Plato's critique of impure reason : on goodness and truth in the Republic / D.C. Schindler.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 337-351) and index.

Introduction. Misology and the modern academy -- La raison oblige? -- Dogmatism and skepticism -- Misological habits -- The significance of Plato -- Plan and method -- Chapter 1. A logic of violence -- Where do we start? -- Shadows of justice -- The power of appearance -- Thrasymachus: relativism as violence -- Common good or good of each? -- Crisis -- Argument as drama -- Shifting horizons -- Chapter 2. With good reason -- The first sailing -- The twofold nature of goodness -- Forms, likenesses, and the souls that love them -- The good as cause of truth -- Approaches to the good -- Intimate knowledge -- Knowledge and love as ascent -- Surprised by truth -- Chapter 3. Breaking in -- The overburdened image -- Keeping the parts together -- Bringing forth the good -- A good turn -- The "perfect" image -- The dramatic structure of knowledge -- Chapter 4. On being invisible -- An altogether different level -- Socrates as a stand-in for the good -- Seeing through -- Obedience unto death -- Justice and obedience -- Showing the philosopher's invisibility -- The invisible author -- Chapter 5. The truth is defenseless -- Guarding reason -- Real knowledge and ecstatic reason -- Good communication -- War and battle -- The indefensible defense of the defenseless -- The "noble risk" of ignorance -- Coda: Restoring appearances -- Is Plato a platonist? -- Contradiction in appearance -- Good distance -- The way up and the way down -- Conversio and phantasmata -- Socrates redivivus -- Plato goes down.

In this book, D.C. Schindler begins with a diagnosis of the crisis of reason in contemporary culture as a background to the study of the Republic. He then sets out a philosophical interpretation of the dialogue in five chapters: an analysis of Book I that shows the inherent violence and dogmatism of skepticism; a reading of goodness as cause of both being and appearance; a discussion of the dramatic reversals in the images Socrates uses for the idea of the good; and exploration of the role of the person of Socrates in the Republic; and a confrontation between the "defenselessness" of philosophy and the violence of sophistry. Finally, in a substantial coda, the book presents a new interpretation of the old quarrel between philosophy and art through an analysis of Book 10.

Print version record.

English.

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