Philosophy

The Philosopher in the World - A talk by Tim Addey

[I am currently attending in London a very interesting series of 5 talks/seminars presented by the Prometheus Trust. A sample of the notes to the first talk is below with a link to the full notes on the Trust?s website for those that like the flavour of my ?taster??. :) ]

'.... Every human being stepping into the world has before him or herself a part to play in a drama: whether that drama is a tragedy or not just as clearly depends upon how well the self is known. Indeed, the whole human race living and acting upon this earth also has a collective drama to enact ? and the message is still the same: unless we as a global society know what we are, what kind of creatures we truly are, we are likely to find out only through tragedy??.

?.. This said, we can see why the Platonic tradition sees the soul as having various faculties: one might be called the desiring nature, another the knowing nature. The desiring nature, or appetitive faculty pursues goodness ? or at least what it takes to be goodness ? through an instinctive attraction to whatever appears beautiful. The knowing nature, or rational faculty, pursues goodness through an investigation of its truth ? it looks beyond appearance,

examining the immaterial causes behind specific effects. Sitting between these two faculties is a third which harmonises their sometimes differing directives: it runs with the appetitive faculty, desiring good and rejecting the less-than-good, but listens attentively to the guidance of the rational faculty: it especially rejoices in good order. In Greek this third faculty was called the thumos ? translated by some as 'the spirited part' and by others as 'anger' (although one has to be careful to understand anger used in this way, as that which reacts against in-ordination).

?? Now each of these faculties of the soul has a perfection which contributes to the perfection of the soul in itself, and the Platonic tradition has much to say about the perfection of these powers which it denominates arête ? that is to say virtue or excellence. The excellence of the rational, guiding faculty is wisdom, through which we discern that which is really good from that which only appears to be good, and through which, also, we can adapt universal truths to particular situations and problems.

The Philosopher in The World by Tim Addey - Prometheus Trust

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Philosophy