The ethics and moral psychology of the Phaedo crucially depend on claims made uniquely about bodily desire. This paper offers an analysis and defense of the account of bodily desire in the dialogue, arguing that bodily desires – desires with their source in processes or conditions of the body – are characterized by three features: motivational pull, assertoric force, and intensity. Desires with these features target the soul’s rational functions with distinctive forms of imprisonment. They target the soul’s capacity to (...) rule with servility; and they target the soul’s capacity for knowledge with confinement in the visible world. (shrink)

The article discusses two passages,Republic IX 571d6–572b1, andTimaeus71a3–72b5, where Plato does not use dream as a metaphor for the soul’s deficit in knowledge but, instead, focuses on the actual process of dreaming during sleep, and the origin and nature of the images involved. In both texts, Plato’s account is closely connected to the soul’s tripartition, with the resulting emphasis on reason’s capacity to control, and even to create, the dream images that influence the lower parts of the soul. While taking (...) a closer look at the differences between the two accounts (and, therefore, at the physiology of dreaming described only in theTimaeus), the article concludes that, despite these differences, both dialogues agree on the possible alliance between reason and dreaming, an alliance that presupposes a virtuous character and further reinforces the reason’s dominance over appetite.Republic IX and theTimaeusthus converge on the idea that dreams, in virtue of their continuity with waking thoughts, can convey and fortify a certain kind of knowledge, and especially self-knowledge, which is of an ethical rather than strictly epistemic relevance. This is also why Plato’s two accounts of rational dreaming anticipate the issue of our moral responsibility for the content of our dreams. (shrink)

In the tripartite psychology of the Republic, Plato characterizes the “spirited” part of the soul as the “ally of reason”: like the auxiliaries of the just city, whose distinctive job is to support the policies and judgments passed down by the rulers, spirit’s distinctive “job” in the soul is to support and defend the practical decisions and commands of the reasoning part. This is to include not only defense against external enemies who might interfere with those commands, but also, and (...) most importantly, defense against unruly appetites within the individual’s own soul.1 Spirit, according to this picture, is by nature reason’s faithful auxiliary in the soul, while appetite is always a potential enemy to be watched .. (shrink)

There are two types ofaisthēsisin theTimaeus, which involve distinct physiological processes and different kinds of soul, appetite and reason respectively. This distinction explains Timaeus’ ambivalent attitude towardsaisthēsis: on the one hand, it is one of the main causes of the disruption of the orbits of the immortal soul upon embodiment; on the other hand, it plays a central role in restoring the immortal soul to its original, god-like condition.

The thesis offers a reconstruction of Plotinus' reading of the Theaetetus, and it presents an account of his epistemology that rests on that reading. It aims to show that Plotinus reads the Theaetetus as containing two anti-sceptical arguments. The first argument is an answer to radical scepticism, namely, to the thesis that nothing is apprehensible and judgement must be suspended on all matters. The second argument is an answer to a more moderate form of scepticism, which does not endorse a (...) universal suspension of judgement, but maintains nonetheless that scientific knowledge is unattainable. (shrink)