Phaedo/Questions
Questions and Considerations for the Phaedo[edit | edit source]
Even if everything comes about from its opposite, as Socrates said, which means life has to come about from death, does that mean we know exactly what death is? Cebes had a good point when he wanted to know whether death is the dispersion of the soul. Socrates defined death as the separation of the soul from the body, but if in life the soul is one, then in death shouldn’t it be the opposite and be dispersed since he said they are opposite? Or maybe this view of life and death is too simple and they each don’t depend on the dispersal or unity of the soul at all. If that is so, then the soul could remain one and still have to pass from life to death as Socrates said. Do you agree with Socrates’ definition of death?
Do you agree that to know universals like equality, beauty, and good we have to have known them from perceiving the forms? Do you also agree that to know these forms means we had to know them before we were born in which case souls do exist before they are in bodies?