NU Splash Biography

Alfred North Whitehead once said, “The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.” The first time you hear this quote you scoff, and think, “he must be overstating the dude.” At least, I thought that before my first political theory course, but the more political theory you read, the more you’ll see just how extraordinarily influential he has been on our thinking, even today. While the translations of his work are excellent, to really understand him requires learning context about the ways in which he said what he said and why. In this class, we will go over the Euthyphro to understand one of the first known arguments against religious government, how to read Plato, see why he's important, and see how he can be problematic as well.