Gregory Vlastos

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Gregory Vlastos (July 27, 1907 – October 12, 1991) was a scholar of ancient philosophy, and author of several works on Plato and Socrates. He was also a Christian believer and some of his later work is on the subject of the Christian faith.

He was born in Istanbul, to a Scottish mother and a Greek father,[1] where he received a Bachelor of Arts from Robert College before moving to Harvard University where he received a PhD in 1931. After teaching for several years at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, he moved to Cornell University in 1948. He was Stuart Professor of Philosophy at Princeton University between 1955 and 1976, and then Mills Professor of Philosophy at University of California, Berkeley until 1987. He received a MacArthur Foundation grant in 1990. Vlastos died in 1991, before finishing a new compilation of essays on Socratic philosophy.

Many of Vlastos's students have become important scholars of ancient philosophy, including Terence Irwin, Richard Kraut, Paul Woodruff, and Alexander Nehamas.