In the Timaeus Plato’s main speaker presents reality as comprised of two linked orders – that of eternal being, and that of temporal being. The latter is “being which is continually coming to be, but never really is.” Into this reality we are shown the soul as a strangely amphibious nature – in some way eternal, in other ways temporal. Plato suggests that the soul has a role to play in the beautification and ordering of the manifest cosmos precisely because of its intermediate state. We will read sections of the Timaeus and explore what this means for how we live. Please download the extracts here: Being becoming soul.
This event is free but donations are encouraged, circumstances allowing. We’ll start the session at 6.30pm: tea/coffee and cake will be available just beforehand. No need to book.
These evenings include short talks and/or readings from Platonic writings – but we hope they will be genuinely interactive, with all participants invited to contribute to our collaborative search for truth. No previous experience of formal philosophy is required. Every effort is made to make these type of evenings accessible to the newcomer, while allowing the great profundity of the Platonic tradition to step forward and speak to us at whatever level our present understanding sits.