Before Plato became the most influential philosopher in Western history, he was a wealthy Athenian wrestler — his very name may derive from the Greek for “broad,” a reference to his powerful build. The man who taught the world to question the nature of reality started life as an aristocrat groomed for politics, and it was the execution of his teacher Socrates that turned him from the wrestling ring to the Academy.

This episode traces Plato from his privileged youth through the trauma of Socrates’s death, the founding of the Academy, and the dialogues that established the foundations of Western philosophy — the Theory of Forms, the Allegory of the Cave, and the vision of the philosopher-king.

• Plato’s aristocratic origins, athletic career, and early political ambitions in Athens
• The execution of Socrates and its transformative impact on Plato’s life direction
• The founding of the Academy — the Western world’s first institution of higher learning
• The Theory of Forms, the Cave allegory, and the Republic’s vision of the ideal state