How Socrates Shows That the Soul Is Immortal.

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The first argument which shows that the soul is immortal is the Opposites Argument or the “Cyclical argument”. Through this argument, Socrates explains that as the soul initiates or carries forward the life, it will not cease to exist. As the human physical body can malfunction and eventually perish, it will have an imperishable opposite entity. And it is the soul that can be considered as that imperishable immortal entity. The second argument put forward by Socrates in Phaedo in favor of immortality is the “Theory of Recollection”.

Through this theory, Socrates argues that humans before birth or even at the time of birth possess some non-empirical knowledge. This perspective implies that the soul was residing in some form before birth in an immortal state, and after birth, it is carried continuously without any end. The third argument is the affinity argument. It explains that the human body is visible and mortal, and so there will be a direct opposite, which will be invisible and immortal and that entity is the soul. The final argument of Plato, which supports that the soul is immortal, is “Form of Life”.

Socrates argues that Forms are the initiating factors of all things in the world, and the soul because of its immortality participates in the “Form of Life”, representing that the soul would remain immortal.Seneca penned the moral essay titled, De Brevitate Vitae, translated as “On the Shortness of Life”, to his friend Paulinus. Through this essay, the philosopher brings up many clear-cut concepts regarding the nature of time. Speaking about the life of leisure, Seneca opines that, humans’ uncontrollably waste a part of their lives in search of meaningless pursuits.

In the essay, Seneca points out, that our nature provides us humans, many man-hours to do several really important things. And it is the duty of humans to plan and allot those leisure time appropriately and effectively, to achieve the expected level of success.