Confusion and Plato

Confusion

Confusion plagues everyone in the world. Daily people are subject to struggles that involve them being confused and allow them to not fully take in what the world has to offer. Confusion simply put is the “impaired orientation with respect to time, place, or person; a disturbed mental state.” With that said it is evident that many things a susceptible to confusion, and being confused. When reading Plato one cannot

help to be confused, some confused on the general meaning others confused on the actual wording. Either way Plato is a difficult book to follow, and the way it is written definitely makes is far more confusing. But what is confusion is it just something that we need in order to understand something, if there was no confusion would we ever learn anything? Are we confused because we don’t want to learn? Is it just that the brain cannot

always take in various issues or topics? In the case of Plato I believe that for better understanding one needs to be confused in order to really get what the true meaning of the book is, and through reading, thinking and getting help I believe that one can fully comprehend Plato to its fullest.

“We speaking of carrying and we speak of being carried, of leading and being led, seeing and being seen”(Plato 437). A line like that can surely cause many problematic situations to readers because of the way it is worded and really makes it that much harder for the brain to take in, rather than if it was worded very simple and did not require much thought. That I think is what makes Plato sink in better, because if one has to look back and read a certain part over again numerous times, it will only make it become easier to understand and comprehend for a future reading. I believe in my case the high levels of confusion found me looking back and reading it a number of times, and also asking more questions about the book, thus giving me a much better perspective and understanding of the text. That makes confusion a very useful tool in order to gain a much better understanding of a text. Although confusion is not intentional, it is involuntary, and in the case of Plato much confusion can be found, and much understanding can be gained from that confusion.

We don’t intentionally confuse ourselves, I don’t think it is possible for one to intentionally confuse themselves if they already know the material. But in the case of students that do not know much about the text and such it is certain that confusion can easily be attained. What we discuss in class and in lectures allow for someone’s jaded ideas about the text to surface. In most cases it is more of the wording and forming an argument that makes it much harder to fully be capable of speaking about Plato. In most cases I find myself having a good idea of thought about Plato, but I find myself running around in circles when it comes down to speaking about it aloud. There definitely can be much to gain from that, and we just need a stepping stone to bridge our thoughts with our mouths. That is why I think it is very important for discussion and for teachers to really make people