“Plato’s theory of forms is unconvincing, discuss”

Plato is a Greek rationalist philosopher that believes that we can only gain knowledge through
reason called epistemology, also referred to as a priori eg logical thinking. He was taught by Socrates
in his childhood through his teachings and principles, Plato came up with the theory of forms. The
theory of forms, means that the realm of appearances is not reality and the physical world that we
currently live in is an imitation of the Form of the Good. A “form” is the essence of a thing, these
forms are abstract and unchanging. Plato uses the quote “you can never step in the same river
twice” to demonstrate the idea of life being constantly changing. In addition, Plato’s theory of forms
is unconvincing as if the physical world is impermanent and constantly changing, trying to gain true
knowledge would be impossible.

Plato’s theory of the forms is unconvincing as there is no scientific evidence that the world of forms
exists and without substantial evidence, his belief is not proven and is referred to as a story.
Furthermore, the philosopher David Hume believes that without any concrete evidence, believing
theories is ignorant and that by following empirical evidence, the truth will reveal itself. Plato
believes that the physical world is not real due to his belief in the theory of forms, therefore he
believes that there must be something immutable and transcendent, in which everything is perfect
and full of goodness for example justice is always just, referred to as the Form Of the Good.
Personally, this belief is unconvincing as every individuals idea of “goodness” and a world of
perfection varies; for example my goodness could be a nice person who looks after others, whilst
someone’s else’s idea of goodness could be donating a certain amount of money to the poor so he
cannot claim that there’s this realm in which, all humans are full of goodness. In addition, Plato
believes that there must be a reason why we have concepts in our head for example a round circle,
even though we have never seen a perfectly round circle, in our head we have a concept of it. Plato
believes we have an understanding of these platonic forms naturally from birth gained by our
immortal soul. This belief is unconvincing, as we have to learn and understand languages and
concepts, and no one naturally has those qualities as it comes from growing up and learning through
education. Plato believes that the immortal soul lived in the realm of the forms before being born
into the physical world, therefore when a soul leaves a body when a human dies, it may exist in an
incorporeal state temporarily before joining back to a new body at birth. This led him to believe that
the consequence of this detaching of the soul is forgetfulness showcased via the slave boy analogy,
however this is unconvincing as the idea of a soul isn’t logical thinking as a soul has never been
proved to exist in an human and is merely created to comfort people about how they came to be
and help to explain the imperfections of humans by supporting the idea that the physical world is an
imitation of the form of the good. The slave boy analogy is when Socrates gives a slave boy a maths
problem, which he cannot do and he relearns something he already knew in the form of the good, as
the world of perfection and goodness cannot be destroyed. Plato believes there is a tripartite soul in
the realms; meaning each person’s soul is divided to three parts; reason, spirit and appetite. As
bodies die, the soul is in a cycle of continuously being reborn called metempsychosis. Plato believes
the Soul is only pure in its divine state, which is in the form of the good and the impurities in the soul
come from its contact with the earth. This is unconvincing as the soul cannot move from one realm
to another, especially if the realms themselves don’t exist. Moreover, according to the theory of
traducianism the soul is passed on to the child from its parents at conception , invalidating the idea
of the soul existing in the Form of the good. Plato was a duelist and believed in a clear distinction
between the soul and the body, however he did believe there was a link between body and spiritual
self from the soul in order for an individual to be just. Critically speaking, a Form of Good can’t exist
due to the inability for the soul to be in a divine state and humans cannot all be perfect as everyone
has their own perceptions of “perfect” too and you cannot create a realm that’s universal to
everyone. In addition, philosopher Kant indicated that the theory of forms means nothing more than
if we were using our imagination, proving that the theory of forms is unconvincing as it’s not real
and an idea in our head. Personally, Plato’s theory of forms is unconvincing as If our bodies die,
that’s the end of our life completely as we cannot be reborn into a form.

Alternatively, Plato’s theory of forms is convincing as it provides a way of understanding reality and
existence. For example, The sight analogy demonstrates when it is very dark and the light helping
you see symbolizes the Form of the good. Without light, one cannot see clearly and need the light to
understand the form of the good and see properly. This is convincing as it gives human an aim in life
and a telos to keep being a good person as an eternal life of perfection does exist in another realm.
Plato also believes in the hierarchy of the forms and the analogy of the divided line that showcased
the idea that the realm of the forms is superior to the realm of appearances, this meant that
intelligence was superior to senses, which was convincing as the brain has the ability to reason. Plato
also believed the world was created by a god called demiurge meaning craftsmen. However, he tried
to create the perfect world but ended up with limitations of resources forming the physical world,
which was an imitation of the form of the good. This is persuasive as it helps us to understand why
these imperfections exist in our world and why the problem of evil exists. If the world was created
with limited resources then we cannot expect our physical world to be perfect, therefore prepares
humans with the idea that certain things will happen that aren’t all good such as natural disasters.
Furthermore, Plato believed there are no bad forms and all forms contains aspects of goodness
within them. This goodness radiates out of the form of the good but gets weaker down the
hierarchy. This is convincing as we are made in the image of God according to Christianity, therefore
we all have aspects of goodness within us as God did considering he was omnibenevolent.

Furthermore, Plato believed in the analogy of the cave, a group of prisoners are chained to a cave
for life and they face towards a brick wall, in which they can see a range of shadows on the wall from
a fire behind them. The chained up prisoners resemble the idea of us as humans being trapped, and
unable to see reality – The form of the good and therefore this causes the theory of forms to be
convincing as it showcases that as humans we tend to follow our senses and let them prove the
existence of thing, even if they aren’t real for example the physical world. The prisoners can’t see
the fire due to a wall and there are people on the other side holding objects. The shadows they see,
resemble the Form of the good and help us to understand that the form of the good can exist and
we can see the imitations of this ideal form without realizing it. The prisoners believe that the
shadows are objects as they have no knowledge of true reality as they cannot see the people holding
the objects. This makes Plato’s theory convincing as it highlights the idea the life we see in front of
us is not real but it’s all in our head, In addition, the prisoners are seeing a glimpse of reality and an
imitation to the reality of people holding the objects. Plato tells us to imagine if we unchain the
prisoners and let them see the ideal people holding the objects, they would be in denial and
confused as it’s a new concept to them. In their minds, the shadows they see are real and so the idea
of the true objects being real is not believable to them. Plato indicates that humans cannot accept
being wrong when they can visualize it via their senses and struggle with accepting new changes
naturally, which makes his theory convincing as when we learn Plato’s theory of forms first we think
surely this isn’t possible and are in denial, however over time we start to understand and accept the
chance this could be real. If a prisoner uncovers the truth and tells the other prisoners about the
truth, they won’t believe him and will find reasons to prove his theory wrong as it leads to a sense of
discomfort in humans from not knowing the truth. This proves that the theory of forms is convincing
due to the several analogies implying the contrast between the form of the good and the physical
world. Plato links this with us, as humans we reject the theory of forms to begin with as it’s a strange
concept we’ve unheard of and cannot use our senses to understand, however that doesn’t mean its
not true.

In conclusion, Plato’s theory of forms is unconvincing as its impossible for everything to have a form
or else it would become a parallel universe, and instead of forms being a physical thing they are
concepts in out mind not reality. Furthermore, The form of the good itself is unconvincing as the
belief of a perfect world universally is impossible as everyone has their own idea of what a perfect
world looks like. Lastly, the hierarchy of forms is also unconvincing as intelligence is higher up the
hierarchy then mathematical reasoning even though mathematics can be proved and pure ideas
cannot be for example the quadratic formula therefore makes no logical sense for something that
cannot be proved to be higher up the hierarchy.