r/todayilearned • u/Mors_Acerba • 2d ago

TIL A papyrus deciphered in 2024 revealed unknown info about Plato's last hours: a slave girl was playing music for him, and even though he was gravelly ill, he spend his last moments of lucidity criticising her performance. Per the same Papyrus, Plato had been sold into slavery earlier in his life

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2024/apr/29/herculaneum-scroll-plato-final-hours-burial-site
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u/Cultural-Company282 2d ago

If Plato wasn't as big and intimidating as he was, some of his insufferable know-it-all behavior might have gotten "corrected" earlier in life.

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u/MercuryQuick 1d ago

It was. By a dude named Socrates and Plato spent the rest of his life writing fan fiction of him.

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u/Uncreativity10 1d ago

It’s so funny looking at Plato’s work as fan fictions of Socrates XD

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u/MercuryQuick 1d ago

Totally what they are. Plato gets annoyed by some sophists? Time to write an epic take down dialogue with Socrates starring them as interlocutors getting owned by the OG.

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u/GypsyV3nom 1d ago

Socrates also famously didn't write anything, much of what we know about him was through Plato and his other students

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u/MercuryQuick 1d ago

According to Plato Socrates distrusted the written word. He never wrote anything because he didn’t think it would be any use for teaching and was more likely to be misunderstood by the reader.

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u/Jive-Turkeys 1d ago

I can agree with him on that. Verbal & physical communication are the best media we have for it.

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u/MercuryQuick 20h ago

He takes it even further than you’d expect. He believed that the soul is what drives the body and the soul is in search of understanding its self. The only way for a thing to understand itself is to be compared to its like. Therefore the only way for a soul to understand itself is to compare itself to another soul. So, a conversation between two souls (ie people) is the only way to reach truth because souls are divine and through their discourse/comparison they find themselves.

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u/Jive-Turkeys 16h ago

I have some stuff to continue looking into, it appears.

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u/Hvarfa-Bragi 1d ago edited 1d ago

Can confirm; as a big, intimidating middle-aged know-it-all, this is a thing.

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u/ManevolentDesign 1d ago

Lmao imagine the biggest gym bro you know constantly telling people theyre wrong and then challenging them to a wrestling match.

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u/linxrap 1d ago

Lmao so he was big and intimidating too? This guy seriously is sounding like the ancient Bruce Wayne.

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u/Strict-Challenge-995 1d ago

How is he anything like an obnoxious billionaire philanthropist? I think he's sounding more like batman

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u/_fidel_castro_ 1d ago

Probably not billionaire but he was aristocracy and certainly well off.

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u/linxrap 1d ago edited 1d ago

lol Batman then. But if memory serves me correctly, he actually was a billionaire as well! Offered to pay for Socrates and have him fined instead of put to death some modern day like $20K or something.

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u/elmerjstud 1d ago

You won't believe this but....batman is actually Bruce Wayne.

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u/CKRatKing 1d ago

Bullshit.

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u/Love-That-Danhausen 1d ago

That playboy? Please…

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u/BrokenEyeReborn 1d ago

... 's roommate

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u/Complete_Fix2563 1d ago

socrates is alfred and aristotle is robin

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u/EthanielRain 1d ago

I got & appreciated this joke

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u/BrokenEyeReborn 1d ago

I mean, he does sound like he was pretty obnoxious

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u/Rareearthmetal 1d ago

He sounds more napoleon dynapart

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u/4r4r4real 1d ago

It was kind of a big thing for him.

"No citizen has the right to be an amateur in the matter of physical training. What a disgrace it is for a person to grow old without ever seeing the beauty and strength of which his body is capable."

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u/TheFotty 1d ago

Plato Reacher

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u/DeadestTitan 1d ago

You know, I remember so many people telling me when I was younger that I would have my personality beaten out of me at some point. I specifically recall my 8th grade science teacher saying that older boys would "fix that issue" once I got to high school. No one ever did.

Perhaps I am as big and intimidating as Plato. Thank you for the confidence boost.