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platonismmore about platonism

platonism


  2  definitions  found 
 
  From  Webster's  Revised  Unabridged  Dictionary  (1913)  [web1913]: 
 
  Platonism  \Pla"to*nism\,  n.  [Cf.  F.  Platonisme.] 
  1.  The  doctrines  or  philosophy  by  Plato  or  of  his  followers. 
 
  Note:  Plato  believed  God  to  be  an  infinitely  wise,  just  and 
  powerful  Spirit;  and  also  that  he  formed  the  visible 
  universe  out  of  pre["e]xistent  amorphous  matter, 
  according  to  perfect  patterns  of  ideas  eternally 
  existent  in  his  own  mind.  Philosophy  he  considered  as 
  being  a  knowledge  of  the  true  nature  of  things  as 
  discoverable  in  those  eternal  ideas  after  which  all 
  things  were  fashioned.  In  other  words  it  is  the 
  knowledge  of  what  is  eternal,  exists  necessarily,  and 
  is  unchangeable;  not  of  the  temporary,  the  dependent, 
  and  changeable;  and  of  course  it  is  not  obtained 
  through  the  senses  neither  is  it  the  product  of  the 
  understanding,  which  concerns  itself  only  with  the 
  variable  and  transitory;  nor  is  it  the  result  of 
  experience  and  observation;  but  it  is  the  product  of 
  our  reason,  which  as  partaking  of  the  divine  nature, 
  has  innate  ideas  resembling  the  eternal  ideas  of  God. 
  By  contemplating  these  innate  ideas,  reasoning  about 
  them  and  comparing  them  with  their  copies  in  the 
  visible  universe,  reason  can  attain  that  true  knowledge 
  of  things  which  is  called  philosophy.  Plato's  professed 
  followers,  the  Academics,  and  the  New  Platonists, 
  differed  considerably  from  him  yet  are  called 
  Platonists.  --Murdock. 
 
  2.  An  elevated  rational  and  ethical  conception  of  the  laws 
  and  forces  of  the  universe;  sometimes  imaginative  or 
  fantastic  philosophical  notions. 
 
  From  WordNet  r  1.6  [wn]: 
 
  Platonism 
  n  :  the  philosophical  doctrine  that  abstract  concepts  exist 
  independent  of  their  names  [syn:  {Platonism},  {realism}] 




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