Of all the superlatives shone upon civilization and the people therein, not a single one is more fundamentally necessary than leadership, a function that is traditionally suited for certain people deemed to be, in one way or another, exceptional. Of course, Socrates’ particular calculus ennobles philosophers as the rightful leaders, and in so doing, his prescriptions raise the inevitable question: what, precisely, constitutes a proper philosopher? Be it self-referentially, self-reverentially, or both, Socrates’ take herein is perhaps not so much concerned with answerable questions, but questionable answers, not the least of which being what now follows. Socrates’ envisioned world is one that eerily resembles the much-lamented class structure
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And 2) sensation itself is an ulterior, almost third-person sentience that acts as a lapse in immanence, distancing what is experiential from what is intra-cognitive in such a way that a true understanding of both finally becomes feasible. Likewise, sensation may be thought of as a proverbial bridge that surmounts the more natural estrangements between two or more objects, i.e. the bridge between manifest stimuli and the appropriate mindful response thereto. It’s rather like a competition between the opposing hemispheres of cognizance, and one that is of the utmost importance, because it is the foundational vicissitude of any degree of genuine agency. With both “sense” and “sensation” now defined, here enters a second question: why, according to Socrates, is it necessarily desirable to process these sensitivities on a more profound …show more content…
It’s fitting, then, that Socrates elaborates at length in answering it; per his terms, proper philosopher-kings have their value in the totality of their earthly immersion into pure thought, for it is only therein that one can truly gleam insight into the more objectively preferable course that he or she (being at the helm) should have society embark upon. The mere lovers of sights and sounds are inadequate, because their perceptive myopia limits their understanding of Truth to what is transduced by the obtuse resolution of their senses alone. (476a9 - 476c1) Powerful, useful, and vital as these senses may be, one runs the risk of allowing them to monopolize his or her clarity and rightness of mind; it is a mistake, then, to make these sensory sources the singular umbilical cord from which one derives the entirety of their basest neurology. Socrates argues that aspiring philosophers require this heightened sense of things, specifically so that they may avoid the mistaken astigmatism of admitting only one channel of input from their surroundings, rather than a synthesis of many channels. That is why this more advanced cognition is necessarily more desirable to Socrates: the very same reason that two or more corroborative sources of information will always be superior to one source
And 2) sensation itself is an ulterior, almost third-person sentience that acts as a lapse in immanence, distancing what is experiential from what is intra-cognitive in such a way that a true understanding of both finally becomes feasible. Likewise, sensation may be thought of as a proverbial bridge that surmounts the more natural estrangements between two or more objects, i.e. the bridge between manifest stimuli and the appropriate mindful response thereto. It’s rather like a competition between the opposing hemispheres of cognizance, and one that is of the utmost importance, because it is the foundational vicissitude of any degree of genuine agency. With both “sense” and “sensation” now defined, here enters a second question: why, according to Socrates, is it necessarily desirable to process these sensitivities on a more profound …show more content…
It’s fitting, then, that Socrates elaborates at length in answering it; per his terms, proper philosopher-kings have their value in the totality of their earthly immersion into pure thought, for it is only therein that one can truly gleam insight into the more objectively preferable course that he or she (being at the helm) should have society embark upon. The mere lovers of sights and sounds are inadequate, because their perceptive myopia limits their understanding of Truth to what is transduced by the obtuse resolution of their senses alone. (476a9 - 476c1) Powerful, useful, and vital as these senses may be, one runs the risk of allowing them to monopolize his or her clarity and rightness of mind; it is a mistake, then, to make these sensory sources the singular umbilical cord from which one derives the entirety of their basest neurology. Socrates argues that aspiring philosophers require this heightened sense of things, specifically so that they may avoid the mistaken astigmatism of admitting only one channel of input from their surroundings, rather than a synthesis of many channels. That is why this more advanced cognition is necessarily more desirable to Socrates: the very same reason that two or more corroborative sources of information will always be superior to one source