Any question answered...

glory be.

this is total bollocks right?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/manchester/hi/people_and_places/newsid_8773000/8773564.stm

Absolute and utter nonsense. This sort of thing comes up every couple of years. People trying to find secrets in Plato are ten a penny. I've certainly read attempts to make him a Pythagorean before. Funnily enough, most of Plato's key views are rather in conflict with Pythagoreanism. :)

What this is is really someone trying to justify some of today's most prevalent views by reference to Plato. It's not particularly interesting. Plato's work is infinitely rich and the work of utter genius, but most of that can be worked out by good old-fashioned thinking (I kid you not) rather than computing symbolic patterns and the like.

I have not got around to reading the article yet (wanted to yesterday, hopefully tonight), but I would not dismiss it so quickly. It's gone through peer review, and is making waves in academia. He is not saying (as far as I can tell) anything about Plato's views (at this point).

Also, I believe the seventh letter is a legitimate and therefore, tend to believe Plato was an esoteric writer - and therefore, does have a "hidden" (or, let's say, difficult to comprehend) message in much of what he wrote.