Plato is by many accounts one of our most influential thinkers. Millions have read him and have been influenced by the likes of the The Republic, The Parmenides, and The Symposium. But now recent studies have unearthed a hidden masterpiece: Plato’s dialogues depicting Socrates as he moved out of university housing and into his first veranda. In addition to elucidating his thoughts on man and free-will, Socrates finally reveals his influential thoughts on home furnishing. This, the so called, “Ikeaides” is quite a revolutionary work.

Plato describes Socrates debating with his entourage on a Saturday night in an Athenian salon. After enough rounds of Dionysius’s finest, Socrates lips got loose and he began to argue about the evils of a local artisan shop, which to modern readers translates as “Ikeaides.”

To begin the first debate, a young Thebian named Uritestes, whose name got some obvious chuckles in the Senate, asked about the nature of the display room. The Thebian asked Socrates whether the display room of Ikeaides is a real place, purgatory or possibly just Hades itself. In one of his most profound analogies, Socrates argued that the displays at Ikeaides were like siren songs calling sailors to their doom. Many a fool, he argued, was drawn to the displays’ shiny well-lit surfaces, but they were doomed to heartbreak and off-center cabinets. For if the body was a prison house for the soul, Ikeaides was a prison house for idle shoppers.

Here is where Socrates’ theory of the ideal comes into play. He previously argued that there is an ideal of “justice” but humanity could not attain it; we witnessed but shadows in a cave of this ideal. Here, Socrates differs from this line of reasoning and says that while there is an ideal chair that we as humans can never attain, it does exist, and it’s on display in aisle five.

Aristotle and Plato differed over this theory, for while Plato believed that we would never actualize the idealized piece of furniture, Aristotle argued that Pottery Barn has much more reasonable prices. Much of modern thought is derived from this split in rhetoric.

Plato then describes to the reader Socrates’ journey at the local veranda furnishing supplier and the deep questions that spawned therein. He wondered if there was such a thing as a towel and such a thing as a pony, why there needed to be a towel in the shape of a pony? Furthermore, what purpose is there for a toothbrush that is also a clock? Timeaus argued that it was “clever” and Pharisees believed it was “somewhat practical” while Socrates finally pointed out that like the shell of a hermit crab, one discards a toothbrush and consequently the clock. Everyone eventually agreed the object wasn’t marketable and should be dropped from the spring catalog.

Socrates then questioned Ikeaides’s use of the term “system.” For there are a system of planets, he argued, a system to conduct war, but many were baffled at the idea that a shelving unit could be a “system.” Himineus argued that it could be an integrated plan for decorating a bedroom. He argued that with this desk/drawer combination, he could maximize his storage space and finally get something to compliment his collection of rocks that look vaguely like Jon Voight. Socrates argued that Himineus wears a dishtowel for a toga and throws grapes at traffic. A fool, Himineus was no match for the rhetorical ability of Socrates.

In a later dialogue, a question was finally asked by the Spartan Jennistes. He asked if objects were named as people were named, if they could be considered people as well. This problem was particularly perplexing because Jennistes had married a dinner table named Claire.

But Socrates quickly pointed out the flaw in Ikeaides’s system of naming furniture. The object is placed with meaning by the mind, by the being. But the object does not then go around voting for LaRouche or displaying rational thought.

Next, Socrates went to the root of the “naming question.” If an object is named, he argued, after its creator, who created the objects from Ikeaides? Are they man, are they objects themselves, or perhaps they are demons sent by Zeus himself? Eventually, to refute Jennistes, he found that the creator of Ikeaides furniture is like the child whose Popsicle birdhouse collapses and kills all the occupants. Whoever designs such furniture, he argues, are not true men, nor objects, bur rather children who for some fucking reason believe a piece of cardboard would be enough to support a hundred pounds of lumber.