Brief Notes on Various Topics - 104

10 August 2026

Brief Notes on Various Topics – 104

1.  The Human Condition

As I’ve been rereading the Laws of Plato I have been struck by how little the human condition has changed.  This morning I read a section in Book XI which discusses conflict within the family that law needs to address.  The two specific examples are when a father wants to disown a son and remove the son from the family altogether, and when a son has concluded that a father is no longer of sound mind and needs to be removed from making binding decisions.  In the first case, where the father wants to disown and remove a son from the family, the law that Plato proposes is that the father has to gather a significant number of relatives from both the father’s and mother’s sides to whom the father presents his case.  The son then defends himself from the father’s accusations.  And the gathering of relatives, minus the father, mother, and son, then votes; if more than half of the gathering votes to disown the son then that is what happens.  In the case of a son dealing with a father who is no longer of sound mind, the son is to present his case to some elders who then make the determination.

These are very human situations that people still deal with today.  In fact, as we live longer, it has become fairly common for children to figure out how to take care of their parents as their capacities dwindle. 

The tendency in our culture is to think of ourselves as having advanced beyond previous cultures and their concerns; but passages like this one (and there are many in the Laws) suggest that the human condition is what it was and always will be.

2.  Comparing Buddhism and Platonism

I have often compared Buddhism and Platonism because I spent decades studying and practicing Buddhism, reading many of is key texts, reading Sutras and Commentaries, and having endless conversations with Buddhist friends.  Buddhism was a big part of my life.  I’m not the only one who is making this kind of comparison; there seems to be a steady flow of Westerners who studied and practiced Buddhism and then at some point turned to Platonism as the focus of their spiritual understanding and as the guide to a genuine spiritual path.  How these comparisons are made varies depending on what kind of Buddhism was being practiced.  I have noticed, for example, that hose who practiced Buddhist Tantra, also known as Vajrayana, tend to focus primarily on metaphysics and they tend to compare and contrast Buddhist and Platonist metaphysics and/or cosmology. 

What I have consistently noticed is that comparing the metaphysics of Buddhism and Platonism quickly becomes complicated.  I think it is difficult, or at least a challenge, to meaningfully compare the two spiritual traditions from the perspectives of metaphysics and cosmology.  It can be done, but doing so seems to stretch one or both of the traditions so that one can find points of association or contact.

It is my own opinion that where Buddhism and Platonism really meet is in the cultivation of ethical restraints, that is to say the cultivation of asceses, or asceticism.  There is a remarkable commonality between the two traditions as to what kinds of ethical restraints and prohibitions should be practiced.  I’m not saying the two systems of ethical restraints are identical, but I am saying that there are a surprising number of shared demands on practitioners as to what ethical restraints are essential for purification and spiritual growth. 

3.  Humpty Dumpty

I sometimes humorously think of contemporary Platonism as resembling Humpty Dumpty from the famous children’s rhyme.  For those not familiar, Humpty falls off a brick wall and breaks into pieces, “All the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t put Humpty together again.”

I say this because of the great variety of interpretations of Platonism circulating in the world today.  And, furthermore, that these interpretations are at times incompatible. 

I’m aware that Platonism has been extremely fertile in presenting multiple interpretations of central insights and that this happened very early in the history of Platonism.  For example, Aristotle reconfigured the nature of Platonic Forms, and there have been other examples like this.  What I have observed, though, is that in Classical Platonism these kinds of variations didn’t seem to fragment Platonism into rival factions.  In fact, I see in Classical Platonism consistent attempts at reconciliation such as interpreting Aristotle in a way that diminishes, or eliminates, or subordinates, the differences between Aristotle and Classical Platonism as a whole.

Today the situation looks different to me.  Perhaps I am overinterpreting this, but the different streams of Platonism don’t seem to be inclined to interact and I have observed that in at least some cases a particular interpretation is adamant about its greater explanatory range and merit.

I don’t think there is anything that can be done about this; I think it is just a matter of letting this moment of intense differentiation within Platonism run its course.  Patience is, I think, the best response in this situation.

4.  Safe Harbor

Everyone knows that life is difficult; it’s not unusual for people to say exactly that.  Any human life is faced with challenges; happiness is rare and brief while strife is frequent and enduring.

When I read the works of Plato, when I read the works of the Platonic tradition such as the works of Plotinus, I feel like I have found a safe harbor from the inevitable difficulties, the inevitable storms, of life.  Reading even a few pages of one of Plato’s Dialogues, or a few paragraphs from the Enneads of Plotinus is in itself to experience the possibility of peace, serenity and transcendence.  This is a great gift; I would call it a grace.