Introduction to Philosophy · Grace Podcasts

Plato's Symposium

·23 min·1 clip

Diatima’s ladder of love ends at the eternal form of beauty.

1. Introduction to Philosophy covers Plato’s Symposium, a dinner-party setting in Athens, 416 BC, where guests speak about Eros, the god of love. 2. The hosts and speakers include Agathon, a poet; Socrates, the philosopher; Aristophanes, the comic playwright; and Alcibiades, the Athenian general and politician. 3. The episode asks what love is for by using the Symposium’s chain of speeches, from praise to criticism to Socrates’ account of Diatima. 4. Apollodorus is named as the source, and he heard the story from Aristodemus, a follower of Socrates who attended the party. 5. Phaedrus begins by calling love an ancient force that inspires noble deeds and heroic action. 6. Phaedrus cites Alcestis and Achilles as examples, and he criticizes Homer and Aeschylus using their own words. 7. Phaedrus also says love between women is as worthy of praise as love between men. 8. Pausanias separates love into common love and heavenly love, linked to physical desire and to soul and intellect. 9. Pausanias argues that how you love matters more than who you love. 10. Pausanias connects attitudes toward male love to Greek regions, other cultures, and political systems, including tyrants who feared strong bonds. 11. Arixie Marcus, described as a physician, treats love as a force working through the whole cosmos. 12. Arixie Marcus compares love to medicine and says it restores balance, harmony, physical health, and mental well-being. 13. Aristophanes gives the episode’s mythic account by describing humans as round beings with four arms, four legs, and two faces. 14. Aristophanes says Zeus split those beings in half, which explains why people look for their other half. 15. Agathon presents love as youthful, beautiful, powerful, and the source of art and creation. 16. Agathon also calls love just, temperate, courageous, and wise, which creates the opening for Socrates’ challenge. 17. Socrates asks Agathon pointed questions about whether love can desire beauty if it lacks beauty itself. 18. Socrates says Diatima taught him that love is not a god but a demon, a spirit between mortals and gods. 19. The tone shifts from formal speeches to a chaotic party when Alcibiades arrives drunk with a flute girl and the revelers burst in. 20. The episode stays conversational and explanatory throughout, and it suits listeners who want a guided reading of Plato’s Symposium but may lose listeners looking for a fast plot.

As heard by us

A dinner-party debate that turns love into a philosophical problem.

Plato's Symposium plays like a dinner-party debate in Athens. Agathon hosts after winning a tragedy competition, and the guests each take a turn praising Eros. The setup keeps a famously dense work conversational, so it stays easier to follow than a straight lecture.

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Hear love argued over at an Athenian dinner party of philosophers.

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