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(2017) Ontologies of nature, Dordrecht, Springer.
"The Ambivalence of Eros: Plato's Natural Beginning(s)" provides an account of φύσις in Plato, and draws upon the fruitful pairing of ἔρως with φύσις. Hayes argues that with the introduction of ἔρως into Plato's account of nature, an alternative account of nature may be ventured, one which essentially disrupts the prevalence of the eidetic domain. Hayes subsequently reasons that the creation of the sensible cosmos by the erotically driven demiurge is a paradigm for the creation of the city in speech by the philosopher. If ἔρως is the common source of the creation of both sensible cosmos and city, then this has important cosmological and political implications. At the end of his chapter, Hayes suggests the ἔρως that humans feel to become one with the noumenal (and to become like a god) is the source of the insatiable greed (πλεονεξία) that ravages the earth today. The drive to immortalize ourselves through the excessive proliferation of our own species has blinded us to our own moral obligations and particularly to our duty to revere the earth as the mother of all things.
Publication details
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-66236-7_2
Full citation:
Hayes, (2017)., The ambivalence of eros: Plato's natural beginning(s), in G. Kuperus & M. Oele (eds.), Ontologies of nature, Dordrecht, Springer, pp. 27-46.
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