Plato

Plato (423 BC – 348 BC) was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the foundations of Western philosophy and science. Plato influenced a whole range of subjects from philosophy to maths, logic and ethics.

Plato wrote on a whole range of topics, but it is his ethics and general philosophy which seemed to be his biggest interest. Plato wrote that he saw a distinction between the body (corporeal world) and the soul. He also saw a distinction between the imperfection of the material world and the highest ideals which transcend material imperfections. Plato felt that someone of a ‘philosophic mind’ could differentiate between outward limitations and the highest ideals of beauty, truth, unity and justice. It is a philosophy which hints at the limitations of the material and mental world and encourages an aspiration to higher ideals.

Plato's fifth book of The Republic discusses the role of women:

Are dogs divided into hes and shes, or do they both share equally in hunting and in keeping watch and in the other duties of dogs? Or do we entrust to the males the entire and exclusive care of the flocks, while we leave the females at home, under the idea that the bearing and suckling their puppies is labour enough for them?