I'll pm you an awesome source if you want. — frank

Of course, any new knowledge is always appreciated.

Plus if you want to read some Plato together, I would be up for that. — frank

Oh my friend, pick the book and lets go! :grin:

Phaedo?

Plotinus uses "the One" and "the Good" interchangeably. — Gus Lamarch

I don't think that's quite right. "Good" is related to Act, and "One" is related to Potential.

Plotinus uses "the One" and "the Good" interchangeably. — Gus Lamarch

This is one reason why people have trouble understanding Plotinus. Metaphysical concepts which have contrary incompatible underlying assumptions cannot be used interchangeably without introducing equivocation and logical incoherence.

Plato mostly got these right whereas Platonists uniformly get them wrong. It is amazing how a fundamentally simple closed static One can be confused with an open transcendent interactive Good, or how either can be thought of as an active creative Agent.

If we read some Plato, can we pick your brain for guidance?

"Good" is related to Act, and "One" is related to Potential. — Metaphysician Undercover

Plotinus denies sentience, self-awareness or any other action to the One. Rather, if we insist on describing it further, we must call the One a sheer potentiality without which nothing could exist. So no, the one is not related to potential.

Phaedo? — frank

Sure.

This is one reason why people have trouble understanding Plotinus. Metaphysical concepts which have contrary incompatible underlying assumptions cannot be used interchangeably without introducing equivocation and logical incoherence.

Plato mostly got these right whereas Platonists uniformly get them wrong. It is amazing how a fundamentally simple closed static One can be confused with an open transcendent interactive Good, or how either can be thought of as an active creative Agent. — magritte

The first purpose of this discussion of mine was about the fact that people find it very easy to confuse the concepts of the One with God. It is probably because of the interchangeable use of some concepts by Plotinus, but it is also likely that his philosophy was focused on a group of people who would understand what Plotinus was trying to explain - his students -.

Plotinus, ... his philosophy was focused on a group of people who would understand what Plotinus was trying to explain - his students -. — Gus Lamarch

An excellent point. This is also the most effective way to interpret professor Plato. Something like the Theaetetus was written to fly over the heads of casual or unsympathetic readers.

And everything, yes?
— praxis

No, because everything emanates from it. Plotinus denies sentience, self-awareness or any other action to the One:

"It is impossible for the One to be Being or a self-aware Creator God."

Plotinus, Enneads — Gus Lamarch

You gotta admit it’s pretty self-denying for anyone to deny sentience or self-awareness.

Why, then, do people so easily confuse metaphysical concepts related to the absolute?


Because the absolute is not IT and doesn't help describe IT.

As soon as you describe IT, the description is inaccurate.

It's like being unable to fish with a harpoon because you keep missing.

So, anything we define is debatable and has flaws that can be pointed at.

You gotta admit it’s pretty self-denying for anyone to deny sentience or self-awareness. — praxis

I am not here to discuss whether Plotinus is correct or not. I am simply stating that people, when reading his works, easily confuse the concept of the One with God.

So, anything we define is debatable and has flaws that can be pointed at. — dussias

Agreed.

This is what Plotinus is saying.

In the moment we try to atribute something to a concept of absolute, it is not anymore absolute. People don't get that - @praxis -

In the moment we try to atribute something to a concept of absolute, it is not anymore absolute. People don't get that - praxis - — Gus Lamarch

And yet it is. How could it possibly not be?

If we read some Plato, can we pick your brain for guidance? — frank

I am very familiar with Plato, have read many dialogues numerous times. They are very interesting, and relevant topics for the modern world. I particularly like The Symposium as a good introduction to Plato's style.

Plotinus denies sentience, self-awareness or any other action to the One. Rather, if we insist on describing it further, we must call the One a sheer potentiality without which nothing could exist. So no, the one is not related to potential. — Gus Lamarch

You contradict yourself when you say that "a sheer potentiality...is not related to potential".

Why Aristotle provides better fundamental principles than Plotinus is because he maintains consistently the categorical separation between potential and actual. Plotinus, following more closely to Plato, displays confusion with respect to these categories. Notice that "Intellect" and "Soul" emanate from "One" but this is not an act of the One. So emanation is closer to the old Pythagorean idea of "participation", in which the thing participated in (the One) is necessarily passive, while the participants are active. Intellect participates in One. But Aristotle, refuted this theory of participation, with his cosmological argument, demonstrating that it is impossible for any potentiality to be eternal, therefore anything eternal must be actual. This is why the cosmological argument becomes the cornerstone for the Christians proof of God, as an active, actual, Being who creates because it is Good.

Plotinus accepts the Good as a principle of action, bit he cannot reconcile the Good with the One, which is supposed to be an absolute, and eternal potentiality. This leaves incompatibility within the first principles, because the emanation from the One is supposed to be passive like participation, yet he describes the activity inspired by the Good. This activity has no place in that scenario of emanation, which is a re-presentation of the theory of participation.

The Symposium as a good introduction to Plato's style. — Metaphysician Undercover

I was thinking the Symposium or Phaedo..

Plotinus accepts the Good as a principle of action, bit he cannot reconcile the Good with the One, which is supposed to be an absolute, and eternal potentiality. — Metaphysician Undercover

For Plotinus the Good is associated with Nous, so why would he have to reconcile it with the One?

I was thinking the Symposium or Phaedo.. — frank

Phadoe is a bit abstract, and some people get turned off because it's so mythical. It might not seem very relevant.

For Plotinus the Good is associated with Nous, so why would he have to reconcile it with the One? — frank

It's an absolute, like One, and a good metaphysics needs to show the relationship between first principles.

It's an absolute, like One, and a good metaphysics needs to show the relationship between first principles. — Metaphysician Undercover

But is the Good absolute? If matter is a privation of the Good, doesnt that mean the Good can show up in a partial way?

If you mean Plotinus' solution to the problem of evil doesn't work, you may be right. I didnt really understand his solution.

And yet it is. How could it possibly not be?

Nicely put, it is odd when folk try to say that the one is something else, thereby insisting one is as least two.

Any time we talk about the One, duality is already on the scene because the intellect is operating. Any object of thought stands against a backdrop of its negation. (Plato alludes to this in Phaedo). The negation of the One is the Nous and the Soul (sort of).

For Neoplatonists, the All is all three: unity + multiplicity. It's also monistic idealsim, so we have to change worldviews to interpret stuff. This is not Buddhism, although Christian/Buddhist combos did once exist in central Asia. They're amenable to fusion, but they arent identical.

For Neoplatonists, the All is all three: unity + multiplicity. — frank

You seem to be missing one.

The One becomes the two. The two becomes the three. The three becomes the fourth which is the One.

Van Gogh was cross-eyed. Betcha didn't know that.

Any time we talk about the One, duality is already on the scene because the intellect is operating. Any object of thought stands against a backdrop of its negation. (Plato alludes to this in Phaedo). The negation of the One is the Nous and the Soul (sort of).

Yes, I know this, I suppose the way I'm talking is in abstraction when using words and thoughts. I do have other ways of relating to the one more directly.

I think of one as already actually two, two is actually three because there are two and the some of them which is one, hence there are three. Three is actually four in the same way. The religious cosmogonies seem to see it this way also. So in a sense one becomes three leapfrogging two.

:smile: :up:

But is the Good absolute? If matter is a privation of the Good, doesnt that mean the Good can show up in a partial way? — frank

I do not think that Plotinus develops an adequate description of the relationship between matter and good. In any case, I don't think you can say that matter is a privation of the Good itself, it is a privation of a thing in relation to the Good. Objects are deprived, the Good is not.

Any object of thought stands against a backdrop of its negation. — frank

I don't agree with this. There is no necessity for the negation of an object of thought, I believe that's a faulty principle. This is why the Good is an absolute. The good is the object of thought, in the sense of a goal, what is wanted, desired. And to speak of its negation is nonsense, because as what is wanted, it is already nonexistent. The "backdrop" of a good is a privation, but privation cannot be understood as a negation. It really doesn't makes sense to speak of the negation of an object of thought.

do not think that Plotinus develops an adequate description of the relationship between matter and good — Metaphysician Undercover

Matter is privation of the Good isn't it?

any case, I don't think you can say that matter is a privation of the Good itself, it is a privation of a thing in relation to the Good. Objects are deprived, the Good is not. — Metaphysician Undercover

Matter is supposed to be somehow emergent. It would be cool to talk to him and get him to explain that.

don't agree with this. There is no necessity for the negation of an object of thought, I believe that's a faulty principle. — Metaphysician Undercover

Its a principle essential to Neoplatonism and runs from Plato through Hegel to Schopenhauer. Even if you disagree with it, you cant deny its place in philosophy, right?

Matter is privation of the Good isn't it? — frank

I think a privation is always of the form, when a thing is less that perfect, so matter is a separate principle from privation. I believe it was the Manicheans and perhaps Gnostics who taught that matter is inherently evil. But I think Plotinus rejected this for a more Aristotelian perspective which holds that good, and privation are proper to the form of a thing, not its matter.

Its a principle essential to Neoplatonism and runs from Plato through Hegel to Schopenhauer. Even if you disagree with it, you cant deny its place in philosophy, right? — frank

I know Plato pretty well, and I don't see this negation of intelligible objects, ideas, in his work, not even in The Sophist. Nor do I see it in any Neo-Platonism. I think you are relying on faulty interpretation.

So I don't deny that it has a place in philosophy, I deny that it is in the place where you say it is.

I think a privation is always of the form, when a thing is less that perfect, so matter is a separate principle from privation. I believe it was the Manicheans and perhaps Gnostics who taught that matter is inherently evil. But I think Plotinus rejected this for a more Aristotelian perspective which holds that good, and privation are proper to the form of a thing, not its matter. — Metaphysician Undercover

Plotinus' matter is devoid of form. It's also evil:

"Considered abstractly and from within Plotinus' system it should be no surprise that matter is the ultimate evil: matter is at the bottom, the Good is at the top. They are opposites. What could matter be, then, other than evil? Matter is not, by consequence, an independent power opposing the Good, however: Plotinus' whole approach to the question of evil consists in explaining its evil nature as its lack of goodness and being, its powerlessness, indefinitenesss..." -- Plotinus, Eyjolfur K Emilsson, 194

"If matter or evil is ultimately caused by the One, then is not the One, as the Good, the cause of evil? In one sense, the answer is definitely yes. As Plotinus reasons, if anything besides the One is going to exist, then there must be a conclusion of the process of production from the One. The beginning of evil is the act of separation from the One by Intellect, an act which the One itself ultimately causes. The end of the process of production from the One defines a limit, like the end of a river going out from its sources. Beyond the limit is matter or evil." --SEP article on Plotinus

I know Plato pretty well, and I don't see this negation of intelligible objects, ideas, in his work, not even in The Sophist. Nor do I see it in any Neo-Platonism. I think you are relying on faulty interpretation. — Metaphysician Undercover

Did you read Phaedo? Based on what you're saying, I don't know what you would make of the argument for the immortality of the Soul.

Plotinus' matter is devoid of form. It's also evil: — frank

Matter, for Plotinus is the receptacle of form, just like in Plato's Timaeus. And, we can talk about matter devoid of form, but Aristotle demonstrated that this is impossible in reality

"Considered abstractly and from within Plotinus' system it should be no surprise that matter is the ultimate evil: matter is at the bottom, the Good is at the top. They are opposites. What could matter be, then, other than evil? Matter is not, by consequence, an independent power opposing the Good, however: Plotinus' whole approach to the question of evil consists in explaining its evil nature as its lack of goodness and being, its powerlessness, indefinitenesss..." -- Plotinus, Eyjolfur K Emilsson, 194 — frank

Matter and form are categorically separated, even for Plotinus. So good and lack of good are in the same category, as being proper to the form. These are the degrees of good and privation. Evil, he describes in the First Ennead, Eight Tractate, as a complete lack of any good, and this makes it a sot of non-being:

There remains, only, if Evil exist at all, that it be situate in the realm
of Non-Being, that it be some mode, as it were, of the Non-Being, that
it have its seat in something in touch with Non-Being or to a certain
degree communicate in Non-Being.

This is why evil becomes associated with formless matter. But formless matter, as demonstrated by Aristotle's cosmological argument is an impossibility, it's a nonsensical, incomprehensible proposition. Plotinus calls this an "Absolute Formlessness", or "Absolute Evil". So if we relegate Good to the category of Form and Privation, such that Good exists by degree relative to privation, we have no longer any need for Absolute Evil because there is no such thing as absolute Good, good exists by degree.

If matter or evil is ultimately caused by the One, then is not the One, as the Good, the cause of evil? In one sense, the answer is definitely yes. — frank

This cannot be the case, because "evil" in Plotinus' sense, is an absolute, non-being, so it cannot be caused. Causation is reserved to the realm of individual forms, and within this realm there are only varying degrees of good and privation, not evil, which is an absolute lack of good. We must recognize that privation is distinct from evil, the latter being an absolute, the former being relative to good.

Did you read Phaedo? Based on what you're saying, I don't know what you would make of the argument for the immortality of the Soul. — frank

I haven't read Phaedo recently, so you'd have to refresh my memory of the argument you refer to. I do remember one strong argument for the soul being prior to the body, but I cannot remember the specifics of it. I believe it says basically that the body is organized, and does not exist as anything other than being organized. So the body does not exist prior to being organized. However, the cause of its organization, as cause, is necessarily prior to it, and therefore prior to the body as well.

I dont think you're disagreeing with the two sources I cited. You're saying that Aristotle's theory was better. Could be.