Extracts from Teachers Notes for Film 2 of Life After Death:
The Immortal Soul

Exercise B:
‘Corrupting the youth of Athens’ sounds like a serious offence. In our day we would expect it
to mean a teacher having a relationship with an underage pupil – or any pupil. Indeed, teachers who
do so are imprisoned. There is a particular responsibility placed on those in authority. Invite students
to come up with a list of ‘crimes’ that they imagine have changed over time – they don’t need any
particular knowledge, but it is easy to imagine that ‘blaspheming against the gods’ or ‘treason to the
king’ was once more serious than it is today. Or was it?
Did Socrates deserve to be put to death?
If the soul is immortal, does this make a difference to our views on capital punishment?
Does the concept of karma have any relevance here?

Exercise C
If, as Plato believes, the Forms exist and there are Perfect versions of Truth, Beauty and
Goodness, what difficulties might you encounter with the following statements
a) Female circumcision is a good thing to do.
b) There are many religions in the world but only one is correct
c) Capital punishment should be ‘brought back’ for people who abuse children
d) War is never right
(aim of the exercise to discuss the differences between absolutism and relativism)

Exercise D
‘This Otherness is important’
Get students to write out pairs of cards in opposites – this can be anything but must be an
opposite eg. Truth/lie Man/woman light/ darkness. NB some things don’t work because
they’re not opposites eg. Cat/dog or book/music but discretion can be used. So if someone
puts Aristotle/Plato I would let it go, if they can justify it! When they’ve got a decent pile,
place them face down on a table and turn them over, two at a time. When a student either
gets lucky and finds an opposite or remember where one is, they get that pair. The winner is
the one with the most pairs.
The aim of the game is to foster a sense of ‘otherness’ what Rudolph Otto called ‘the
numinous. Is this what Plato is talking about? Or are the Forms and their expressions here on
earth actually quite related? And does it take the Hebraic concept of ‘Yahweh’ to introduce a
real feeling of ‘otherness’ and awe? Get students to think about the last time they felt awe –
a beautiful sunset etc. Did they feel connected or ‘other’? Out of the three theories of a)
Resurrection b) Immortality of the soul c) Reincarnation which most reinforces this profound
sense of otherness and which feels more of a continuation of our present life?

Exercise E
Plato’s ideas about the soul and the chariot, has some links to the theory of Sigmund Freud
who presented the idea of the id, the ego and the super-ego; with the latter being the
‘conscience’ that controls the conflicting desires of the other two. On the same topic of
‘conscience’ it is also possible to make a connection with Butler’s theory of two opposing
pulls between the ‘self’ on the one hand and ‘benevolence’ on the other, with God-given
conscience being the ‘tool’ that adjudicates between the two.
Get students to discuss with a friend a few of their own personal traits – are they ambitious,
cautious, hard working, lazy etc. Distribute pictures of one black and one white horse. If the
black horse represents our earthly life and the white is aiming for something more
otherworldly and wise - invite students to allocate a personality trait to the horse that
would want it most.
© Ethics Online 2015