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Eros Is Misplaced Desire, Not The Enemy
- Plato reframes eros: the problem isn't desire but the object of desire, which must be redirected toward the beautiful and the good.
- Eros can become a medicine that tempers aggression when properly oriented toward transcendent truth.
Use Ascetic Restraint To Redirect Desire
- Transform misplaced desire by deliberate restraint and redirection toward higher goods, as Socrates attempts with Alcibiades.
- Use loss or disciplined refusal as a trampoline to glimpse and pursue the beautiful rather than immediate gratifications.
The Split Humans Story
- Aristophanes' myth describes original spherical humans cut in half by Zeus, producing the sexes and longing for reunion.
- The myth mixes sex and aggression and proposes eros as a horizontal diversion from attacking the gods.