This book includes selected papers from the International Colloquium 'Plato Ethicus: philosophy is life' (Piacenza, Italy), organised by M. Migliori (Univ. of Macerata) and L. M. Napolitano Valditara (Univ. of Trieste),The variety of approaches adopted on the issue of Platonic ethics is very wide: however, two commonly-held opinions emerge from these essays. In the first place, one cannot ascribe to Plato an ethics deemed autonomous from other branches of philosophy, as it will later be in Aristotle. Secondly, the current approaches to Platonic ethics today are partial, if not unreliable. These two opinions actually overturn the manner in which the unclassifiable multiplicity of the approaches adopted here was in danger of being interpreted. Their absolute variety does not denote the non-existence of ethics in Plato but, on the contrary, the radical pervasiveness and strength of its ethical problematization, therefore, placing itself at the very roots - historical, linguistic and conceptual - of what Western thought shall yield in that sphere.Essays by: E. Berti, F. Bravo, L. Brisson, G. Casertano, B. Centrone, M. Erler, S. Gastaldi, L. P. Gerson, C. Gill, F. Ferrari, M. Migliori, L. M. Napolitano Valditara, N. Notomi, G. Reale, C. J. Rowe, M. I. Santa Cruz, S. Scolnicov, M. Tulli, M. Vegetti.