Plato and Intellectual Development

This book reconstructs the impact of Plato’s words for the modern reader. In the Republic, Plato presented his schematization of human intellectual development, and called for collaboration between writer and reader. The response presented in this book results in a new theoretical framework for engaging with Plato’s dialogues. Susanna Saracco analyzes the epistemic function of Plato’s written words and explores Plato’s higher order pedagogy, in which students are not mere learners and teachers are not the depositories of the truth.

“In this original and invigorating work, Saracco argues that we still have much to learn from Plato about the nature of cognitive development and what is needed to facilitate it. She begins from the widely agreed premise that Plato’s aim is to stimulate independent thought; however, she radically expands on this. Central to her interpretation is the claim that the sheer novelty of Plato’s interdisciplinary approach is both insufficiently recognised in the secondary literature and a key factor in the efficacy of his works. Thought-provoking connections are made: as her argument develops, the philosophy of mathematics – so important to Plato - takes on ever greater prominence. She concludes by giving an intriguing outline for a Platonically-inspired programme of critical reasoning for 8-12 year olds.  This is a fresh and challenging work which will be of great interest to all those interested in the theory and practice of cognitive development.” (Angela Hobbs, Professor of the Public Understanding of Philosophy, University of Sheffield, UK)

“Saracco’s book is an exciting and creative contribution to our understanding of Plato’s pedagogy. Saracco shares a common view that Plato writes so as to encourage the intellectual development of his readers.  But she goes beyond the standard view in arguing that Plato calls for an especially wide-ranging collaboration between the author and the reader and that we can best appreciate the revolutionarypower of Plato’s philosophy by grasping the analogical relations it has to various contemporary theories across a wide range of disciplines.  She carries out this program with great energy and imagination in exploring several illustrative examples.  Anyone interested in Plato’s pedagogy or the question of why Plato wrote as he did will want to read this important and fascinating book.” (Chris Bobonich, CI Lewis Professor of Philosophy, Stanford University, USA)

“This unusual and at times challenging book aims to reconstruct how Plato conceived intellectual development and contributed to cultural progress through a conception of higher order pedagogy. Saracco’s emphasis is very much on the pedagogical function of myth, which she defines as ‘an image for the mind’. A novelty of Saracco’s analysis is her use of modern theories of scientific modelling to elucidate the epistemic function of the Forms. But most surprising of all is the final chapter of the book describing a project whose laudable aim is to develop a philosophical pedagogy based on Plato’s texts to encourage critical thinking in 8-12 year olds, regardless of socioeconomic background. The modern world indeed has much to learn about pedagogy from Plato’s philosophical method, and Saracco’s book makes a stimulating contribution to the literature on the subject.” (Penelope Murray, Former Professor of Classics at the University of Warwick, UK)

“As a Neuroscientist, I have always been fascinated by the development in stages of the human intellect and the importance of the stimulation of it for its growth. Thanks to this beautiful book, for the first time, I have had the opportunity to reflect upon the contribution of philosophy to this topic. I have been very impressed by Saracco’s ability to describe the engagement that Plato creates with his text to encourage the rational development of the reader. I also loved Saracco’s analysis of the function of Plato’s Forms in relation to the modern use of modeling. Finally, I think that her project of using philosophy to promote the development of the thinking abilities of students who are 8-12 years old is a winning one: this project has the potential to create collaboration between humanities and science, and can surely enrich both.” (Antonello Bonci, Scientific Director, National Institute on Drug Abuse, NIH; Adj. Professor of Neuroscience and Psychiatry Johns Hopkins School of Medicine; Adj professor of Psychiatry University of Maryland; Adj Professor of Neuroscience Georgetown University, USA)

“Susanna Saracco sets out to convince us that Plato’s project was about the continual stimulation of engagement with the ways we produce and use knowledge, especially text-based knowledge, and how that engagement comes with active reading: to read is to contribute; a text is to be recreated by a collaborating co-author, occasion by occasion. One unique feature of this book is that the author provides an addendum in which she outlines an online dialogic program. The program is based on high levels of engagement in important topics, and focused questioning skills, all based on the Platonic dialogues. The project, as Saracco demonstrates, is both crucial and necessarily ongoing. Its preoccupations with thought, logic, and the talk-text relationship connect with philosophers’, social scientists’, and psychologists’ inquiries into the nature of science and human cognition and in the nature of human judgment.” (Peter Freebody, Honorary Professor, School of Education and Social Work, The University of Sydney; Honorary Professor, The University of Wollongong; Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia)

“This work is special in emphasizing the necessity for each reader to respond to Plato’s request to activate her/his intellectual capacity and to forge a new path of cognitive development together with Plato. Saracco’s interpretation is especially unique in maintaining that the individual rational growth, as envisaged by the Line in the Republic, does not reach completion at the line segment of noēsis, but continues with further stages of rational development. In accordance with this interpretation, she represents the four segments as equal in length, since the four stages have equal importance as the stages of theoretical childhood, to contribute to further human cognitive progress, and adds four further subsections as the cognitive stages of theoretical adulthood. Saracco stimulates the readers of her work to participate actively not only in interpretative reading of Plato’s texts, but also in their own project of educating themselves and others as free thinkers.”  (Yahei Kanayama, Professor of Philosophy, Nagoya University, Japan)

Susanna Saracco  is a post-doctoral researcher, having received her PhD in philosophy from the University of Sydney, Australia. Her pieces have been published in the International Journal for Transformative Research, Metaphilosophy and Philosophia: Philosophical Quarterly of Israel.