Nous and Necessity Relationship in Plato's Timaeus Dialogue
This study aims to inquire about the principles on which Plato’s understanding of the universe he revealed in Timaeus dialogue is based, along with the meaning of these principles in terms of the ethical life of the individual human. Upon the analyses of this inquiry, Plato’s universe design is discussed as a possible explanation for the universe in the first part of the article, and the teleological orientation of this design is expounded in the second part. The teleological approach emphasizes that Plato’s cosmology has an ethical context, which is the basic claim of the article and searches for the ultimate goal of human life for the good. While the third and fourth parts of the article highlight the principle of rational and necessary conditions, which are the basis of the Platonic universe design, the fifth part focuses on the structure of the holistic universe created by the collaboration of these two conditions. In this way, the universe was created through the collaboration of the two conditions and exhibits the order and the harmony which provide a model guide for human life. By focusing on how to actualize a good idea in ethical and political life and how to achieve happiness through taking the cosmic order as a model through the triple structure of the human soul the article concludes that there is a similarity between macrocosmos and microcosmos.
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