A historical Critique of Platonism | Seminars 2024

Full Title: A historical Critique of Platonism, from its Ancient Emergence to its postmodern ideological descendants of today

Presenter: Dr Tim Themi

Synopsis

It is said we are all but a series of footnotes to Plato, given how his metaphysics was adopted by the West.But this was not something to rejoice for the philologist Nietzsche, who deemed our problems all Plato’s fault, that Plato was the greatest misfortune of Europe.Why did Nietzsche think the best parts of Hellenism were before Platonism and that the latter enacted a history of veiled nihilism? Why did he think it prepared the ground for Christianity which makes it worse and that the Enlightenment fails to overcome it? How might Lacan help to understand this complaint and how might postmodernism not?This lecture will discuss the various aspects of Nietzsche’s critique of Platonism, from its birth with Plato in the 4th century BC to some of the many derivatives we find ensconced in our “post” Christian and modern today.It builds on Nietzsche’s striking critique with aid of Lacan’s ethics of psychoanalysis, itself building on the work of Freud which Nietzsche is seen to have anticipated.

Bio

‌Tim Themi is a PhD in Philosophy and Psychoanalysis from Deakin University who also holds Honours degrees in Philosophy from La Trobe University and Engineering from The University of Melbourne. His doctoral dissertation brought together the psychoanalysis of Lacan and philosophy of Nietzsche on the question of desire and ethics. He is author of Lacan's Ethics and Nietzsche's Critique of Platonism (SUNY Press 2014), and most recently of Eroticizing Aesthetics: In the Real with Bataille and Lacan (Rowman & Littlefield 2021), along with numerous refereed articles. He has taught at the University of Melbourne, Deakin University, Australian Catholic University, Melbourne School of Continental Philosophy, and Lacan Circle of Australia.

Sponsors

We thank The Ithacan Philanthropic Society of Victoria for the kind donation that made this seminar possible.

During the course of the year considerable expenses are incurred in staging the seminars. In order to mitigate these costs individuals or organisations are invited to donate against a lecture of their choice.

We thank the following corporate sponsors:
Delphi Accounting, Symposiarch Wines and the Kastellorizian Association of Victoria

[psunnyjose]

An eyeopener, . Now I know why Schopenhauer and Nietzsche got enamored of eastern philosophy

[DrTimThemi]

Nietzsche turns away from Schopenhauer and his Buddhism towards the end of the 1870s, searching for more affirmation concerning nature and desire

[kathykarageorgiou]

Thank you Dr Themi. Brilliant / very enlightening.