The aim of this paper is to investigate Plato’s conception of the whole in the Phaedrus and the theory of medical dialectic underlying this conception. Through this analysis Plato’s conception of kairos will also be adressed. It will be argued that the epistemological holism developed in the dialogue and the patient-typology emerging from it provides us with a way of perceiving individual situations of medical discourse and decision-making that makes it possible to bridge the gap between observations of a professional (...) nature, i.e. of diagnostics and therapy—of whom to treat and in what magnitude—and individual patients’ perceptions of their situation. Besides, it will be argued that such a patient-typology represents a conceptual framework to assess and deal normatively with patients’ ailments and needs that is more robust than the current standards in use, i.e. the Subjective Standard, the Reasonable Person Standard and the Professional Practice Standard. Finally, it will be argued that the possession of kairos, which according to Plato is the hallmark of a true physician, represents a normative conception of time that today’s medicine is in need of revisiting. (shrink)

Dreams are used figuratively throughout Greek literature to refer to something fleeting and/or unreal. In Plato, this metaphorical language is specifically used to describe an epistemological distinction: the one who has false knowledge or opinion is said to be dreaming while the one who has true knowledge is said to be awake. These figures are also central to Philo of Alexandria's philosophical language in De somniis 1-2 and De Iosepho. Although scholars have documented these epistemological metaphors in Plato and related (...) treatments of the concept of sleep in Heraclitus, it has not been discussed in any detail in relation to Philo's treatment of Joseph in these two treatises. In De somniis 1-2, Philo primarily emphasizes his role as a dreamer and thus one incapable of true knowledge. In De Iosepho, Joseph is a dream interpreter who is not only awake but also capable of interpreting the figurative dream of life to which most people are subject. Although some scholars have considered these treatises contradictory in terms of their treatments of Joseph, an analysis of Philo's figurative use of sleep and dreaming reveals that they are a part of a coherent exegetical framework. (shrink)

EEl sistema constituido a partir de la composición del verbo κρίνω con una variedad de preverbios en los fragmentos de Anaxágoras se presenta como un complejo de eventos ordenados que reproduce en el plano léxico la diversidad procedente de un elemento común, una conexión entre forma y contenido que insiste a su manera en la organización de las cosas a partir de una masa origi- naria indiferenciada. El análisis de tales compuestos en determinados contextos permite observar sus diferencias, precisar su (...) sentido como procesos de configuración del mundo y apreciar lo significativo del recurso. (shrink)

Plato's Sophist is complex. Its themes are many and ambiguous. The early grammarians gave it the subtitle1tEp1. 'tau ov'to~ ('on being') and assigned it to Plato's logical investigations. The Neoplatonists prized it for a theory of ontological categories they preferred to Aristotle's. Modern scholars sometimes court paradox and refer to the Sophist as Plato's dialogue on not-being (because the question ofthe possibility of not-being occupies much of the dialogue). Whitehead took the Sophist to be primarily about ouvo.~t~ ('power') and found (...) in it many of the central ideas of process theology.2 Heidegger thought it articulated the 'average concept of being in general'.3 In Cornford's view the Sophist is mainly about truth and falsehood. Ackrill, Frede and most analytic philosophers think it is about predication.4 Stanley Rosen treats it as a metaphysico-aesthetic dialogue: in his view it is about the relation of images to originals.5 As far as the title of the dialogue goes, however, opinion is almost universal. Do not be misled: 'the definition of the sophist' observed Archer-Hind 'is simply a piece of pungent satire'6 and he added that 'we may be sure that (Plato] cared little about defining the sophist, but very much about the metaphysical questions to which the process of definition was to give rise'.7 The most spectacular case of agreement with this judgment can be found in Cornford, who omits to translate the sections on the definition of the sophist because, as he says 'the modern reader ... might be wearied'.8. (shrink)