Plato, the functions of the soul in the Republic
This is a fragment of the Republic. The Republic is the most famous and important work of the Greek philosopher Plato, and it is the collection of the ideas that make up his thought. This is a dialogue between Socrates and other characters (disciples or relatives of Socrates himself) himself). The work is made up of ten books, differentiated and unrelated to the changes in the discussion issues presented. Although the work takes place around the issue of justice, the text covers many of Plato’s primary doctrines, such as the theory of ideas or forms, the understanding of philosophy as a dialectic, the myth of cave,purpose of an ideal city or a theory of the soul other than that exposed above. Written in the form of dialogues, the Republic undertakes what is in relation to the ‘philosophy of human things’, and implies issues such as ethics, ontology, politics or gnoseology.
Plato deals in the Republic the functions of the soul. The Greeks of antiquity understood the psyche or the soul as the principle of the activity of a body or the breath of life, but also as the intelligent principle that understands and organizes nature. This differentiation will be present in Plato’s thinking, which considers that the main function of the soul is knowledge. Different three parts in the soul: the rational or spiritual part, the irascible and the concupiscible. The rational or spiritual part is the specifically human. It has a divine and immortal nature like ideas. It is the part that can be considered divisible from the body. His virtue is wisdom and is guided by reason and its mission is the rational government of the body according to the intelligible and perfect, that is, the ideas. Plato places this part of the soul in the head.
The complex relationship of the actions of the soul with the body is explained through the other two parts of the soul that cannot be separated from the body: the irascible and the concupiscible. Irascible is universal to animals and as it cannot be separated from the body, it is deadly. Its power is the strength, it is guided by value and its function is to promote action, to love: it makes it possible for human beings to overcome pain and renounce pleasures when the rational part decides it. Plato places this part of the soul on the chest. The concupiscible part cannot be separated from the body and, therefore, is also deadly. Its virtue is temperance, the ability to moderate pleasures. It is guided by desire and its function is to manifest body wishes. Is found in the belly.
The main concern of Socrates and Plato is to make philosophy a continuous search for virtue. This search for virtue forms a mainly practical activity, as soon as they want to make virtuous beings. The platonic understanding of human nature is the manifestation of a tension that is born of complexity and that requires harmony. This complexity begins with the dual character of the human being, body and soul. The relationship between the soul and the body is characterized by tension: the body is the prison of the soul, the inclinations of the body can lead to the soul to slavery, and the destiny of the soul, the ideas, cannot be fulfilled without the release of theBody. The contradiction relationships between body and soul are revealed in the tripartite nature of the soul.
The Republic is exposed as an organic and circular text. The work consists of 10 books and has Socrates as a protagonist, but it is a Socrates very different from that of the other Platonic dialogues, especially those of youth, and which serves as an alter ego of Plato. The Socrates of the Republic defends thesis that are not sustained by the historical Socrates, but those of Plato.
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