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Re:Why Anti-Authoritarians Are Diagnosed as Mentally Ill (2012) by krylon on Friday March 25, 2016 @12:02PM (#11360818)
As a rule of thumb I tend to intensely dislike Plato, but that is surprisingly modern.
Re:Why Anti-Authoritarians Are Diagnosed as Mentally Ill (2012) by vlunkr on Friday March 25, 2016 @12:20PM (#11360907)
Disliking Plato because he's not "modern" is a little silly. His teachings are obviously old, but they were also a huge stepping stone in philosophy.
Re:Why Anti-Authoritarians Are Diagnosed as Mentally Ill (2012) by krylon on Friday March 25, 2016 @05:27PM (#11362802)
I do not dislike Plato because he is "not modern". I am sorry if I gave you that impression.

And I do not debate his influence on European philosophy, which is hard to underestimate.

Mostly, the reason I dislike Plato is because in school I had a teacher who practically worshipped Plato and acted as if he was the pinnacle of philosophy or human thinking in general.

Also, a few years later, I was unfortunate enough to read an introduction to European philosophy written by somebody who literally said that European philosophers could be divided into two groups - those who agreed with Plato, and those who were wrong.

So when it comes to Plato, I am kind of "traumatized".

What I meant to say was that it took us surprisingly long to rediscover that particular piece of wisdom expressed by Plato, and that given my attitude towards him, I was pleasantly surprised to see him express such a thought.

Re:Why Anti-Authoritarians Are Diagnosed as Mentally Ill (2012) by smoothgrips on Friday March 25, 2016 @06:21PM (#11363142)
It's unfortunate that you are "traumatized" in regards to Plato, or anything, for that matter. Even though you consider yourself "traumatized", Plato still has good ideas, and likely some not so good ideas as well. I would encourage judging the ideas on their own merit, and not to immediately dismiss them simply because you don't like Plato.
Re:Why Anti-Authoritarians Are Diagnosed as Mentally Ill (2012) by alanwatts on Friday March 25, 2016 @05:23PM (#11362776)
Socrates/Plato and Aristotle's writings remain highly relevant today in regards to the origins of democracy, western civilization, alphabetical language, and the "market economy" of uniform pricing systems.