God & forms in Plato

This book is a collection of dovetailing essays which together interpret and assess the chief arguments and texts which make up Plato's cosmology. Arguments in the Timaeus, Sophist, Statesman, Philebus, and Laws X are analyzed with an eye to problems which affect the wider understanding of Plato's metaphysics, theology, epistemology, psychology, and physics. New interpretations are given to Plato's views on the role and characteristics of his craftsman God, the nature and status of Forms, the nature of time and eternity, the status and nature of space and the phenomenal realm, and the nature of and relations between reason, souls, bodies, and motion.

Revised edition of: The Platonic cosmology. 1985.

CONTENTS -- PREFACE TO THE REVISED AND EXPANDED EDITION (2005) -- FROM THE ORIGINAL PREFACE (1985) -- INTRODUCTION: THEMES AND THESES (1985) -- PART ONE THE WORKS OF REASON -- Divinity, Cognition, and Ontology: The Unique World Argument -- Plato on Time and Eternity -- PART TWO THE EFFECTS OF NECESSITY -- Image, Flux, and Space in the Timaeus -- The Gold Analogy in the Timaeus -- Remarks on the Stereometric Nature and Status of the Primary Bodies in the Timaeus -- The Mechanism of Flux in the Timaeus -- PART THREE THE OTHER COSMOLOGICAL WRITINGS

Disorderly Motion in the StatesmanThe Sources of Evil Problem and the Principle of Motion Doctrine in the Phaedrus and Laws X -- The World-Soul in the Platonic Cosmology -- The Relation of Reason to Soul in the Platonic Cosmology: Sophist 248e�249d -- The Platonic Theodicy: Laws X, 899�905 -- RELATED ESSAYS ON PLATO�S METAPHYSICS -- Family Resemblance, Platonism, Universals -- The Formation of the Cosmos in the Statesman Myth -- The Divided Line and the Doctrine of Recollection in Plato -- The Number Theory in Plato�s Republic VII and Philebus

Extensions (2005)bibliography of works cited -- index of platonic passages cited -- aut…