The Dialogues of Plato
Socrates asks one more question. He always asks one more question.
Every stat is a checkable fact about the actual book, not a designer's mood. Bars are drawn against the highest value any book reaches.
By levelling up. A book that develops keeps what it knew and learns the rest on its new schedule.
| Lv | Move | Type | Cat. | Pwr | Acc | PP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Socratic Question | Rationality | Argument | 50 | 100% | 20 |
| 1 | Allegory of the Cave | Allegory | Argument | 55 | 100% | 15 |
| 8 | Question the Premise | Rationality | Type shift | — | — | 10 |
| 50 | Speak Greek | History | Status | — | 100% | 5 |
How to read these. In Scholar’s Dream, books argue with each other. Each thing a book can do in a debate is a move, and most moves carry a real quotation — the words the book puts on the table when it uses that move.
Strong against lists the opposing books and arguments a move was written to answer. Used against one of them, it hits much harder than usual: ×2 means twice the normal force, ×4 four times. It is the game’s way of saying: this is the sentence that answers that argument. Open an entry to read why.
“And do you think that they would see anything of themselves or of one another, except the shadows thrown by the fire on the wall of the cave?”
Plato, Republic 514a–515a (trans. Jowett, public domain; condensed) — prisoners who take shadows for reality, until one climbs to the light.public domain
In the gameShadows on a wall, mistaken for the world.
“The unexamined life is not worth living.” — Socrates at his trial, as Plato records it.
Plato, Apology 38a (trans. Jowett, public domain).public domain
In the gameQuestion after question until the seams show. Often finds the telling stroke.
“He who pleads his cause first seems right; until another comes and questions him.”
Proverbs 18:17 (WEB).
In the gameChallenge the foundation of an argument before it can be pressed. Lowers the foe’s Contend.
The specific move or chapter of Scripture that cuts through this one, and why. The number is how much harder it hits than usual — ×4 is four times the normal force.
Everything but the one sentence. Augustine read these books and found the Word in them, and did not find him made flesh.
Diotima’s ladder in the Symposium climbs from one beautiful body to all of them to beauty itself, because no particular thing ever finishes the wanting. Augustine makes that argument nearly eight centuries later and grants Plato every rung of it. What a Form cannot do is come looking for you.
Nobody here says Plato was wrong. The claim is that he was unfinished, and that what he was reaching for came down and finished it.
Paul did not argue the Athenians out of their poets. He quoted them, agreed with them, and then said the one thing the poets had never reached.
Justin’s rule: whatever any philosopher said truly, he said it because the Word who became Christ had already sown it in him. Plato is not the opponent here. He is early evidence.