Not out of total forgetfulness, say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay And not in total nakedness, But behind clouds of glory we come from God, who is our home. - William Wordsworth, Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Early Childhood Memories, 62-65 Although Plato died nearly 2,500 years ago, the English language still maintains its definition of love in common usage. Maintaining a relationship "platonic" means eliminating its romantic aspect, limiting partners to intellectual stimulation only. Modern minds might think that this love is not as fertile as heterosexual romantic love and even consider this asexual affection something other than love, since it does not produce children. Plato would respond that intellectual association leads to the creation of timeless ideas, and it is therefore a love greater than physical love that creates children. Plato explores and defends his vision of love in the Symposium, particularly in the dialogue between Socrates and Diotima (Symposium, 204e 209e). Plato first defines love by examining the lover, then uses this definition to construct an abstract function and purpose of love that places intellectual men above pregnant women. Diotima teaches Socrates that the lover of good things wants to possess them in order to be happy (204e). This definition of lover applies to everyone, since Diotima's assumption, supported by Socrates, is that "everyone wants good things to be his forever." (205a) It is necessary to refine this broad definition which would include as lovers those who seek to achieve good by any means. The scope of love, in Plato as in common language, is limited "to those whose enthusiasm is directed towards a specific type described by the terminology that belongs to the entire class, that of love, loving and lovers" . (205d) He then goes on to reject Aristophanes' definition of love as the search for one's other half on the grounds that this is only true if the reunion is positive, using the example that amputation is acceptable if a limb is considered diseased. In place of Aristophanes' argument that love is trying to find oneself, Diotima provides a definition of love, the object of which is "the good" (205e). Naturally, if the object of love is "the good", the one who loves wishes to have "the good" forever (206a). The progression from the initial definition of the lover as a concrete individual who wants the good forever to the definition of love as an abstract "desire to have the good forever" (206a) establishes a similar progression from a concrete function of love to a abstract function that is at the center of platonic love. If the object of love is to have goodness forever, the function of love is to "give birth in beauty both in body and mind." (206b) Diotima begins her explanation of how “all human beings are pregnant in body and spirit” (206c) by discussing the concrete physical pregnancy of the body. Heterosexual relationships and the child that a woman gives them as a result are a beautiful end of love because they perpetuate the man. This perpetuation is essential because if love is to possess the good forever, then love requires the immortality created by reproduction (206a). Reproduction creates immortality because just as a man's body is constantly renewed and he is still called man, a man who grows old and leaves a new man in his place also renews himself (207d-208b). The transition to the abstract "pregnancy of the mind" hinges on the extension of this analogy to the mind and knowledge, saying that it ages and must be replaced just like the body (207e208a). This implies the existence of conceptual as well as physical children, and Diotima gives an example of the former by noting man's love of honor, his desire for his name to ring through the ages "it is of immortality that they are in love" with." (208c-e) Just as the pregnancy of a man's body is released by impregnating the body of a fertile woman (208e), the pregnancy of a man's mind is released by teaching the mind of another intelligent man (209b) The possibility of a woman having a mind suited to wisdom is not even considered by Plato in this topic. The ultimate function of love is considered to be the work of the pregnant mind as it attempts to produce "that which is fit for a mind to engender." and generate" (209a), that is, wisdom and other virtues. Among the wisdoms, according to Diotima, moderation and justice stand out "connected to the organization of cities and families". creates virtue in others (209d 209e). The result of this discussion is the creation of a spectrum of functions of love, starting with sexual reproduction as its basest expression and ending with the teaching of justice and moderation as its basest expression. noblest expression. The logical extension of this emphasis on intellectual reproduction is the exaltation of the homoerotic teaching relationship over the familial heterosexual relationship and thus the superiority of the intellectual man over the fertile woman. Diotima says that men who seek to achieve the immortality they love by fathering children seek only "what they consider to be happiness forever." (208e) The true path to eternal remembrance and happiness is to give birth to a conceptual child of virtue. The two fathers of this beautiful child "have between them a much closer partnership and a stronger bond of friendship than the parents have, because the children of their marriage are more beautiful and more immortal." (209c, emphasis mine) Although the lover is initially inspired by the physical and mental beauty of his beloved, the emphasis of the homoerotic relationship described by Diotima is not on the lover's sexual gratification, but rather on the perpetuation of the lover's virtue and virtue. 'lover. wisdom through teaching the beloved. Indeed, one step towards ascending to the ultimate form of love is to see "the beauty of the body as something petty." (210c) Poets like Homer and Hesiod, legislators like Lycurgus and Solon, men like these have left children of thought to live after them, and for this they are much envied, honored and even venerated by other men (209d 209e). The physical children of uncertain virtue that a man leaves to carry on his name can hardly bear comparison with the great mental children, whose virtue a man has fashioned for himself. Making such a comparison, it is no wonder that Diotima states: "Everyone would rather have [thought children] than human children." (209c 209d) Keep in mind: This is just one example. Get a custom paper from our expert writers now. Get a Custom Essay The statement that the ideas a man bequeaths to the world are as much his legacy as his children is not shocking. However, Plato's definition of the processes of wisdom transmission in terms of pregnancy and birth provokes a reaffirmation of fundamental gender roles. Not only can a man implant the seed of his pregnant body into a woman, but he can implant the seed of his pregnant mind into his beloved student, who is also a man. Thus man, who according to the conventional definition of love only had the ability to transmit physical fertility, acquires the ability to both transmit and receive the germ of mental fertility, a revolutionary concept of Platonic love. Some have claimed that the!