Plato Summer School
Each January, the School of Philosophy organizes and hosts a Plato Summer School, providing a wonderful opportunity for students to engage with Plato and his world. This week-long event includes guest speakers from Melbourne and abroad.
To receive more information or request a registration form, please send your name, email address and message via the contact form to the right. (Please note that this event is currently only available to School of Philosophy members.)
Theaetatus: The Nature of Knowledge
January, 2011
“Philosophy begins in wonder” (Socrates in the Theaetetus)
What is the true nature of knowledge?
Does Socrates know the answer to this question?
If he does not know the answers then what can we ever learn from him?
What can we truly know or learn?
Plato presents philosophy not in dogmatic treatises but in the form of discussions and conversations in which great philosophic questions are examined in a lively and interactive manner among characters with whom we can readily identify. In conversation with the young Theaetetus Socrates explores the nature of his own philosophic mission and he exemplifies and explains his famous Socratic method of approaching philosophy through question and answer. He states that he himself knows nothing and has nothing to teach and compares himself to a philosophic midwife who can help others bring forth ideas but has no ideas of his own.
This of course leads to the question ‘what is knowledge?’ We live in a society which greatly values knowledge and uses phrases such as:
Knowledge is power
This is a knowledge society
Knowledge is relative
Advances in knowledge
With Socrates we can step back from the clichés of modern debate and explore great and universal philosophic questions in the true spirit of inquiry and come to understand that, in truth: “Philosophy begins in wonder”.
Event details
Date: Friday 7th Jan to Friday 14th Jan, 2011
Location: Hawthorn Campus
You can also download a flyer for this event.
Places for the event are limited, and are available to School members only. To receive more information or request a registration form, please complete the form to the right.
