Word: plato
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Taber was assisted by Reporter-Researchers Charles Alexander and Robert Grieves, who helped to pin down such fine points as the cost of gasoline in Bulgaria, the distribution of wealth envisioned in Plato's Republic, and whether Marie Antoinette really did say, "Let them eat cake" (she did not). Says Alexander: "Happily, we had to reach out of our accustomed economic niche to become students of history, literature and philosophy." Last week TIME opened its first bureau on mainland China since our office in Shanghai was closed in September 1949, four months after the city was taken over...
Certainly, the large divergence of income within capitalist societies can be a cause of serious social tensions. In the society described by Plato in The Laws, no person would be permitted to be more than four times richer than the poorest. In the U.S. the upper 20% of the population earn 46% of the income, a figure that has changed very little in the past generation. In France that same group earns 44% and in Britain 40%. But those who complain that the chairman of General Motors earns nearly $ 1 million a year never criticize the Who for pocketing that...
...exclusive restaurants and private clubs had opened discos, and annual membership fees at some of the plusher, better-equipped ones started at several hundred dollars. Studio 54, and all it represented, was only the tip of a narcissistic iceberg that ranged the gamut from hot tubs to Plato's Retreat. Those who could no longer afford the Studio and were still a bit too tame for Plato's, it seemed, were all out jogging or roller skating...
...distributing cassette tapes of his anti-Shah sermons throughout Iran before the revolution, more recently by exploiting television to maintain his popularity with the people. He has read deeply in early Greek philosophy and can discuss Aristotle with animated admiration; Iran's new constitution is an Islamic version of Plato's Republic, with Khomeini as philosopher-king. His peers, however, generally believe that on matters of Islamic scholarship he is less profound than some of his fellow ayatullahs?notably Seyed Kazem Sharietmadari. Numerous Western scholars who have spoken to him have been shocked by his ignorance of modern life...