“Forming the Soul: Plato and his Opponents”
20~22 April 2018, Taipei
The 2nd Asia Regional Meeting of the International Plato Society
International Conference
The International Conference “Forming the Soul: Plato and his Opponents” was held from 20th to 22nd April 2018 in Chinese Culture University, Taipei, Taiwan. The conference was endorsed by the International Plato Society as a Regional Meeting, and supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) and Chinese Culture University in Taiwan. The conference received warm helps from international friends, including our Korean and Japanese IPS members, and local backing from the colleagues and students in the Department of Philosophy of Chinese Culture University, and other Taiwanese scholars who were doing ancient philosophy and history, and those who specialized in other fields but were friendly and helping to this Platonic event. The conference was the first formal academic activity of the International Plato Society taking place in Taiwan (and in the Chinese-speaking world). The event was successful. We appreciate all these kind supports.
The conference was the second Asia Regional Meeting of the International Plato Society. The first Asia Regional Meeting took place in Yokohama in 2014, with the theme “Plato and Rhetoric.” One must study the nature of the soul in order to practice true rhetoric, as Plato reveals in the Phaedrus. Following the line of thinking, we moved from rhetoric to the soul (ψυχή) and decided the theme for the conference as “Forming the Soul: Plato and his Opponents.” We issued our call-for-papers in September 2017 and invited proposals for papers on the form(s) of the soul or the ways of forming the soul, either in Plato or in his opponents, such as Isocrates and Aristotle, expecting to develop rich discussions on Plato’s psychology (moral or cognitive), including effects of educational or political influences on the soul, and the epistemic or aesthetic capacities of the soul, as well as relevant criticisms from other Greek thinkers.
As the same as in the meeting in Yokohama, our idea is to create more opportunities for the scholars in the field of Plato and Greek Philosophy in the East to develop international collaborations inside and outside Asia, by a comparatively smaller but more intimate conference. We received an ideal number of abstract submissions. The Organizing Committee selected twenty four papers among them, in addition to three invited speeches given by two “western” scholars, Professors Debra Nails (Michigan State University) and Nickolas Pappas (City College and Graduate Center, CUNY), and one Asian scholar, Professor Noburu Notomi (Tokyo University). Twenty seven papers in total were expected to be read in the conference. However, due to various reasons, four of them pitifully withdrew, including one from Africa, one America, one Europe and one Asia. Eventually, there were twenty three papers in total read in the conference.
The speakers were from Australia, Brazil, France, Germany, Japan, Korea, USA and Taiwan (according to their academic affiliations). Sixty-six people attended the conference including local scholars and students. We were glad to have a few papers contributed by scholars from outside Asia. This helped in forming a truly international communication. On the other hand, most but not all papers were submitted by Asian scholars. Two scholars affiliated to German universities were oversea Asian scholars who were from China and Japan respectively. One of the two contributors from France was a young female Taiwanese. The phenomenon showed that the Asia Regional Meeting did provide more opportunities for Asian scholars, and had its effect of encouraging them to participate in the events of the International Plato Society.
The conference started on the Friday afternoon on the 20th April 2018, and lasted for three days. The three invited speeches were arranged into the late afternoon on each day. On the first day, it was the speech given by Professor Debra Nails, “Forms and the Psyche.” She interpreted the theme of the conference by exploring the “twin pillars of Platonism,” the Forms and the Psyche, in Plato, Aristotle and Platonism. On the second day, it was the speech given by Professor Nickolas Pappas, “What Becomes of a Soul: Hope for a Philosophical City in the Myth of Er.” We arranged the papers concerning art, emotions, learning process and the bodily engagement of the soul in the earlier sessions of the same day, to be highlighted by his investigation into the interrelated aesthetic, political and educational aspects in Plato’s story on the soul. The speech by Professor Noburu Notomi “Why Soul Matters: Reconsidering the Philosophical Contexts of Plato’s On Soul” was given on the third day, when two papers on the Phaedo were read in that morning. He revealed the tradition of the studies on the soul in antiquity which Plato’s Phaedo led, and gave the participants a closing lecture which led to the expectation for the continuous studies in the future.
The complete program is attached below:
2018/4/20 Friday
1:30-2:00 Registration
2:00-3:00 Cultural Event : Visiting Hwa-kang Museum (located in the same building where we will have the conference. Its collection ranges from ceramics of ancient China to objects of Taiwan indigenous peoples including a tatala boat.)
3:10-4:10 Parallel session
1A. [metaphysics & epistemology] Chair: Fei-ting Chen
Liliana Carolina Sánchez Castro (University of São Paulo), The Aristotelian Criticism to the Conception of the Soul as a Self-Mover
Teng He (Bonn University), Soul as a Harmony? — A Reflex on Aristotle’s Comment on Timaeus 35a-37c
1B. [ethics & politics] Chair: Chun-Liong Ng
Jong Hwan Lee (University of Seoul), Saving Callicles in the Gorgias
Sungwoo Park (Seoul National University), Politics of Soul-Care in Plato’s Alcibiades
4:10-4:30 Break
4:30-5:20 Invited speech 1 Chair: Yuji Kurihara : Debra Nails (Michigan State University) : Forms and the Psyche
5:20-6:20 Report by Yuji Kurihara (Representative for Asia, Australia, and Africa of the IPS) & Welcome coffee-tea party
2018/4/21 Saturday
10:00-10:30 I. [art and emotions 1] Chair: Feng-wei Wu : Mai Oki-Suga (University of Tübingen), Forming the Soul with Mousiké: How Can We Be Free from Stásis?
10:30-10:40 Break
10:40-11:40 II. [art and emotions 2] Chair: Chih-Sheng Yang
Makoto Sekimura (Hiroshima City University), Lexis and Formation of the Soul in Plato’s Republic
André Rehbinder (EDITTA, Paris-Sorbonne University), The Pain of the Enamoured Soul in the Palinode of Plato’s Phaedrus
11:40-1:00 Lunch
1:00-2:00 Parallel session
2A. [soul’s process of learning 1] Chair: C. Lynne Hong
I-Kai Jeng (National Taiwan University), On the Unity of Courage and Modesty in the Theaetetus
Ikko Tanaka (J. F. Oberlin University), On the Assimilation to the Forms in Plato’s Republic 6
2B. [the soul with the body 1] Chair: Satoshi Ogihara
Akira Kawashima (Tohoku University), Tripartite Psychology in Plato’s Republic
Yu-Jung Sun (University of Paris Pantheon-Sorbonne), The Myth of Incarnation in Plato’s Phaedrus: A Partitioned and Disincarnated Soul
2:00-2:10 Break
2:10-3:40 Parallel session
3A. [soul’s process of learning 2] Chair: Chia-Lin Hsu
Sheng-Yu Peng (Taiwan Baptist Christian Seminary), Dialectic of Love and Beauty in the Ever-Moving Soul: An Epistemological and Ethical Survey in Plato’s Phaedrus
Yoon Cheol Lee (Seoul National University), The Sophist for Soul in Plato
Yip-Mei Loh (Chung Yuan Christian University), The Dialectical Development between Self-Knowledge and Self-Ignorance in Plato’s Dialogues
3B. [the soul with the body 2] Chair: Zhi-hue Wang
Lee M. J. Coulson (University of Sydney), The Dyadic Ontology for Platonic Souls: A Way to Transcend Space and Time
Hoyoung Yang (Seoul National University), Bridging the Gap between the Intelligible and the Perceptible
3:40-4:00 Break
4:00-4:50 Invited speech 2 Chair: Yahei Kanayama : Nickolas Pappas (City College and Graduate Center, CUNY) : What Becomes of a Soul: Hope for a Philosophical City in the Myth of Er
2018/4/22 Sunday
9:30-10:30 III. [soul and the forms] Chair: Hua-kuei Ho :
Suzanne Obdrzalek (Claremont McKenna College), Knowledge as Assimilation in Plato’s Phaedo
Van Tu (University of Michigan), The Deathless, Imperishable, and Formless Soul: Phaedo 102a10-107b10
10:30-10:40 Break
10:40-11:40 IV. [forming the philosopher’s soul] Chair: Hsei-Yung Hsu
Satoshi Ogihara (Tohoku University), Education-related Compulsion in Plato’s Republic
Heon Kim (Seoul National University), Psukhagōgia and Epimeleia tēs Psukhēs between Plato and Isocrates
11:40-1:00 Lunch
1:00-1:50 Invited speech 3 Chair: Sung-Hoon Kang : Noburu Notomi (Tokyo University; IPS ex-president) : Why Soul Matters: Reconsidering the Philosophical Contexts of Plato’s On Soul
1:50-2:20 Report by Sung-Hoon Kang (speaking for the next Asia Regional Meeting in Seoul) & Farewell
We established a website for the conference where one may find relevant information and the album which catches the delightful moments during the conference– https://sites.google.com/view/ips-asia-2018/
The Organizing Committee of the conference consisted of the following IPS members from three different countries: Hua-kuei Ho (Chinese Culture University, Taiwan), Sung-Hoon Kang (Seoul National University, Korea), Yuji Kurihara (Tokyo Metropolitan University, Japan), Chun-Liong Ng (National Chung Cheng University, Taiwan), Satsuki Tasaka (Rissho University, Japan). Professor Yuji Kurihara, as the Representative for Asia, Australia, and Africa of the IPS, provided priceless support since we proposed the idea of the 2nd Asia Meeting in the Assembly in Brasília in 2016, to the final minutes of the event in April 2018, and even after. Our colleagues in Seoul had been planning for a regional meeting, but decided to assist us to have the meeting in Taipei this time with the respectable spirit of cooperation. We believe that the study of Plato and Greek Philosophy is and will continue to be developing well in Asia. On this ground, we are all supporting our Korean colleagues to plan for the 3rd Asia Regional Meeting in the next interval of the Symposia Platonicum.
Hua-kuei Ho (Chinese Culture University, Taiwan)
