Ancient · c. 428–348 BC
Who influenced Plato?
Influences and legacy
Turned Socrates into dialogues and eternal Forms into the West's default picture of reality.
Plato was influenced by Pythagoras, Parmenides, Empedocles, Protagoras, Socrates and Philolaus, and went on to influence Aristotle, Cicero, Plotinus, Augustine of Hippo, Arthur Schopenhauer, Simone Weil and 2 others. That is 14 lines of the 448 documented lines of influence between the 279 thinkers on this map.
Read on Wikipedia Portrait: Marie-Lan Nguyen, Public domain See the whole map
Who was Plato?
An Athenian of the classical age, Plato is most often counted as the founding thinker of the Western philosophical tradition. He developed the philosophical dialogue as a literary form and founded the Academy in Athens, where he taught the theories later known as Platonism. His best-known contribution is the Theory of Forms, his answer to what is now called the problem of universals.
Pupil of Socrates and teacher of Aristotle, he drew on Pythagoras, Heraclitus and Parmenides. Unlike the writings of nearly all his contemporaries, his complete works are believed to survive, and through Neoplatonism they shaped Christian, Jewish and Islamic thought. Whitehead called European philosophy "a series of footnotes to Plato".
Summarized from the lead of the Wikipedia article.
Who influenced Plato?
6 direct influences on this map, earliest first.
- Pythagoras c. 570–495 BC
- Parmenides c. 515–450 BC
- Empedocles c. 494–434 BC
- Protagoras c. 490–420 BC
- Socrates c. 470–399 BC
- Philolaus c. 470–385 BC
Who did Plato influence?
8 thinkers on this map draw directly on Plato.
- Aristotle 384–322 BC
- Cicero 106–43 BC
- Philo of Alexandria c. 20 BC – AD 50
- Plotinus AD 204–270
- Augustine of Hippo AD 354–430
- Marsilio Ficino 1433–1499
- Arthur Schopenhauer 1788–1860
- Simone Weil 1909–1943
The line of teachers behind Plato
The longest documented line of influence ending at Plato runs 4 generations back, to Thales of Miletus.
Two steps away from Plato
Indirect influences
- Through Socrates: Anaxagoras, Aspasia, Prodicus
- Through Pythagoras: Anaximander
- Through Parmenides: Xenophanes
The second generation
- Through Aristotle: Theophrastus, Boethius, Al-Kindi, Al-Farabi, Avicenna, Peter Abelard, Averroes, Maimonides, Robert Grosseteste, Thomas Aquinas, Siger of Brabant, Ibn Khaldun, Franz Brentano, Martin Heidegger
- Through Augustine of Hippo: John Scotus Eriugena, Anselm of Canterbury, Bonaventure, Ramon Llull, Julian of Norwich, René Descartes
- Through Cicero: Niccolò Machiavelli, Michel de Montaigne, Hugo Grotius
- Through Arthur Schopenhauer: Leo Tolstoy, Friedrich Nietzsche, Ludwig Wittgenstein
- Through Philo of Alexandria: Clement of Alexandria, Saadia Gaon
- Through Marsilio Ficino: Pico della Mirandola, Giordano Bruno
Contemporaries of Plato
Thinkers on this map born within 25 years of Plato, with no direct line between them.
- Xenophon c. 430–354 BC
- Aristippus c. 435–356 BC
- Antisthenes c. 446–366 BC
- Diogenes of Sinope c. 404–323 BC
Plato by the numbers
- Direct influences
- 6
- Direct followers
- 8 — #7 of 279 on this map
- Thinkers upstream
- 13
- Thinkers downstream
- 195
- Wikipedia languages
- 221 — #3 of 54 among ancient philosophers
- Card rarity
- Legendary
Questions about Plato
- Who influenced Plato?
- Pythagoras, Parmenides, Empedocles, Protagoras, Socrates and Philolaus.
- Who did Plato influence?
- Aristotle, Cicero, Philo of Alexandria, Plotinus, Augustine of Hippo, Marsilio Ficino, Arthur Schopenhauer and Simone Weil.
- When did Plato live?
- c. 428–348 BC. The map files Plato under the ancient world.
- How rare is the Plato card?
- Wikipedia carries an article on Plato in 221 languages, which makes it a Legendary card. Legendary starts at 100 languages, Epic at 50 and Rare at 25.
More ancient philosophers
- Confucius 551–479 BC
- Aristotle 384–322 BC
- Socrates c. 470–399 BC
- Pythagoras c. 570–495 BC
- Laozi c. 6th c. BC
- Cicero 106–43 BC
- Thales of Miletus c. 624–546 BC
- Marcus Aurelius AD 121–180