I love Plato, Lorraine! I remember you from the Cube thread. Philosophess. From a Platonic point of view, there is nothing higher to seek in a human than the philosophic element.
For Plato, government was an art and science. It was a recognition of the demand that the state be ruled by the highest available intelligence.
Plato regarded law as both a genetic and teleologic process whose primary function as an art is to correct the inequalities in the relationship between society and its environment. Stated precisely, the precise end of law is the achievement of group unity, which cannot be obtained if minority groups are disregarded or by legislating for single classes. (Republic 423B, 463CD, 466A). This is the philosophic or highest view, and it leads to the position that if the function of law as the interest of the entire community is observed faithfully, in the end it will yield an understanding of the ideal laws in the world of forms which then may be utilized as models.
The legislator, of course, through Reason alone is able to formulate a set of rules which will be adequate for the needs of the community. For Plato, the legislator is the philosopher in action. He or She is the one who has seen the reality of the just, the beautiful, and the good.
You see some elements of Platonism in Bill Clinton? |
