Plato’s Dualism

The conceptual birth of Western metaphysical duality.

Division between the “true” world (ideal, eternal) and the lived world (material, changing).

A philosophical attempt to reconcile human experience with an absolute, but it deepens the gap between spirit and matter.

The intellectual crystallization of duality.

Plato introduces a worldview in which reality is divided into two layers:
1. The Realm of Forms — eternal, perfect, unchanging.
2. The Sensible World — temporary, imperfect, illusory.
This becomes the backbone of Western thought, setting the stage for later divisions: body vs soul, nature vs divine, empirical vs spiritual, sacred vs profane. Plato’s mapping shapes 2,400 years of philosophy, religion, and science.

Classical Greece, 4th century BCE — the rise of rational inquiry, metaphysics, and proto-scientific thinking.