We need Plato now.
There are many things we can learn from Plato quite apart from his metaphysics. He reminds us that genuine dialogue is a matter of seeking truth together—collaboratively—where the aim is not to “win” but to understand. We can engage in this practice even with those with whom we disagree. In doing so, we do not merely defend our positions; we refine them. We grow together.
He reminds us that the goal of life is not perpetual happiness but flourishing: the cultivation of a harmonized soul capable of contributing goodness to society, relative to our capacities and circumstances. The meaning of our lives is not measured by how happy we feel at a given moment, but by how well attuned our souls are to the deeper realities of truth, goodness, and beauty—and by how faithfully we contribute to the world around us.
And he warns us that democracies can, all too easily, devolve into tyrannies, as demagogues with disordered souls rise to power through deception and the corruption of language. We must remain alert to the dynamics of demagoguery and the ways democracies erode from within—especially when leaders accuse others of spreading “fake news” while themselves trafficking in distortion and falsehood. Plato’s warning is not merely ancient; it is perennial.
All of these lessons are carefully explained and vividly explored by Angie Hobbs in Why Plato Matters Now, a book written not for specialists but for the intellectually engaged general reader. Hobbs does not dwell on Plato’s metaphysics; she concentrates instead on the practical and moral wisdom embedded in his dialogues—wisdom that speaks across worldviews, whatever one’s own metaphysical commitments.
She shows how Plato’s dramatic dialogue form itself embodies philosophical humility. By refusing to lecture in his own voice and instead staging conversations among contrasting characters, Plato forces readers to enter the inquiry. Dialogue, in this vision, is not eristic combat but collaborative searching. The Socratic method subverts the desire to dominate. It trains us to listen carefully, question honestly, and revise our views when necessary. In a time when public discourse is often reduced to performance and polarization, this model alone is a profound civic lesson.
Hobbs also draws attention to Plato’s account of flourishing. The good life is not a life of uninterrupted pleasure or emotional satisfaction. It is a life ordered from within—a life in which reason, spirit, and appetite are brought into harmony. Justice is internal before it is external. To act unjustly is to damage one’s own soul. The flourishing person, then, is one who seeks to actualize his or her best capacities—rational, emotional, imaginative, physical—within the circumstances at hand, contributing to the good of the wider community. Such flourishing may include suffering; it does not guarantee happiness. But it does secure integrity.
Equally urgent is Plato’s analysis of tyranny. Hobbs shows how democracies become vulnerable when citizens grow inattentive to the corruption of language and careless about the values of wisdom and compassion. The demagogue presents himself as a champion of the people while quietly dismantling the very structures that protect them. Tyranny begins not merely with institutional change but with psychological disorder—souls governed by appetite rather than reason. Plato’s warning is not antiquarian; it is contemporary.
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If we do bring Plato’s metaphysics back into view, it reinforces rather than distracts from these lessons. It reminds us that Truth with a capital “T” always exceeds any particular formulation. It is something toward which we may strive but never fully possess. That recognition grounds humility. Everyone may seek Truth; no one can claim absolute ownership of it.
Moreover, if we are religiously minded, we may recognize that Truth—understood as an ideal to be sought but never possessed—is one way the divine reality becomes present in human life, and that it is inseparable from Goodness and Beauty. To revere Truth is also to revere Goodness and Beauty, for these ideals call us beyond self-interest toward alignment with a higher order of value. Reverence for Truth becomes a spiritual posture: a willingness to be corrected, a refusal to absolutize one’s own formulations, and a trust that the reality we seek transcends us. In that sense, faith need not mean doctrinal certainty; it can mean fidelity to the ongoing search.
But the wisdom of Hobbs’s book is that she does not press Plato in these more overtly metaphysical or theological directions. She allows his practical insights to stand on their own. One need not affirm a doctrine of transcendent Forms to recognize the value of dialogical humility, interior harmony, and civic vigilance. Her Plato is a moral educator and political diagnostician before he is a metaphysical system-builder. That restraint broadens the book’s reach and preserves its accessibility.
Thus we might say that Plato, and building upon his spirit, offers us at least five lessons:
1. Dialogue is seeking truth together — Genuine dialogue seeks understanding rather than victory. Its aim is not to 'win.'
2. Human Flourishing is integrity not happiness — The aim of life is the harmony of the soul and the contribution of goodness to the wider community. A flourishing person knows sadness as well as happiness.
2. Demagogues are dangerous — Governments decay when language is corrupted, power becomes more important than goodness, and leaders have disordered souls.
4. Truth is always more than our opinions about it — Truth as an aspirational ideal transcends every individual conception and resists possession.
5. Truth is another name for God, and sometimes a better name — Devotion to Truth can itself be a mode of spiritual attunement, and way of being responsive to the sacred depths of things.
Taken together, these lessons explain why Plato remains a living mentor rather than a museum figure. His importance lies not only in what he thought, but in the habits of mind and soul he invites us to cultivate—habits urgently needed in our own unsettled time.
We need Plato today.
- Jay McDaniel