I have recently become very interested in philosophy and have recently decided to work through Plato's Republic. However, I am already a little confused with Book I. Ideally; I should like to understand Book I before I move on. What confuses me is how Socrates presents his arguments, or rather how he undermines the arguments of others. It almost seems that all of what Socrates says is trickery. I think a good example of what I'm saying is the "Analogy of the Arts". Socrates uses the analogy to convince Polemarchus that "justice is the art which gives good to friends and evil to enemies". So far, this analogy seems to make sense and I would agree with Socrates. However, Socrates goes on to use the analogy to make it appear that Justice is of no use in times of peace. Really? At this point I believe that the analogy has been taken too far and has been taken in such literal understanding that it has been stretched beyond context. Another problem I am having is how specific Socrates is getting in...

I guess Kant said that it is ALWAYS wrong to lie, even in the most extreme circumstances (and not only Kant, see Jonathan Westphal's answer to question 2701). I do not want to discuss that. But would you explain me why did he think that? Why didn't he just say that "in normal circumstances" it's wrong to lie. Or that it is wrong to lie "when no other value is disregarded by not lying"? Or something like that... Why did Kant (and some modern philosophers) feel he should make such an extreme claim? It's just that Kant's opinion seems to be so contrary to common sense that there must have been a good reason for him to have it... What reason was (or is) that?

Is the consensus in favor of Neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory as strong among philosophers of science as it is among scientists in general?

It seems that logical fallacies are regularly committed in the course of daily political dialogue. For example, many politicians support their policy decisions through appeal to the emotions of the electorate rather than their faculties of reason. If philosophers possess the tools to dissect the logic and substance of political discourse, why don't philosophers play a greater role in public life? Why isn't their a panel of philosophers to transparently dissect and scrutinise the speeches, policies and actions of contemporary politicians?

In Kant's metaphysics, he claims that the world of human experience (phenomena) is categorically different from things in themselves (noumena). He states that there is no reason to believe that the world as we experience it is the same as things are "in themselves." Doesn't the fact that the way we have experienced the world as human beings has led to evolutionary success reveal that while phenomena may not exactly duplicate noumena; it must certainly resemble it very much? The fact that we successfully manipulate the external world through our knowledge that comes from experience,seems to suggest that they way things are in themselves is very much like we experience them. Even to the extent that phenomena may give us a lot of information about how things are in themselves.

Reviews for Russell's History of Western Philosophy are all over the map. I get that he's an early positivist, and since his book is written from this particular perspective it will turn away people who are really into Hegel, Kierkegaard, etc. But one would not expect a book about philosophy written by a guy like Russell to include much on Hegel, right? Likewise, one wouldn't expect to find much Russell in a survey of philosophy written by Foucault, right? So I guess I'm asking this: if one generally likes Russell, will this individual benefit from reading his History of Western Philosophy, or is it too full of poor generalizations such that it obfuscates history more than sheds light upon it? Did that question make sense? I hope so.

In the Platonic theory of forms, one could imagine a thing participating in many different forms at once. E.g. a large oak tree could participate in tree-ness, oak-tree-ness, bark-ness, leaven-ness, green-ness, brown-ness, large-ness, beauty, etc. One could imagine this could go on ad infinitum (i.e. ever more specification leading to ever more forms). Where is the limit? Or is there no limit? Or in reality, is there really only one form? (The Good?) or to put it another way the Form of "being." It might remind one of Parmenides....it is or it is not.... It seems to me that sensible things either participate in infinite forms or one form. Thoughts? Lou, New York

What is the accepted date for the setting of Plato's Phaedrus and when was it written?

Does Quine's argument that there is no real boundary between analytic and synthetic statements include purely mathematical statements such as 1 + 2 = 3? Granted, sentences in everyday languages contain both analytic and synthetic elements, but cannot formal languages support purely analytical statements? Or does mathematics, being a human creation, inextricably model the natural world around us, and thus contain synthetic information? I'm trying to understand the short and (very difficult for me) book "Knowledge and Reality: A Comparative Study of Quine & Some Buddhist Logicians" by Kaisa Puhakka, which seems to represent Quine's thinking faithfully, but my training as a scientist leaves me ill-prepared for much of it. Thank you.

According to Kant, as I understand him, nature has an orderliness that appears (or compels belief in) to have been ordered by a divine power, but that the validity of such an appearance can neither be proved or disproved by the power of (pure) reason. Darwin's theory shows (as I understand it) that all life is the product of successive random forces. Does Kant's philosophy remain unaffected by this Darwinian insight?