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The earliest records of physical training are drawings on the walls of a funerary chapel in Beni-Hassan in Egypt 4,500 years ago

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Physical training has a long, rich history, with some original records starting an estimated 4500 years ago. Why is it important?

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archaeological evidence suggests that strength training was popularized and that weightlifting was a regular occurrence during the Greek period.
https://greekreporter.com/2022/09/19/ancient-greek-weightlifter-bybon/

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The famous Philosopher Plato is the one who invented physical education, hosting classes at his school titled Akademia. He started teaching students at age 7 because he understood the importance of teaching children about physical fitness.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plato

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Plato ( PLAY-toe; Greek: Plátōn; 428/427 or 424/423 - 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world.

Plato is widely considered a pivotal figure in the history of Ancient Greek and Western philosophy, along with his teacher, Socrates, and his most famous student, Aristotle. He has often been cited as one of the founders of Western religion and spirituality. The so-called neoplatonism of philosophers, such as Plotinus and Porphyry, greatly influenced Christianity through Church Fathers such as Augustine. Alfred North Whitehead once noted: "the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato."

Plato was an innovator of the written dialogue and dialectic forms in philosophy. Plato is also considered the founder of Western political philosophy. His most famous contribution is the theory of Forms known by pure reason, in which Plato presents a solution to the problem of universals known as Platonism (also ambiguously called either Platonic realism or Platonic idealism). He is also the namesake of Platonic love and the Platonic solids.

His own most decisive philosophical influences are usually thought to have been, along with Socrates, the pre-Socratics Pythagoras, Heraclitus and Parmenides, although few of his predecessors' works remain extant and much of what we know about these figures today derives from Plato himself. Unlike the work of nearly all of his contemporaries, Plato's entire body of work is believed to have survived intact for over 2,400 years. Although their popularity has fluctuated, Plato's works have consistently been read and studied.

Birth and family

Little is known about Plato's early life and education. He belonged to an aristocratic and influential family. According to a disputed tradition, reported by doxographer Diogenes Laërtius, Plato's father Ariston traced his descent from the king of Athens, Codrus, and the king of Messenia, Melanthus. According to the ancient Hellenic tradition, Codrus was said to have been descended from the mythological deity Poseidon.

Plato's mother was Perictione, whose family boasted of a relationship with the famous Athenian lawmaker and lyric poet Solon, one of the seven sages, who repealed the laws of Draco (except for the death penalty for homicide). Perictione was sister of Charmides and niece of Critias, both prominent figures of the Thirty Tyrants, known as the Thirty, the brief oligarchic regime (404-403 BC), which followed on the collapse of Athens at the end of the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC). According to some accounts, Ariston tried to force his attentions on Perictione, but failed in his purpose; then the god Apollo appeared to him in a vision, and as a result, Ariston left Perictione unmolested.

The exact time and place of Plato's birth are unknown. Based on ancient sources, most modern scholars believe that he was born in Athens or Aegina between 429 and 423 BC, not long after the start of the Peloponnesian War. The traditional date of Plato's birth during the 87th or 88th Olympiad, 428 or 427 BC, is based on a dubious interpretation of Diogenes Laërtius, who says, "When [Socrates] was gone, [Plato] joined Cratylus the Heracleitean and Hermogenes, who philosophized in the manner of Parmenides. Then, at twenty-eight, Hermodorus says, [Plato] went to Euclides in Megara." However, as Debra Nails argues, the text does not state that Plato left for Megara immediately after joining Cratylus and Hermogenes. In his Seventh Letter, Plato notes that his coming of age coincided with the taking of power by the Thirty, remarking, "But a youth under the age of twenty made himself a laughingstock if he attempted to enter the political arena." Thus, Nails dates Plato's birth to 424/423.

According to Neanthes, Plato was six years younger than Isocrates, and therefore was born the same year the prominent Athenian statesman Pericles died (429 BC). Jonathan Barnes regards 428 BC as the year of Plato's birth. The grammarian Apollodorus of Athens in his Chronicles argues that Plato was born in the 88th Olympiad. Both the and Sir Thomas Browne also claimed he was born during the 88th Olympiad. Another legend related that, when Plato was an infant, bees settled on his lips while he was sleeping: an augury of the sweetness of style in which he would discourse about philosophy.

Besides Plato himself, Ariston and Perictione had three other children; two sons, Adeimantus and Glaucon, and a daughter Potone, the mother of Speusippus (the nephew and successor of Plato as head of the Academy). The brothers Adeimantus and Glaucon are mentioned in the as sons of Ariston, and presumably brothers of Plato, though some have argued they were uncles. In a scenario in the Memorabilia, Xenophon confused the issue by presenting a Glaucon much younger than Plato.

Ariston appears to have died in Plato's childhood, although the precise dating of his death is difficult. Perictione then married Pyrilampes, her mother's brother, who had served many times as an ambassador to the Persian court and was a friend of Pericles, the leader of the democratic faction in Athens. Pyrilampes had a son from a previous marriage, Demus, who was famous for his beauty. Perictione gave birth to Pyrilampes' second son, Antiphon, the half-brother of Plato, who appears in Parmenides.

In contrast to his reticence about himself, Plato often introduced his distinguished relatives into his dialogues or referred to them with some precision. In addition to Adeimantus and Glaucon in the Republic, Charmides has a dialogue named after him; and Critias speaks in both and Protagoras. These and other references suggest a considerable amount of family pride and enable us to reconstruct Plato's family tree. According to Burnet, "the opening scene of the Charmides is a glorification of the whole [family] connection ... Plato's dialogues are not only a memorial to Socrates but also the happier days of his own family."

The fact that the philosopher in his maturity called himself Platon is indisputable, but the origin of this name remains mysterious. Platon is a nickname from the adjective platýs () 'broad'. Although Platon was a fairly common name (31 instances are known from Athens alone), the name does not occur in Plato's known family line. The sources of Diogenes Laërtius account for this by claiming that his wrestling coach, Ariston of Argos, dubbed him "broad" on account of his chest and shoulders, or that Plato derived his name from the breadth of his eloquence, or his wide forehead. While recalling a moral lesson about frugal living Seneca mentions the meaning of Plato's name: "His very name was given him because of his broad chest."

His true name was supposedly Aristocles (Ἀριστοκλῆς ), meaning 'best reputation'. According to Diogenes Laërtius, he was named after his grandfather, as was common in Athenian society. But there is only one inscription of an Aristocles, an early archon of Athens in 605/4 BC. There is no record of a line from Aristocles to Plato's father, Ariston. Recently a scholar has argued that even the name Aristocles for Plato was a much later invention. However, another scholar claims that "there is good reason for not dismissing [the idea that Aristocles was Plato's given name] as a mere invention of his biographers", noting how prevalent that account is in our sources.

Ancient sources describe him as a bright though modest boy who excelled in his studies. Apuleius informs us that Speusippus praised Plato's quickness of mind and modesty as a boy, and the "first fruits of his youth infused with hard work and love of study". His father contributed all which was necessary to give to his son a good education, and, therefore, Plato must have been instructed in grammar, music, and gymnastics by the most distinguished teachers of his time. Plato invokes Damon many times in the Republic. Plato was a wrestler, and Dicaearchus went so far as to say that Plato wrestled at the Isthmian games. Plato had also attended courses of philosophy; before meeting Socrates, he first became acquainted with Cratylus and the Heraclitean doctrines.

Ambrose believed that Plato met Jeremiah in Egypt and was influenced by his ideas. Augustine initially accepted this claim, but later rejected it, arguing in The City of God that "Plato was born a hundred years after Jeremiah prophesied."

Later life and death

Plato may have travelled in Italy, Sicily, Egypt, and Cyrene. Plato's own statement was that he visited Italy and Sicily at the age of forty and was disgusted by the sensuality of life there. Said to have returned to Athens at the age of forty, Plato founded one of the earliest known organized schools in Western Civilization on a plot of land in the Grove of Hecademus or Academus. This land was named after Academus, an Attic hero in Greek mythology. In historic Greek times it was adorned with oriental plane and olive plantations

The Academy was a large enclosure of ground about six stadia (a total of between a kilometer and a half mile) outside of Athens proper. One story is that the name of the Academy comes from the ancient hero, Academus; still another story is that the name came from a supposed former owner of the plot of land, an Athenian citizen whose name was (also) Academus; while yet another account is that it was named after a member of the army of Castor and Pollux, an Arcadian named Echedemus. The Academy operated until it was destroyed by Lucius Cornelius Sulla in 84 BC. Many intellectuals were schooled in the Academy, the most prominent one being Aristotle.

Throughout his later life, Plato became entangled with the politics of the city of Syracuse. According to Diogenes Laërtius, Plato initially visited Syracuse while it was under the rule of Dionysius. During this first trip Dionysius's brother-in-law, Dion of Syracuse, became one of Plato's disciples, but the tyrant himself turned against Plato. Plato almost faced death, but he was sold into slavery. Anniceris, a Cyrenaic philosopher, subsequently bought Plato's freedom for twenty minas, and sent him home. After Dionysius's death, according to Plato's Seventh Letter, Dion requested Plato return to Syracuse to tutor Dionysius II and guide him to become a philosopher king. Dionysius II seemed to accept Plato's teachings, but he became suspicious of Dion, his uncle. Dionysius expelled Dion and kept Plato against his will. Eventually Plato left Syracuse. Dion would return to overthrow Dionysius and ruled Syracuse for a short time before being usurped by Calippus, a fellow disciple of Plato.

According to Seneca, Plato died at the age of 81 on the same day he was born. The Suda indicates that he lived to 82 years, while Neanthes claims an age of 84. A variety of sources have given accounts of his death. One story, based on a mutilated manuscript, suggests Plato died in his bed, whilst a young Thracian girl played the flute to him. Another tradition suggests Plato died at a wedding feast. The account is based on Diogenes Laërtius's reference to an account by Hermippus, a third-century Alexandrian. According to Tertullian, Plato simply died in his sleep.

Plato owned an estate at Iphistiadae, which by will he left to a certain youth named Adeimantus, presumably a younger relative, as Plato had an elder brother or uncle by this name.

Influences

Pythagoras

Although Socrates influenced Plato directly as related in the dialogues, the influence of Pythagoras upon Plato, or in a broader sense, the Pythagoreans, such as Archytas also appears to have been significant. Aristotle claimed that the philosophy of Plato closely followed the teachings of the Pythagoreans, and Cicero repeats this claim: "They say Plato learned all things Pythagorean." It is probable that both were influenced by Orphism, and both believed in metempsychosis, transmigration of the soul.

Pythagoras held that all things are number, and the cosmos comes from numerical principles. He introduced the concept of form as distinct from matter, and that the physical world is an imitation of an eternal mathematical world. These ideas were very influential on Heraclitus, Parmenides and Plato.

George Karamanolis notes that

Numenius accepted both Pythagoras and Plato as the two authorities one should follow in philosophy, but he regarded Plato's authority as subordinate to that of Pythagoras, whom he considered to be the source of all true philosophy-including Plato's own. For Numenius it is just that Plato wrote so many philosophical works, whereas Pythagoras' views were originally passed on only orally.

According to R. M. Hare, this influence consists of three points:

1. The platonic Republic might be related to the idea of "a tightly organized community of like-minded thinkers", like the one established by Pythagoras in Croton.

2. The idea that mathematics and, generally speaking, abstract thinking is a secure basis for philosophical thinking as well as "for substantial theses in science and morals".

3. They shared a "mystical approach to the soul and its place in the material world".

Plato and mathematics

Plato may have studied under the mathematician Theodorus of Cyrene, and has a dialogue named for and whose central character is the mathematician Theaetetus. While not a mathematician, Plato was considered an accomplished teacher of mathematics. Eudoxus of Cnidus, the greatest mathematician in Classical Greece, who contributed much of what is found in Euclid's , was taught by Archytas and Plato. Plato helped to distinguish between pure and applied mathematics by widening the gap between "arithmetic", now called number theory and "logistic", now called arithmetic.

In the dialogue Plato associated each of the four classical elements ( earth, air, water, and fire) with a regular solid ( cube, octahedron, icosahedron, and tetrahedron respectively) due to their shape, the so-called Platonic solids. The fifth regular solid, the dodecahedron, was supposed to be the element which made up the heavens.

Heraclitus and Parmenides

The two philosophers Heraclitus and Parmenides, following the way initiated by pre-Socratic Greek philosophers such as Pythagoras, depart from mythology and begin the metaphysical tradition that strongly influenced Plato and continues today.

The surviving fragments written by Heraclitus suggest the view that all things are continuously changing, or becoming. His image of the river, with ever-changing waters, is well known. According to some ancient traditions such as that of Diogenes Laërtius, Plato received these ideas through Heraclitus' disciple Cratylus, who held the more radical view that continuous change warrants scepticism because we cannot define a thing that does not have a permanent nature.

Parmenides adopted an altogether contrary vision, arguing for the idea of changeless Being and the view that change is an illusion. John Palmer notes "Parmenides' distinction among the principal modes of being and his derivation of the attributes that must belong to what must be, simply as such, qualify him to be seen as the founder of metaphysics or ontology as a domain of inquiry distinct from theology."

These ideas about change and permanence, or becoming and Being, influenced Plato in formulating his theory of Forms.

Plato's most self-critical dialogue is the Parmenides, which features Parmenides and his student Zeno, who, following Parmenides' denial of change, argued forcefully through his paradoxes to deny the existence of motion.

Plato's dialogue includes an Eleatic stranger, a follower of Parmenides, as a foil for his arguments against Parmenides. In the dialogue, Plato distinguishes nouns and verbs, providing some of the earliest treatment of subject and predicate. He also argues that motion and rest both "are", against followers of Parmenides who say rest is but motion is not.

Plato was one of the devoted young followers of Socrates. The precise relationship between Plato and Socrates remains an area of contention among scholars.

Plato never speaks in his own voice in his dialogues, and speaks as Socrates in all but the Laws. In the Second Letter, it says, "no writing of Plato exists or ever will exist, but those now said to be his are those of a Socrates become beautiful and new"; if the Letter is Plato's, the final qualification seems to call into question the dialogues' historical fidelity. In any case, Xenophon's Memorabilia and Aristophanes's seem to present a somewhat different portrait of Socrates from the one Plato paints. The Socratic problem asks how to reconcile these various accounts. Leo Strauss notes that Socrates' reputation for irony casts doubt on whether Plato's Socrates is expressing sincere beliefs.

Aristotle attributes a different doctrine with respect to Forms to Plato and Socrates. Aristotle suggests that Socrates' idea of forms can be discovered through investigation of the natural world, unlike Plato's Forms that exist beyond and outside the ordinary range of human understanding. In the dialogues of Plato though, Socrates sometimes seems to support a mystical side, discussing reincarnation and the mystery religions, this is generally attributed to Plato. Regardless, this view of Socrates cannot be dismissed out of hand, as we cannot be sure of the differences between the views of Plato and Socrates. In the Plato refers to the Eleusinian Mysteries, telling Meno he would understand Socrates's answers better if he could stay for the initiations next week. It is possible that Plato and Socrates took part in the Eleusinian Mysteries.

Philosophy

In Plato's dialogues, Socrates and his company of disputants had something to say on many subjects, including several aspects of metaphysics. These include religion and science, human nature, love, and sexuality. More than one dialogue contrasts perception and reality, nature and custom, and body and soul. Francis Cornford referred to the "twin pillars of Platonism" as being the theory of Forms on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the doctrine of immortality of the soul.

"Platonism" and its theory of Forms (or theory of Ideas) denies the reality of the material world, considering it only an image or copy of the real world. The theory of Forms is first introduced in the dialogue (also known as On the Soul), wherein Socrates refutes the pluralism of the likes of Anaxagoras, then the most popular response to Heraclitus and Parmenides, while giving the "Opposites Argument" in support of the Forms.

According to this theory of Forms, there are at least two worlds: the apparent world of concrete objects, grasped by the senses, which constantly changes, and an unchanging and unseen world of Forms or abstract objects, grasped by pure reason (), which ground what is apparent.

It can also be said there are three worlds, with the apparent world consisting of both the world of material objects and of mental images, with the "third realm" consisting of the Forms. Thus, though there is the term "Platonic idealism", this refers to Platonic Ideas or the Forms, and not to some platonic kind of idealism, an 18th-century view which sees matter as unreal in favour of mind. For Plato, though grasped by the mind, only the Forms are truly real.

Plato's Forms thus represent types of things, as well as properties, patterns, and relations, to which we refer as objects. Just as individual tables, chairs, and cars refer to objects in this world, 'tableness', 'chairness', and 'carness', as well as e. g. justice, truth, and beauty refer to objects in another world. One of Plato's most cited examples for the Forms were the truths of geometry, such as the Pythagorean theorem.

In other words, the Forms are universals given as a solution to the problem of universals, or the problem of "the One and the Many", e. g. how one predicate "red" can apply to many red objects. For Plato, this is because there is one abstract object or Form of red, redness itself, in which the several red things "participate". As Plato's solution is that universals are Forms and that Forms are real if anything is, Plato's philosophy is unambiguously called Platonic realism. According to Aristotle, Plato's best-known argument in support of the Forms was the "one over many" argument.

Aside from being immutable, timeless, changeless, and one over many, the Forms also provide definitions and the standard against which all instances are measured. In the dialogues Socrates regularly asks for the meaning - in the sense of intensional definitions - of a general term (e. g. justice, truth, beauty), and criticizes those who instead give him particular, extensional examples, rather than the quality shared by all examples.

There is thus a world of perfect, eternal, and changeless meanings of predicates, the Forms, existing in the realm of Being outside of space and time; and the imperfect sensible world of becoming, subjects somehow in a state between being and nothing, that partakes of the qualities of the Forms, and is its instantiation.

For Plato, as was characteristic of ancient Greek philosophy, the soul was that which gave life. See this brief exchange from the Phaedo: "What is it that, when present in a body, makes it living? - A soul."

Plato advocates a belief in the immortality of the soul, and several dialogues end with long speeches imagining the afterlife. In the Timaeus, Socrates locates the parts of the soul within the human body: Reason is located in the head, spirit in the top third of the torso, and the appetite in the middle third of the torso, down to the navel.

Epistemology

Plato also discusses several aspects of epistemology. More than one dialogue contrasts knowledge () and opinion (). Plato's epistemology involves Socrates (and other characters, such as Timaeus) arguing that knowledge is not empirical, and that it comes from divine insight. The Forms are also responsible for both knowledge or certainty, and are grasped by pure reason.

In several dialogues, Socrates inverts the common man's intuition about what is knowable and what is real. Reality is unavailable to those who use their senses. Socrates says that he who sees with his eyes is blind. While most people take the objects of their senses to be real if anything is, Socrates is contemptuous of people who think that something has to be graspable in the hands to be real. In the Theaetetus, he says such people are eu amousoi (εὖ ἄμουσοι), an expression that means literally, "happily without the muses". In other words, such people are willingly ignorant, living without divine inspiration and access to higher insights about reality.

In Plato's dialogues, Socrates always insists on his ignorance and humility, that he knows nothing, so-called " Socratic irony." Several dialogues refute a series of viewpoints, but offer no positive position, thus ending in aporia.

Recollection

In several of Plato's dialogues, Socrates promulgates the idea that knowledge is a matter of recollection of the state before one is born, and not of observation or study. Keeping with the theme of admitting his own ignorance, Socrates regularly complains of his forgetfulness. In the Meno, Socrates uses a geometrical example to expound Plato's view that knowledge in this latter sense is acquired by recollection. Socrates elicits a fact concerning a geometrical construction from a slave boy, who could not have otherwise known the fact (due to the slave boy's lack of education). The knowledge must be present, Socrates concludes, in an eternal, non-experiential form.

In other dialogues, the Sophist, , Republic, and the Parmenides, Plato himself associates knowledge with the apprehension of unchanging Forms and their relationships to one another (which he calls "expertise" in Dialectic), including through the processes of collection and division. More explicitly, Plato himself argues in the Timaeus that knowledge is always proportionate to the realm from which it is gained. In other words, if one derives one's account of something experientially, because the world of sense is in flux, the views therein attained will be mere opinions. And opinions are characterized by a lack of necessity and stability. On the other hand, if one derives one's account of something by way of the non-sensible forms, because these forms are unchanging, so too is the account derived from them. That apprehension of forms is required for knowledge may be taken to cohere with Plato's theory in the Theaetetus and Meno. Indeed, the apprehension of Forms may be at the base of the "account" required for justification, in that it offers foundational knowledge which itself needs no account, thereby avoiding an infinite regression.

Justified true belief

Many have interpreted Plato as stating - even having been the first to write - that knowledge is justified true belief, an influential view that informed future developments in epistemology. This interpretation is partly based on a reading of the Theaetetus wherein Plato argues that knowledge is distinguished from mere true belief by the knower having an "account" of the object of their true belief. And this theory may again be seen in the Meno, where it is suggested that true belief can be raised to the level of knowledge if it is bound with an account as to the question of "why" the object of the true belief is so.

Many years later, Edmund Gettier famously demonstrated the problems of the justified true belief account of knowledge. That the modern theory of justified true belief as knowledge, which Gettier addresses, is equivalent to Plato's is accepted by some scholars but rejected by others. Plato himself also identified problems with the justified true belief definition in the Theaetetus, concluding that justification (or an "account") would require knowledge of difference, meaning that the definition of knowledge is circular.

Several dialogues discuss ethics including virtue and vice, pleasure and pain, crime and punishment, and justice and medicine. Plato views "The Good" as the supreme Form, somehow existing even "beyond being".

Socrates propounded a moral intellectualism which claimed nobody does bad on purpose, and to know what is good results in doing what is good; that knowledge is virtue. In the Protagoras dialogue it is argued that virtue is innate and cannot be learned.

Socrates presents the famous Euthyphro dilemma in the dialogue of the same name: "Is the pious ( τὸ ὅσιον) loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because it is loved by the gods?" ( 10a)

As above, in the Republic, Plato asks the question, "What is justice?" By means of the Greek term dikaiosune - a term for "justice" that captures both individual justice and the justice that informs societies, Plato is able not only to inform metaphysics, but also ethics and politics with the question: "What is the basis of moral and social obligation?" Plato's well-known answer rests upon the fundamental responsibility to seek wisdom, wisdom which leads to an understanding of the Form of the Good. Plato further argues that such understanding of Forms produces and ensures the good communal life when ideally structured under a philosopher king in a society with three classes (philosopher kings, guardians, and workers) that neatly mirror his triadic view of the individual soul (reason, spirit, and appetite). In this manner, justice is obtained when knowledge of how to fulfill one's moral and political function in society is put into practice.

The dialogues also discuss politics. Some of Plato's most famous doctrines are contained in the Republic as well as in the and the Statesman. Because these opinions are not spoken directly by Plato and vary between dialogues, they cannot be straightforwardly assumed as representing Plato's own views.

Socrates asserts that societies have a tripartite class structure corresponding to the appetite/spirit/reason structure of the individual soul. The appetite/spirit/reason are analogous to the castes of society.

Productive (Workers) - the labourers, carpenters, plumbers, masons, merchants, farmers, ranchers, etc. These correspond to the "appetite" part of the soul.

Protective (Warriors or Guardians) - those who are adventurous, strong and brave; in the armed forces. These correspond to the "spirit" part of the soul.

Governing (Rulers or Philosopher Kings) - those who are intelligent, rational, self-controlled, in love with wisdom, well suited to make decisions for the community. These correspond to the "reason" part of the soul and are very few.

According to this model, the principles of Athenian democracy (as it existed in his day) are rejected as only a few are fit to rule. Instead of rhetoric and persuasion, Socrates says reason and wisdom should govern. As Socrates puts it:

"Until philosophers rule as kings or those who are now called kings and leading men genuinely and adequately philosophize, that is, until political power and philosophy entirely coincide, while the many natures who at present pursue either one exclusively are forcibly prevented from doing so, cities will have no rest from evils,... nor, I think, will the human race."

Socrates describes these "philosopher kings" as "those who love the sight of truth" and supports the idea with the analogy of a captain and his ship or a doctor and his medicine. According to him, sailing and health are not things that everyone is qualified to practice by nature. A large part of the Republic then addresses how the educational system should be set up to produce these philosopher kings.

In addition, the ideal city is used as an image to illuminate the state of one's soul, or the will, reason, and desires combined in the human body. Socrates is attempting to make an image of a rightly ordered human, and then later goes on to describe the different kinds of humans that can be observed, from tyrants to lovers of money in various kinds of cities. The ideal city is not promoted, but only used to magnify the different kinds of individual humans and the state of their soul. However, the philosopher king image was used by many after Plato to justify their personal political beliefs. The philosophic soul according to Socrates has reason, will, and desires united in virtuous harmony. A philosopher has the moderate love for wisdom and the courage to act according to wisdom. Wisdom is knowledge about the Good or the right relations between all that exists.

Wherein it concerns states and rulers, Socrates asks which is better-a bad democracy or a country reigned by a tyrant. He argues that it is better to be ruled by a bad tyrant, than by a bad democracy (since here all the people are now responsible for such actions, rather than one individual committing many bad deeds.) This is emphasised within the Republic as Socrates describes the event of mutiny on board a ship. Socrates suggests the ship's crew to be in line with the democratic rule of many and the captain, although inhibited through ailments, the tyrant. Socrates' description of this event is parallel to that of democracy within the state and the inherent problems that arise.

According to Socrates, a state made up of different kinds of souls will, overall, decline from an aristocracy (rule by the best) to a timocracy (rule by the honourable), then to an oligarchy (rule by the few), then to a democracy (rule by the people), and finally to tyranny (rule by one person, rule by a tyrant). Aristocracy in the sense of government (politeia) is advocated in Plato's Republic. This regime is ruled by a philosopher king, and thus is grounded on wisdom and reason.

The aristocratic state, and the man whose nature corresponds to it, are the objects of Plato's analyses throughout much of the Republic, as opposed to the other four types of states/men, who are discussed later in his work. In Book VIII, Socrates states in order the other four imperfect societies with a description of the state's structure and individual character. In timocracy, the ruling class is made up primarily of those with a warrior-like character. Oligarchy is made up of a society in which wealth is the criterion of merit and the wealthy are in control. In democracy, the state bears resemblance to ancient Athens with traits such as equality of political opportunity and freedom for the individual to do as he likes. Democracy then degenerates into tyranny from the conflict of rich and poor. It is characterized by an undisciplined society existing in chaos, where the tyrant rises as a popular champion leading to the formation of his private army and the growth of oppression.

Art and poetry

Several dialogues tackle questions about art, including rhetoric and rhapsody. Socrates says that poetry is inspired by the muses, and is not rational. He speaks approvingly of this, and other forms of divine madness (drunkenness, eroticism, and dreaming) in the Phaedrus, and yet in the Republic wants to outlaw Homer's great poetry, and laughter as well. In , Socrates gives no hint of the disapproval of Homer that he expresses in the Republic. The dialogue Ion suggests that Homer's functioned in the ancient Greek world as the Bible does today in the modern Christian world: as divinely inspired literature that can provide moral guidance, if only it can be properly interpreted.

Scholars often view Plato's philosophy as at odds with rhetoric due to his criticisms of rhetoric in the Gorgias and his ambivalence toward rhetoric expressed in the Phaedrus. But other contemporary researchers contest the idea that Plato despised rhetoric and instead view his dialogues as a dramatization of complex rhetorical principles.

Unwritten doctrines

For a long time, Plato's unwritten doctrines had been controversial. Many modern books on Plato seem to diminish its importance; nevertheless, the first important witness who mentions its existence is Aristotle, who in his writes: "It is true, indeed, that the account he gives there [i.e. in Timaeus] of the participant is different from what he says in his so-called unwritten teachings ( Ancient Greek: ἄγραφα δόγματα, agrapha dogmata )." The term "" literally means unwritten doctrines or unwritten dogmas and it stands for the most fundamental metaphysical teaching of Plato, which he disclosed only orally, and some say only to his most trusted fellows, and which he may have kept secret from the public. The importance of the unwritten doctrines does not seem to have been seriously questioned before the 19th century.

A reason for not revealing it to everyone is partially discussed in Phaedrus where Plato criticizes the written transmission of knowledge as faulty, favouring instead the spoken : "he who has knowledge of the just and the good and beautiful ... will not, when in earnest, write them in ink, sowing them through a pen with words, which cannot defend themselves by argument and cannot teach the truth effectually." The same argument is repeated in Plato's Seventh Letter: "every serious man in dealing with really serious subjects carefully avoids writing." In the same letter he writes: "I can certainly declare concerning all these writers who claim to know the subjects that I seriously study ... there does not exist, nor will there ever exist, any treatise of mine dealing therewith." Such secrecy is necessary in order not "to expose them to unseemly and degrading treatment".

It is, however, said that Plato once disclosed this knowledge to the public in his lecture On the Good (Περὶ τἀγαθοῦ ), in which the Good () is identified with the One (the Unity, ), the fundamental ontological principle. The content of this lecture has been transmitted by several witnesses. Aristoxenus describes the event in the following words: "Each came expecting to learn something about the things that are generally considered good for men, such as wealth, good health, physical strength, and altogether a kind of wonderful happiness. But when the mathematical demonstrations came, including numbers, geometrical figures and astronomy, and finally the statement Good is One seemed to them, I imagine, utterly unexpected and strange; hence some belittled the matter, while others rejected it." Simplicius quotes Alexander of Aphrodisias, who states that "according to Plato, the first principles of everything, including the Forms themselves are One and Indefinite Duality (ἡ ἀόριστος δυάς ), which he called Large and Small (τὸ μέγα καὶ τὸ μικρόν )", and Simplicius reports as well that "one might also learn this from Speusippus and Xenocrates and the others who were present at Plato's lecture on the Good".

Their account is in full agreement with Aristotle's description of Plato's metaphysical doctrine. In Metaphysics he writes: "Now since the Forms are the causes of everything else, he [i.e. Plato] supposed that their elements are the elements of all things. Accordingly, the material principle is the Great and Small [i.e. the Dyad], and the essence is the One (), since the numbers are derived from the Great and Small by participation in the One". "From this account it is clear that he only employed two causes: that of the essence, and the material cause; for the Forms are the cause of the essence in everything else, and the One is the cause of it in the Forms. He also tells us what the material substrate is of which the Forms are predicated in the case of sensible things, and the One in that of the Forms-that it is this the duality (the Dyad, ), the Great and Small (τὸ μέγα καὶ τὸ μικρόν ). Further, he assigned to these two elements respectively the causation of good and of evil".

The most important aspect of this interpretation of Plato's metaphysics is the continuity between his teaching and the Neoplatonic interpretation of Plotinus or Ficino which has been considered erroneous by many but may in fact have been directly influenced by oral transmission of Plato's doctrine. A modern scholar who recognized the importance of the unwritten doctrine of Plato was Heinrich Gomperz who described it in his speech during the 7th International Congress of Philosophy in 1930. All the sources related to the ἄγραφα δόγματα have been collected by Konrad Gaiser and published as Testimonia Platonica. These sources have subsequently been interpreted by scholars from the German Tübingen School of interpretation such as Hans Joachim Krämer or Thomas A. Szlezák.

Themes of Plato's dialogues

Trial of Socrates

The trial of Socrates and his death sentence is the central, unifying event of Plato's dialogues. It is relayed in the dialogues Apology, , and . Apology is Socrates' defence speech, and Crito and Phaedo take place in prison after the conviction.

Apology is among the most frequently read of Plato's works. In the Apology, Socrates tries to dismiss rumours that he is a sophist and defends himself against charges of disbelief in the gods and corruption of the young. Socrates insists that long-standing slander will be the real cause of his demise, and says the legal charges are essentially false. Socrates famously denies being wise, and explains how his life as a philosopher was launched by the Oracle at Delphi. He says that his quest to resolve the riddle of the oracle put him at odds with his fellow man, and that this is the reason he has been mistaken for a menace to the city-state of Athens.

In Apology, Socrates is presented as mentioning Plato by name as one of those youths close enough to him to have been corrupted, if he were in fact guilty of corrupting the youth, and questioning why their fathers and brothers did not step forward to testify against him if he was indeed guilty of such a crime. Later, Plato is mentioned along with Crito, Critobolus, and Apollodorus as offering to pay a fine of 30 minas on Socrates' behalf, in lieu of the death penalty proposed by Meletus. In the Phaedo, the title character lists those who were in attendance at the prison on Socrates' last day, explaining Plato's absence by saying, "Plato was ill".

The trial in other dialogues

If Plato's important dialogues do not refer to Socrates' execution explicitly, they allude to it, or use characters or themes that play a part in it. Five dialogues foreshadow the trial: In the Theaetetus and the Euthyphro Socrates tells people that he is about to face corruption charges. In the , one of the men who brings legal charges against Socrates, Anytus, warns him about the trouble he may get into if he does not stop criticizing important people. In the , Socrates says that his trial will be like a doctor prosecuted by a cook who asks a jury of children to choose between the doctor's bitter medicine and the cook's tasty treats. In the Republic, Socrates explains why an enlightened man (presumably himself) will stumble in a courtroom situation. Plato's support of aristocracy and distrust of democracy is also taken to be partly rooted in a democracy having killed Socrates. In the Protagoras, Socrates is a guest at the home of Callias, son of Hipponicus, a man whom Socrates disparages in the Apology as having wasted a great amount of money on sophists' fees.

Two other important dialogues, the and the , are linked to the main storyline by characters. In the Apology, Socrates says Aristophanes slandered him in a comic play, and blames him for causing his bad reputation, and ultimately, his death. In the Symposium, the two of them are drinking together with other friends. The character Phaedrus is linked to the main story line by character (Phaedrus is also a participant in the Symposium and the Protagoras) and by theme (the philosopher as divine emissary, etc.) The Protagoras is also strongly linked to the Symposium by characters: all of the formal speakers at the Symposium (with the exception of Aristophanes) are present at the home of Callias in that dialogue. Charmides and his guardian Critias are present for the discussion in the Protagoras. Examples of characters crossing between dialogues can be further multiplied. The Protagoras contains the largest gathering of Socratic associates.

In the dialogues Plato is most celebrated and admired for, Socrates is concerned with human and political virtue, has a distinctive personality, and friends and enemies who "travel" with him from dialogue to dialogue. This is not to say that Socrates is consistent: a man who is his friend in one dialogue may be an adversary or subject of his mockery in another. For example, Socrates praises the wisdom of Euthyphro many times in the , but makes him look like a fool in the Euthyphro. He disparages sophists generally, and Prodicus specifically in the Apology, whom he also slyly jabs in the Cratylus for charging the hefty fee of fifty drachmas for a course on language and grammar. However, Socrates tells Theaetetus in his namesake dialogue that he admires Prodicus and has directed many pupils to him. Socrates' ideas are also not consistent within or between or among dialogues.

Allegories

Mythos and logos are terms that evolved throughout classical Greek history. In the times of Homer and Hesiod (8th century BC) they were essentially synonyms, and contained the meaning of 'tale' or 'history'. Later came historians like Herodotus and Thucydides, as well as philosophers like Heraclitus and Parmenides and other Presocratics who introduced a distinction between both terms; mythos became more a nonverifiable account, and logos a rational account. It may seem that Plato, being a disciple of Socrates and a strong partisan of philosophy based on logos, should have avoided the use of myth-telling. Instead, he made abundant use of it. This fact has produced analytical and interpretative work, in order to clarify the reasons and purposes for that use.

Plato, in general, distinguished between three types of myth. First, there were the false myths, like those based on stories of gods subject to passions and sufferings, because reason teaches that God is perfect. Then came the myths based on true reasoning, and therefore also true. Finally, there were those non-verifiable because beyond of human reason, but containing some truth in them. Regarding the subjects of Plato's myths, they are of two types, those dealing with the origin of the universe, and those about morals and the origin and fate of the soul.

It is generally agreed that the main purpose for Plato in using myths was didactic. He considered that only a few people were capable or interested in following a reasoned philosophical discourse, but men in general are attracted by stories and tales. Consequently, then, he used the myth to convey the conclusions of the philosophical reasoning. Some of Plato's myths were based in traditional ones, others were modifications of them, and finally, he also invented altogether new myths. Notable examples include the story of Atlantis, the Myth of Er, and the Allegory of the Cave.

The theory of Forms is most famously captured in his Allegory of the Cave, and more explicitly in his analogy of the sun and the divided line. The Allegory of the Cave is a paradoxical analogy wherein Socrates argues that the invisible world is the most intelligible ( noeton) and that the visible world ((h)oraton) is the least knowable, and the most obscure.

Socrates says in the Republic that people who take the sun-lit world of the senses to be good and real are living pitifully in a den of evil and ignorance. Socrates admits that few climb out of the den, or cave of ignorance, and those who do, not only have a terrible struggle to attain the heights, but when they go back down for a visit or to help other people up, they find themselves objects of scorn and ridicule.

According to Socrates, physical objects and physical events are "shadows" of their ideal or perfect forms, and exist only to the extent that they instantiate the perfect versions of themselves. Just as shadows are temporary, inconsequential epiphenomena produced by physical objects, physical objects are themselves fleeting phenomena caused by more substantial causes, the ideals of which they are mere instances. For example, Socrates thinks that perfect justice exists (although it is not clear where) and his own trial would be a cheap copy of it.

The Allegory of the Cave is intimately connected to his political ideology, that only people who have climbed out of the cave and cast their eyes on a vision of goodness are fit to rule. Socrates claims that the enlightened men of society must be forced from their divine contemplation and be compelled to run the city according to their lofty insights. Thus is born the idea of the " philosopher-king", the wise person who accepts the power thrust upon him by the people who are wise enough to choose a good master. This is the main thesis of Socrates in the Republic, that the most wisdom the masses can muster is the wise choice of a ruler.

Ring of Gyges

A ring which could make one invisible, the Ring of Gyges is proposed in the Republic by the character of Glaucon, and considered by the rest of the characters for its ethical consequences, whether an individual possessing it would be most happy abstaining or doing injustice.

He also compares the soul (psyche) to a chariot. In this allegory he introduces a triple soul composed of a charioteer and two horses. The charioteer is a symbol of the intellectual and logical part of the soul (logistikon), and the two horses represent the moral virtues (thymoeides) and passionate instincts (epithymetikon), respectively, to illustrate the conflict between them.

Socrates employs a dialectic method which proceeds by questioning. The role of dialectic in Plato's thought is contested but there are two main interpretations: a type of reasoning and a method of intuition. Simon Blackburn adopts the first, saying that Plato's dialectic is "the process of eliciting the truth by means of questions aimed at opening out what is already implicitly known, or at exposing the contradictions and muddles of an opponent's position." A similar interpretation has been put forth by Louis Hartz, who compares Plato's dialectic to that of Hegel. According to this view, opposing arguments improve upon each other, and prevailing opinion is shaped by the synthesis of many conflicting ideas over time. Each new idea exposes a flaw in the accepted model, and the epistemological substance of the debate continually approaches the truth. Hartz's is a teleological interpretation at the core, in which philosophers will ultimately exhaust the available body of knowledge and thus reach "the end of history." Karl Popper, on the other hand, claims that dialectic is the art of intuition for "visualising the divine originals, the Forms or Ideas, of unveiling the Great Mystery behind the common man's everyday world of appearances."

Plato often discusses the father-son relationship and the question of whether a father's interest in his sons has much to do with how well his sons turn out. In ancient Athens, a boy was socially located by his family identity, and Plato often refers to his characters in terms of their paternal and fraternal relationships. Socrates was not a family man, and saw himself as the son of his mother, who was apparently a midwife. A divine fatalist, Socrates mocks men who spent exorbitant fees on tutors and trainers for their sons, and repeatedly ventures the idea that good character is a gift from the gods. Plato's dialogue Crito reminds Socrates that orphans are at the mercy of chance, but Socrates is unconcerned. In the Theaetetus, he is found recruiting as a disciple a young man whose inheritance has been squandered. Socrates twice compares the relationship of the older man and his boy lover to the father-son relationship, and in the Phaedo, Socrates' disciples, towards whom he displays more concern than his biological sons, say they will feel "fatherless" when he is gone.

Though Plato agreed with Aristotle that women were inferior to men, in the fourth book of the Republic the character of Socrates says this was only because of nomos or custom and not because of nature, and thus women needed paidia, rearing or education to be equal to men. In the "merely probable tale" of the eponymous character in the Timaeus, unjust men who live corrupted lives would be reincarnated as women or various animal kinds.

Plato never presents himself as a participant in any of the dialogues, and with the exception of the Apology, there is no suggestion that he heard any of the dialogues firsthand. Some dialogues have no narrator but have a pure "dramatic" form (examples: Meno, Gorgias, Phaedrus, Crito, Euthyphro), some dialogues are narrated by Socrates, wherein he speaks in first person (examples: , Charmides, Republic). One dialogue, Protagoras, begins in dramatic form but quickly proceeds to Socrates' narration of a conversation he had previously with the sophist for whom the dialogue is named; this narration continues uninterrupted till the dialogue's end.

Two dialogues Phaedo and Symposium also begin in dramatic form but then proceed to virtually uninterrupted narration by followers of Socrates. Phaedo, an account of Socrates' final conversation and hemlock drinking, is narrated by Phaedo to Echecrates in a foreign city not long after the execution took place. The Symposium is narrated by Apollodorus, a Socratic disciple, apparently to Glaucon. Apollodorus assures his listener that he is recounting the story, which took place when he himself was an infant, not from his own memory, but as remembered by Aristodemus, who told him the story years ago.

The Theaetetus is a peculiar case: a dialogue in dramatic form embedded within another dialogue in dramatic form. In the beginning of the Theaetetus, Euclides says that he compiled the conversation from notes he took based on what Socrates told him of his conversation with the title character. The rest of the Theaetetus is presented as a "book" written in dramatic form and read by one of Euclides' slaves. Some scholars take this as an indication that Plato had by this date wearied of the narrated form. With the exception of the Theaetetus, Plato gives no explicit indication as to how these orally transmitted conversations came to be written down.

History of Plato's dialogues

Thirty-five dialogues and thirteen letters (the Epistles) have traditionally been ascribed to Plato, though modern scholarship doubts the authenticity of at least some of these. Plato's writings have been published in several fashions; this has led to several conventions regarding the naming and referencing of Plato's texts.

The usual system for making unique references to sections of the text by Plato derives from a 16th-century edition of Plato's works by Henricus Stephanus known as Stephanus pagination.

One tradition regarding the arrangement of Plato's texts is according to tetralogies. This scheme is ascribed by Diogenes Laërtius to an ancient scholar and court astrologer to Tiberius named Thrasyllus. The list includes works of doubtful authenticity (written in italic), and includes the Letters.

Chronology

No one knows the exact order Plato's dialogues were written in, nor the extent to which some might have been later revised and rewritten. The works are usually grouped into Early (sometimes by some into Transitional), Middle, and Late period. This choice to group chronologically is thought worthy of criticism by some (Cooper et al), given that it is recognized that there is no absolute agreement as to the true chronology, since the facts of the temporal order of writing are not confidently ascertained. Chronology was not a consideration in ancient times, in that groupings of this nature are virtually absent (Tarrant) in the extant writings of ancient Platonists.

Whereas those classified as "early dialogues" often conclude in aporia, the so-called "middle dialogues" provide more clearly stated positive teachings that are often ascribed to Plato such as the theory of Forms. The remaining dialogues are classified as "late" and are generally agreed to be difficult and challenging pieces of philosophy. This grouping is the only one proven by stylometric analysis. Among those who classify the dialogues into periods of composition, Socrates figures in all of the "early dialogues" and they are considered the most faithful representations of the historical Socrates.

The following represents one relatively common division. It should, however, be kept in mind that many of the positions in the ordering are still highly disputed, and also that the very notion that Plato's dialogues can or should be "ordered" is by no means universally accepted. Increasingly in the most recent Plato scholarship, writers are sceptical of the notion that the order of Plato's writings can be established with any precision, though Plato's works are still often characterized as falling at least roughly into three groups.

A significant distinction of the early Plato and the later Plato has been offered by scholars such as E.R. Dodds and has been summarized by Harold Bloom in his book titled Agon: "E.R. Dodds is the classical scholar whose writings most illuminated the Hellenic descent (in) The Greeks and the Irrational ... In his chapter on Plato and the Irrational Soul ... Dodds traces Plato's spiritual evolution from the pure rationalist of the Protagoras to the transcendental psychologist, influenced by the Pythagoreans and Orphics, of the later works culminating in the Laws."

Lewis Campbell was the first to make exhaustive use of stylometry to prove the great probability that the Critias, Timaeus, Laws, Philebus, Sophist, and Statesman were all clustered together as a group, while the Parmenides, Phaedrus, Republic, and Theaetetus belong to a separate group, which must be earlier (given Aristotle's statement in his Politics that the Laws was written after the Republic; cf. Diogenes Laërtius Lives 3.37). What is remarkable about Campbell's conclusions is that, in spite of all the stylometric studies that have been conducted since his time, perhaps the only chronological fact about Plato's works that can now be said to be proven by stylometry is the fact that Critias, Timaeus, Laws, Philebus, Sophist, and Statesman are the latest of Plato's dialogues, the others earlier.

Protagoras is often considered one of the last of the "early dialogues". Three dialogues are often considered "transitional" or "pre-middle": Euthydemus, Gorgias, and Meno. Proponents of dividing the dialogues into periods often consider the Parmenides and Theaetetus to come late in the middle period and be transitional to the next, as they seem to treat the theory of Forms critically ( Parmenides) or only indirectly ( Theaetetus). Ritter's stylometric analysis places Phaedrus as probably after Theaetetus and Parmenides, although it does not relate to the theory of Forms in the same way. The first book of the Republic is often thought to have been written significantly earlier than the rest of the work, although possibly having undergone revisions when the later books were attached to it.

While looked to for Plato's "mature" answers to the questions posed by his earlier works, those answers are difficult to discern. Some scholars indicate that the theory of Forms is absent from the late dialogues, its having been refuted in the Parmenides, but there is not total consensus that the Parmenides actually refutes the theory of Forms.

Writings of doubted authenticity

Jowett mentions in his Appendix to Menexenus, that works which bore the character of a writer were attributed to that writer even when the actual author was unknown.

For below:

(*) if there is no consensus among scholars as to whether Plato is the author, and (‡) if most scholars agree that Plato is not the author of the work.

Spurious writings

The following works were transmitted under Plato's name, most of them already considered spurious in antiquity, and so were not included by Thrasyllus in his tetralogical arrangement. These works are labelled as Notheuomenoi ("spurious") or Apocrypha.

Textual sources and history

Some 250 known manuscripts of Plato survive. The texts of Plato as received today apparently represent the complete written philosophical work of Plato and are generally good by the standards of textual criticism. No modern edition of Plato in the original Greek represents a single source, but rather it is reconstructed from multiple sources which are compared with each other. These sources are medieval manuscripts written on vellum (mainly from 9th to 13th century AD Byzantium), papyri (mainly from late antiquity in Egypt), and from the independent testimonia of other authors who quote various segments of the works (which come from a variety of sources). The text as presented is usually not much different from what appears in the Byzantine manuscripts, and papyri and testimonia just confirm the manuscript tradition. In some editions, however, the readings in the papyri or testimonia are favoured in some places by the editing critic of the text. Reviewing editions of papyri for the Republic in 1987, Slings suggests that the use of papyri is hampered due to some poor editing practices.

In the first century AD, Thrasyllus of Mendes had compiled and published the works of Plato in the original Greek, both genuine and spurious. While it has not survived to the present day, all the extant medieval Greek manuscripts are based on his edition.

The oldest surviving complete manuscript for many of the dialogues is the Clarke Plato (Codex Oxoniensis Clarkianus 39, or Codex Boleianus MS E.D. Clarke 39), which was written in Constantinople in 895 and acquired by Oxford University in 1809. The Clarke is given the siglum B in modern editions. B contains the first six tetralogies and is described internally as being written by "John the Calligrapher" on behalf of Arethas of Caesarea. It appears to have undergone corrections by Arethas himself. For the last two tetralogies and the apocrypha, the oldest surviving complete manuscript is Codex Parisinus graecus 1807, designated A, which was written nearly contemporaneously to B, circa 900 AD. A must be a copy of the edition edited by the patriarch, Photios, teacher of Arethas. A probably had an initial volume containing the first 7 tetralogies which is now lost, but of which a copy was made, Codex Venetus append. class. 4, 1, which has the siglum T. The oldest manuscript for the seventh tetralogy is Codex Vindobonensis 54. suppl. phil. Gr. 7, with siglum W, with a supposed date in the twelfth century. In total there are fifty-one such Byzantine manuscripts known, while others may yet be found.

To help establish the text, the older evidence of papyri and the independent evidence of the testimony of commentators and other authors (i.e., those who quote and refer to an old text of Plato which is no longer extant) are also used. Many papyri which contain fragments of Plato's texts are among the Oxyrhynchus Papyri. The 2003 Oxford Classical Texts edition by Slings even cites the Coptic translation of a fragment of the Republic in the Nag Hammadi library as evidence. Important authors for testimony include Olympiodorus the Younger, Plutarch, Proclus, Iamblichus, Eusebius, and Stobaeus.

During the early Renaissance, the Greek language and, along with it, Plato's texts were reintroduced to Western Europe by Byzantine scholars. In September or October 1484 Filippo Valori and Francesco Berlinghieri printed 1025 copies of Ficino's translation, using the printing press at the Dominican convent S.Jacopo di Ripoli. Cosimo had been influenced toward studying Plato by the many Byzantine Platonists in Florence during his day, including George Gemistus Plethon.

The 1578 edition of Plato's complete works published by Henricus Stephanus ( Henri Estienne) in Geneva also included parallel Latin translation and running commentary by Joannes Serranus ( Jean de Serres). It was this edition which established standard Stephanus pagination, still in use today.

Modern editions

The Oxford Classical Texts offers the current standard complete Greek text of Plato's complete works. In five volumes edited by John Burnet, its first edition was published 1900-1907, and it is still available from the publisher, having last been printed in 1993. The second edition is still in progress with only the first volume, printed in 1995, and the Republic, printed in 2003, available. The Cambridge Greek and Latin Texts and Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries series includes Greek editions of the Protagoras, Symposium, Phaedrus, Alcibiades, and Clitophon, with English philological, literary, and, to an extent, philosophical commentary. One distinguished edition of the Greek text is E. R. Dodds' of the Gorgias, which includes extensive English commentary.

The modern standard complete English edition is the 1997 Hackett Plato, Complete Works, edited by John M. Cooper. For many of these translations Hackett offers separate volumes which include more by way of commentary, notes, and introductory material. There is also the Clarendon Plato Series by Oxford University Press which offers English translations and thorough philosophical commentary by leading scholars on a few of Plato's works, including John McDowell's version of the Theaetetus. Cornell University Press has also begun the Agora series of English translations of classical and medieval philosophical texts, including a few of Plato's.

The most famous criticism of the Theory of Forms is the Third Man Argument by Aristotle in the Metaphysics. Plato had actually already considered this objection with the idea of "large" rather than "man" in the dialogue Parmenides, using the elderly Elean philosophers Parmenides and Zeno characters anachronistically to criticize the character of the younger Socrates who proposed the idea. The dialogue ends in aporia.

Many recent philosophers have diverged from what some would describe as the ontological models and moral ideals characteristic of traditional Platonism. A number of these postmodern philosophers have thus appeared to disparage Platonism from more or less informed perspectives. Friedrich Nietzsche notoriously attacked Plato's "idea of the good itself" along with many fundamentals of Christian morality, which he interpreted as "Platonism for the masses" in one of his most important works, Beyond Good and Evil (1886). Martin Heidegger argued against Plato's alleged obfuscation of in his incomplete tome, Being and Time (1927), and the philosopher of science Karl Popper argued in The Open Society and Its Enemies (1945) that Plato's alleged proposal for a utopian political regime in the was prototypically totalitarian.

Plato's Academy mosaic was created in the villa of T. Siminius Stephanus in Pompeii, around 100 BC to 100 CE. The School of Athens fresco by Raphael features Plato also as a central figure. The Nuremberg Chronicle depicts Plato and others as anachronistic schoolmen.

In philosophy

Plato's thought is often compared with that of his most famous student, Aristotle, whose reputation during the Western Middle Ages so completely eclipsed that of Plato that the Scholastic philosophers referred to Aristotle as "the Philosopher". However, the study of Plato continued in the Byzantine Empire, the Caliphates during the Islamic Golden Age, and Spain during Golden age of Jewish culture.

The only Platonic work known to western scholarship was , until translations were made after the fall of Constantinople, which occurred during 1453. George Gemistos Plethon brought Plato's original writings from Constantinople in the century of its fall. It is believed that Plethon passed a copy of the Dialogues to Cosimo de' Medici when in 1438 the Council of Ferrara, called to unify the Greek and Latin Churches, was adjourned to Florence, where Plethon then lectured on the relation and differences of Plato and Aristotle, and fired Cosimo with his enthusiasm; Cosimo would supply Marsilio Ficino with Plato's text for translation to Latin. During the early Islamic era, Persian, Arab, and Jewish scholars translated much of Plato into Arabic and wrote commentaries and interpretations on Plato's, Aristotle's and other Platonist philosophers' works (see Al-Kindi, Al-Farabi, Avicenna, Averroes, Hunayn ibn Ishaq). Plato is also referenced by Jewish philosopher and Talmudic scholar Maimonides in his The Guide for the Perplexed. Many of these commentaries on Plato were translated from Arabic into Latin and as such influenced Medieval scholastic philosophers.

During the Renaissance, with the general resurgence of interest in classical civilization, knowledge of Plato's philosophy would become widespread again in the West. Many of the greatest early modern scientists and artists who broke with Scholasticism and fostered the flowering of the Renaissance, with the support of the Plato-inspired Lorenzo (grandson of Cosimo), saw Plato's philosophy as the basis for progress in the arts and sciences. More problematic was Plato's belief in metempsychosis as well as his ethical views (on polyamory and euthanasia in particular), which did not match those of Christianity. It was Plethon's student Bessarion who reconciled Plato with Christian theology, arguing that Plato's views were only ideals, unattainable due to the fall of man. The Cambridge Platonists were an influential group active in the 17th century.

By the 19th century, Plato's reputation was restored, and at least on par with Aristotle's. Notable Western philosophers have continued to draw upon Plato's work since that time. Plato's influence has been especially strong in mathematics and the sciences. Plato's resurgence further inspired some of the greatest advances in logic since Aristotle, primarily through Gottlob Frege and his followers Kurt Gödel, Alonzo Church, and Alfred Tarski. Albert Einstein suggested that the scientist who takes philosophy seriously would have to avoid systematization and take on many different roles, and possibly appear as a Platonist or Pythagorean, in that such a one would have "the viewpoint of logical simplicity as an indispensable and effective tool of his research." Werner Heisenberg stated that "My mind was formed by studying philosophy, Plato and that sort of thing". and that "Modern physics has definitely decided in favor of Plato. In fact the smallest units of matter are not physical objects in the ordinary sense; they are forms, ideas which can be expressed unambiguously only in mathematical language" Samuel Taylor Coleridge said: Everybody is born either a Platonist or an Aristotelian.

The political philosopher and professor Leo Strauss is considered by some as the prime thinker involved in the recovery of Platonic thought in its more political, and less metaphysical, form. Strauss' political approach was in part inspired by the appropriation of Plato and Aristotle by medieval Jewish and Islamic political philosophers, especially Maimonides and Al-Farabi, as opposed to the Christian metaphysical tradition that developed from Neoplatonism. Deeply influenced by Nietzsche and Heidegger, Strauss nonetheless rejects their condemnation of Plato and looks to the dialogues for a solution to what all three latter-day thinkers acknowledge as 'the crisis of the West.

W. V. O. Quine dubbed the problem of negative existentials " Plato's beard". Noam Chomsky dubbed the problem of knowledge Plato's problem. One author calls the definist fallacy the Socratic fallacy.

More broadly, platonism (sometimes distinguished from Plato's particular view by the lowercase) refers to the view that there are many abstract objects. Still to this day, platonists take number and the truths of mathematics as the best support in favour of this view. Most mathematicians think, like platonists, that numbers and the truths of mathematics are perceived by reason rather than the senses yet exist independently of minds and people, that is to say, they are discovered rather than invented.

Contemporary platonism is also more open to the idea of there being infinitely many abstract objects, as numbers or propositions might qualify as abstract objects, while ancient Platonism seemed to resist this view, possibly because of the need to overcome the problem of "the One and the Many". Thus e. g. in the Parmenides dialogue, Plato denies there are Forms for more mundane things like hair and mud. However, he repeatedly does support the idea that there are Forms of artifacts, e. g. the Form of Bed. Contemporary platonism also tends to view abstract objects as unable to cause anything, but it is unclear whether the ancient Platonists felt this way.

Philosophy

Ancient scholarship

Medieval scholarship

Modern scholarship

Marsilio Ficino, Italian scholar and first translator of Plato's complete works into Latin

Stephanus pagination, the standard reference numbering in Platonic scholarship, based on the 1578 complete Latin translation by Jean de Serres, and published by Henri Estienne

Johann Gottfried Stallbaum, major Plato scholar and commentator in Latin

Eduard Zeller, scholar and classicist

Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, Plato scholar and classicist

John Alexander Stewart, major Plato scholar and classicist

Victor Cousin, scholar and the first translator Plato's complete works into French

Émile Saisset, scholar and a translator Plato's complete works into French

Émile Chambry, scholar and a translator Plato's complete works into French

Pentti Saarikoski, translator into Finnish

Friedrich Schleiermacher, philologist and the first to translate Plato's complete works into German

Otto Apelt, scholar and translator Plato's complete works into German

Benjamin Jowett, scholar and the first translated Plato's complete works into English

Lewis Campbell, scholar and author of commentaries

Martin Heidegger, philosopher and author of a commentary on Plato's Sophist

James Adam, major Plato scholar and author of the authoritative critical edition of the Republic

John Burnet, major Plato scholar and translator

Francis Macdonald Cornford, translator of Republic and author of commentaries

Reginald Hackforth, classical scholar and translator of Phaedrus

William Keith Chambers Guthrie, classical scholar and historian

E. R. Dodds, classical scholar and author of commentaries on Plato

Thomas Taylor, classical scholar and translator

Édouard des Places, classical philologist, and translator of Plato's Laws in French

Allan Bloom, major Plato scholar and translator of Republic in English

Myles Burnyeat, major Plato scholar

Harold F. Cherniss, major Plato scholar

Guy Cromwell Field, Plato scholar

Paul Friedländer, Plato scholar

Terence Irwin, major Plato scholar

Richard Kraut, major Plato scholar

Ellen Francis Mason, translator of Plato

Eric Havelock, Plato scholar

Debra Nails, Plato scholar

Alexander Nehamas, major Plato scholar

Thomas Pangle, major Plato scholar and translator of Laws in English

Eugène Napoleon Tigerstedt, major Plato scholar

Paul Shorey, major Plato scholar and translator of Republic

John Madison Cooper, major Plato scholar and translator of several works of Plato, and editor of the Hackett edition of the complete works of Plato in English

Leo Strauss, major Plato scholar and author of commentaries of Platonic political philosophy

Jacob Klein, Plato scholar and author of commentaries on Meno

Seth Benardete, major Plato scholar

Gregory Vlastos, major Plato scholar

Hans-Georg Gadamer, major Plato scholar

Paul Woodruff, major Plato scholar

Gisela Striker, Plato scholar

Heinrich Gomperz, Plato scholar

David Sedley, Plato scholar

Gábor Betegh, Plato scholar

Karl Albert, Plato scholar

Herwig Görgemanns, Plato scholar

John M. Dillon, Plato scholar

Catherine Zuckert, Plato scholar and political philosopher

Julia Annas, Plato scholar and moral philosopher

John McDowell, translated Theaetetus in English

Robin Waterfield, Plato scholar and translator in English

Léon Robin, scholar of Ancient Greek philosophy, translator of the complete works of Plato in French

Alain Badiou, French philosopher, loosely translated Republic in French

Chen Chung-hwan, scholar and commentator, translated Parmenides in Chinese

Liu Xiaofeng, scholar and commentator, translated Symposium in Chinese

Michitaro Tanaka and Norio Fujisawa, translators of the complete works of Plato in Japanese

Joseph Gerhard Liebes, major scholar and commentator, the first to translate Plato's complete works in Hebrew

Margalit Finkelberg, scholar and commentator, translated Symposium in Hebrew

Virgilio S. Almario, translated Republic to Filipino

Roque Ferriols, translated Apology to Filipino

Mahatma Gandhi, translated Apology in Gujarati

Zakir Husain, Indian politician and academic, translated Republic in Urdu

Pierre Hadot, scholar and author of commentaries of Plato in French

Luc Brisson, translator and author of commentaries on several works of Plato, and editor of the complete French translations; widely considered to be the most important contemporary scholar of Plato

References

Works cited

Primary sources (Greek and Roman)

Apuleius, De Dogmate Platonis, I. See original text in Latin Library.

Laërtius, Diogenes (1925). "Plato" . Lives of the Eminent Philosophers. Vol. 1:3. Translated by Hicks, Robert Drew (Two volume ed.). Loeb Classical Library.

Plato. Charmides . Translated by Jowett, Benjamin - via Wikisource. See original text in Perseus program.

Plato. Gorgias . Translated by Jowett Benjamin - via Wikisource. See original text in Perseus program.

Plato (1903). Parmenides. Translated by Burnet, John. Oxford University. republished by: Crane, Gregory (ed.). "Perseus Digital Library Project".

Plato. The Republic . Translated by Jowett Benjamin - via Wikisource. See original text in Perseus program.

Plutarch (1683) [written in the late 1st century]. "Pericles" . Lives. Translated by Dryden, John - via Wikisource. See original text in Perseus program.

Seneca the Younger. Moral Letters to Lucilius: Letter 58 . Translated by Richard Mott Gummere - via Wikisource. See original text in Latin Library.

Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War . Translated by Crawley, Richard - via Wikisource., V, VIII. See original text in Perseus program.

Secondary sources

Borody, W.A. (1998). "Figuring the Phallogocentric Argument with Respect to the Classical Greek Philosophical Tradition". Nebula, A Netzine of the Arts and Science. 13: 1-27.

Boyer, Carl B. (1991). Merzbach, Uta C. (ed.). A History of Mathematics (Second ed.). John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-0-471-54397-8.

Brickhouse, Thomas; Smith, Nicholas D. Fieser, James; Dowden, Bradley (eds.). "Plato". The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

Brumbaugh, Robert S.; Wells, Rulon S. (October 1989). "Completing Yale's Microfilm Project". The Yale University Library Gazette. 64 (1/2): 73-75. JSTOR 40858970.

Fine, Gail (July 1979). "Knowledge and Logos in the Theaetetus". Philosophical Review. 88 (3): 366-397. doi:10.2307/2184956. JSTOR 2184956. Reprinted in Fine 2003.

Gaiser, Konrad (1980). "Plato's Enigmatic Lecture 'On the Good'". Phronesis. 25 (1): 5-37. doi:10.1163/156852880x00025.

Gaiser, Konrad (1998). Reale, Giovanni (ed.). Testimonia Platonica: Le antiche testimonianze sulle dottrine non scritte di Platone. Milan: Vita e Pensiero. First published as "Testimonia Platonica. Quellentexte zur Schule und mündlichen Lehre Platons" as an appendix to Gaiser's Platons Ungeschriebene Lehre, Stuttgart, 1963.

Gomperz, H. (1931). "Plato's System of Philosophy". In Ryle, G. (ed.). Proceedings of the Seventh International Congress of Philosophy. London. pp. 426-431. Reprinted in Gomperz, H. (1953). Philosophical Studies. Boston: Christopher Publishing House 1953, pp. 119-124.

Lee, M.-K. (2011). "The Theaetetus". In Fine, G. (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of Plato. Oxford University Press. pp. 411-436.

Kraut, Richard (11 September 2013). Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). "Plato". The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University.

McEvoy, James (1984). "Plato and The Wisdom of Egypt". Irish Philosophical Journal. 1 (2): 1-24. doi:10.5840/irishphil1984125. ISSN 0266-9080. Archived from the original on 5 December 2007.

Notopoulos, A. (April 1939). "The Name of Plato". Classical Philology. 34 (2): 135-145. doi:10.1086/362227. S2CID 161505593.

Robinson, John (1827). Archæologica Græca (Second ed.). London: A. J. Valpy. Archived from the original on 1 July 2014.

Rodriguez-Grandjean, Pablo (1998). Philosophy and Dialogue: Plato's Unwritten Doctrines from a Hermeneutical Point of View. Twentieth World Congress of Philosophy. Boston.

Schall, James V. (Summer 1996). "On the Death of Plato". The American Scholar. 65.

Schofield, Malcolm (23 August 2002). Craig, Edward (ed.). "Plato". Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Routledge. Archived from the original on 10 October 2008.

Slings, S.R. (1987). "Remarks on Some Recent Papyri of the Politeia". Mnemosyne. Fourth. 40 (1/2): 27-34. doi:10.1163/156852587x00030.

Suzanne, Bernard (8 March 2009). "The Stephanus edition". Plato and his dialogues.

Further reading

Anderson, Mark; Osborn, Ginger (2009). Approaching Plato: A Guide to the Early and Middle Dialogues (PDF). Nashville: Belmont University.

Cadame, Claude (1999). Indigenous and Modern Perspectives on Tribal Initiation Rites: Education According to Plato, pp. 278-312, in Padilla, Mark William (editor), "Rites of Passage in Ancient Greece: Literature, Religion, Society", Bucknell University Press, 1999. ISBN 0-8387-5418-X

Cooper, John M.; Hutchinson, D.S., eds. (1997). Plato: Complete Works. Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. ISBN 978-0-87220-349-5.

Derrida, Jacques (1972). La dissémination, Paris: Seuil. (esp. cap.: La Pharmacie de Platon, 69-199) ISBN 2-02-001958-2

Finley, M.I. (1969). Aspects of antiquity: Discoveries and Controversies The Viking Press, Inc., US

Garvey, James (2006). Twenty Greatest Philosophy Books. Continuum. ISBN 978-0-8264-9053-7.

Irvine, Andrew David (2008). Socrates on Trial: A play based on Aristophanes' Clouds and Plato's Apology, Crito, and Phaedo, adapted for modern performance. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-0-8020-9783-5, 978-0-8020-9538-1

Jowett, Benjamin (1892). [The Dialogues of Plato. Translated into English with analyses and introductions by B. Jowett.], Oxford Clarendon Press, UK, UIN:BLL01002931898

Kraut, Richard, ed. (1993). The Cambridge Companion to Plato. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-43610-6.

Lilar, Suzanne (1954), Journal de l'analogiste, Paris, Éditions Julliard; Reedited 1979, Paris, Grasset. Foreword by Julien Gracq

Lilar, Suzanne (1963), Le couple, Paris, Grasset. Translated as Aspects of Love in Western Society in 1965, with a foreword by Jonathan Griffin London, Thames and Hudson.

Lilar, Suzanne (1967) A propos de Sartre et de l'amour , Paris, Grasset.

Melchert, Norman (2002). The Great Conversation: A Historical Introduction to Philosophy. McGraw Hill. ISBN 978-0-19-517510-3.

Nightingale, Andrea Wilson. (1995). "Genres in Dialogue: Plato and the Construct of Philosophy", Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-48264-X

Oxford University Press publishes scholarly editions of Plato's Greek texts in the Oxford Classical Texts series, and some translations in the Clarendon Plato Series.

Thomas Taylor has translated Plato's complete works.

Thomas Taylor (1804). The Works of Plato, viz. His Fifty-Five Dialogues and Twelve Epistles 5 vols

Vlastos, Gregory (2006). Plato's Universe - with a new Introduction by Luc Brisson, Parmenides Publishing. ISBN 978-1-930972-13-1

External links

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Plato ( PLAY-toe ; Greek: Plátōn; 428/427 or 424/423 - 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world.

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Galen was a celebrated physician, his systems included what modern coaches refer to as heavy lifting and isometric exercises. Galen also produced many exercises to improve athletic power, strength and speed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galen

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French strongman turned fitness entrepreneur Hippolyte Triat, is often credited with being the earliest to open commercial gyms with the first in Brussels, and then in Paris sometime during the 1840s. his gyms popularized the philosophy of progressive weight training with free weights, barbells and dumbbells.
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hippolyte_Triat

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Basculer la table des matières

Un article de Wikipédia, l'encyclopédie libre.

Hippolyte Triat, portrait photographique (vers 1876-1877).

Antoine Hippolyte Trilhac dit Hippolyte Triat, né le à Saint-Chaptes et mort le à Paris, est un homme fort et entrepreneur français, l'un des pères fondateurs de la culture physique et du centre de remise en forme modernes.

Biographie

Originaire du Gard, Hippolyte est le fils de Marguerite Bailesse et de Félix Trilhac, alors âgé de 50 ans, jardinier pour le compte de Marie Anne Aubin de Bellevue, veuve de François Paul de Brueys d'Aigalliers. Devenu orphelin vers 1816, élevé par sa sœur aînée du côté de Nîmes, Hippolyte est enlevé par des vagabonds puis vendu à une troupe de saltimbanques niçois : il devient alors une sorte de mascotte, les accompagnant dans leur tournée dans toute l'Europe, qui se fixe ensuite en Espagne. En 1828, il fait partie d'une troupe espagnole de contorsionnistes et se blesse gravement. Il est alors pris en charge par une dame-patronnesse originaire de Burgos, soigné et éduqué, pratiquant les sports. En 1834, émancipé, il met au point un spectacle itinérant sportif, équipé de petites machineries de force ; ses numéros rencontrent le succès et le portent jusqu'à Bruxelles. Il y ouvre un premier gymnase en 1840 au 7 de la rue de Ligne. Hippolyte arrive à Paris vers 1846, s'associe à Nicolas Dally (1795-1862) pour fonder une société par actions dans le but d'ouvrir un grand gymnase à plancher sur l'allée des Veuves, future avenue Montaigne. Cet espace sera connu sous le nom de " Gymnase Triat ", changeant plusieurs fois d'emplacement. Très engagés, Triat et Dally écrivent en 1848 au Gouvernement provisoire une lettre pour réclamer la création d'un ministère de l'Éducation physique.

Hippolyte Triat se veut un " gymnasiarque ", un éducateur sportif hygiéniste à visées orthopédiques. Il a comme élèves et clients des aristocrates et des membres de la haute bourgeoisie parisienne. Parmi eux, on compte le prince Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, Paul Féval, Jules Vallès et Eugène Paz. À la fin des années 1860, ayant gagné jusqu'à 400 000 francs de recettes, il ambitionne de faire construire, sur l' île Saint-Germain, un immense complexe sportif, une " école normale de gymnastique ", dont les plans sont tracés par le fils de Théodore Charpentier. La guerre franco-prussienne vient compromettre le projet. Triat, reclus dans Paris au moment de la Commune, est alors nommé par Jules Allix à la tête d'un bataillon de gymnastes. Dénoncé, Triat est emprisonné par les Versaillais, puis rendu à la liberté en juillet 1871. Le gymnase Triat existe encore en 1872, publicisant ses nouveaux traitements à base d' hydrothérapie.

Quittant l'avenue Montaigne en 1873, il ouvre un dernier espace, plus petit, au 22 de la rue du Bouloi. Présent à l' exposition universelle de 1878, il y présente en réduction une maquette de son gymnase, qui doit fermer l'année suivante. Relativement oublié, Triat, laissant une veuve née Marie-Françoise-Cornélie Pasquet, meurt au 22 de la rue Jean-Jacques Rousseau en janvier 1881 : Jules Allix lui rend hommage et permet à sa dépouille d'être enterrée dans le tombeau de sa famille,.

Représentations et postérité

Selon Desbonnet, Triat en 1854 mesurait 1,79 mètre et pesait 95 kilos. Il était capable de soulever un haltère de 91 kilos. Dans son gymnase parisien, il se déguisait en maître de cérémonie et entraînait collectivement les sportifs selon diverses disciplines de force, auxquelles pouvait assister le public : " Triat, supprimant les appareils compliqués, inventa sa méthode du parquet, où l'élève avec une paire d'haltères de 6 livres, une barre de 12 livres et quelques massues, acquiert une bonne musculature avant d'aborder les exercices de suspension, d'escalade, de sauts, etc. ".

Il existe une série de représentations peintes de Triat. Le tableau d' Ernest Hébert, Esclave près d'un tombeau dans la campagne romaine (1841 [?], musée Hébert) s'inspirerait de l'athlète ; un autre, le montrant à mi-corps portant une massue, où il est identifié comme " Gymnasiarque, Grand Maître fondateur de l'Ordre de la Régénération de l'Homme ". On compte aussi un portrait en médaillon gravé par Maurice Borrel (Salon de 1855) et un portrait sur émail (Salon de 1878) signé Thérèse-Mirza Allix.

En haltérophilie, il était d'usage d'appeler certains poids des " haltères de Triat ".

Notes et références

1. ↑ Archives départementales du Gard, commune de Saint-Chaptes, année 1812, acte de naissance no 9

2. ↑ Archives du Gard, acte de naissance Mairie de Saint-Chaptes, année 1812 EC n°9.

3. Desbonnet (1911), ↑ p. 58.

4. Nicolas Dally est l'auteur de ↑ Gymnastique. De la régénération physique de l'espèce humaine par la gymnastique rationelle publié en 1848 à Paris - lire sur Welcome Collection.

5. En juillet 1855, Triat fonde une nouvelle société par actions, " La Société générale des gymnases de France ", sise au 33 rue du Faubourg-Montmartre, annonçant un capital de 5 millions de francs - ↑ lire sur Gallica.

6. Triat, H. et Dally, N., ↑ Au gouvernement provisoire. Lettre demandant la création d'un ministère de l'Éducation publique, Paris: P. Dupont, 1848.

7. Jean Latte, ↑ La Gymnastique, Paris, Vigot, 1948, p. 24.

8. ↑ " L'île Saint-Germain : projet de Centre sportif international ", 15 avril 2014, sur Historim.fr.

9. Desbonnet (1911), ↑ p. 74

10. ↑ " Les précurseurs de la culture physique : Hippolyte Triat " par a et b Edmond Desbonnet, in La Culture physique, Paris, septembre 1912, pp. 10-14 - sur Gallica.

11. " Commune de Paris. Séance du 7 mai 1871 ", par Eloi Valat, in: ↑ Médiapart, 4 juin 2016 - article en ligne.

12. Desbonnet (1911), ↑ p. 73.

13. " Les gymnastiques culturistes ", par Élie Mercier, in: Marcel Labbé (dir.), ↑ Traité d'éducation physique, 1930, p. 495.

14. ↑ " Exposant Salon de Paris de 1878 ", sur http://salons.musee-orsay.fr

Annexes

Bibliographie

Edmond Desbonnet, Les rois de la force, histoire de tous les hommes forts depuis les temps anciens jusqu'à nos jours, Éditions Berger-Levrault et Cie., 1911, pp. 58-78 - sur Archive.org.

Jean-Michel Faidit, " Hippolyte Triat (1812-1881). Pionnier de l'éducation physique et du sport pour tous. (Communication du 13 avril 2018). Mémoires de l'Académie de Nîmes ". IXe série. Tome XCII. Année 2018. 2019. pp. 153-175.

Jacques Gleyse, " De l'art de la gymnastique (1569) au culturisme et aux premières compétitions organisées (1904). L'émergence du body-building ?", in: Staps, revue internationale des sciences du sport et de l'éducation physique, De Boeck Supérieur, 2018|1 no 119, pp. 27-45 - lire sur Cairn.info.

Liens externes

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Basculer la table des matières Un article de Wikipédia, l'encyclopédie libre. Hippolyte Triat, portrait photographique (vers 1876-1877). Antoine Hippolyte Trilhac dit Hippolyte Triat, né le à Saint-Chaptes et mort le à Paris, est un homme fort et entrepreneur français, l'un des pères fondateurs de la culture physique et du centre de remise en forme modernes.

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the 20th Century introduced a number of conventional fitness programs and physical education classes. However, even at this time most exercises for regular civilian life were made up of callisthenics, running, jumping and sports. Jack Lalane was the man who wanted to push away the notion that the gym was for bodybuilders, weightlifters and the military. Jack was an exceptional athlete holding records at the time. He then went on to open his first health club in the United States in 1936 in Oakland, California.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_LaLanne

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Francois Henri " Jack" LaLanne (; September 26, 1914 - January 23, 2011) was an American fitness and nutrition guru and motivational speaker. He described himself as being a "sugarholic" and a " junk food junkie" until he was age 15. He also had behavioral problems, but "turned his life around" after listening to a public lecture about the benefits of good nutrition by health food pioneer Paul Bragg. During his career, he came to believe that the country's overall health depended on the health of its population, and referred to physical culture and nutrition as "the salvation of America."

Decades before health and fitness began being promoted by celebrities like Jane Fonda and Richard Simmons, LaLanne was already widely recognized for publicly preaching the health benefits of regular exercise and a good diet. He published numerous books on fitness and hosted the fitness television program The Jack LaLanne Show from 1951 to 1985. As early as 1936, at age 21, he opened one of the nation's first fitness gyms in Oakland, California, which became a prototype for dozens of similar gyms bearing his name. One of his 1950s television exercise programs was aimed toward women, whom he also encouraged to join his health clubs. He invented a number of exercise machines, including the pulley and leg extension devices and the Smith machine. Besides producing his own series of videos, he coached the elderly and disabled not to forgo exercise, believing it would enable them to enhance their strength.

LaLanne also gained recognition for his success as a bodybuilder, as well as for his prodigious feats of strength. Arnold Schwarzenegger once exclaimed "That Jack LaLanne's an animal!" after a 54-year-old LaLanne beat then 21-year-old Schwarzenegger in an informal contest. On the occasion of LaLanne's death, Schwarzenegger credited LaLanne for being "an apostle for fitness" by inspiring "billions all over the world to live healthier lives," and, as governor of California, had earlier placed him on his Governor's Council on Physical Fitness. Steve Reeves credited LaLanne as his inspiration to build his muscular physique while keeping a slim waist.

LaLanne was inducted into the California Hall of Fame and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

LaLanne was born in San Francisco, California, the son of Jennie ( née Garaig; 1882-1973) and Jean/John LaLanne (1881-1939), French immigrants from Oloron-Sainte-Marie. Both entered the U.S. in the 1880s as young children at the Port of New Orleans. LaLanne had two older brothers, Ervil, who died in childhood (1906-1911), and Norman (1908-2005), who nicknamed him "Jack." He grew up in Bakersfield, California and later moved with his family to Berkeley, California circa 1928. In 1939, his father died at the age of 58 in a San Francisco hospital, which LaLanne attributed to "coronary thrombosis and cirrhosis of the liver." In his book The Jack LaLanne Way to Vibrant Health, LaLanne wrote that as a boy he was addicted to sugar and junk food. He had violent episodes directed against himself and others, describing himself as "a miserable kid ... it was like hell."

Besides having a bad temper, LaLanne also suffered from headaches and bulimia, and temporarily dropped out of high school at age 14. The following year, at age 15, he heard health food pioneer Paul Bragg give a talk on health and nutrition, focusing on the "evils of meat and sugar." Bragg's message had a powerful influence on LaLanne, who then changed his life and started focusing on his diet and exercise. In his own words, he was "born again," and besides his new focus on nutrition, he began working out daily (although while serving during World War II as a Pharmacist Mate First Class at the Sun Valley Naval Convalescent Hospital, LaLanne stated that he started in bodybuilding at "age 13"). Describing his change of diet, LaLanne stated, "I had to take my lunch alone to the football field to eat so no one would see me eat my raw veggies, whole bread, raisins and nuts. You don't know the crap I went through."

Writer Hal Reynolds, who interviewed LaLanne in 2008, notes that he became an avid swimmer and trained with weights; he described his introduction to weight lifting thus:

[LaLanne] found two men working out in a back room, who kept weights in a locked box. When he asked them if he could use their weights, they laughed at him and said, "Kid, you can't even lift those weights." So he challenged them both to a wrestling match with the bet that if he could beat them, they would give him a key to the box. After he beat them both, they gave him a key and he used their weights until he was able to buy his own.

LaLanne went back to school, where he made the high school football team, and later went on to college in San Francisco where he earned a Doctor of Chiropractic degree. He studied Henry Gray's Anatomy of the Human Body and concentrated on bodybuilding and weightlifting.

In 1936, he opened the nation's first health and fitness club in Oakland, California, where he offered supervised weight and exercise training and gave nutritional advice. His primary goal was to encourage and motivate his clients to improve their overall health. Doctors, however, advised their patients to stay away from his health club, a business totally unheard of at the time, and warned their patients that "LaLanne was an exercise 'nut,' whose programs would make them 'muscle-bound' and cause severe medical problems." LaLanne recalls the initial reaction of doctors to his promotion of weight-lifting:

People thought I was a charlatan and a nut. The doctors were against me‍-‌they said that working out with weights would give people heart attacks and they would lose their sex drive.

LaLanne designed the first leg extension machines, pulley machines using cables, and the weight selectors that are now standard in the fitness industry. He invented the original model of what became the Smith machine. LaLanne encouraged women to lift weights (though at the time it was thought this would make women look masculine and unattractive). By the 1980s, Jack LaLanne's European Health Spas numbered more than 200. He eventually licensed all his health clubs to the Bally company, now known as Bally Total Fitness. Though not associated with any gym, LaLanne continued to lift weights until his death.

LaLanne's gym ownership led to a brief professional wrestling career in 1938. Wrestlers were among the few athletes who embraced weight training, and they frequented his health club. LaLanne wrestled in the Bay Area for only a few months. He was well respected enough that he was booked to wrestle to a draw against some big name opponents rather than lose, despite his lack of experience. According to Ad Santel's grandson David Ad Santel, LaLanne wanted to be a champion from the start, but did not have the wrestling skills to do so. LaLanne was also friendly with such performers as Lou Thesz and Strangler Lewis.

Books, television and other media

LaLanne presented fitness and exercise advice on television for 34 years. The Jack LaLanne Show was the longest-running television exercise program. According to the SF Chronicle TV program archives, it first began on 28 September 1953 as a 15-minute local morning program (sandwiched between the morning news and a cooking show) on San Francisco's ABC television station, KGO-TV, with LaLanne paying for the airtime himself as a way to promote his gym and related health products. LaLanne also met his wife Elaine while she was working for the local station. In 1959, the show was picked up for nationwide syndication, and continued until 1985.

The show was noted for its minimalist set, where LaLanne inspired his viewers to use basic home objects, such as a chair, to perform their exercises along with him. Wearing his standard jumpsuit, he urged his audience "with the enthusiasm of an evangelist," to get off their couch and copy his basic movements, a manner considered the forerunner of today's fitness videos. In 1959, LaLanne recorded Glamour Stretcher Time, a workout album that provided phonograph-based instruction for exercising with an elastic cord called the Glamour Stretcher. As a daytime show, much of LaLanne's audience were stay-at-home mothers. Wife Elaine LaLanne was part of the show to demonstrate the exercises, as well as the fact that doing them would not ruin their figures or musculature. LaLanne also included his dog Happy as a way to attract children to the show. Later in the run, another dog named Walter was used, with LaLanne claiming "Walter" stood for "We All Love To Exercise Regularly."

LaLanne published several books and videos on fitness and nutrition, appeared in movies, and recorded a song with Connie Haines. He marketed exercise equipment, a range of vitamin supplements, and two models of electric juicers. These include the "Juice Tiger," as seen on Amazing Discoveries with Mike Levey, and "Jack LaLanne's Power Juicer." It was on the show that LaLanne introduced the phrase "That's the power of the juice!" However, in March 1996, 70,000 Juice Tiger juicers, 9% of its models, were recalled after 14 injury incidents were reported. The Power Juicer is still sold in five models.

LaLanne celebrated his 95th birthday with the release of a new book titled, Live Young Forever. In the book, he discussed how he maintained his health and activeness well into his advanced age.

LaLanne blamed overly processed foods for many health problems. For most of his life, Jack was mostly vegetarian while including fish in his evening meal. In his later years, he appeared to advocate a mostly meatless diet that included fish, and took vitamin supplements.

He ate two meals a day and avoided snacks. His breakfast, after working out for two hours, consisted of hard-boiled egg whites, a cup of broth, oatmeal with soy milk, and seasonal fruit. For dinner, he and his wife typically ate raw vegetables, egg whites, and fish. He did not drink coffee.

When exercising, LaLanne worked out repetitively with weights until he experienced "muscle fatigue" in whatever muscle groups he was exercising, or when it became impossible for him to go on with a particular routine; this is most often referred to as " training to failure." LaLanne moved from exercise to exercise without stopping. To contradict critics who thought this would leave him tightly musclebound and uncoordinated, LaLanne liked to demonstrate one-handed balancing. His home contained two gyms and a pool that he used daily.

He continued with his two-hour workouts into his 90s, which also included walking.

He stated, "If I died, people would say 'Oh look, Jack LaLanne died. He didn't practice what he preached.'" When asked about sex, LaLanne had a standard joke, saying that despite their advanced age, he and his wife still made love almost every night: "Almost on Monday, almost on Tuesday, almost on Wednesday..."

He added, "I know so many people in their 80s who have Alzheimer's or are in a wheelchair or whatever. And I say to myself 'I don't want to live like that. I don't want to be a burden on my family. I need to live life. And I'd hate dying-it would ruin my image.'"

LaLanne summed up his philosophy about good nutrition and exercise:

Dying is easy. Living is a pain in the butt. It's like an athletic event. You've got to train for it. You've got to eat right. You've got to exercise. Your health account, your bank account, they're the same thing. The more you put in, the more you can take out. Exercise is king and nutrition is queen: together, you have a kingdom.

LaLanne often stressed that artificial food additives, drugs, and processed foods contributed to making people mentally and physically ill. As a result, he writes, many people turn to alcohol and drugs to deal with symptoms of ailments, noting that "a stream of aches and pains seems to encompass us as we get older." He refers to the human bloodstream as a "River of Life," which is "polluted" by "junk foods" loaded with "preservatives, salt, sugar, and artificial flavorings."

Relying on evidence from The President's Council on Physical Fitness, he also agreed that "many of our aches and pains come from lack of physical activity." As an immediate remedy for symptoms such as constipation, insomnia, tiredness, anxiety, shortness of breath, or high blood pressure, LaLanne states that people will resort to various drugs: "We look for crutches such as sleeping pills, pep pills, alcohol, cigarettes, and so on."

LaLanne was married to his second wife, Elaine Doyle LaLanne, for over five decades. They had three children: a daughter named Yvonne LaLanne from his first marriage, a son named Dan Doyle from Elaine's first marriage, and a son named Jon LaLanne together. Yvonne is a chiropractor in California; Dan and Jon are involved in the family business, BeFit Enterprises, which they and their mother and sister plan to continue. Another daughter from Elaine's first marriage, Janet Doyle, died in a car accident at age 21 in 1974.

LaLanne died of respiratory failure due to pneumonia at his home on January 23, 2011. He was 96. According to his family, he had been sick for a week, but refused to see a doctor. They added that he had been performing his daily workout routine the day before his death. He is buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Hollywood Hills, California.

LaLanne's feats

(As reported on Jack LaLanne's website) These accounts are not necessarily entirely accurate descriptions of what LaLanne actually did. See the 1974 Alcatraz Island to Fisherman's Wharf swim (below) for an illustration of the difference between the website account and objective reporting of the same event.

1954 (age 40) - Swam the entire 8,981-foot (1.7 mi; 2.7 km) length of the Golden Gate in San Francisco, under water, with 140 lb (64 kg; 10 st) of air tanks and other equipment strapped to his body; a world record.

1955 (age 41) - Swam from Alcatraz Island to Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco while handcuffed. When interviewed afterwards, he was quoted as saying that the worst thing about the ordeal was being handcuffed, which significantly reduced his ability to do a jumping jack.

1956 (age 42) - Set what was claimed as a world record of 1,033 push-ups in 23 minutes on You Asked For It, a television program hosted by Art Baker.

1957 (age 43) - Swam the Golden Gate channel while towing a 2,500 lb (1,130 kg; 180 st) cabin cruiser. The swift ocean currents turned this one-mile (1.6 km) swim into a swimming distance of 6.5 miles (10.5 km).

1958 (age 44) - Maneuvered a paddleboard nonstop from Farallon Islands to the San Francisco shore. The 30-mile (48 km) trip took 9.5 hours.

1959 (age 45) - Did 1,000 push ups and 1,000 chin-ups in 1 hour, 22 minutes, to promote The Jack LaLanne Show going nationwide. LaLanne said this was the most difficult of his stunts, but only because the skin on his hands started ripping off during the chin-ups. He felt he couldn't stop, because it would be seen as a public failure.

1974 (age 60) - For the second time, he swam from Alcatraz Island to Fisherman's Wharf. Again, he was handcuffed, but this time he was also shackled and towed a 1,000 lb (450 kg; 71 st) boat, according to his obituary in Los Angeles Times in 2011 and his website. However, according to an account of this event published the day after it occurred in the Los Angeles Times, written by Philip Hager, a Times staff writer, LaLanne was neither handcuffed nor shackled if each of those terms has the conventional meaning of "tightly binding the wrists or ankles together with a pair of metal fasteners." Hager says that LaLanne "had his hands and feet bound with cords that allowed minimal freedom." But "minimal" clearly did not mean "no" freedom, since elsewhere in the article Hager describes LaLanne's method of propulsion through the water as "half-breast-stroke, half-dog paddle" which is how you swim with your hands tied.

1976 (age 62) - To commemorate the "Spirit of '76," United States Bicentennial, he swam one mile (1.6 km) in Long Beach Harbor. He was handcuffed and shackled, and he towed 13 boats (representing the 13 original colonies) containing 76 people.

1979 (age 65) - Towed 65 boats in Lake Ashinoko, near Tokyo, Japan. He was handcuffed and shackled, and the boats were filled with 6,500 lb (2,950 kg; 460 st) of Louisiana Pacific wood pulp.

1980 (age 66) - Towed 10 boats in North Miami, Florida. The boats carried 77 people, and he towed them for over one mile (1.6 km) in less than one hour.

1984 (age 70) - He towed 70 rowboats, one with several guests, from the Queen's Way Bridge in the Long Beach Harbor to the , 1 mile.

On June 10, 2005, then governor Arnold Schwarzenegger launched the California Governor's Council on Physical Fitness and Sport. In his address, Schwarzenegger paid special tribute to LaLanne, who he credited with demonstrating the benefits of fitness and a healthy lifestyle for 75 years. In 2008, he inducted LaLanne into the California Hall of Fame and personally gave him an inscribed plaque at a special ceremony.

In 2007, LaLanne was awarded The President's Council's Lifetime Achievement Award. The award is given to "individuals whose careers have greatly contributed to the advancement or promotion of physical activity, fitness, or sports nationwide." Winners are chosen based on the "individual's career, the estimated number of lives the individual has touched through his or her work, the legacy of the individual's work, and additional awards or honors received over the course of his or her career."

Other honors

LaLanne appeared as himself in the following films and television shows:

(1960) - LaLanne appeared in an episode with Craig Stevens.

Mister Ed (1961), episode "Psychoanalyst Show" (as "Instructor"), (1963), episode "Doctor Ed"

The Addams Family (Season 2, 1966), episode "Fester Goes on a Diet"

(man on roof with girls, uncredited cameo) (1966)

Here's Lucy (Season 2, 1969), episode "Lucy and the Bogie Affair"

Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In (Episode #5.14, 1971), Guest Performer

Fit & Fun Time (kids TV pilot) (1972)

Amazing Discoveries (1991)

The Simpsons (Season 10, 1999), episode "The Old Man and the 'C' Student"

Beefcake (1999)

Hollywood's Magical Island: Catalina (2003)

"Mostly True Stories: Urban Legends Revealed" (2004)

Penn & Teller: Bullshit! (Season 2, 2004)

The Year Without a Santa Claus (2006), Hercules

1. ^ Luther, Claudia (23 January 2011). "Jack LaLanne obituary: Jack LaLanne dies at 96; spiritual father of U.S. fitness movement". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 7 February 2011.

2. Horn, Huston (19 December 1960). "LaLanne: a treat and a treatment". Sports Illustrated. p. 28.

3. ^ "Schwarzenegger calls LaLanne 'most energetic man in the room'" Archived 29 January 2011 at the Wayback Machine, KSBY.com, 24 January 2011

4. ^ Andrew Dalton (23 January 2011). "Fitness guru Jack LaLanne, 96, dies at Calif. home". U-T San Diego.

5. Kuruvila, Matthai; Demian Bulwa (24 January 2011). "Jack LaLanne, fitness pioneer, dies at 96". San Francisco Chronicle.

6. ^ St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture vol. 3, St. James Press (2000) pp. 81-83

7. "Jack La Lanne - A Berkeley (not Oakland) Original", Berkeley Daily Planet, 25 January 2011

8. U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission CPSC, National Media Corporation Announced Juice Tiger Recall Program Archived 11 January 2012 at the Wayback Machine

9. ^ McManis, Sam (19 January 2003). "Raising the bar / At 88, fitness guru Jack LaLanne can run circles around those half his age". The San Francisco Chronicle.

10. ^ LaLanne, Jack. Revitalize Your Life: Improve Your Looks, Your Health & Your Sex Life, Hastings House (2003)

11. ^ "A Fitting Life for Jack LaLanne" Orange Coast Magazine, August 1986

12. ^ "Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger Announces California Council on Physical Fitness and Sports"Lauphing Place, 14 June 2005

13. ^ Press Release President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports, 3 May 2007

14. Everyone's Guide to Cancer Therapy, Andrews McMeel Publishing (2008) p. xxxi

15. ^ National Fitness Hall of Fame Class of 2005. Retrieved on 23 November 2008. Archived 13 January 2009 at the Wayback Machine

16. ^ "The California Hall of Fame 2008 Exhibits". The California Museum. Archived from the original on 2 December 2009.

Official

Media and publications

Interviews

Miscellaneous

Memorials and retrospectives

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Francois Henri " Jack" LaLanne (; September 26, 1914 - January 23, 2011) was an American fitness and nutrition guru and motivational speaker. He described himself as being a "sugarholic" and a " junk food junkie" until he was age 15.

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Video Aerobics featuring Leslie Lilien and Julie Lavin, was made cheaply available on videotape in 1979.
https://www.vogue.com/article/jane-fonda-vogue-fitness-feature

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The first popular search engine on the Web was Yahoo! Search. founded by Jerry Yang and David Filo in January 1994. This made fitness information accessible to anyone regardless without needing a direct connection to professionals. As well as creating opportunities for online coaching.

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Just before COVID hit, 39 percent of trainers said they did something online. Not necessarily full-time online, but some sort of online fitness. By August 2020, that number was 83 percent.
https://www.theptdc.com/articles/how-big-is-online-personal-training-industry#:~:text=Just%20before%20COVID%20hit%2C%2039,that%20number%20was%2083%20percent.

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Ever hear one question from somebody, but you realize they're asking something else?

If someone points and says, "You gonna eat that?" They really mean, "Can I have it?"

When I hear someone asking how big the online personal training industry is, what I really hear is:

"Is there room for me?"

They're wondering if our industry is saturated. They know that online training is popular and that it's only getting more popular. More crowded.

But is there still opportunity? The answer is unequivocally YES.

I understand the doubt. It seems like everyone is doing it.

Trainers are increasingly taking on clients for at-home workouts. Clients who've been cooped up during the pandemic are eager to get their workouts in, and they want professional guidance.

For a trainer new to this world, it's like staring at a crowded, moving train and wondering if you can jump on. Maybe you should wait for the next one?

Back to the original question ...

How big is the online personal training industry?

S hort answer: We don't really know.

You won't find official employment statistics that mean anything because lots of trainers work for cash, under the table, and don't tell the full truth on their taxes. That's undeniable.

Anyone who says they have accurate statistics is lying or mistaken.

But it almost doesn't matter. It might be interesting, but it's not important.

Here at thePTDC.com we do surveys that give us a snapshot of our industry. We do one every year on personal trainer salaries , for instance.

Last year, we did a survey to see how the COVID shutdown was affecting business.

Just before COVID hit, 39 percent of trainers said they did something online. Not necessarily full-time online, but some sort of online fitness business.

By August 2020, that number was 83 percent.

We also asked what they'd be doing once COVID ends: Only 14 percent say they'll be primarily in the gym. That's a 75 percent drop from previous levels.

Okay, I get it. Those numbers sound discouraging. It does seem that everyone's already defining themselves as online fitness professionals, or thinking about doing it. Sounds like the industry is saturated.

Not at all. In fact, the potential is almost unlimited.

Here's why. I'm going to admit that in one sense, the market is saturated-if you don't differentiate yourself from the crowd. If you're trying to sell "fat loss" or "muscle gain," you're part of that crowd. Nobody can see you or hear you.

If you try to build a business on a vague, generic promise, it's going to be very difficult.

But if you know how to set yourself apart, growth potential is huge. If you know how to build content around your distinct identity, your audience is out there.

Coming out of COVID, this is truer than ever.
There is more trust in online fitness now. There are more customers for online fitness now. There's more acceptance that online fitness works now.
That's because it's been proven. We've known that it works for a long time. Now everyone else is catching up. The general populace is getting it.

With that, it's time for pie.

Online personal training industry: How to get a piece of the pie

The online fitness industry "pie" used to be much smaller, but the slice each trainer got was a decent size, and plenty satisfying.

Now there are a lot more online trainers. But there are WAY more customers than before.

That means the pie is WAY bigger. And that means there's a tremendous amount of opportunity now. You should dig in.

Don't worry about the big companies that are going to take a big slab of pie. There's plenty to go around.
What you need to do is figure out what's distinctive about you, about what you have to offer.
We call it the 1% Uniqueness Factor, and it's essential to how we think at the PTDC. Find what makes you unique, and let the clients who match that find you.

Remember, there is only one you. Also remember that the audience has seen it all and been promised it all.

They're not going to believe another fat-loss promise. But they will believe you if you present an open, honest version of yourself.

Don't fake it. Just the opposite: Frame your real self in a new way. Admit your weaknesses, confess your quirks. They can become strengths and assets.

Make yourself a category of one. Stake your position and brand it as yours.

The current decentralized market is a massive opportunity for smaller service providers-meaning you. Playing at the fringes of this market offers great value.

Picture an ideal client. This client probably shares your interests, senses that you can solve their problems, and will end up a loyal fan who refers you to others.

I've been using an example for years now: Say you're a trainer who works with military spouses who are moms who had a C-section and are still living on base. (But it can be anything. Maybe night-shift workers with bad backs and wacky eating schedules. Whatever.)

Maybe you're actually like the ideal client you're envisioning, which is great-you'll truly understand each other. Or maybe you've just had plenty of experience with a particular kind of client.

You can now build one program for that type of client, but with individual tweaks. It's way easier than building a new program for every single person.

You'll know how and where to network. You'll know what kind of content to produce. You'll know exactly what language to use.

Yours may seem like a small, narrow market. That's right, and that's great! Because in the internet age, the audience is huge-it's literally as big as the world.

And your specific market is more than big enough for you.

You will literally be the only trainer in your world. The only one who is perfectly suited for that narrow demographic slice.

Word will get around: You're just the one for this type of client.

That's the key. That's how you get started. And once you start getting results, you'll see that referrals start rolling in.

That's when you can start expanding your client roster beyond that narrow niche.

In other words: Don't start wide and hope to narrow down your niche. Start narrow. Otherwise, you'll struggle to stand out.

And you'll soon get over this question of whether the industry is saturated.

How big is the industry? We don't really know. And we shouldn't care.

Is it saturated? Yes, if you do a bad job. But absolutely not-if you know how to set yourself apart.
Learn more: Get answers to more online trainer questions.

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How Big Is the Online Personal Training Industry?

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Ever hear one question from somebody, but you realize they're asking something else? If someone points and says, "You gonna eat that?" They really mean, "Can I have it?" When I hear someone asking how big the online personal training industry is, what I really hear is: "Is there room for me?"