Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
  1. Home
  2. Search

Refine search

Refine search

Access:
Content type:
Publication date:
Apply   From and To filters
Subject: Show more
Journals Show more
Publishers: Show more
Societies Show more
Series: Show more
Collections: Show more

Actions for selected content:

Select all | Deselect all
  • View selected items
  • Export citations
  • Download PDF (zip)
  • Save to Kindle
  • Save to Dropbox
  • Save to Google Drive

Save Search

You can save your searches here and later view and run them again in "My saved searches".

Please provide a title, maximum of 40 characters.
Cancel
×

1 results

  • 11 - Pictures and passions in the Timaeus and Philebus

  • from Part III - After the Republic
  • Edited by Rachel Barney, University of Toronto, Tad Brennan, Cornell University, New York, Charles Brittain, Cornell University, New York
  • Book:
    Plato and the Divided Self
    Published online:
    05 March 2012
    Print publication:
    16 February 2012, pp 259-280

  • Summary

    The chapter argues that Plato's psychology represents our motivations as themselves person-like with the aim of showing us the lineaments of philosophic virtue and of the self-transformation required for its development. It examines the way one ordinarily uses personification to think about our own motivations. The chapter highlights that Plato uses personification in a similar way with respect to the development of philosophic virtue. Parallels between Plato's psychology and the theology of the Republic suggest that one ought to regard personification as a likely story told for its effects on our self-conceptions and behavior. Finally, it is important to acknowledge that personification is a feature not only of Plato's middle-period but also of his late psychology, where it appears to conflict with two significant theoretical developments in the psychology: the denial of belief to appetite, and the recognition of the requirements for unity of the experiencing subject.