Unique Approach Breathes New Life into Classical Work

Dr. Miriam Byrd Philosophy

By shifting perspectives, Dr. Miriam Byrd is mining new life from 2,000-year-old texts.

The Associate Professor of Philosophy has continued her development of a new way to approach the work of Plato, a Classical Greek philosopher and mathematician considered to be the father of Western philosophy. For the past decade, Byrd has argued several of the contradictions often found in Plato’s work are meant to initiate a process of active learning among students.

“My thesis is that Plato put summoners in the dialogues for the readers,” Byrd said. “The problematic aspects of the dialogues are intentional. They make us not just agree and be passive with the ideas presented, but instead grapple with those ideas and learn through our own efforts.”

Byrd’s approach has been growing in popularity among philosophy scholars. She has published articles on the topic in several academic journals, including the Journal of History of Philosophy, and earlier this year she was an invited lecturer at the Boston Area Colloquium in Ancient Philosophy at Boston College. An article based on her lecture, “When the Middle Comes Early,” will appear in the event’s published proceedings next year.

In Plato’s dialogues, his mentor Socrates is a central character, and the early works detail Socrates’ viewpoints and philosophy. In later works, Plato inserts his own opinions and develops some very puzzling, open-ended questions, Byrd said.

“Previous interest has been on the doctrinal aspect of the work; people will pull out passages and put them together piecemeal,” she said. “With my approach, you can see that Plato has road signs there to guide us. You have to do the work yourself and stay engaged philosophically. But the approach can lead us in new directions to solve philosophical problems … and allows us to study philosophy, instead of the history of philosophy.”

Byrd hopes her approach will continue to be explored by other philosophers and researchers, as well as educators who understand the importance of active learning in the classroom.

“You can’t convey your true opinions to someone and give them knowledge,” she said. “People have to figure things out for themselves. … Plato emphasizes the same thing and it’s very effective."