To See a City Come into Being in Speech: Genus and Analogy in Plato’s Republic

• Authors: Barmore Steven
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

An understanding of the philosophical genus contributes to the perfection of the act of the philosophical habit of the human soul because reality is constituted by a multitude of overlapping genera. Because genera are constituted by a multitude of species unequally related to their generic aim, St. Thomas’s teaching on virtual quantity facilitates an understanding of the diversity of being. Analogy is an act of judgment that expresses an unequally proportionate relationship between beings. Like genus, analogy has to do with a multitude of beings unequally related to a primary subject; as such, analogy is the language of philosophy. To see ‘a city come into being in speech’ in Book II of The Republic is to be trained to observe the relation between real beings, to make correct judgments about those relationships, and to thereby be properly oriented toward reality.

Keywords

EN

Plato; Aristotle; Aquinas; genus; species; virtual quantity; analogy; being

• Publisher: International Étienne Gilson Society
• Journal: Studia Gilsoniana
• Year: 2018
• Volume: 7
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 159-179

Dates

published

2018-06-30

Contributors

author

Barmore Steven

• Holy Apostles College and Seminary, Cromwell, CT, USA

References

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Identifiers

ISSN

2300-0066

ISSN

2577-0314

DOI

10.26385/SG.070208