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Theory of Forms
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Plato
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Plato's theory of Forms or theory of Ideas[1][2][3] asserts that non-material abstract (but substantial) forms (or ideas), and not the material world of change known to us through sensation, possess the highest and most fundamental kind of reality.[4] When used in this sense, the word form is often capitalized.[5] Plato says that these Forms are the only true objects of study that can provide us with genuine knowledge. [6] Plato spoke of Forms in formulating his solution to the problem of universals.
Forms
Terminology: the Forms and the forms
The English word "form" may be used to translate two distinct concepts with which Plato was concerned—the outward "form" or appearance of something , and "Form" in a new, technical sense, apparently invented by Plato. These are often distinguished by the use of uncapitalized "form" and capitalized "Form," respectively. In the following summary passage, the two concepts are related to each other:[7]
Suppose a person were to make all kinds of figures of gold...—somebody points to one of them and asks what it is. By far the safest and truest answer is [to say] that it is gold; and not to call the triangle or any other figures which are formed in the gold "these" as though they had existence; and the same argument applies to the universal nature which receives all bodies —that must always be called the same; for, while receiving all things, she never departs at all from her own nature, and never...assumes a form like that of any of the things which enter into her; ... But the forms which enter into and go out of her are the likenesses of real existences modelled after their patterns in a wonderful and inexplicable manner....
The forms that we see, according to Plato, are not real, but literally mimic the real Forms. In the allegory of the cave expressed in Republic, the things we ordinarily perceive in the world are characterized as shadows of the real things, which we do not perceive directly. That which the observer understands when he views the world mimics the archetypes of the many types and properties (that is, of universals) of things we see all around us.
What are the Forms?
The Greek concept of form precedes the attested language and is represented by a number of words mainly having to do with vision: the sight or appearance of a thing. The main words, εἶδος (eidos) and ἰδέα (idea)[8] come from the Indo-European root *weid-, "see".[9] Both words are in the works of Homer, the earliest Greek literature. Equally ancient is μορφή (morphē), "shape", from an obscure root. The φαινόμενα (phainomena), "appearances", from φαίνω (phainō), "shine", Indo-European *bhā-,[10] was a synonym.
These meanings remained the same over the centuries until the beginning of philosophy, when they became equivocal, acquiring additional specialized philosophic meanings. The pre-Socratic philosophers, starting with Thales, noted that appearances change quite a bit and began to ask what the thing changing "really" is. The answer was substance, which stands under the changes and is the actually existing thing being seen. The status of appearances now came into question. What is the form really and how is that related to substance?
Thus the theory of matter and form (today's hylomorphism) was born. Starting with at least Plato and possibly germinal in some of the presocratics the forms were considered "in" something else, which Plato called nature (phusis). The latter seemed as a "mother" (matter from mater)[11] of substances by receiving (or losing) forms.
But what were the forms? In Plato as well as in general speech there is a form for every object or quality in reality: forms of dogs, human beings, mountains, colors, courage, love, and goodness. Form answers the question "what is that?" Plato was going a step further and asking what Form itself is. He supposed that the object was essentially or "really" the Form and that the phenomena were mere shadows mimicking the Form; that is, momentary portrayals of the Form under different circumstances. The problem of universals - how can one thing in general be many things in particular - was solved by presuming that Form was a distinct singular thing but caused plural representations of itself in particular objects.[12] Matter was considered particular in itself.
These Forms are the essences of various objects: they are that without which a thing would not be the kind of thing it is. For example, there are countless tables in the world but the Form of tableness is at the core; it is the essence of all of them.[13] Plato held that the world of Forms is separate from our own world (the world of substances) and also is the true basis of reality. Removed from matter, Forms are the most pure of all things. Furthermore, Plato believed that true knowledge/intelligence is the ability to grasp the world of Forms with one's mind.[14]
A Form is aspatial (outside the world) and atemporal (outside time). Atemporal means that it does not exist within any time period. It did not start, there is no duration in time, and it will not end. It is neither eternal in the sense of existing forever or mortal, of limited duration. It exists outside time altogether.[15] Forms are aspatial in that they have no spatial dimensions, and thus no orientation in space, nor do they even (like the point) have a location.[16] They are non-physical, but they are not in the mind. Forms are extra-mental.[17]
A Form is an objective "blueprint" of perfection.[18] The Forms are perfect themselves because they are unchanging. For example, say we have a triangle drawn on a blackboard. A triangle is a polygon with 3 sides. The triangle as it is on the blackboard is far from perfect. However, it is only the intelligibility of the Form "triangle" that allows us to know the drawing on the chalkboard is a triangle, and the Form "triangle" is perfect and unchanging. It is exactly the same whenever anyone chooses to consider it; however, the time is that of the observer and not of the triangle.
The "Intelligible Realm"
Plato often invokes, particularly in the Phaedo, Republic and Phaedrus, poetic language to illustrate the mode in which the Forms are said to exist. Near the end of the Phaedo, for example, Plato describes the world of Forms as a pristine region of the physical universe located above the surface of the Earth (Phd. 109a-111c). In the Phaedrus the Forms are in a "place beyond heaven" (Phdr. 247c ff); and in the Republic the sensible world is contrasted with the intelligible world in the famous allegory of the cave.
It would be a mistake, however, to take Plato's imagery literally.[19] Plato emphasizes that the Forms are not beings which are extended in space (or time), but rather subsist in a more abstract way. Such we read in the Symposium of the Form of Beauty: "It is not anywhere in another thing, as in an animal, or in earth, or in heaven, or in anything else, but itself by itself with itself," (211b). And in the Timaeus Plato writes: "Since these things are so, we must agree that that which keeps its own form unchangingly, which has not been brought into being and is not destroyed, which neither receives into itself anything else from anywhere else, nor itself enters into anything anywhere, is one thing," (52a, emphasis added).
The ideal state
Plato 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 mimes, a corruption of the real one. This world was created by the Good according to the patterns of the Forms. Man's proper service to the Good is cooperation in the implementation of the ideal in the world of shadows; that is, in miming the Good.
To this end Plato wrote Republic detailing the proper imitation of the Good, despite his admission that Justice, Beauty, Courage, Temperance, etc., cannot be known. Apparently they can be known to some degree through the copies with great difficulty and to varying degrees by persons of varying ability.
The republic is a greater imitation of Justice:[20]
Our aim in founding the state was not the disproportional happiness of any one class,[21] but the greatest happiness of the whole; we thought that in a state which is ordered with a view to the good of the whole we should be most likely to find justice.