{"id":7386,"date":"2017-01-18T21:43:13","date_gmt":"2017-01-18T21:43:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/?p=7386"},"modified":"2020-06-20T22:38:48","modified_gmt":"2020-06-20T22:38:48","slug":"platos-discursive-defense","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/2017\/01\/platos-discursive-defense\/","title":{"rendered":"Plato\u2019s Discursive Defense"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Ryan Smith<\/strong><\/p>\n

Now that we have reconstructed the contents of the Unwritten Doctrine and examined the paradox of how the One can be both unconditioned and limited at the same time, it remains for us to examine whether the Unwritten Doctrine actually refutes the Third Man Argument, as it was ostensibly meant to do.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>First, let us recap Plato\u2019s main line of defense against the Third Man Argument. Recall that the argument goes: \u201cYou say that sensible things are caused by the Forms \u2013 for example, that all physical men must be caused by the ideal Form of Man. But what causes the Form itself? Must that not be another Form, which is itself then caused by another Form, and so on in an infinite regress?\u201d<\/p>\n

In the early and middle parts of his career, Plato would not have been able to answer this argument. But after having developed the Unwritten Doctrine late in his career, Plato\u2019s response would have been: \u201cMy good man, the Forms are not caused by Forms, but by the super-entities of the One and the Indefinite Duality. These super-entities are not Forms themselves, but belong to an altogether higher plane of reality, from whence they may originate the Forms without depending on Forms for their own existence.\u201d<\/p>\n

With a response like this, which seems almost designed to frustrate an empiricist, Plato would be refusing to respond to the argument on the terms on which it was set forth, opting instead to alter the problem altogether. His solution consists in positing an altogether new layer of reality that was not in the cards when the problem was first formulated. From the perspective of the psychology of types, this is another piece of evidence to suggest that Plato was an Intuitive and not a Thinking type: He fantasizes his way out of the problem while offering little in the way of rigorous thinking to facilitate his escape.[1]<\/p>\n

The empiricist could easily protest: \u201cMy dear Plato, first you presented me with the Forms and I found a flaw in that argument. Now you tell me there is another level of reality which causes the Forms. If I find a flaw in that<\/em> argument too, what will prevent you from coming up with yet another<\/em> level of reality, and so on and so on in another<\/em> infinite regress?\u201d<\/p>\n

In the modern world, philosophy has developed into a specialized discipline that relies heavily on the operations of the Thinking function. But my argument is that Plato was an Intuitive-Feeling type. When Plato falls back on the Parmenidian One and the Heraclitean Indefinite Duality, this indicates that he did not chiefly rely on Thinking to foster his arguments in the manner that moderns have come to expect of contemporary philosophers \u2013 rather, he relied on the dictates of Extroverted Feeling.<\/p>\n

Now, the Extroverted Feeling approach allows for objective validity to be derived from principles that are commonly recognized as authoritative in their community and which it would therefore upset the general Feeling mood to dispute.[2] Naturally, the philosophies of Heraclitus and Parmenides do not carry this same kind of authoritative Feeling clout today as they did in Plato\u2019s culture, which is why his recourse to them comes across as contrived, at least to us moderns. But in Plato\u2019s day, these philosophies certainly did carry this kind of clout, as evidenced by Aristotle\u2019s extensive commentaries on them, or even by Plato\u2019s own characterization of Parmenides as \u201cvenerable and awesome.\u201d[3]<\/p>\n

It may thus legitimately be objected that Plato\u2019s falling back on the authority of Heraclitus and Parmenides is not a tenable defense against the Third Man Argument when considered as a piece of free-floating logic, divorced from time and space the way we we have come to expect in modern philosophy. Indeed his rejoinder was intimately tied to \u2013 if not inseparable from \u2013 the specific time and place where it was set forth, namely the intellectual milieu of Classical Athens.[4] Plato\u2019s first line of defense really tells us more about Plato\u2019s personal psychology than it does about philosophy of the Forms.<\/p>\n

When reviewing Plato\u2019s discursive defense from the standpoint of Introverted Thinking we must therefore reject Plato\u2019s first line of defense as invalid. However, Plato also provides a second defense against the Third Man Argument, which he presents to us in the Parmenides<\/em>: Here we are told that it is impossible to give up the Theory of Forms because insofar as we were to do so, we \u201cwould not be able to think.\u201d<\/p>\n

Plato\u2019s Second Line of Defense<\/strong><\/p>\n

PARMENIDES: \u201cIf anyone, with his mind fixed on all these objections [against the Theory of Forms] denies the existence of the Forms, and does not assume a Form under which each individual thing is classed, he will be quite at a loss, since he denies that the Form of each thing is always the same, and in this way he will utterly destroy the power of carrying on discussion. You seem to have been well aware of this.\u201d
\nSOCRATES: \u201cQuite true.\u201d
\nPARMENIDES: \u201cThen what will become of philosophy? To what can you turn, if these things are unknown?\u201d
\nSOCRATES: \u201cI do not see at all, at least not at present.\u201d<\/p>\n

– Plato: Parmenides <\/em>\u00a7135bc<\/p>\n

This exchange encapsulates what I call Plato\u2019s second life of defense. Here Plato admits that there may well be problems with the Theory of Forms, but counters that if we were to give it up, we would \u201cutterly destroy\u201d our powers of reasoning and would not be able to think as fruitfully as before. If Plato\u2019s first line of defense can be called an Extroverted Feeling defense, then this second argument must be traced back to Introverted Intuition. To understand how this defense reflects Introverted Intuition, it will first be necessary to expose some facets of Introverted Intuition that are not commonly understood at the time of this writing.<\/p>\n

Introverted Intuition is a mental function that seeks to integrate and consolidate ideational information. It wants to develop one<\/em> singular perspective that is then able to account for as much information as possible. This integrative and consolidative tendency can be contrasted with the disintegrative and tentative partialities of Extroverted Intuition, which seeks to develop as many perspectives on the same thing as possible, believing each of them to be partially true and none of them to be the whole truth. In this way we may say, as has been my own addition to Jungian typology, that while Extroverted Intuition goes from the one to the many, Introverted Intuition goes from the many to the one.<\/p>\n

One corollary of Introverted Intuition\u2019s prejudice in favor of integration and consolidation is that Introverted Intuitive types often evince a dogged stubbornness when challenged to either substantiate their mono-perspective or give it up. Though they may not admit as much in formal discussions, or even be aware of it themselves, Introverted Intuitive types tend to equate the capability of a perspective to make sense of a wide range of phenomena with its truth. In other words, with the Introverted Intuitive type, we are dealing with an interlocutor for whom the conclusion (i.e. the veracity of their preferred perspective) is often assumed to be necessary prior to the analysis itself. Whatever philosophical arguments the Introverted Intuitive type advances to justify his mono-perspective only serve to corroborate the psychological<\/em> legitimation he has already experienced in his psyche. Consequently his desire for the perspective to be true can hardly be budged by the tools of formal analysis. The arguments voiced for or against the mono-perspective are derivatives and footnotes \u2013 expedient means to be cast away once the perspective is grasped. Indeed, the Introverted Intuitive type is not concerned with externals for their own sake, but (as Jung would have it) \u201cwith what the external object has released within him.\u201d[5]<\/p>\n

In practice, the Introverted Intuitive\u2019s defense of a cherished mono-perspective is often little more than a form of special pleading: \u201cI know that you might be able to find faults in my conjecture, but if you take away my theory, there will be too many things that we can no longer make sense of. It is therefore not enough to merely point to the problems. Unless you can offer a more persuasive perspective, one that can better make sense of the same range of phenomena, we are better off assuming that my perspective is true.\u201d This defense conflates the richness of thought stemming from the Introverted Intuitive\u2019s mono-perspective with the likelihood of it being true. If the conceptual richness that results from adopting that mono-perspective is unparalleled, that also functions as a guarantee of its truth.[6] This mode of argument is often seen in Plato, as indeed also in Jung.<\/p>\n

How Both Jung and Plato Testify to Extroverted Feeling and Introverted Intuition<\/strong><\/p>\n

In the Parmenides<\/em>, Plato essentially tells us that without the Theory of Forms, we would not be able to think. Though he acknowledges that his theory has its flaws, it is simply too intellectually delicious, too rewarding to give up.\u00a0 This assessment of Plato\u2019s discursive defense is shared by Plato scholar John Pebble, who paraphrases Plato\u2019s answer to his critics as follows:<\/p>\n

“I know that I have nothing important to say against [the Third Man] argument at this time, but I am utterly convinced of the existence of forms, for positing their existence solves too many deep philosophical problems and is anyway necessary for the possibility of thought and language to even think of abandoning them. I am confident that someday I or someone else will find an answer to this vexing Third Man argument, after which no one of any intelligence could doubt the existence of such important and divine entities…” \u2013 John Pebble: The Unwritten Doctrines<\/em> (Kenyon\u00a0College 1997) \u00a7XI<\/p>\n

When Aristotle mentions the Third Man argument, he does not discuss the argument as being contested, which suggests that there was no commonly known attempt to refute it in Plato\u2019s own time.[7] In other words, it seems that Plato did not endeavor to present an analytical defense against the Third Man argument. Instead he gave priority to reasserting the truth of his beloved mono-perspective for himself.<\/p>\n

This inclination to re-assert the truth that one has found for oneself, rather than responding to one\u2019s critics, should remind us not just of Plato, but also of Jung. Presenting an early version of his ideas of the Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, Jung said:<\/p>\n

\u201cA schizophrenic in my clinic once explained to me that there was a tube in the sun from which it blew out the wind. Many years later a papyrus was discovered that told the scientific world for the first time of an age-old myth about the wind from the sun tube, a myth that had not only been recorded in the ancient papyrus but also inherited from generation to generation in the deepest layers of the conscious mind. Then, in a single case, the enchained fantasy was allowed to burst forth, at first in inexplicable form.\u201d \u2013 Jung, quoted in McGuire & Hull: C.G. Jung Speaking<\/em> (Princeton University Press 1977) p. 44<\/p>\n

From a scientific perspective, there are several problems with Jung\u2019s approach, factual as well as methodological. But for our purposes, we can do no better than to quote the Jung biographer Frank McLynn\u2019s characterization of Jung\u2019s epistemological stance. As McLynn puts it, Jung \u201cseemed unable or unwilling to understand that because a set of data is compatible with hypothesis X, it does not thereby prove X. The same set of data could just as well [fit] dozens of other hypotheses.\u201d[8] Likewise, as the Jungian analyst Marilyn Nagy has noted, Jung did not expend much effort critically contemplating the logical alternatives to his own preferred perspectives.[9] Thus, like Plato reminded us of Jung, Jung should also remind us of Plato.<\/p>\n

Whether the Introverted Intuitive\u2019s second-most function is Feeling or Thinking, the principle holds true that epistemological inquiries guided by Introverted Intuition tend to be dedicated to asserting (and re-asserting) the subjective truth that they have found to their authors, as opposed to actually refuting the arguments of their critics.[10] However, in cases where Introverted Intuition is flanked by Thinking (as it was with Heraclitus and Nietzsche), the individual will often come to view their own cognition as the quintessential guarantee of truth, whereas in cases where Introverted Intuition is supported by Extroverted Feeling (as with Plato and Jung), the individual tends to focus more of their energies on the interpersonal aspects of knowledge claims as well. This relates to the Extroverted Feeling type\u2019s tendency to regard intellectual propositions as entities to be gauged through the medium of people. That is to say, individuals with Extroverted Feeling high in consciousness may engage their scholarly side to study some idea from afar, but will rarely realize the full scope and importance of the idea until they can relate the idea to some specific person or human need in their life.<\/p>\n

In the case of Jung, several of his biographers have noted how he would often be sensitive to the interpersonal aspects of a situation where the knowledge claims he held dear had to be defended. Similarly, biographers have also remarked on how resourceful he was when it came to adapting his message to audiences who had not yet bought into his ideas:<\/p>\n

\u201cIn lectures, as in conversations, he was, as one of his patients noticed, \u2018particularly adept at presenting his ideas in such a way that they would not be rejected out-of-hand \u2026 I heard him present his basic theory about the collective unconscious in two different ways to two different groups. \u2019\u201d\u00a0 \u2013 Ronald Hayman: A Life of Jung<\/em> (Bloomsbury 2002) p. 4<\/p>\n

\u201cEven if we accept the reality of archetypes for the sake of argument, the difficulties do not end, for Jung was notoriously careless in defining the word: sometimes it seems equivalent to a Platonic form, sometimes to a Kantian noumenon, sometimes to a biological instinct.\u201d \u2013 Frank McLynn: Carl Gustav Jung \u2013 A Biography<\/em> (Black Swan 1997) p. 312<\/p>\n

While Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Feeling types like Plato and Jung may appear outwardly concerted and sure of themselves, there remains a tendency for such types to gauge the merits of their own thought on the basis of how others respond to it. What the type who relies on Extroverted Thinking might see as mere \u201csubjective\u201d sentiment, the Extroverted Feeling type reveres as having objective value as well.[11] That is to say, the Extroverted Feeling type is inclined to take the passion, approval, and enthusiasm stirred up in others as proof that his analysis is correct, even though he may \u2013 privately and initially \u2013 have had his doubts about it. With this inclination as his natural state, it is often especially tempting for the Extroverted Feeling type to honey his message to suit each individual audience. In doing so, he ensures the acceptance of his message, and by way of that acceptance, quells his inner doubts by means of external proof \u2013 proof that he derives from shared \u201cobjective\u201d sentiments.<\/p>\n

We have already seen how Jung could be more concerned with eliciting favorable reactions from his audience than refuting the criticisms levelled against his ideas. It remains for us to gauge whether the same is true of Plato. Let us therefore review Plato\u2019s three reasons for keeping the Unwritten Doctrine under wraps.<\/p>\n

According to Plato:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. The doctrine would seem ridiculous to the uninitiated if they heard it without proper preparation.<\/li>\n
  2. The interlocutor would be unable to clarify his understanding by asking questions of the teacher.<\/li>\n
  3. The student must meditate on the teachings for a long time before he stands a chance of grasping them.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    As far as these arguments go, Plato is no doubt correct that a good teacher is vital to the cultivation of the supra-mundane consciousness required to grasp the teachings of the Unwritten Doctrine. Admonitions along these lines are ubiquitous in so-called \u201cmystical\u201d texts from all over the world, all of which stress the importance of devotion to a sound teacher (and conversely warning against false and incompetent ones \u2013 much like what is done in the Seventh Letter<\/em>).<\/p>\n

    However, as already hinted, Plato may also have had a more mundane reason for not divulging the Unwritten Doctrines. We have already established the interpersonal sensitivity (and by extension, vulnerability) of the Extroverted Feeling type. Now add to that the obvious psychological fact that someone who is willing to spend years of his life as an intimate and devoted follower of a master will also be less inclined, psychologically, to criticize and challenge that master once, after years of dedication and study, the master finally reveals the secret ideas to the initiate. It must have been quite convenient for Plato, therefore, as it was for Jung, to divulge his most esoteric and impenetrable ideas only in the company of loyal and intimate followers, while keeping them concealed from the critical gaze of intellectuals at large.<\/p>\n

    These tendencies of Plato\u2019s should very much remind us of Jung, whose initiates also had to undergo such initiatory rites as “one hundred hours of [Jungian] analysis and [obtaining] Jung’s personal permission” before they could read such inner-circle texts as the minutes from the \u2018Seminar Given in 1925.\u2019[12] In fact, as the historian of science Don McGowan has said:<\/p>\n

    \u201cIt is as if Jung had been born with blue filters in his eyes and would only accept a photo as accurate if it had been taken through a blue filter. So he goes one step further and convinces other people to put blue filters in their eyes. Now he and they see the world in the same way, and therefore he will listen to their opinions.\u201d \u2013 Don McGowan: What Is Wrong with Jung?<\/em> (Prometheus Books 1994) p. 62<\/p>\n

    We have asserted that Plato was an Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Feeling type. When he says that disclosing the Unwritten Doctrine would expose it to \u201cunseemly and degrading treatment” (Seventh Letter<\/em> \u00a7344d) and that such writings would not be able to \u201cdefend themselves\u201d (Phaedrus<\/em> \u00a7276c), he indulges in the Feeling type\u2019s general predilection for anthropomorphizing inanimate objects. Extroverted Feeling in particular is especially prone to construe such objects as subjects which have a dignity of their own, which it would be a mark of human boorishness and insensitivity to violate. It is hard to imagine a Thinking type consistently opting not to fight logic with logic, but to fight logic with appeals to propriety and the human companionship and connection.[13] Once again, Jung and Plato resemble each other in making use of this \u2018human element\u2019 over hard logic in the transmission of their teachings. We have already furnished the relevant quotes for Jung. For Plato, Charlies H. Kahn lets us know that:<\/p>\n

    \u00a0\u201c[Plato had a] temperamental aversion to direct statement, reinforced by much reflection on the obstacles to successful communication … [the] ingressive mode of exposition has, I suggest, been chosen by Plato because of his acute sense of the psychological distance that separates his world view from that of his audience …\u201d \u2013 Charles H. Kahn: Plato and the Socratic Dialogue<\/em> (Cambridge University Press 1996) p. 66<\/p>\n

    In conclusion, Plato was firstly more concerned with preserving his cherished mono-perspective (i.e. the Forms) than candidly considering whether his perspective could stand up to the arguments levelled against it. Secondly, Plato sought time and again to engage the affective faculties of both sympathizers and adversaries by appealing to sentiment and custom and to deploy these in a way that would crowd out logic. Thus the question posed at the start of this chapter (i.e. whether the Third Man argument invalidates the Theory of Forms) is never resolved by Plato\u2019s discursive defense. Parmenides<\/em> \u00a7135ab provides at best a post hoc<\/em> defense of the Forms. Akin to Jung\u2019s protean defense of the archetypes, Plato\u2019s rejoinders do not refute the arguments levelled against his position, but merely seek to confirm what Plato had already deemed to be true. As with Jung and the archetypes, Plato\u2019s answer affirms that the conclusion is true, prior to the analysis: That since the Theory of Forms is necessary to the philosophical position that Plato preferred, then it had to<\/em> be true, even if no impartial investigator would ever have determined it to be so.<\/p>\n

    SUPPLEMENT \u2013 EXTROVERTED THINKING AND EXTROVERTED FEELING<\/strong>[14]<\/p>\n

    1<\/strong>
    \nReductionism vs. Expansivity.<\/em> Both Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Thinking and Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Feeling types are introverted perceivers, primarily cognizing the world through Introverted Intuition, a function which in its true expression can be said to be an almost metacognitive mode of perception (if not for the fact that it is unconscious).[15] But where Extroverted Thinking will typically focus on what is being said in a concrete and reductionist fashion (“Does this statement make sense according to my already accepted framework of the world?”) and will speedily return with a statement of either acceptance or protest, Extroverted Feeling is rather attuned to the emotions and motives\u00a0behind<\/em>\u00a0what is being said.[16]<\/p>\n

    When the Extroverted Feeling type finds himself in the role of listener, he is not so much attuned to the descriptive truth of what is being said as he is to how the other person feels, what his values are like, and why he was led to believe the things he believes. In short, Extroverted Feeling primes the subject to go beyond his own subjective affectivities to align himself with the other party’s values and worldview.<\/p>\n

    People who are focused on descriptive truth and who know an Extroverted Feeling type intimately may notice that the Extroverted Feeling type will sometimes contradict themselves \u2013 first appearing sympathetic towards a particular viewpoint with one person, then shifting their sympathies to the opposite viewpoint in the company of another person.[17] This happens not because of a lack of opinion on the part of the Extroverted Feeling type, but because they get so carried away in the course of harmonizing with others that they may not remember to consult their inner reasoned viewpoint and make a point of being faithful to it as they concentrate on mirroring the other person’s emotional state instead.<\/p>\n

    However, it is when an Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Feeling type is not<\/em>\u00a0in a listening mode \u2013 when the mental pursuits of such a type are\u00a0not<\/em>\u00a0curbed by the specific emotional needs of the people around them \u2013 that the true intellectual dispositions of this type may come to the fore. By way of Introverted Intuition, they seek noumenal realities in people, in thought, in ideas, problems, and feelings. Under solitary conditions, their Introverted Intuition can bypass the immediate needs of the people around them, grow wings, and partner with Introverted Thinking\u00a0instead.<\/p>\n

    All Introverted Intuition has a metacognitive aspect where the Introverted Intuitive type wants to find the constitutive archetypes behind emergent phenomena. Because of this cognitive inclination to abstract from the empirical world, Introverted Intuitive types are often regarded as mystical. However, with Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Thinking types, the reductionism and more empirical interests of Extroverted Thinking tend to mitigate this mysticism so as to make this type appear merely visionary. In the case of the Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Feeling type, however, there is no Extroverted Thinking to constrain the cognitive intellections and “mysticism” of Introverted Intuition. An instructive contrast can be seen if we compare Heraclitus to Plato. Here we can do no better than to match Constantine Vamvacas\u2019 characterization of the thought of Heraclitus as being “at once both highly abstract in its generality and extremely concrete in its evocation”[18] with Kant\u2019s depiction of Plato as \u201cthe light dove, in free flight cutting through the air the resistance of which it feels, could get the idea that it could do even better in airless space \u2026 [who]\u00a0abandoned the world of the senses because it posed so many hindrances for the understanding, and dared to go beyond it on the wings of the ideas, in the empty space of pure understanding.\u201d[19]<\/p>\n

    One could say that while the cognition of both Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Feeling and Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Thinking types is informed by the noumenal backdrop that Introverted Intuition so easily provides an entry point to, Introverted Intuition-Extroverted Feeling types tend to be more aware of this backdrop, regarding individual objects and phenomena as nebulously formed out of it, while on the other hand Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Thinking types tend to be less aware of how their cognition is formed by this archetypical repository, having a tendency to focus sharply (too sharply) on individual objects and reifying what they see into something extremely concrete. Again we may remind ourselves of Heraclitus, where the entities that he speaks of are extremely sharply drawn and even the abstract world-principle of the logos<\/em> is reified and spoken of as something tangible, far nearer to us than Plato\u2019s otherworldly Forms.[20]<\/p>\n

    2<\/strong>
    \nBelligerence vs. Silence.<\/em> Both Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Feeling and Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Thinking types can often feel very strongly about their commitment to an intellectual position \u2013 especially if this position happens to be an explanatory mono-perspective of the sort described above. And since the visions of Introverted Intuition are not reasoned, but indeed discerned \u201cas an indissoluble whole\u201d and \u201ca full tide of lofty thoughts and images and words\u201d that the subject has not reasoned himself into piece by piece, but experienced as a complete and seamless psychological necessity, Introverted Intuitive types can often become excessively defensive when faced with focused analytical arguments that do not plot whole against whole or full tide against full tide, but look at singular points of weakness in the whole in isolation.[21] This is exactly what happened with Plato when his critics confronted him with the Third Man Argument. However, a great difference between the Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Feeling and Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Thinking types in this regard is that Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Feeling types will more often respond to such criticisms with withdrawal and a \u201cnoble silence,\u201d whereas Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Thinking types will (as a rule) be more belligerent and eager to confront the opposition, due to the more angular and oppositional nature of the Extroverted Thinking-Introverted Feeling axis when compared to its Extroverted Feeling-Introverted Thinking counterpart. Of course, from Plato\u2019s discursive defense we see that Plato fits the bill of the Extroverted Feeling adaptation much more than that of Extroverted Thinking in his handling and response to the Third Man Argument (and we may add that we find other instances of Plato shunning belligerence and confrontation in favor of an \u201cexalted withdrawal\u201d from worldly affairs in other descriptions of his personality as well).[22] By contrast, if we wanted to furnish an example of the Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Thinking type\u2019s more typical response to challenges threatening their cherished mono-perspective, we could again mention Heraclitus who, in accordance with the typical attitude of his type, was more belligerent, being less afraid of faulting others for not seeing his \u201ctruth.\u201d As a particularly clear instance of this inclination, we might furnish Heraclitus DK B34 which construes those who do not see his truth as deaf and vacuous fools. (Elsewhere we find him likening those who will not see as sleepers and ignoramuses, with Heraclitus presumably being awake and possessing true understanding.)[23] As was said of him already in antiquity, he \u201cblamed the people for being devoid of understanding or thought,\u201d whereas, by contrast, Plato was more inclined to abstain from disparaging others, preferring instead to withdraw into his exalted silence.[24]<\/p>\n

    We might even elevate this difference of belligerence vs. silence to the metaphysical level, where Plato in his philosophy explains the imperfection of the sensible world by reference to the fact that it is removed from the perfect supersensible world (that is, the Forms and the super-entities of the Indefinite Duality and the One), whereas to Heraclitus, the constant flux and change of the world is explained, not so much as being the result of lamentable imperfections, but as the result of constant war and strife, which is in fact the natural state of the world.[25] There is nothing unjust about it, and the tears shed over its supposed brutality are but the dirges of weaker natures, unfit to cope with the transitory nature of the world without recourse to sentimentality and empty, vacuous abstractions, presenting some semblance of that everlasting Being which is but a fiction.[26]<\/p>\n

    In contemporary applications of Jungian typology, Introverted Intuitive-Extroverted Feeling types are often touted as “mystical” because of their aforementioned inclination to meet argument and opposition with ennobling silence and reticence. Yet from our analysis of Plato above, we see that it is not always an awareness of high-minded and numinous insights that underlies these specific behaviors \u2013 it can also be a mode of defense that this type falls back on when formal counterarguments fail. Or a defense against being seen as odd or becoming an object of ridicule \u2013 as is indeed exactly what is confessed in the Second Letter<\/em> \u00a7314ab and the Seventh Letter<\/em> \u00a7344d.<\/p>\n

    ***<\/p>\n

    Image in the article made by artist Georgios Magkakis.<\/em><\/p>\n

    NOTES<\/strong><\/p>\n

    \n

    [1] Mitchell: A Study of Greek Philosophy (S.C. Griggs & Co. 1891) pp. 109-110<\/p>\n

    [2] Jung: Psychological Types \u00a7595<\/p>\n

    [3] Aristotle: Metaphysics \u00a7986b; \u00a71010a, cf. Plato: Theaetetus \u00a7183e<\/p>\n

    [4] Jung says that the intellectual opinions that appeal the most naturally to Extroverted Thinking are often derived from the traditional assessments of the community and the intellectual atmosphere of the Extroverted Thinking type\u2019s time (Jung: Psychological Types \u00a7577). I add that the same is true of Extroverted Feeling.<\/p>\n

    [5] Jung: Psychological Types \u00a7656<\/p>\n

    [6] Jung: Psychological Types \u00a7662<\/p>\n

    [7] Aristotle: Metaphysics \u00a7990b, \u00a71038b-1039a, \u00a71079ab<\/p>\n

    [8] McLynn: Carl Gustav Jung (Black Swan 1997) p. 312<\/p>\n

    [9] Nagy: Philosophical Issues in the Psychology of C. G. Jung (State University of New York Press 1991) p. 31<\/p>\n

    [10] Van der Hoop: Conscious Orientation (Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co. 1939) p.47<\/p>\n

    [11] Van der Hoop: Character and the Unconscious (Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co. 1923) p. 160<\/p>\n

    [12] Noll: The Jung Cult (Free Press 1997) p. 283<\/p>\n

    [13] Jung: Psychological Types \u00a7598<\/p>\n

    [14] The insights in this supplement were developed in cooperation with Jesse Gerroir.<\/p>\n

    [15] Jung: Psychological Types\u00a0\u00a7657<\/p>\n

    [16] Von Franz: Lectures on Jung\u2019s Typology (Spring Publications 1984) pp. 44<\/p>\n

    [17] Von Franz: Lectures on Jung\u2019s Typology (Spring Publications 1984) pp. 43-44<\/p>\n

    [18] Vamvacas: The Founders of Western Thought (Springer 2009) p. 105<\/p>\n

    [19] Kant: Critique of Pure Reason \u00a7A5\/B9<\/p>\n

    [20] The logos<\/em> is also reified as a lightning bolt at DK B64: \u201cThe lightning steers everything.\u201d<\/p>\n

    [21] Popper, quoting Adam: The Open Society and Its Enemies (Routledge 2002) p. 41, cf. Vamvacas: The Founders of Western Thought (Springer 2009) p. 105 and Jung: Nietzsche\u2019s Zarathustra (Princeton University Press 1988) pp. 1082-1083<\/p>\n

    [22] Diogenes Laertius: Lives of Eminent Philosophers \u00a73.1<\/p>\n

    [23] Heraclitus: Fragments DK B1, 21, and 40.<\/p>\n

    [24] Hegel, quoting Proclus: Lectures on the History of Philosophy: Greek Philosophy to Plato (University of Nebraska Press 1995) p. 280<\/p>\n

    [25] Heraclitus: Fragments DK B8, 53 and 80.<\/p>\n

    [26] Heraclitus: Fragment DK B102, cf. Nietzsche: Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks \u00a711<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    By Ryan Smith Now that we have reconstructed the contents of the Unwritten Doctrine and examined the paradox of how the One can be both unconditioned and limited at the same time, it remains for us to examine whether the Unwritten Doctrine actually refutes the Third Man Argument, as it was ostensibly meant to do.[\u2026] Continue Reading<\/i><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7386","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-psychology"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7386","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7386"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7386\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7399,"href":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7386\/revisions\/7399"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idrlabs.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}