What is the world really like? Plato and Aristotle, the giants of western philosophy, attempted to answer this question with their own theories about ultimate reality. Plato was the first one of these ancient Athenians to come onto the scene.
Plato's metaphysical theory goes as follows. He believed that at the core of every person is the Immortal Soul. This soul can be lead by one of three things: reason, spirit, or appetites. Among these he argued reason was the best, most important, and should be in dominance over the others. He said we needed positions for the ideal people to be in, and called them Philosopher Kings. The emotionally lead were to be soldiers and those led by appetites could be anything else. These social classes were to be locked because he wanted people to do what they could do the best, depending on what part of them dominated.
Aristotle (1811) Galleria dell'Accademia, Venice
Theory of Boundaries, 1969-1970, chalk on dry pigm...
Ancient Greek philosophers such as Plato and Arist...This was all an attempt to promote a utopian, just society.
Plato also believed in Two Worlds. One world was the world of Forms. It is eternal and unchanging with perfect ideas and ideals. The second world was Becoming, which is the changing, everyday world that we live in. Anything we see in our world of Becoming participates in ideal forms, and the closer to the ideal form the better. He said that for everything there is an ideal that we are trying to get close to. However, what is truly real is the forms.
Finally, he said that all knowledge is a result of reminding us of what we already know, innate knowledge of ideal forms from our Immortal Soul. However, our mortal soul sometimes leads us astray of our true knowledge within. Our Immortal Soul possesses knowledge of all things, since it is eternal.