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CHAPTER 5
THE PHILOSOPHER-KING: PLATO
INSTRUCTIONS: Select the best answer according to the text.
TRUE/FALSE
1. Our chief source of information regarding Plato s
philosophy is Aristotle.
2. The Republic is probably the most widely read work in
Western philosophy.
3. Plato concluded that all existing states are bad.
4. The chief purpose of Plato s school was probably to
provide Plato with a comfortable living.
5. Plato believed that what is true changes slowly
over time.
6. In Plato s metaphysics, the highest level of reality
consists of forms.
7. Plato claimed that there are four levels of awareness.
8. Plato compared the good to the sun.
9. Plato s Republic identifies three classes of people:
philosopher-kings, guardians, and workers.
10. Plato divided the human soul into three parts: reason,
spirit, and appetite.
11. The Republic concerns the search for justice.
12. The cardinal virtues are justice, courage, temperance,
and love.
13. According to Plato, justice is the result of the other
cardinal virtues.
14. According to Plato, injustice is a form of imbalance.
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15. For Plato, aristocracy is the ideal form of government.
16. According to Plato, democracy leads to tyranny.
17. According to Plato, the disordered soul lacks a sense
of shame.
MULTIPLE CHOICE
18. Perictione is rumored to have been Plato s _____ .
a. daughter
b. girlfriend
c. mentor
d. mother
19. Perictione said that wisdom is a form of _____ .
a. toil
b. harmony
c. insight
d. power
20. Our chief source of information regarding Plato s
philosophy is _____ .
a. Xenophon
b. Socrates
c. Plato
d. Aristotle
21. _____ is probably the most widely read work in Western
philosophy.
a. The Apology
b. The Republic
c. The Plato
d. The Bible
22. Plato s family were members of _____ .
a. the Spartan army
b. Phoenician mystery cults
c. the Thirty
d. the Delphic Oracles
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23. Plato became disillusioned with both the _____ and
the _____.
a. mob/philosophers
b. aristocracy/Persians
c. aristocracy/mob
d. friends of Socrates/followers of Aristotle
24. Plato thought that rule by the many _____ .
a. was Athens s only hope for salvation
b. led to irrationality
c. was based on heritage and tyranny, not on reason
and merit
d. was the most effective way to avoid error in
government
25. Plato thought that rule by the aristocracy _____ .
a. was Athens s only hope for salvation
b. guaranteed mediocrity and corruption
c. was based on heritage and tyranny, not on reason
and merit
d. was the most effective way to avoid error in
government
26. In Plato s view, the average person _____ .
a. is most fit to rule by virtue of his or her common
sense
b. lacks wisdom and self-restraint
c. though unfit to lead, is a wise judge of leaders
d. acquires practical wisdom whenever he or she is
compelled to take part in a true democracy
27. In regard to systems of government, Plato concluded that
_____ .
a. all existing states are bad
b. democracy, when true, is the best form of
government
c. oligarchy is the ideal form of government
d. one form of government is as good as another when
their leaders are decent representatives of the
people
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28. Plato named his school _____ .
a. Wise Acres
b. the Lyceum
c. the Museum
d. the Academy
29. The chief purpose of Plato s school was probably _____ .
a. to educate people who would be fit to rule the state
b. to provide Plato with a comfortable living
c. as a cover for a secret attempt to overthrow Athens
so that philosophers could govern the city
d. to restore the old aristocracy to power
30. Plato concluded that the solution to the basic problem of
knowledge lay in acknowledging that _____ .
a. neither Heraclitus nor Parmenides was correct in
their efforts to characterize reality
b. both Heraclitus and Parmenides were correct in
their efforts to characterize reality
c. Heraclitus was correct in his efforts to characterize
reality
d. Parmenides was correct in his efforts to
characterize reality
31. In part, Plato s theory of forms was his answer to _____ .
a. sophistic skepticism
b. the question of the meaning of life
c. Socratic egoism
d. dualism
32. Plato believed that what is true _____ .
a. changes slowly over time
b. is always true
c. can never be known
d. can only be discovered by scientific experiment
33. According to Plato, what is real _____ .
a. is eternal
b. is physical
c. is a matter of appearance
d. is less important than what is true
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34. According to Plato, _____ changes.
a. reality
b. time
c. appearance
d. knowledge
35. In Plato s metaphysics, the highest level of reality
consists of _____ .
a. forms
b. objects
c. human beings
d. concrete entities
36. Platonic forms are _____ .
a. styles of government
b. the middle level of reality
c. the lowest level of reality
d. the highest level of reality
37. Platonic forms are _____ .
a. mental constructs, ideas of the mind
b. independent and nonspatial
c. known through thought and perception
d. ever-changing
38. According to Plato, _____ changes, but _____ is timeless.
a. knowledge/wisdom
b. opinion/knowledge
c. society/the state
d. knowledge/intuition
39. According to Plato, _____ make things uniquely and
essentially what they are.
a. forms
b. ones
c. beings
d. atoms
40. For Plato, knowledge is always of _____ .
a. forms
b. sensibles
c. itself
d. momentary truths, understood deductively
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41. According to Plato, knowledge of particulars _____ .
a. is the foundation of knowledge of forms
b. is the beginning of knowledge of the general
c. comes only after glimpsing the forms
d. is impossible
42. According to Plato, the Sophists _____ .
a. understood politics but not epistemology
b. did not understand that opinions change, not the
truth itself
c. failed to realize that opinions never change since
they are ultimately derived from forms
d. understood the theory of forms but did not know
how to apply it to practical issues
43. Plato used the concept of a divided line to illustrate the _____ .
a. levels of being
b. relationship of knowledge to opinion, reality to
experience, and metaphysics to epistemology
c. difference between Parmenidean ones and
Platonic forms
d. failure of the Sophists to distinguish between
social truth and metaphysical truth
44. The Divided Line consists of _____ .
a. two evenly divided sections
b. two unevenly divided sections
c. two basic sections, each unevenly divided into
two segments
d. three unevenly divided segments representing the
three levels of reality
45. From lowest to highest, the levels of awareness
are _____ .
a. illusion, informed opinion, deductive reasoning,
direct apprehension of the Good
b. illusion, informed opinion, deductive reasoning,
philosophical reasoning
c. worker, warrior, philosopher
d. opinion, informed opinion, expert opinion,
knowledge
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46. In Platonic terms, a thing s _____ is what makes it
what it is.
a. nature
b. structure
c. form
d. culture
47. According to Plato, there are two levels of _____ .
a. reality
b. awareness
c. becoming
d. living
48. Plato s _____ illustrates the path from ignorance to
enlightenment.
a. Simile of the Sun
b. Allegory of the Sage
c. Allegory of the Cave
d. Parable of the Good
49. According to Plato, the disordered soul lacks a sense
of _____ .
a. humor
b. shame
c. spirituality
d. power
50. Plato s Republic identifies three classes of people:
_____ .
a. philosophers, poets, and soldiers
b. philosopher-kings, guardians, and workers
c. workers, warriors, and guardians
d. men, women, and noncitizens
51. Plato divided the human soul into three parts:
_____ .
a. ego, id, and superego
b. parent, adult, and child
c. reason, spirit, and appetite
d. reason, emotion, and spirit
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52. The Republic concerns the search for _____ .
a. wisdom
b. salvation
c. happiness
d. justice
53. Plato argues for a(n) _____ theory of morality.
a. rationalist
b. functionalist
c. instrumental
d. pragmatic
54. According to the Greeks of Plato s time, happiness
_____ .
a. is beyond human reach
b. is irrelevant when compared to politics
c. is the result of living a fully functioning life
d. remains the special domain of philosophers
55. According to Plato, the ideal state meets three kinds of
needs: _____ .
a. nourishing, protection, and ordering
b. physical, mental, and spiritual
c. physical, sexual, and developmental
d. technical, philosophical, and social
56. The cardinal virtues are _____ .
a. faith, hope, and charity
b. wisdom, courage, and temperance
c. justice, courage, temperance, and love
d. wisdom, courage, temperance, and justice
57. According to Plato, _____ is excellence of function of
the whole.
a. wisdom
b. justice
c. reason
d. Becoming
58. _____ is the virtue associated with the guardians.
a. Wisdom
b. Courage
c. Hope
d. Temperance
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59. According to Plato, injustice _____ .
a. is the result of denying all people equal rights
b. occurs whenever a state cannot enforce its laws
c. is a form of imbalance
d. cannot occur in a true democracy
60. For Plato, _____ is the ideal form of government.
a. rule by the people
b. rule by oligarchs
c. rule by philosopher-kings
d. rule by one tyrant
61. According to Plato, _____ is the origin of democracy.
a. tyranny
b. oligarchy
c. utopia
d. republicanism
62. According to Plato, the seeds of democracy are the love
of _____ .
a. freedom and equality
b. people and justice
c. property and riches
d. the individual and society
63. According to Plato, the seeds of tyranny are abuses
of _____ .
a. money
b. liberty
c. government property
d. power
64. According to Plato, democracy leads to _____ .
a. utopia
b. communism
c. tyranny
d. oligarchy
65. According to Plato, particular kinds of _____ produce
particular kinds of_____ .
a. philosophies/societies
b. societies/individuals
c. societies/philosophies
d. philosophies/realities
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Chapter 5
THE PHILOSOPHER-KING: PLATO
1. How did Plato distinguish between knowledge and opinion?
2. Explain the role Plato s theory of Forms played in his response
to sophistic skepticism. *
3. Identify and explain the basic levels of reality and distinguish
the realm of Being from the realm of Becoming.
4. First, tell Plato s Allegory of the Cave in your own words. Next,
carefully explain its epistemological purpose. Then use examples
from contemporary life to create an Allegory of the Cave in the
twenty-first century, being sure to identify specific examples of each
level. *
5. Explain in what sense Plato s theory of justice is functionalist
and relate it to the Greek concept of happiness. *
6. Describe the general structure of the ideal state as Plato
presents it in the Republic by responding to the following questions:
What are the cardinal virtues, and how do they relate to Plato s
theory of the ideal state? What makes a state unjust according to
Plato? *
7. Explain the origin, nature, and demise of democracy according
to Plato. Cite and evaluate contemporary evidence to support or
refute his description and prediction. *
8. Write a general assessment of contemporary American culture
from a Platonic perspective. Be specific. *
9. Use the Divided Line to explain the relationships among each
segment of Plato s epistemology characterized in the Allegory of the
Cave. *
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CHAPTER 5 ANSWERS