Gabriele Cornelli

In Plato’s Symposium eros and paideia draw the fabric of dramatic and rhetorical speeches and, especially, the picture of the relation between Socrates and Alcibiades. This paper will focus, firstly, on two important facts, which are essential for the correct understanding of the dialogue, both of which appear at the beginning. First, it is said that Socrates, Alcibiades and the others were present at the famous banquet, and second, that the banquet and the erotic speeches of the participants were so celebrated as to attract the attention for several decades to come. So, the memory of that symposium is thus the memory, far beyond the other symposiasts, and through the erotic speeches, of something precise: that is, a particularly significant relationship, that between Socrates and Alcibiades. What matters most for the aim of this paper is the fact that Alcibiades is considered one of the major reasons for the defeat of Athens and the main cause of the crisis into which the city was plunged during the last years of 5th century BC. Due to the distrust of the city towards the groups of ‘philosophers’ that remitted to Alcibiades’ group, it is no surprise that the so-called Socratics committed themselves to refuting the accusation of Socrates having been Alcibiades’ mentor, to the point of reversing the charge. In the same way as the others Plato, also a Socratic, concerns himself with what might be called the ‘Alcibiades’ Connection’. Realizing there obviously was no way to deny the deep connection between Socrates and Alcibiades, he uses a clever dramatic construction with the intention of operating a political intervention upon the memory of this relationship, that is, of rewriting history, with the intent of relieving him of a more precise charge, which must have especially weighed upon Plato andupon Socrates’ memory: of him having been Alcibiades’ lover/mentor. This Platonic apology is based, ultimately, in a clever rhetorical strategy, which emphasizes the now traditional sexual paranomia of Alcibiades, in order tomake him guilty of an attempted excessive and outrageous seduction not only of Socrates, but of the polis itself. Reusing comic and oratorical/rhetorical motifs of his time, therefore, Plato deepens the J’accuse against Alcibiades, trying to withdraw him from the orbit of Socrates and the Socratics.

This article proposes to address the relationship between philosophy and politics through the 5th-4th Century's intellectual debate on ethics and politics in Athens. A debate which takes place in the wake of the rise of a new individuality, marked by the discovery of the tragicity of the soul. What stands out in this debate is the redefinition of a philopolitical stand in all its historical ambiguity and ethical idealism. Aristophanes, Thucydides, Euripides, Gorgias and, obviously, Plato himself are striving to define the possibility of the encounter between philosophy and the city, public and private, justice and interests, individual and community. The Platonic solution for the problem reveals complexity and articulation typical of his thought: the philosopher that shelters himself from the storm behind an academic wall is the same who "in order for himself not to seem nothing but words" sails towards the uncertain Syracusan project.

O presente artigo é fruto de trabalhos e pesquisas conduzidos pela equipe de coordenação do PNLD 2018 (Plano Nacional de Livros Didáticos), a qual se reuniu por duas ocasiões, juntamente com todos os pareceristas, em seminários exclusivamente dedicados ao projeto. O texto pode, pois, ser dividido em quatro seções, as quais (e cuja divisão) se revelarão suficientemente evidentes para o leitor. Em primeiro lugar, é apresentada uma revisão historiográfica (inédita, tanto quanto sabemos) do ensino de Filosofia no Ocidente, desde as primeiras instituições da Antiguidade até a atualidade, mas com especial enfoque no caso brasileiro. Em segundo lugar, apresentamos uma revisão crítica da legislação mais relevante, sobretudo a vigente, para o processo de seleção dos manuais didáticos a distribuir pelas escolas brasileiras durante o período de vigência do edital, referindo em particular os critérios que nortearam tal seleção. Em terceiro lugar, são referidos alguns dos aspectos mais importantes das obras aprovadas neste edital do PNLD. Finalmente, são abordados alguns aspectos relativos aos desafios que o PNLD terá necessariamente que enfrentar, tendo em conta a conjuntura brasileira atual, nomeadamente os pacotes legislativos mais recentes a propósito do PNLD enquanto tal, mas também do papel da própria Filosofia no ensino obrigatório no nível médio.

Despite their tensions and contradictions, the various discourses about globalization reveal a desire to build the space and time of the encounter between worlds and cultures, through the persistence of a dialogue that approximates distances, but respects differences. A considerable part of the political, cultural, urban, linguistic formation of the Western world has given rise to motives and solutions of the institution of the poles and cosmopolis of the Ancient World. On the other hand, mobility can even be considered a characteristic trait of Luso-Brazilian culture, from the Portuguese discoveries and their cultural production, in the first steps of the Jesuit literature in Brazil, especially in José de Anchieta, passing by António Vieira, Machado de Assis, Guimarães Rosa, among others. For this reason, the presence and the different nuances of the theme of mobility and the cosmopolis of old in the reception of Classical Antiquity in the Portuguese language literature are also a central theme of the volume... https://books.google.be/books/about/Cosmópolis.html?id=4C3ODQAAQBAJ&redir_esc=y.

O presente trabalho desenvolve as narrativas das catábases clássicas e a sua semelhança estrutural com as descidas ao inferno da alquimia, valendo-se do conceito de imortalidade da alma para a separação entre uma geografia da imortalidade, no caso do período clássico, de uma operação imaginativa que ocorre dentro da própria alma do alquimista, no caso das descidas herméticas do renascimento. Para tanto, desenvolver-se-á o papel da faculdade imaginativa na filosofia renascentista e o simbolismo por trás da “destruição” do corpo e do “renascimento” da alma em duas iluminuras do tratado alquímico Splendor Solis.

This article proposes to address the relationship between philosophy and politics through the 5th-4th Century's intellectual debate on ethics and politics in Athens. A debate which takes place in the wake of the rise of a new individuality, marked by the discovery of the tragicity of the soul. What stands out in this debate is the redefinition of a philopolitical stand in all its historical ambiguity and ethical idealism. Aristophanes, Thucydides, Euripides, Gorgias and, obviously, Plato himself are striving to define the possibility of the encounter between philosophy and the city, public and private, justice and interests, individual and community. The Platonic solution for the problem reveals complexity and articulation typical of his thought: the philosopher that shelters himself from the storm behind an academic wall is the same who "in order for himself not to seem nothing but words" sails towards the uncertain Syracusan project.

A pergunta, “Tudo é número?” no título do famoso artigo de 1989 de Zhmud, deixa aberto um desafio para o extremamente importante testemunho aristotélico de que “tudo é número” era a definição fundamental da filosofia pitagórica. Tal desafio não é nada simples, especialmente quando se considera que, até então, as histórias tanto da filosofia quanto da matemática antiga parecem não ter dúvidas de que esta afirmação é correta. Este artigo pretende submeter à avaliação crítica a alegação de Aristóteles de que os pitagóricos acreditavam que “tudo é número”. Nossa análise dos muitos modos nos quais Aristóteles enuncia a tese de que “tudo é número” revelará, para além de variações meramente semânticas, uma contradição teórica fundamental que o próprio Aristóteles parece incapaz de resolver. De fato, três versões diferentes da doutrina estão presentes na doxografia aristotélica: uma identificação dos números com objetos sensíveis; uma identificação dos princípios dos números com os princípios das coisas que existem; uma imitação dos objetos pelos números. Enquanto as versões e parecem identificar, em termos que lembram Platão, os números com a causa material da realidade, a versão, a saber, números como causas formais da realidade, é uma reconstrução aristotélica da teoria pitagórica. Aristóteles teria sido levado a tal reconstrução pela dificuldade que encontrou para aceitar a noção pitagórica material de número, e por considerá-la, para seu gosto, fortemente marcada pela recepção da mesma teoria no ambiente da Academia.

The significance of Plato’s literary style to the content of his ideas is perhaps one of the central problems in the study of Plato and Ancient Philosophy as a whole. As Samuel Scolnicov points out in this collection, many other philosophers have employed literary techniques to express their ideas, just as many literary authors have exemplified philosophical ideas in their narratives, but for no other philosopher does the mode of expression play such a vital role in their thought as it does for Plato. And yet, even after two thousand years there is still no consensus about why Plato expresses his ideas in this distinctive style. Selected from the first Latin American Area meeting of the International Plato Society in Brazil in 2012, the following collection of essays presents some of the most recent scholarship from around the world on the wide range of issues related to Plato’s dialogue form. The essays can be divided into three categories. The first addresses general questions concerning Plato’s literary style. The second concerns the relation of his style to other genres and traditions in Ancient Greece. And the third examines Plato’s characters and his purpose in using them.

In Plato’s Symposium eros and paideia draw the fabric of dramatic and rhetorical speeches and, especially, the picture of the relation between Socrates and Alcibiades. This paper will focus, firstly, on two important facts, which are essential for the correct understanding of the dialogue, both of which appear at the beginning. First, it is said that Socrates, Alcibiades and the others were present at the famous banquet, and second, that the banquet and the erotic speeches of the participants were so celebrated as to attract the attention for several decades to come. So, the memory of that symposium is thus the memory, far beyond the other symposiasts, and through the erotic speeches, of something precise: that is, a particularly significant relationship, that between Socrates and Alcibiades. What matters most for the aim of this paper is the fact that Alcibiades is considered one of the major reasons for the defeat of Athens and the main cause of the crisis into which the city was plunged during the last years of 5th century BC. Due to the distrust of the city towards the groups of ‘philosophers’ that remitted to Alcibiades’ group, it is no surprise that the so-called Socratics committed themselves to refuting the accusation of Socrates having been Alcibiades’ mentor, to the point of reversing the charge. In the same way as the others Plato, also a Socratic, concerns himself with what might be called the ‘Alcibiades’ Connection’. Realizing there obviously was no way to deny the deep connection between Socrates and Alcibiades, he uses a clever dramatic construction with the intention of operating a political intervention upon the memory of this relationship, that is, of rewriting history, with the intent of relieving him of a more precise charge, which must have especially weighed upon Plato and upon Socrates’ memory: of him having been Alcibiades’ lover/mentor. This Platonic apology is based, ultimately, in a clever rhetorical strategy, which emphasizes the now traditional sexual paranomia of Alcibiades, in order to make him guilty of an attempted excessive and outrageous seduction not only of Socrates, but of the polis itself. Reusing comic and oratorical/rhetorical motifs of his time, therefore, Plato deepens the J’accuse against Alcibiades, trying to withdraw him from the orbit of Socrates and the Socratics.

The aim of this article is to set forth conjectures that are likely to explain the inclusion of Plato and Hermes as heralds of Mani in the testimony of Ephrem of Syria. This incorporation should be set against the background of the Syrian religious milieu, which was influenced by both Hellenistic philosophy and Eastern religious traditions. Therefore, it would be better to seek a religious and philosophical environment wherein Plato and Hermes were associated. Keywords: Manichaeism, apocalypticism, theurgy, hermetism, Merkabah mysticism, late platonism.