Plato

     Plato was a student of Socrates. Most of what we know of Socrates comes from Plato. Plato was very upset by his teacher's execution, and left Greece for more than a decade. He returned to the village of Academia, near Athens, where he began a school known as the Academy. Plato's Academy operated for over nine hundred years.

     Plato described what he considered an ideal society in his most famous book, the Republic. Plato did not believe in democracy. He argued in favor of an aristocracy of merit, or rule by the best and the wisest persons. A small guardian class would select the best and the brightest students to join them.

     Plato believed the government should raise all children so that everyone would have equal opportunities. Schools would test students on a regular basis. Those who did poorly would be sent to work, while those who did well would continue their studies. At the age of thirty-five, those persons who mastered their education would be sent to the workplace to apply their learning to the real world. After fifteen years, if the student was successful, he or she would be admitted to the guardian class.

     Plato taught that the ideals of truth or justice cannot exist in a material world. Today we describe a "platonic" relationship as one in which people have mental and spiritual exchanges but refrain from physical intimacy.