply)