Interview with Matt Ehret Pt. 3: Plato vs. Aristotle: The Divide That Still Shapes How We Think
What if the divide between Plato and Aristotle is not a chapter in the history of philosophy — but a structural fault line that still determines how civilizations think about knowledge, progress, and discovery? In the final part of his three-part conversation, Matt Ehret presents his argument that this ancient divide carries forward as a kind of civilizational operating system — one whose consequences extend from the classical world to the present, and whose terms determine whether a culture tends toward genuine intellectual advance or toward increasingly sophisticated forms of stagnation.
In this concluding episode, Ehret examines what he sees as the core methodological difference between Plato and Aristotle: a verb-driven, process-oriented universe oriented toward discovery, versus a noun-driven, classification-based framework built on closed axioms that cannot be questioned. He develops the open versus closed systems distinction — with entropy and anti-entropy as the evaluative frame — arguing that the Platonic tradition keeps inquiry alive while the Aristotelian method, however elegant, forecloses the kind of creative discovery that genuine progress requires. The conversation closes with Plato’s Republic Book II, the question of poetry and the arts, and the image of Plato as a thinker conducting an open dialogue across twenty-five centuries. This episode closes the Ehret arc and opens directly onto the Aristotle episodes ahead.
Show Notes & Timestamps
1. Introduction — 0:40
2. Aristotle vs. Plato — The Core Difference — 1:32
3. The Aristotelian Method and Loss of Free Will — 2:02
4. Human Agency and the Two Wolves — 5:58
5. Open vs. Closed Systems — Entropy and Anti-Entropy — 9:02
6. Plato's Republic and the Consequences of Closed Thinking — 13:57
7. Plato in Today's Media World — 17:48
8. Closing and Outro — 20:16
Key Concepts & Terms
Noun-driven vs. verb-driven universe (nown-driv-en / verb-driv-en) — Two orientations toward reality
Ehret’s foundational contrast distinguishes how the Platonic and Aristotelian traditions approach the nature of reality. A verb-driven, process-oriented framework treats the world as dynamic, discoverable, and open to creative inquiry. A noun-driven, classification-based framework treats reality as something to be mapped, labeled, and described within fixed categories. For Ehret, everything follows from this distinction: the method shapes the questions a culture can ask, the discoveries it can make, and ultimately the direction of its progress.
A priori method (AH-pree-OR-ee) — Reasoning from closed, unquestionable starting points
Ehret describes the Aristotelian a priori method as beginning with a set of core axioms, postulates, and definitions that are accepted as perfect and closed before inquiry begins. Upon these fixed building blocks, the thinker then attempts to make sense of the discoverable world. Ehret’s argument is that this approach is not neutral: the axioms themselves determine what can be found, and because they are placed beyond question, what lies outside them cannot enter the system. The result, in his reading, is a kind of organized blindness — increasingly sophisticated in its internal logic, but increasingly detached from genuine discovery.
Entropy and anti-entropy (EN-troh-pee / an-tee-EN-troh-pee) — Closed systems running down versus open systems generating new potential
Ehret draws on the physical concept of entropy — the tendency of a closed system to exhaust its energy and move toward stagnation — as a frame for evaluating philosophical traditions. A closed-system framework, on this reading, is entropic: its potential for discovery decreases over time as the fixed axioms progressively constrain what can be thought. An anti-entropic framework, by contrast, remains open to creative inputs and new discoveries, increasing its potential rather than exhausting it. Ehret applies this distinction not only to philosophy but to civilizations as a whole, arguing that cultures organized around closed-system thinking tend toward Malthusian constraints, while those oriented toward open inquiry tend toward genuine advance.
Civilizational operating system — The underlying framework through which a culture organizes knowledge and inquiry
This is Ehret’s central thesis for the episode: that the Plato—Aristotle divide is not a historical debate between two ancient thinkers, but a structural feature of how civilizations organize their relationship to knowledge. The operating system metaphor captures the idea that the framework runs beneath the surface of any particular cultural, political, or scientific development — shaping what questions get asked, what counts as an answer, and what kind of progress is possible. Ehret argues that identifying which operating system a culture is running is the prerequisite for understanding whether it is genuinely advancing or producing increasingly elaborate illusions of advancement.
Fascinating Historical Insights
Plato’s preference for craftsmen over scholars
One of the more unexpected moments in Ehret’s account is his discussion of Plato’s documented preference for speaking with shoemakers, woodworkers, and craftsmen rather than with lawyers, politicians, and scholars. Ehret’s reading is that Plato valued these conversations precisely because the craftsmen’s knowledge was grounded in something real — earned through direct engagement with materials, problems, and outcomes. The scholar or politician trained in the Aristotelian manner might deploy impressive language and elaborate argument, but the knowledge, having been built on unexamined axioms, was not anchored to anything verifiable. For Plato, the craftsman’s humility was epistemologically sounder than the scholar’s confidence. Ehret connects this to Socrates’ fate: the arrogance of those who had been exposed as not knowing what they thought they knew, and who responded with lethal force.
The two wolves — A cross-cultural parallel to Plato’s soul/flesh distinction
In explaining Plato’s account of human agency, Ehret draws a parallel to a piece of Native American wisdom: the story of the two wolves within every person, one representing ego and appetite, the other representing spirit and the better part of the self, with the answer to which prevails being “whichever one you feed.” Ehret maps this directly onto Plato’s argument in the Gorgias — that the soul should lead the flesh, not be dragged by it — and notes similar formulations in Confucius and in later Platonic thinkers including Origen and Philo of Alexandria. The point Ehret is making is structural: the Platonic tradition across cultures identifies a bifurcation within the human agent, and the quality of a person’s development — and by extension, of civilization itself — depends on which tendency is cultivated.
Plato’s “Republic”, Book II: from simple community to territorial war
Ehret highlights a remarkable sequence in Book II of the Republic in which Plato traces, step by step, how a simple human community moves from basic needs to luxury, from luxury to territorial expansion, from expansion to conflict, and from conflict to the need for guardians. At each step, Plato has Glaucon accept the next premise — and at each step, Plato is, in Ehret’s reading, provoking the reader to find a better answer. The trajectory ends with Plato suggesting that this society might need to exterminate children born into the “wrong” social class — a conclusion designed not as a recommendation, but as an indictment of the entire trajectory the community has chosen. Ehret’s reading is that Plato is conducting a reductio ad absurdum: follow these premises and this is where you end up. The text is a challenge to the reader to find a better path.
The ban on poets: provocation, not prescription
Few passages in Plato are more frequently cited as evidence of authoritarian thinking than his proposal, in the Republic, to ban poets from the city. Ehret’s reading inverts the standard interpretation. Plato is writing against the backdrop of an Athenian culture saturated with theatrical performances depicting gods behaving badly, and concludes that if the population accepts these as models of the divine, the social consequences are corrupting. The ban on poets is Plato’s logical endpoint of one set of premises. But Ehret draws attention to what Plato says in the same breath: that anyone who can offer a better argument for letting the poets back into the republic should make it. The text, in this reading, is not a decree — it is an open invitation. Plato is conducting a dialogue with readers across twenty-five centuries, and the question he is posing remains genuinely open.
Resources & Further Reading
Primary Sources
• Plato, Republic (esp. Book II). Multiple translations available. Book II contains the community-building argument Ehret discusses, tracing the trajectory from simple need to territorial conflict to the guardian class. Stephanus reference: 357a—383c (Book II). Recommended translation: G.M.A. Grube, revised C.D.C. Reeve (Hackett).
• Plato, Gorgias. The dialogue Ehret references for Plato’s soul/flesh distinction and the argument that the soul should lead the flesh, not be dragged by appetite. Stephanus reference: 447a—527e. Recommended translation: Donald Zeyl (Hackett).
• Plato, Meno. Introduced in Episodes 11 and 12 as the dialogue establishing Plato’s account of learning as recollection rather than transmission. Stephanus reference: 70a—100b. Recommended translation: G.M.A. Grube (Hackett).
Works Discussed
• Matt Ehret. Available via the Canadian Patriot Review and the Rising Tide Foundation. Ehret’s published work includes the Untold History of Canada series and The Cl...
00:00 - Closing and Outro
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That, that all of human beings are shaped,
or, or human history is shaped by this
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schism, this battle between paradigms.
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In this case, we're using, for
the sake of language, uh, the
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Aristotelian and Platonic frameworks.
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It's not Manichaean.
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It's not like the Manichaean idea
of, of good counterbalancing with
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evil, but rather these two frameworks
where one is built upon the illusion
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of, of, of truth, the other one
on the actual pursuit of truth.
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Hi, welcome back to Notions of Progress.
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In the first two parts of this
conversation, Matt Ehret traced what he
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sees as the foundational method of the
Platonic tradition, how Plato thought,
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what the academy was built to produce, and
how the allegory of the cave has been read
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and misread over two and a half millennia.
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In this final part three, Ehret
arrives at the civilizational stakes.
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His argument is that the divide
between Plato and Aristotle is
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not a historical footnote or a
matter of philosophical preference.
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It is, in fact, he contends, a
structural fault line that runs through
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every era of Western intellectual
history, including our own.
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And it determines, in his reading, whether
a culture tends towards genuine discovery
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and advancement or toward increasingly
sophisticated illusions of it.
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Sources reading in today's transcript
can be found in Notions of Progress.
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Welcome.
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Now maybe, we can go back a little bit.
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Just talk a little bit about Aristotle
in terms of, like, kind of what he, you
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know, when he showed up at the academy.
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You don't have to give, like, a whole
history of his time at the academy,
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but just more like, what do you think
he was responding to, and whatâ¦
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I, I want⦠'Cause what I would
love to do in the time that we
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have left, Matt, is understand what
is, what is Plato's⦠Excuse me.
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What is Aristotle's view of progress,
and where does this tension really lie?
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So if people, if, if you had, if
someone had to explain the difference
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between those two, really what it
comes down to, if you can, if you can,
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if you don't mind, give that a shot.
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I, I would say the d- the core difference
of the two in the shortest amount of words
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is one posits a, a noun-driven universe,
and the other a verb-driven universe.
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You know?
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One is more process-oriented,
discovery-oriented.
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The other one is more, uh,
memorize, explanatory-oriented,
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but not discovery-oriented.
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So the noun-based idea of descriptive
reality, that, uh, that's more,
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you could say, the flow that
one gets out of Aristotle, who
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innovated a method of analysis.
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It's not just the particulars of what he
says, which are not always all that bad.
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He's, he doesn't say a lot of things
that you'd necessarily disagree with.
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There are some things
that are, uh, abhorrent.
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But a lot of the things he says are, you
know, they're like, okay, yeah, he likes
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freedom, he likes democracy, he likesâ¦
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Okay.
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Um, but number one is being genuine.
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Number two, does his method actually
allow those things to happen?
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And I would say the, everything is in
the method, and he's actually giving
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you a method where he's saying, okay,
a⦠He uses the a priori method.
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So he says, "If you wanna be a responsible
thinker, you have to adopt this a
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priori method," which begins with
starting with, uh, core axioms, lists
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of axioms and assumptions that you just
begin with that are unquestionable,
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that are perfect, they're closed.
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And upon these closed, limited axioms, and
postulates, and definitions we just give
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things in a closed, absolute language With
those building blocks, you can now begin
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to make sense of the chaos and fluidity
of the discoverable world you're born
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into and try to map it and navigate it.
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If you do that, I would say, um,
and Plato I think would agree,
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that you will become more enmeshed
within the shadows of the cave.
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You will not become more free.
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You will become only the illusion of
freedom, and the illusion of agency
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will increase, but the, but you will
become more of a human autom- automata,
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a human robot in effect, which because
of that method will result in your
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feelings, in your actions being highly
predictable, highly baked in like a robot.
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You know, a, a, an AI bot, for example, is
subservient to the, those core axioms that
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the programmer puts into the algorithms
that then set up the behavior of how
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that, that AI bot is going to problem
solve or content create anywhere down the
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line, similar to, to how a human will be
programmed through an Aristotelian method
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of core axioms that are unbridgeable
and that accept blindly in certain
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universals that are not proven to be true.
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They just are accepted as
true, and so blind faith.
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Ep- the absence of knowledge is the
foundation upon which then knowledge
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is built, which again, you can't
build something from nothing, and so
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you're actually building on nothings
thinking that they're somethings,
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which makes it very dangerous um,
as you become more successful as a
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lawyer, as a scholar, as a teacher,
as a whomever in that kind of world.
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Which is also why Plato liked
very much talking to the
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shoemakers, the, the woodworkers.
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He liked talking to the craftsmen because
even though they had a simplicity to
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them, they had what they did know as
real knowledge was really earned, and
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you could really⦠So he much preferred
talking to those types of craftsmen more
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so than the, the more dangerous, uh,
politician or lawyer class or s- you
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know, um, because they would typically
never have any grounding of, of anything
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that would, that would base their, their
so-called i- uh, impressive sounding
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words and knowledge on anything real.
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But, you know, the illusion was higher,
their arrogance was thus higher, their
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humility was way lower, and their
dangerousness of being offended when
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their egos get slighted much higher, as
Socrates got to feel the brunt of that,
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uh, when he was, you know, induced to, to
drink the poi- drink the poison and die
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for offending certain, you know, wannabe
overlords So, and, and so within that
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framework that you paint, Mac, what about
the idea, because you mentioned agency.
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You know, how would you describe,
let's say, the role of human agency
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vis-a-vis Plato versus Aristotle in
this case, or the, or the lack thereof?
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Yeah, well, Plato, uh, creates the
foundations around which true sovereignty
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of the individual will increase, true
freedom of will, freedom of action will
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increase by virtue of you developing a
better and better and better relationship
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every day with your soul and the,
the immortal better parts of you that
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show as lead, as he points out in the
Gorgias, that the better part show as
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lead the, the worst part within us.
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You know, the, the flesh should be
led by the s- the, the interest of the
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soul, not the⦠The soul should not be
dragged by the interest of the flesh.
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But, you know, the natives, the Native
Americans have a similar wisdom that
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they've put in their own words too,
that, you know, when asked, uh, um, when
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asking a, an elder, uh, I, I don't know
if the, w- if this is the, the Mohawks
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or the Shawnee or I'm not too sure which,
but, you know, this is a native, uh,
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legend or na- native wisdom of, uh, a
young man asking, uh, how to become a
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better, a better person and, uh, having
it described that we all have within
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us by an elder two, two, uh, two wolves
that are always at odds with each other.
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And he asks, "But which, which w- which
wolf is gonna win?" Describing, you
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know, the, the, the wolf of the ego,
the wolf of the, the, the sensual realm,
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and the wolf representing the, the
spirit and the better part of ourselves.
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And he's like, "Whichâ¦" The answer
he gets is whichever one you feed.
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And it's the same kind of
lessons you see in, in Confucius.
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Um, you see the same
kind of lessons in Plato.
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Um, and you see it as well manifesting in,
uh, the Platonic followers of Plato in,
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in the form of Origen, later on an early
church father in his writings, or Philo
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of Alexandria, a Jewish Platonist, a rabbi
who worked with Peter in Rome combating,
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combating Simon the Magician and the,
the Neoplatonic mystery cultists in Rome,
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um, who later on would influence even
Christian doctrine around, uh, a healthy
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notion of the Trinity and the Nicene
Creed would be influenced ironically
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by this guy Philo of Alexandria, the,
the Pythagorean Platonist working with
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Peter, um, against those ag- you know.
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So you've got these two different schools,
and I, I think anytime somebody uses,
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even if with an honest heart, but they
use this Aristotelian method and they
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get too, uh, enmeshed with that method
of thinking they lose their free will.
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They lose their ability to have true
understanding of what their soul actually
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is, what makes their soul better, what
makes it healthier, what makes it sicker.
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That understanding is
increasingly severed.
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And as such, we become more cloudy in
our dreamland, our dreamscape, that
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makes us increasingly an instrument of
forces that are not us, that will use
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us for acts that might be even very
destructive for our friends, our family,
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ourselves, and our broader human species
that we should be defending, not hurting.
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But we won't even know it.
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So a lot of people, they find themselves
agents of influence of something that
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is evil, but they don't even know it
because of the general way of the makeup,
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the way that they've been taught to
think in that way that abides by and
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allows for blind faith in things rather
than discovering things to be true.
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So And Matt, in the last few minutes
that we have left, or at least for
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today Can you talk a little bit about
your conception of, of open versus
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closed systems vis-a-vis these two
philosophies that we've just spent a
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lot⦠And that you've, you know, just
laid out for us so el- eloquently, so
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that people can understand what thatâ¦
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What we're actually talking about vers- in
the Plato versus Aristotle thought model?
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Yeah, man.
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Uh, yes, for sure.
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I, I could.
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Um, well, I, that, that's, uh,
those are terms that I found useful,
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um, that I've, I, I was playing
with them for, for some years.
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And originally, like, they, they
derive from my studies of the, the
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philosophical writings of a modern
Platonist, uh, by the name of Lyndon
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LaRouche, who passed away some years ago.
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Um, but his, his writings I found
to be very, very fruitful and very
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authentic as far as a follower and a,
and utilizer of the Platonic method.
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Um, and I would, uh, study, uh, his works,
especially, uh, there's a particular
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book called The Science of Christian
Economy, but also the So You Wish to
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Learn All About Economics and a few
other very important, uh, thorough es-
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essays, um, which, which got me to sort
of become aware of, of the idea of anâ¦
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That, that all of human beings are shaped,
or, or human history is shaped by this
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schism, this battle between paradigms.
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In this case, we're using, for
the sake of language, uh, the
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Aristotelian and Platonic frameworks.
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It's not Manichaean.
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It's not like the Manichaean idea
of, of good counterbalancing with
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evil, but rather these two frameworks
where one is built upon the illusion
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of, of, of truth, the other one
on the actual pursuit of truth.
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The sophist who pursues wisdom
without the love of it, the other one
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being the, the lover of wisdom who
pursues it for the authentic reasons.
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And, uh, and so, um, now LaRouche
uses different terms to try to help
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people understand that, that dichotomy.
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One of the things was, uh, entropic
and anti-entropic language.
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So he's like one system is, you could say,
using a scientific terminology, entropic
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Um, founded upon principles of decay,
of death, of the absence of life, which
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is basically what entropy is, is if you
extend a process of, of high complexity
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in time, as it unfolds, as let's say
a machine, it has many parts to that
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system moving for a purpose, that there's
less energy that causes the parts to
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move as time passes, as the fuel burns
down, because there's an limited way, or
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amount of fuel you can put into a motor.
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And it will eventually be pulled
teleologically towards some future
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point of heat death, where less
and less can possibly happen.
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Potential for change decreases in time.
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Um, as- And that's within a closed
system ⦠within a closed system.
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And within an anti-entropic system,
which is a much more healthy, natural
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way of, of organizing human thought
and action, would be the opposite.
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You start with something that has a l-
certain limited amount of potential,
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but then that is always increasing
based on new creative inputs and
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discoveries by those parts within
that system of humanity, in this case.
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And, you know, I think when you look at
the evidence of, of ontological reality
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in physics, just without any assumptions
of, of, of standard models of physics
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that they're, that are taught in school
or, or biology, Darwinian biology, just,
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just let all of that, those assumptions
go and just look at the trend of life from
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500 million years ago of the Precambrian
simple-celled amoebas that were, it
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appears, the only thing really that we
could say was living on the Earth, to the
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different grades, the different gradients
of more complex, more interesting
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life appearing at different moments.
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Um, you have a choice to say, "Okay,
based on this moment we're at now
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and that moment that was then of
living matter we do, we have change.
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Was the change directed by any principles?
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Is there progress?
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Are things getting, um, are
they moving in a, in an, in an
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entropic or anti-entropic way?
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Which one is it?
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Or is it totally random, which
would be more inclined to entropy?
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Well, I think, you know, the data,
if we don't, if we don't take axioms,
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assumptions into it and just look at
the data, I would say it's probably
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the case that there's some sense of
purposefulness and direction and, and
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beauty and symmetry that is guiding this
process that's allowing us to have this,
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this discussion over space and time using
the, the electrical medium from amoebas.
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And the same thing for the
formation of solar systems, right?
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The questions of like, why should our
solar system and any solar system be
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arranged in the ordering principles that
we find the planets arranged as they do?
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And are, is it random or is it purposeful?
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What about the, the
periodic table of elements?
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Is that just a random unfolding, you
know, with all of the different isotopes
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that also occur in periodic ways?
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Or is there a, a, an organization, a
beauty, a symmetry to it that has purpose
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maybe baked into it even that's not put
there by humans, but that's already there
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and humans are, are able, capable of, of
uncovering and discovering what that is.
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So I think that the Platonic way is much
more open system, much more anti-entropic.
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Um, the, uh, the other ways that
one would attempt to, to approach it
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Neoplatonic or Aristotelian, um, would,
would incline towards de- destroying
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our powers of productivity over time,
destroying our potential to reproduce our
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species over time as the, the physical
potential constraints close in on what
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we're capable of doing and the thus
Malthusian trappings that are predicted
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by the, the Thomas Malthuses, the Henry
Kissingers will tend to then manifest
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more and more as we lack creativity.
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We'll tend to wear down the soil.
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We'll wear down the resources.
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We won't overcome those things through
new dis⦠And so the consequences
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of overpopulation, of demographic
crises and things that Plato describes
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in Book Two of The Republic when
he describes the, the⦠He's like,
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"Okay, we, we, we're having trouble
seeing justice on an individual level.
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Let's try to scale up and see if
maybe it's more visible on a, on a,
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on a social level with many people.
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Let's try a simple community." Now let's
say that that community, which requires
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food and water and organization, let's
say that it, it wants to have a little
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bit of abundance and ha- and with that
abundance, a little bit of luxury.
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Well, with that luxury, let's say
it's going to cut down more trees.
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Okay, well that's gonna ne- mean
that they're gonna grow into that new
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space as the⦠Okay, well let's say
they're gonna inevitably start pro-
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protruding upon some other social
group Well, they're gonna fight, right?
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Okay, so they're gonna fight
for territory if that happens.
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Well, then what do they do?
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And he starts building up,
again, one of the traps.
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He's like, "Did, number one, did they
have to fight?" Well, according to that
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00:15:30,431 --> 00:15:34,911
dialogue, they- Glaucon just accepts,
"Yes, we have to fight now." Okay, well,
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if that's the case and you can't think of
anything else, let's now proceed onward.
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Well, who do we need?
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We need guardians.
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Okay, well, how do we
train guardians then?
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You know, if they're gonna have power,
uh, w- how are they⦠Well, do-
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dogs, humans are like dogs, right?
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Yes, of course, they're like dogs.
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Okay, so then okay, well, if that's
the case, how do we train our dogs?
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Well, okay, we breed the best dogs.
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Okay, well, got some golden souls that are
born into bronze soul families, you know.
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00:15:56,221 --> 00:15:57,041
That's not natural.
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It's like, no, it's not natural.
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So what do you do with them?
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00:15:58,871 --> 00:16:01,751
Well, you gotta probably,
I guess, exterminate those
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kids if they're, you know.
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So, um, but he's building up basic
simple economies and trying to
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tickle your, your creativity, your,
your sense of, like, injustice.
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So it's through a negative.
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He's like, "Okay, it's not just
that we do these things, but can
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00:16:16,581 --> 00:16:19,371
you, can you solve the problem? Can
you⦠Let's ban poets," you know.
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00:16:19,371 --> 00:16:22,731
Like, one of the things he says in
The Republic is, well, uh, you know,
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00:16:22,731 --> 00:16:25,771
look, look at, look at the, look at
the world of Athens around Plato.
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I mean, people are, are, are becoming
drunk on, on, uh, on, on, on theater and,
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and theatrical plays of Homer and, and
the gods warring and sexing it out and
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00:16:38,601 --> 00:16:45,041
all of these, these, uh, these, these,
you know, um, immoral tendencies expressed
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00:16:45,051 --> 00:16:48,191
poetically by the gods that were popular
in, in the world that Plato was living in.
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00:16:48,191 --> 00:16:50,551
And he's like, "Look how, look how
corrupting the influence is that people
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think the gods who are perfect are
actually these, these very debauched
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00:16:53,871 --> 00:16:56,751
s- beings." And he's like, "Well, I
guess the only thing we could do to
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00:16:56,751 --> 00:17:00,051
stop society from sliding into decadence
and corruption and decay would be
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00:17:00,051 --> 00:17:01,811
to then ban poetry and the arts."
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00:17:02,091 --> 00:17:06,681
He's like, "Yes, I guess so." And so
people are today horrified by some of
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00:17:06,681 --> 00:17:09,331
these conclusions that Plato's making,
but they're not realizing that he
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00:17:09,521 --> 00:17:14,929
also says within that same breath But
if anybody now or in the future can
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00:17:14,929 --> 00:17:18,639
challenge us to find a better reason why
we should let poets back into the pub-
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00:17:18,649 --> 00:17:22,709
the, the republic, let them do it, and
we will certainly welcome them back in.
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00:17:22,949 --> 00:17:27,339
He's challenging the friggin'
readers to come up with a better
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00:17:27,339 --> 00:17:32,099
line of, of investigation than what
is being presented in that dialogue.
287
00:17:32,269 --> 00:17:32,699
You know?
288
00:17:33,149 --> 00:17:34,129
It's, it's engaging.
289
00:17:34,139 --> 00:17:36,689
He's having a dialogue with
us that's transcending time.
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00:17:36,689 --> 00:17:40,709
He's been dead for 2,500 years, but yet
it's a, an ongoing conversation that's
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00:17:40,709 --> 00:17:43,849
gonna still be had 1,000 years in the
future for people who read these things
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00:17:44,169 --> 00:17:47,639
with an honest heart and confront these
universal problems of the species.
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00:17:48,399 --> 00:17:50,969
You know, Matt, if I, if I could
just put a kind of a close on this.
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00:17:51,189 --> 00:17:55,949
, If you will, it- it's not unimaginable to
understand this in today's context, right?
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00:17:55,949 --> 00:18:00,309
In other words, that people were even,
even during that time were cherry-picking
296
00:18:00,319 --> 00:18:04,459
what he was saying and leaving off the,
leaving off what was the intention, But
297
00:18:04,459 --> 00:18:08,479
if you just took the sentence, "Let's
ban poets," and, "Let's ban," and you,
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00:18:08,549 --> 00:18:11,779
and you didn't give that second part
or the explanation that you gave before
299
00:18:11,779 --> 00:18:14,619
about the cave , then you're taking
it out of context and you're using,
300
00:18:14,629 --> 00:18:15,949
you're slicing it up and dicing it.
301
00:18:15,949 --> 00:18:20,119
I'm just saying in today's media world,
that doesn't seem like such a far stretch.
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00:18:20,579 --> 00:18:20,809
- Hmm
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00:18:20,869 --> 00:18:21,219
to me.
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00:18:21,599 --> 00:18:21,859
Thanks.
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00:18:23,255 --> 00:18:25,915
Well, well Matt, I just wanna thank
you for this tremendous contribution
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00:18:25,925 --> 00:18:29,175
that you made, uh, the, and for all the
work that you and Cynthia are doing.
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00:18:29,175 --> 00:18:33,275
I realize the difficulty in trying
to put this all together into
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00:18:33,275 --> 00:18:35,515
a, into a short, succinct way,
uh, how difficult that would be.
309
00:18:35,515 --> 00:18:38,395
Well, it was⦠It's a good challenge,
and I, I appreciate you, you creating
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00:18:38,395 --> 00:18:41,755
the, the context and the impetus for
that, and I, I hope that, yeah, we can
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00:18:41,755 --> 00:18:45,675
continue to, to explore these, these
important topics, uh, going forward.
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00:18:45,695 --> 00:18:47,485
And, uh, you know, it's edifying to me.
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00:18:47,485 --> 00:18:51,605
It's, it's a, a, an hope ed- edifying
to your audience, and, uh, and I hope
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00:18:51,605 --> 00:18:52,895
it inspires people to read some Plato.
315
00:18:53,005 --> 00:18:56,395
Um, you know, the dialogues are just
such a treat for people to just turn
316
00:18:56,395 --> 00:18:59,895
off the, their Netflix for a, a couple
of, a couple of nights and just read a
317
00:18:59,895 --> 00:19:03,675
couple of dialogues instead and, and see
what it does to, uh, to make you better.
318
00:19:04,615 --> 00:19:05,315
Absolutely.
319
00:19:05,405 --> 00:19:06,015
Absolutely.
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00:19:06,255 --> 00:19:08,245
All right, well thanks again,
Matt, and I'm gonna stop it now,
321
00:19:08,245 --> 00:19:10,191
and like if you hang on for one
second we'll, we'll chat a bit.
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00:19:10,191 --> 00:19:10,405
Mm-hmm.
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00:19:10,515 --> 00:19:11,065
Thanks again.
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00:19:11,235 --> 00:19:11,445
Sure.
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00:19:12,831 --> 00:19:15,921
This concludes part three of a
three-part interview with Matt Ehret.
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00:19:16,581 --> 00:19:19,701
Ehret's argument that the
Plato-Aristotle divide functions as
327
00:19:19,701 --> 00:19:23,191
a civilizational operating system
is one reading of a debate that
328
00:19:23,191 --> 00:19:25,261
scholars have engaged for centuries.
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00:19:26,171 --> 00:19:29,981
In the episodes ahead, that divide
gets tested against the historical
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00:19:29,981 --> 00:19:32,941
record and against scholars
who read it very differently.
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00:19:33,921 --> 00:19:39,101
The next episode turns directly to
Aristotle himself, what he actually
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00:19:39,101 --> 00:19:42,751
argued and what scholars have made of
it, and why the question of progress
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00:19:42,781 --> 00:19:46,181
looks very different when you start
from his text rather than Plato's.
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Thanks for listening to this series.
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00:19:48,881 --> 00:19:52,851
Sources reading and today's transcript
can be found at notionsofprogress.com.
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00:19:53,341 --> 00:19:53,971
See you soon
337
00:19:58,346 --> 00:20:01,366
If you enjoyed this episode, you
can find "Notions of Progress" on
338
00:20:01,366 --> 00:20:03,936
YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify.
339
00:20:04,206 --> 00:20:07,496
And all the sources, reading
recommendations, and further context
340
00:20:07,506 --> 00:20:09,456
for every episode are in the show notes.
341
00:20:09,996 --> 00:20:14,066
If you are enjoying this series, liking
the episode on YouTube and signing up for
342
00:20:14,076 --> 00:20:19,286
the newsletter at notionsofprogress.com
really helps more people find these ideas.
343
00:20:19,856 --> 00:20:24,376
For those who wanna go even deeper,
the Curator's Flame blog and Substack
344
00:20:24,406 --> 00:20:28,256
newsletter accompany each episode with
the questions the scholarship leaves open.
345
00:20:28,936 --> 00:20:32,186
I'm Marshall, tracing ideas
of progress from antiquity to
346
00:20:32,186 --> 00:20:36,036
the age of AI and leaving the
debates open for you to consider.
347
00:20:36,306 --> 00:20:37,216
Until next time
