Ion - Plato

[@2tehnik]

I'm not sure if the view on poetry as reflecting culture would conflict with Plato's main point. Mainly, if the problem with poetry is that, insofar as it is not grounded on any skill, it makes unjustified assertions. The unjustified assertions people take seriously are still there even if there's no possibility of it being an art/techne.

[@jameseldridge3445]

Exactly

[@Ybby999]

I think Socrates is mistaken in assuming that poetry, because it discusses many things, pretends to reign over many arts. It reigns supreme over only one: that of poetry. In discussing the fisherman and the physician, the poet is not giving a step-by-step guide on how to fish or heal people. He is portraying goings-on with the specific intention of transferring and imprinting some feeling on the audience. That is the domain of the poet - the transference of feelings. For this it makes use of the appearance of many other arts, but it does not truly approach those arts. A fisherman in a poem is not a real fisherman, he is a character in a poem. And so he serves a very different purpose than a real fisherman does. All in all, poetry concerns only one art - that of poetry.