The IPS is pleased to announce that Prof. Livio Rossetti will be appointed Honorary Citizen of Bevagna (where the IPS was founded in 1989) on May 18th, 2024. The distinction will be bestowed on him during a special session of the municipal council and will be followed by a public speech by Prof. Rossetti himself. The event will be broadcast live on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100051040046981&sk=videos.
We are pleased to inform you of the publication of the following book on the Timaeus: Ordre et désordre dans l’univers Une étude sur l’expérience de pensée du Timée Series: Brill's Plato Studies Series, Volume: 16 Author: Luca Pitteloud Ce livre propose une nouvelle interprétation du Timée de Platon dans laquelle le mythe cosmologique est identifié à une expérience de pensée. Le discours de Timée nous demande ce que nous ferions si nous étions un artisan divin chargé de façonner l'univers en conférant de l'ordre à un milieu chaotique. Après avoir adopté trois critères à satisfaire pour appartenir à la catégorie de l’expérience de pensée (1 : contrefactualité ; 2 : nécessité de la production d’images ; 3 : progrès cognitif), il est défendu que le discours de Timée contient à la fois une séquence d'arguments déductifs et la possibilité de combiner ces arguments en différents modèles mentaux de l'univers. [...]
Call for papers XIV Symposium Platonicum Plato’s Theaetetus Madrid, May 5th-9th (in person) May 19th-21st (online) 2025 The International Plato Society organizes a symposium on a single Platonic dialogue every three years. We are pleased to announce the Call for Papers for the XIV Symposium Platonicum: Plato’s Theaetetus. The Symposium will take place in two separate modalities: In Person: May 5–9, 2025, at the Facultad de Filosofía (Universidad Complutense de Madrid) and Online: May 19-21, 2025, from the Facultad de Humanidades (Universidad Carlos III, Madrid). Presentation length: As we want to encourage discussion, speakers will be given double time on this occasion. Papers should be suitable for 40-minute presentations (suggestion: 20 minutes of reading plus 20 minutes of discussion). Authors may be asked to expand their papers to be presented at one of the 1- hour plenary sessions. Abstracts We welcome abstracts from all IPS members, full and associate. If you [...]
The IPS is pleased to announce that the Mid-Term Meeting for the period 2022-2025 will be split into two parts, on close themes, and will be organized by two different teams: Part I will be held in Japan on the occasion of the 4th Asia Regional Meeting, on "Plato and the Gods", 11-13 September 2024, Nagoya University (see attached announcement and call for papers here). Part II will be held in Italy on "Asebeia, Eusebeia. Plato on impiety, piety and religion, 15-17 January 2025, Milan, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore. This meeting will take place both in person and online. Presentations and discussion will be in all languages officially accepted by the IPS (English, German, French, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese). The Call for Papers and details will be published in May 2024.
Dear friends, It's a pleasure to announce the publication of this book by Gerard Naddaf with Louis-André Dorion, Making Sense of Myth: Conversations with Luc Brisson, with McGill-Queen’s University Press. https://www.mqup.ca/making-sense-of-myth-products-9780228020714.php
It was with great sadness that we learned of the passing of Anne Gabrièle Wersinger in January 2024. A. G. Wersinger studied literature and philosophy (in preparatory classes and at the Université de Strasbourg), was awarded first place in the Agrégation de philosophie (1979), and taught in secondary schools (1979-1994), before becoming a lecturer at the Université Paris 1 from 1994 to 2006, and then full Professor at the Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne and a member of the Centre Jean Pépin, CNRS. Always on the lookout for the subtleties of the text, A. G. Wersinger’s research has explored the full complexity of the Platonic dialogues, paying attention to the variety of ways in which dialectical operations were carried out in the dialogues. In her dissertation, L’usage des amphibologies dans les dialogues de Platon: essai sur l'interprétation pré-philosophique de la différence, defended under the supervision of Pierre Aubenque in 1992, [...]
According to a middle Platonist, Alcinous, the aim of life is to become as godlike as possible, a theme that Plato addresses in various ways. Indeed, in Republic X, it is said that those who live a life of justice become like god as far as possible for a human being. Famously, in the Theaetetus, Plato argues that to escape from earth is to become like god so far as possible, and this likeness is to be just and pious with wisdom. The concept of godlikeness appears to be intricately connected not just to Plato's ethics, but also to his epistemological views. In Republic VI, philosophers are depicted as gazing upon and imitating the Forms, thus attaining a divine state. Similarly, in the Phaedrus, the philosopher's soul is portrayed as following the divine circular motions, beholding the Forms. Do these descriptions represent various approaches to explaining the same philosophical concept, [...]
Giovanni Casertano was a founding member of the IPS, was born in Santa Maria Capua Vetere on 6 March 1941. A pupil of Giuseppe Martano, the first holder of the History of Ancient Philosophy chair at the University of Naples, he was full professor of History of Ancient Philosophy at the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Naples from 1980 to 2009. A member of the College of Honorary Citizens of the ancient city of Elea and Doctor honoris causa at the University of Brasilia, a refined scholar of the pre-Socratics, the Sophists and, above all, of his beloved Plato, he taught generations of students to think katà philosophian. With Gabriele Giannantoni, Mario Vegetti and Giovanni Cerri, as well as with many other scholars, both Italian and foreign, now deceased, he collaborated in the construction of the best international philosophical historiography on antiquity. Among his many important books, we [...]
In memoriam Maurizio Migliori (1943-2023) Maurizio Migliori, was born in 1943 and graduated from the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan with Giovanni Reale. He taught History of Ancient Philosophy, first as an associate Professor from 1991 to 2000 and then as a full professor from 2000 to 2015 at the University of Macerata, where he animated a highly participative teaching activity and research activity focused especially on Plato and Aristotle, which generated a remarkable flowering of qualified studies. He himself was an influential member of the International Plato Society and vice-president of the Italian Society for the History of Philosophy. Among his numerous publications, we would like to mention the seminal work entitled Il disordine ordinato. La filosofia dialettica di Platone (Plato's Dialectical Philosophy), Morcelliana, Brescia 2013, divided into two volumes: Dialectics, Metaphysics and Cosmology and From the Soul to Ethical and Political Praxis. Valuable, among other things, is his [...]
“Eines Morgens wachst Du nicht mehr auf, die Vögel aber singen, wie sie gestern sangen. Nichts ändert diesen Tageslauf. Nur Du bist fortgegangen, Du bist nun frei und unsere Tränen wünschen Dir Glück“ "One morning you will no longer wake up, but the birds will sing as they sang yesterday. Nothing changes this course of the day. Only you have gone away, you are now free and our tears wish you happiness“ With these heartfelt words the Szlezák family announces the departure of Thomas Alexander Szlezák on 18 October, after a brief but difficult illness. He was not only a co-founder but also an active member of the IPS, both on the Executive Committee and the Editorial Board. His publications include first and foremost his edition and commentary on the Pseudo Archytas über die Kategorien (1972). His Habilitationschrift was on Platon und Aristoteles in der Nuslehre Plotins(1979). Together with K. [...]