Plato: Philosophizing in the Face of Beauty

The monograph presents a new approach at interpreting those dialogues of Plato that conditionally could be called as dialogues about the Soul. The novelty of the interpretation lies in an effort to treat the dialogues, and antique philosophy in general, from the point of view of the subject of philosophizing. The latter is defined as an anonymous and not a self-identifying subject due to its lack of Descartian ego cogito. Such a conception of the subject explains why it is only the object of thinking that is directly presumed in the gnoseological scheme of antique philosophy. However, taking into account the specific nature of the subject of antique philosophizing – the Soul – it is possible to analytically reconstruct those onto-gnoseological aspects of Plato’s philosophy which are usually treated as the inconsistencies of Plato’s thinking. In addition, a particular focus is given in the monograph to the value structure of Platonic philosophy with its prevailing ideas of the beauty and the good. This special role attributed by Plato to beauty in particular enables his philosophy to be interpreted as philosophizing in the face of beauty.