Why is Plato wrong about ideal forms? And is there anything that Plato said that is valuble to Christian philosophy?

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The following is from Wikipedia.

According to Plato, Socrates postulated a world of ideal Forms, which he admitted were impossible to know. Nevertheless, he formulated a very specific description of that world, which did not match his metaphysical principles. Corresponding to the world of Forms is our world, that of the shadows, an imitation of the real one.[23] Just as shadows exist only because of the light of a fire, our world exists as, “the offspring of the good”.[24] Our world is modeled after the patterns of the Forms. The function of humans in our world is therefore to imitate the ideal world as much as possible which, importantly, includes imitating the good, i.e. acting morally.

## Evidence of Forms

Plato’s main evidence for the existence of Forms is intuitive only and is as follows.

### Human perception

We call both the sky and blue jeans by the same color, blue. However, clearly a pair of jeans and the sky are not the same color; moreover, the wavelengths of light reflected by the sky at every location and all the millions of blue jeans in every state of fading constantly change, and yet we somehow have a consensus of the basic form Blueness as it applies to them. Says Plato:[35][36]

> But if the very nature of knowledge changes, at the time when the change occurs there will be no knowledge, and, according to this view, there will be no one to know and nothing to be known: but if that which knows and that which is known exist ever, and the beautiful and the good and every other thing also exist, then I do not think that they can resemble a process of flux, as we were just now supposing.

Plato believed that long before our bodies ever existed, our souls existed and inhabited heaven, where they became directly acquainted with the forms themselves. Real knowledge, to him, was knowledge of the forms. But knowledge of the forms cannot be gained through sensory experience because the forms are not in the physical world. Therefore, our real knowledge of the forms must be the memory of our initial acquaintance with the forms in heaven. Therefore, what we seem to learn is in fact just remembering.[37]

 
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Aristotle did not believe Plato was wrong about the ideal forms as the formal cause of things except that Plato located the ideas or forms in a separate world of existence apart from the material things that participate in the ideas or forms. For Aristotle, the ideas or forms are a substantial formal cause of material substances united to formless matter and which informs it or which is the form and act of matter. Both form and matter are real features and substantial parts of individual horses, dogs, cats, etc. that we see in the world. The union of the idea or form with matter comprises the substance which primarily has being because neither the form or the matter have being by themselves. The ideal form is the substantial form of material substances and is the formal cause why a thing is what it is such as a dog or horse. What a thing is or the kind or species of thing it is, is derived from the form which is the form and act of matter.
So, Aristotle located Plato’s ideas or forms not apart from material things as Plato did but as the form of material things.

The forms in matter are derived from the master forms or ideas in the divine intellect. St Augustine placed the separate immaterial world of ideas of Plato in the divine mind. The scholastic theologians followed as well as adhered to Aristotle’s hylemorphism.
 
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Richca said:
The forms in matter are derived from the master forms or ideas in the divine intellect. St Augustine placed the separate immaterial world of ideas of Plato in the divine mind.
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Yes i agree with this (and the rest of what you said to the extent of my understanding). I think Plato thought that the ideal forms in which we participate as imperfect representations was existing by themselves without cause. But Augustine puts these ideal forms or master forms in the mind of God instead. am i right?
 
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Well, I’m pretty sure Plato placed the immaterial ideas in a hierarchical manner with absolute being and absolute good I think at the top of the hierarchy or one or the other. Absolute beauty was up there too. I believe he thought (though I’m not entirely sure at the moment) that the lower ideas such as man, horse, or tree were all derived or caused from the more universal ideas such as absolute being or absolute good which these two he may have united together as the divinity or God. I’d have to go back and reread some of his stuff or what I have from various authors concerning Plato and the history of philosophy.
 
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Richca said:
Well, I’m pretty sure Plato placed the immaterial ideas in a hierarchical manner with absolute being and absolute good I think at the top of the hierarchy or one or the other. Absolute beauty was up there too. I believe he thought that the lower ideas such as man, horse, or tree were all derived or caused from the more universal ideas such as absolute being or absolute good which these two he may have united together as the divinity or God.
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The text in the OP suggests that Plato arrived at his idea of Ideal forms intuitively. What do you think that exactly means in the context of philosophy and did Plato or anyone else devise a systematic approach that would be considered a “proof”. From what i read, he seems to argue for example that there is an idea of a horse that all horses share to varying degrees, and i suppose that if this ideal form did not exist in some way then it would not make sense that there is a horseness that all horses share to a limited degree; which implies an absolute or master form of a horse. which is kind of similar to something Aquinas said.
 
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IWantGod said:
We call both the sky and blue jeans by the same color, blue.
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Thats a poor summary of his position. Substantial form (as opposed to accidental form, might be a better starter.
IWantGod said:
Plato believed that long before our bodies ever existed, our souls existed and inhabited heaven,
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That was simply the cosmology of the time - Aristotle believed this also…yet somehow Aquinas convinced Christians that Aristotle mea nt the soul was immortal only after death but not before birth!

No do we really know what “immortal” (you use the word heaven) meant in this context.
It certainly doesnt mean what we Christians mean by that word today.

May I suggest that trying to understand Plato via an English translation and without understanding what his own followers understood him to be saying in subsequent centuries is probably an exercise in mental frustration.

Plato was adopted by the early Church because he seemed to lend authorative secular support (read “science”) for Christian belief in the afterlife.

He was eventually rejected by C12 in favor of Aristotle.
The main reason being that Plato’s principle inevitably lead to a downplaying of the role of the material/bodily aspects of true Christianity leading to Manicheanism/Gnosticism/Albigensianism/Catharism. All these heresies have a spirituality in common that in various ways sees earthly life as somehow inimical to a truly spiritual life which tends to be about escaping the prision of the body to some other pure world where there is no concupiscence or materiality.
Christian mysticism still suffers from that Platonic tendancy today.
 
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IWantGod said:
The text in the OP suggests that Plato arrived at his idea of Ideal forms intuitively. What do you think that exactly means in the context of philosophy and did Plato or anyone else devise a systematic approach that would be considered a “proof”. From what i read, he seems to argue for example that there is an idea of a horse that all horses share to varying degrees, which is kind of similar to something Aquinas said.
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Intuitively means by introspection or examination of our own thoughts. We certainly have universal ideas and concepts of things such as humanity, man, tree, triangles. But we cannot imagine universal ideas such as form a picture of them in our imagination. We can only imagine particular trees for example. So Plato realized that matter individualizes things. Every tree we see outside our mind in the world around us is an individual tree made out of matter. There is no universal material tree that we can point too existing outside our mind nor can we form a picture of such in our imagination. Try it! LOL. So the universal concept ‘tree’ which applies to all trees is or must be immaterial. This is where philosophy and metaphysics starts to get more difficult to grasp because we are so used to using our senses which we can’t help doing actually. But it was Plato or Socrates who distinguished between sense and intellect which Aquinas often remarks about. Although there was one pre-Socratic philosopher possibly Anaximander who made this distinction somewhat. Aquinas explains in various places about this introspection of our own thoughts better than what I’m doing here and about the immaterial universal idea and the particular material ideas. Edward Feser offers some pretty good examples as well to better grasp what is going on here. I’m kind of just touching upon the idea rudimentary as it were.
 
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Richca said:
There is no universal material tree. So the universal concept ‘tree’ which applies to all trees is or must be immaterial.
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So basically one could use this as an argument for the immateriality of the intellect?
 
Richca said:
Yes, that is what is done.
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What would you say to those who would make a distinction that it is the thought that is immaterial and not the intellect? This is just one possible argument a materialist might make off the top of my head.
 
Just off the top of my head. The thought is produced by the intellect. We give the name intellect to the power which produces the immaterial thought. It doesn’t make much sense that a particular material thing is going to produce a universal immaterial idea. Every effect is like its cause in some way. And a cause cannot give to its effect what it itself doesn’t possess and no effect is greater than its cause.
 
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Richca said:
Just off the top of my head. The thought is produced by the intellect. We give the name intellect to the power which produces the immaterial thought. It doesn’t make much sense that a particular material thing is going to produce a universal immaterial idea. Every effect is like its cause in some way. And a cause cannot give to its effect what it itself doesn’t possess.
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True. And one could also argue, as stated by you, that the universal idea does not exist as a material form, and so the intellect must be immaterial because a material form cannot be or produce a universal form. That is to say that a material form can only be one particular material embodiment of the same form and not a universal form? Is that right?
 
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IWantGod said:
True. And one could also argue, as stated by you, that the universal idea does not exist in matter, and so the intellect must be immaterial because matter cannot produce a universal idea. Is that right?
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This is true and we would be proceeding in the right direction. At the same time, you might notice that we are proceeding in somewhat difficult ‘terrain’ or ideas that may be difficult to grasp unless someone has the intellect of a Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, or Aquinas which I definitely can’t say I do. As Aquinas says, metaphysics is the most difficult science to learn as it involves the greatest abstraction from matter such as the concept of God, the first cause of all things and the investigation of being as being which is the most universal concept we have. But, we do have universal concepts which most people probably never ask themselves what exactly is a universal concept and why do we have them? It was philosophers like Plato and Aristotle who critically examined these concepts as they exist in our intellects. The topic of your OP here is very interesting and very crucial to understanding Plato, Aristotle, and Thomistic philosophy and metaphysics.
 
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Richca said:
But, we do have universal concepts which most people probably never ask themselves what exactly is a universal concept and why do we have them?
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Yes, i think understanding this concept is key. And i to some extent grasp it, but it is difficult, if not discouraging.
 
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I think it all makes sense though in that God is a pure spirit and his knowledge and his being is immaterial in the highest possible degree. He created the world and us according to his knowledge and wisdom. He is the source of all knowledge. So I think it only makes sense that immateriality may pervade everything in a sense. In fact, the forms of Plato and Aristotle, both substantial and accidental, are immaterial in themselves and all knowledge is through the form. Knowledge itself is immaterial and the more something is separated from matter the more knowable it is in itself. So, God who is supremely immaterial is supremely knowable in himself. However, God’s infinite being blinds the power of every created intellect as the sun does to the eyes of an owl.

Actually, it is not necessary to perfectly understand philosophically the immateriality of the soul. We know with 100% certainty that our soul is immaterial and spiritual through the teaching of the Church and divine revelation. Beginning with the certitude of faith as guide, we can work out the philosophical matters. The philosophy behind the immateriality and spirituality of our soul, I find very interesting and it is very useful for evangelizing. But, its not like my limited philosophical understanding of the nature of our soul is a determining factor in what I believe about our soul. I simply believe with the certainty of God revealing, regardless of what I might philosophically understand about the nature of our souls, what the Church teaches about it as this is based on divine revelation and guided by the Holy Spirit. I mean, we don’t see our souls and since we are so accustomed to living in the senses, intellection and philosophical abstraction we find more difficult to think about although just by thinking we are using our intellects though we take no notice of it. In fact, we are constantly using our intellect and will all day long. If you get discouraged philosophically, maybe encourage yourself with the light of faith. Ultimately, faith, hope, and love are our guides here on earth as wayfarers in our journey to God and heaven. St John of the Cross teaches that faith is to the intellect what darkness is to the sight. Faith is the sure, secure, and certain ‘blindman’s guide’ in our journey to union with God here on earth.
 
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Richca said:
Actually, it is not necessary to perfectly understand philosophically the immateriality of the soul. We know with 100% certainty that our soul is immaterial and spiritual through the teaching of the Church and divine revelation. Beginning with the certitude of faith as guide, we can work out the philosophical matters. The philosophy behind the immateriality and spirituality of our soul, I find very interesting and it is very useful for evangelizing. But, its not like my limited philosophical understanding of the nature of our soul is a determining factor in what I believe about our soul. I simply believe with the certainty of God revealing, regardless of what I might philosophically understand about the nature of our souls, what the Church teaches about it as this is based on divine revelation and guided by the Holy Spirit. I mean, we don’t see our souls and since we are so accustomed to living in the senses, intellection and philosophical abstraction we find more difficult to think about although just by thinking we are using our intellects though we take no notice of it. In fact, we are constantly using our intellect and will all day long. If you get discouraged philosophically, maybe encourage yourself with the light of faith.
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True, what we hold by faith induces the kind of knowledge that does not require philosophy as such. But still i am compelled to know, which is the only reason i have reached the level of understanding i have now.
 
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