THE "Theory of Ideas” Platonic arose to explain first the problem posed by Socrates about definitions. In its development, it was necessary to establish the ideas as unifying the multiple objects given in sensations (representations of smell, taste, sight, hearing and touch), which alone are not sufficient to explain the representations of these objects and their essence.
Plato thus divides reality into two distinct universes: the intelligible and the sensible. The first contains the pure forms, the essences and the foundation of the existence of the beings of the second. Thus, both nature beings and men are sensitive copies of intelligible original models.
It is from this that Plato criticizes art. Each particular being participates in ideas (participation is the relationship between the whole and the parts) without being confused with them, which are, therefore, absolute. The world is a copy of the real and this departure from the real is already a Dissimilarity, albeit natural. However, Plato judges art as an imitation, capable of deceiving, since the sensible reality is already an imitation of the intelligible. Art distances even more from the real, as it imitates copying. The imitation of the copy is what Plato calls the
Simulacrum, which introduces an excess greater than the very existence of the natural world. That is why Plato rejects art in its ideal state, wanting, with that, to replace Poetry by Philosophy.Do not stop now... There's more after the advertising ;)
As for Aristotle, this Platonic model is useless and untenable. For him, reality is the sensitive and "the being says itself in various ways”. That is to say, beings are always called in relation to a category and a universal gender abstracted from particular beings. Imitation, therefore, becomes even beneficial because it represents a composition of narratives that show possible experiences. Imitation has a pedagogical character, as its effect (catharsis) promotes an identification with the character, creating or awakening feelings that purify and educate, featuring norms of actions.
In this sense, it is said that the artistic experience is based on situations that have a Likelihood, not with real facts or acts, but also with those that are possible to happen, that is, that are potential. Aristotle uses tragedy above other art forms because it deals with human dramas in which only the best can be happy solving such dramas.
Therefore, while dissimilarity, or rather its production, increasingly distances itself from the real, verisimilitude (although ontologically different) is the possibility of becoming a reality. The first uneducates, while the second prepares for community life, awakening common and universal feelings.
By João Francisco P. Cabral
Brazil School Collaborator
Graduated in Philosophy from the Federal University of Uberlândia - UFU
Master's student in Philosophy at the State University of Campinas - UNICAMP
Philosophy - Brazil School
Would you like to reference this text in a school or academic work? Look:
CABRAL, João Francisco Pereira. "Aesthetics in the Philosophy of Plato and Aristotle"; Brazil School. Available in: https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/filosofia/a-estetica-na-filosofia-platao-aristoteles.htm. Accessed on June 28, 2021.