Thinking Plato's Timaeus: on the soul-body interconnection

Abstract

Plato's Timaeus, one of the great cosmological works of antiquity, was a dominant reference until the Scientific Revolution. For this reason, its current reading is often restricted to an 'archaeological curiosity,' used only to confirm the profound ruptures brought about by modern physics. Modern science, by postulating its method as the only one capable of achieving truth, expanded it even to the human sciences, an approach that Plato, however, would vehemently criticize. For him, each class of things requires a science adequate to it; studying man by the physical method would be identical to reducing him to the 'infra-human,' disregarding his specificity. In fact, the Timaeus investigates the cosmos through the divine, the 'supra-human' that would design it, and starts from the premise that man, in order to think the whole, must necessarily raise hypotheses about the whole to deduce the nature of the cosmos and, consequently, his own 'place'. In this sense, Plato tacitly recognizes that the starting point for any investigation into the totality of being are the pre-scientific opinions or notions that underpin human science, that is, the art that culminates in the knowledge of ends. The elusive nature of the knowledge of ends reflects the elusive nature of the knowledge of the Good, the foundation of moderation, while the infinite knowledge of means touches on the complexity of the organization of the Good in the forms of the whole and, consequently, in the sensible world. This teaching would directly oppose Francis Bacon's critique of the ancients, particularly Aristotle, and points towards a path of conciliation: just like music that recreates the harmonization of the cosmos in its permanent and mutable traits, in its heterogeneity (of classes) and homogeneity (of means), the Timaeus suggests that, although man is not a Demiurge, the beauty of his art can elevate him. This article aims to initiate a reflection on the art of the Timaeus to arrive at the author's own terms, including the often-disregarded significance of Socrates' presence in the dialogue and, consequently, in the subtle relationship established between the human and natural sciences. This is a complex issue that requires the articulation of reflection on what is in motion “ the visible world “ with that of what remains in eternal repose “ the ideas or forms.