Plotinus
204-270 · Middle & Neo-Platonism · Prominent
Plotinus founded Neoplatonism. All reality pours out of a single source he would not even call a thing, the One, and it spills down through Intellect and then Soul until it thins out into matter at the bottom. The philosophical life is the disciplined climb back up that ladder, made by contemplation. His student Porphyry reported that Plotinus reached the top of it a handful of times.
Signature
The position Plotinus is most identified with in the Profiler:
- Nature of Reality
- leans Unity
- Beginning of Things
- Emanation
Positions on the 13 axes the sources answer
- Natural Processes
- leans Purposeful (75 on a 0–100 scale from Mechanistic to Purposeful)
- Mind
- leans Beyond Brain (83 on a 0–100 scale from Brain Only to Beyond Brain)
- The Divine
- mildly leans Indescribable (67 on a 0–100 scale from Describable to Indescribable)
- Beauty
- leans Objective (79 on a 0–100 scale from Subjective to Objective)
- Universals
- leans Realism (12 on a 0–100 scale from Realism to Nominalism)
- Identity
- leans Unchanging (25 on a 0–100 scale from Unchanging to Changing)
- Meaning
- leans Inherent (83 on a 0–100 scale from Constructed to Inherent)
- Order
- leans Vertical (17 on a 0–100 scale from Vertical to Horizontal)
- Nature of Reality
- leans Unity (12 on a 0–100 scale from Unity to Multiplicity)
- Ground of Being
- leans Transcendence (88 on a 0–100 scale from Immanence to Transcendence)
- Truth
- leans Objective (75 on a 0–100 scale from Subjective to Objective)
- Opposition
- leans Concurrence (88 on a 0–100 scale from Sublation to Concurrence)
- Nature
- leans Harmony (75 on a 0–100 scale from Mastery to Harmony)
7 of 20 axes are left blank: the sources do not answer them, or Plotinus refused the framing. Nothing is imputed; a blank is not a middling score.
Foundational questions
- Theology
- Panentheism / Pantheism
What is your position on the existence and nature of God or gods? - Government
- Epistocracy
What is your ideal form of government? - Highest Good
- Union with God
What is the highest good? - Good and Evil
- Good Real, Evil Privative
What is the fundamental nature of good and evil? - Perception
- Non-Dual Awareness / Idealism
What do we directly perceive? - Knowledge
- Receptive Intellect / Intuition
What is the ultimate foundation of knowledge? - Ethics Basis
- Virtue
What is the ultimate basis of ethics? - Agency
- Divine Providence / Libertarian Free Will
What is the nature of human agency and freedom? - Beginning of Things
- Emanation
What is the origin of reality? - Time
- Block Universe / Spiral
What is the fundamental shape of time? - Authority
- Wisdom
What is the legitimate source of authority? - Language
- Logos
What is the fundamental nature of language? - Paradox
- Apophatic Pointer
What is the status of paradox? - Law
- Natural Law
What is the ultimate source of legitimate law? - Death
- Union with the One
What happens at death? - Role of Emotion
- Obstacle to Reason
What is the proper role of emotion? - Human Nature
- Innate Good
What is human nature? - Primary Bond
- The Divine
What is your primary bond and loyalty?