DOCSLIB.ORG

Plato's Meno (2005)

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Plato's Meno (2005) PLATO’S MENO Given its brevity, Plato’s Meno covers an astonishingly wide array of topics: politics, education, virtue, definition, philosophical method, mathematics, the nature and acquisition of knowledge, and immor- tality. Its treatment of these, though profound, is tantalizingly short, leaving the reader with many unresolved questions. This book con- fronts the dialogue’s many enigmas and attempts to solve them in a way that is both lucid and sympathetic to Plato’s philosophy. Reading the dialogue as a whole, it explains how different arguments are related to one another, and how the interplay between characters is connected to the philosophical content of the work. In a new departure, this book’s exploration focuses primarily on the content and coherence of the dialogue in its own right, and not merely in the context of other dialogues, making it required reading for all students of Plato, be they from the world of classics or philosophy. dominic scott is Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Clare College. His previous publications include Recollection and Experience: Plato’s Theory of Learning and its Successors (Cambridge, 1995). cambridge studies in the dialogues of plato Series editor: Mary Margaret McCabe Plato’s dialogues are rich mixtures of subtle argument, sublime theorising and superb literature. It is tempting to read them piecemeal – by analysing the argu- ments, by espousing or rejecting the theories or by praising Plato’s literary expertise. It is equally tempting to search for Platonic views across dialogues, selecting pas- sages from throughout the Platonic corpus. But Plato offers us the dialogues to read whole and one by one. This series provides original studies in individual dialogues of Plato. Each study will aim to throw light on such questions as why its chosen dialogue is composed in the complex way that it is, and what makes this unified whole more than the sum of its parts. In so doing, each volume will both give a full account of its dialogue and offer a view of Plato’s philosophising from that perspective. Titles published in the series: Plato’s Cratylus David Sedley Plato’s Lysis Christopher Rowe and Terence Penner Plato’s Meno Dominic Scott Forthcoming titles in the series: Plato’s Euthydemus Mary Margaret McCabe Plato’s Timaeus Dorothea Frede Plato’s Symposium Robert Wardy PLATO’S MENO DOMINIC SCOTT University of Cambridge cambridge university press Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo Cambridge University Press The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge cb2 2ru,UK Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York www.cambridge.org Informationonthistitle:www.cambridge.org/9780521640336 © Dominic Scott 2005 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provision of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published in print format 2006 isbn-13 978-0-511-14655-8 eBook (EBL) isbn-10 0-511-14655-8 eBook (EBL) isbn-13 978-0-521-64033-6 hardback isbn-10 0-521-64033-4 hardback Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of urls for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. For Aylin Contents Acknowledgements page ix Introduction 1 part i 1 The opening: 70a–71d 11 2 The first definition: 71e–73c 23 3 A lesson in definition: 73c–77d 31 4 The third definition: 77b–79e 46 5 Meno as an interlocutor 60 part ii 6 The stingray: 79e–80d 69 7 ‘Meno’s paradox’: 80d–81a 75 8 The emergence of recollection: 81a–e 92 9 The argument for recollection: 82b–85d 98 10 The conclusion: 86b6–c2 121 part iii 11 The method of hypothesis: 86c–87c 129 12 Virtue is teachable: 87c–89c 145 vii viii Contents 13 Virtue is not teachable: 89e–96d 161 14 Virtue as true belief: 96d–100b 176 15 Irony in the Meno: the evidence of the Gorgias 194 16 Meno’s progress 209 Conclusion 214 Appendices 219 References 227 Index of ancient passages 232 General index 235 Acknowledgements Most of this book was written while I was a British Academy Research Reader in 2001–3.Needless to say, I am enormously grateful to the Academy for this opportunity. I would also like to thank the Center for Hellenic Studies and its Directors, Debbie Boedekker and Kurt Raaflaub, for a very productive and enjoyable fellowship there in 1998–9.Asever,Ioweagreat debt of gratitude to the Cambridge Faculty of Philosophy and to Clare College for their continued support. I have benefited from trying out the central ideas of this book at various seminars and conferences. My debts to individuals who commented at such occasions are too numerous to recall, but I would especially like to thank Hugh Benson, Tad Brennan, Lesley Brown, Victor Caston, Terry Irwin, Thomas Johansen, Geoffrey Lloyd, Mark McPherran, David Sedley, Frisbee Sheffield, Roslyn Weiss and Raphael Woolf. I am particularly grateful to Jimmy Altham, Myles Burnyeat, Gail Fine and Rosanna Keefe for reading earlier drafts of the manuscript all the way through. I have also been very fortunate that Gail Fine gave me detailed feedback on the manuscript. Her comments, invariably incisive, have saved me from a number of errors. From beginning to end, M. M. McCabe has acted as gadfly, midwife and occasionally stingray (though only in the most beneficial sense). The series of which this book forms a part is very much her inspiration. I only hope I have done her credit. As with all my research, I also owe a lasting debt to Myles Burnyeat, who has been a continuing source of inspiration. For some years, the Meno has been a set text on the undergraduate philosophy syllabus at Cambridge, and I owe a special debt to my students. Their obvious enthusiasm for the dialogue has been a constant delight and their feedback yet another source of inspiration. My only regret is that I may have to remove it from the syllabus to prevent future generations hounding me with lists of my errors, now that they have been committed to print. ix x Acknowledgements Finally, I would like to thank the Cambridge University Press, and par- ticularly Linda Woodward, for their help in the final stages of production. This book has been some years in the making. Doubtless it would benefit by gestating for many more. But the moment of publication can no longer be delayed. My text of the dialogue is now on the verge of disintegration and is threatening to do so at the very page where Socrates remarks on the need to examine the same topic over and over again (85c10–11). No one should ignore such an omen. Introduction synopsis of the dialogue Meno, a young aristocrat from Thessaly, asks how virtue is acquired. In reply, Socrates professes himself unable to answer: since he does not even know what virtue is, how can he know how it is acquired? Meno agrees to tackle the nature of virtue first and offers Socrates a definition, or rather a list of different kinds of virtue. After some argument, he accepts that this is inadequate, and offers another definition – virtue as the power to rule – which is also rejected. In order to help the inquiry along, Socrates gives a short lesson in definition, after which Meno offers his third and final definition of virtue: the desire for fine things and ability to acquire them. When this is refuted, he despairs of ever making any progress in their inquiry: how, he demands, can you look for something of whose nature youare entirely ignorant? Even if you stumble upon the answer, how will you know that this is the thing you did not know before? In the face of this challenge, Socrates changes tack (81a). Adopting a religious tone, he asserts that the soul is immortal and has had many pre- vious lives; what we call learning is in fact the recollection of knowledge that the soul had before. At Meno’s request, he offers to provide some support for these claims, and summons one of Meno’s slave boys to join them. Drawing some figures in the sand, he sets the boy a geometrical puzzle: take a square with sides of two feet and an area of four square feet. What would be the length of the sides of the square whose area is double the original? In response to Socrates’ questioning, the boy first gives two wrong answers. But eventually, after continued questioning, he gives the correct one. Socrates argues that, as he has only questioned the boy and never taught him, the answers must have been in him all along. In fact, they must have been in him before birth. Finally, Socrates mounts an argu- ment to show that the truth was in him for all time and that his soul is immortal. 1 2 Introduction They now return to the topic of virtue. Socrates still wants it defined, but Meno persists in asking how it is acquired (86c). Socrates yields to his demand and, to move the inquiry ahead, introduces a new method adapted from geometry, the method of hypothesis. If virtue is a form of knowledge, he argues, it can be taught. The task now is to show that virtue is a form of knowledge, which Socrates immediately proceeds to do: virtue is the knowledge that enables us to make correct use of our available resources, be they money, power, or qualities of character, such as endurance or self-discipline.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • The Trial and Death of Socrates : Being the Euthyphron, Apology, Crito, and Phaedo of Plato
    LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN DIEGO /?. (Boffcen THE TRIAL & DEATH OF SOCRATES *O 5' dve^Tcurroj /3toj ov /Siwrds cu>0p(j!nrip ' An unexamined life is not worth living.' (PLATO, Apol. 38 A. ) THE TRIAL AND DEATH OF SOCRATES BEING THE EUTHYPHRON, APOLOGY, CRITO, AND PH^EDO OF PLATO TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH BY F. J. CHURCH, M.A. LONDON MACMILLAN AND CO. AND NEW YORK 1895 [ All rights reserved.] First Edition printed 1880 Second Edition, Golden Treasury Series, 1886 Reprinted 1887, 1888, 1890, 1891, 1892, March and September 1895 PREFACE. THIS book, which is intended principally for the large and increasing class of readers who wish to learn something of the masterpieces of Greek literature, and who cannot easily read them in Greek, was originally published by Messrs. Macmillan in a different form. Since its first appearance it has been revised and corrected throughout, and largely re- written. The chief part of the Introduction is new. It is not intended to be a general essay on Socrates, but only an attempt to explain and illustrate such points in his life and teaching as are referred to in these dialogues, which, taken by themselves, con- tain Plato's description of his great master's life, and work, and death. The books which were most useful to me in writing it are Professor Zeller's Socrates and the Socratic Schools, and the edition of the VI PREFACE. Apology by the late Rev. James Riddell, published after his death by the delegates of the Clarendon Press. His account of Socrates is singularly striking.
    [Show full text]
  • SGR VERY Final Version
    PLATO’S EXPLANATORY PREDICATION A Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Cornell University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy by Saul Gordon Rosenthal January 2011 © 2011 Saul Gordon Rosenthal All rights reserved PLATO’S EXPLANATORY PREDICATION Saul Gordon Rosenthal, Ph. D. Cornell University 2011 One of the most classic puzzles in Plato’s metaphysics is how to interpret his apparently self-predicational language. Plato seems committed, at least in his middle dialogues, to the view that for all forms, the form of F “is F”. For instance, he seems to say that the form of largeness itself “is large”, and to generalize this claim to all forms. Commentators have struggled to find an interpretation of such claims that is consistent with Plato’s text and that attributes to Plato a view with some plausibility. One aim of this dissertation is to show that we have good reason to doubt all of the most influential interpretations offered by commentators. The views discussed include Narrow Self-Predication, the Tautologous Identity view, two Non- Tautologous Identity views, the Pauline Predication view, Broad Self-Predication, and a view distinguishing different kinds of predication. It is doubtful whether any of these interpretations correctly captures Plato’s self-predicational commitments. Another aim of the dissertation is to argue that the textual evidence most often thought to commit Plato to the Self-Predication Assumption (SP), that for all forms, the form of F is itself an F thing, is insufficient to establish such a commitment. One chapter focuses on Plato’s repeated discussion of the resemblance between form and participant.
    [Show full text]
  • The Poverty of Socratic Questioning: Asking and Answering in the Meno
    University of Cincinnati University of Cincinnati College of Law Scholarship and Publications Faculty Articles and Other Publications College of Law Faculty Scholarship 1994 The oP verty of Socratic Questioning: Asking and Answering In The eM no Thomas D. Eisele University of Cincinnati College of Law, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.law.uc.edu/fac_pubs Part of the Legal Education Commons Recommended Citation Eisele, Thomas D., "The oP verty of Socratic Questioning: Asking and Answering In The eM no" (1994). Faculty Articles and Other Publications. Paper 36. http://scholarship.law.uc.edu/fac_pubs/36 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the College of Law Faculty Scholarship at University of Cincinnati College of Law Scholarship and Publications. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Articles and Other Publications by an authorized administrator of University of Cincinnati College of Law Scholarship and Publications. For more information, please contact [email protected]. THE POVERTY OF SOCRATIC QUESTIONING: ASKING AND ANSWERING IN THE MEND Thomas D. Eisele* I understand [philosophy 1 as a willingness to think not about some­ thing other than what ordinary human beings think about, but rather to learn to think undistractedly about things that ordinary human beings cannot help thinking about, or anyway cannot help having occur to them, sometimes in fantasy, sometimes asa flash across a landscape; such things, for example, as whether we can know the world as it is in itself, or whether others really know the nature of one's own experiences, or whether good and bad are relative, or whether we might not now be dreaming that we are awake, or whether modern tyrannies and weapons and spaces and speeds and art are continuous with the past of the human race or discontinuous, and hence whether the learning of the human race is not irrelevant to the problems it has brought before itself.
    [Show full text]
  • The Historicity of Plato's Apology of Socrates
    Loyola University Chicago Loyola eCommons Master's Theses Theses and Dissertations 1946 The Historicity of Plato's Apology of Socrates David J. Bowman Loyola University Chicago Follow this and additional works at: https://ecommons.luc.edu/luc_theses Part of the Classical Literature and Philology Commons Recommended Citation Bowman, David J., "The Historicity of Plato's Apology of Socrates" (1946). Master's Theses. 61. https://ecommons.luc.edu/luc_theses/61 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Theses and Dissertations at Loyola eCommons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Master's Theses by an authorized administrator of Loyola eCommons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License. Copyright © 1946 David J. Bowman !HE HISTORICITY OP PLATO'S APOLOGY OF SOCRATES BY DA.VID J. BOWJWf~ S.J• .l. !BESIS SUBMITTED Ilf PARTIAL FULFILIJIE.NT OF THB: R}gQUIRE'IIENTS POR THE DEGREE OF IIA.STER OF ARTS Ill LOYOLA UlfiVERSITY JULY 1946 -VI'fA. David J. Bowman; S.J•• was born in Oak Park, Ill1no1a, on Ma7 20, 1919. Atter b!a eleaentar7 education at Ascension School# in Oak Park, he attended LoJola AcademJ ot Chicago, graduat1DS .from. there in June, 1937. On September 1, 1937# he entered the Sacred Heart Novitiate ot the SocietJ ot Jesus at Milford~ Ohio. Por the tour Jear• he spent there, he was aoademicallJ connected with Xavier Univeraitr, Cincinnati, Ohio. In August ot 1941 he tranaterred to West Baden College o.f Lorol& Universit7, Obicago, and received the degree ot Bachelor o.f Arts with a major in Greek in Deo.aber, 1941.
    [Show full text]
  • The Prosecutors of Socrates and the Political Motive Theory
    Portland State University PDXScholar Dissertations and Theses Dissertations and Theses 2-1981 The prosecutors of Socrates and the political motive theory Thomas Patrick Kelly Portland State University Follow this and additional works at: https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/open_access_etds Part of the Intellectual History Commons, and the Political History Commons Let us know how access to this document benefits ou.y Recommended Citation Kelly, Thomas Patrick, "The prosecutors of Socrates and the political motive theory" (1981). Dissertations and Theses. Paper 2692. https://doi.org/10.15760/etd.2689 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations and Theses by an authorized administrator of PDXScholar. Please contact us if we can make this document more accessible: [email protected]. AN ABSTRACT OF THE THESIS OF Thomas Patrick Kelly for the Master of Arts in History presented February 26, 1981. Title: The Prosecutors of Socrates and The Political Motive Theory. APPROVED BY MEMBERS OF THE THESIS CO~rnITTEE: ~~varnos, Cha1rman Charles A. Le Guin Roderlc D1man This thesis presents a critical analysis of the histor- ical roles assigned to the prosecutors of Socrates by modern historians. Ancient sources relating to the trial and the principles involved, and modern renditions, especially those of John Burnet and A. E. Taylor, originators of the theory that the trial of Socrates was politically motivated, are critically 2 analyzed and examined. The thesis concludes that the political motive theory is not supported by the evidence on which it relies. THE PROSECUTORS OF SOCRATES AND THE POLITICAL MOTIVE THEORY by THOMAS PATRICK KELLY A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS in HISTORY Portland State University 1981 TO THE OFFICE OF GRADUATE STUDIES AND RESEARCH: The members of the Committee approve the thesis of Thomas Patrick Kelly presented February 26, 1981.
    [Show full text]
  • On the Arrangement of the Platonic Dialogues
    Ryan C. Fowler 25th Hour On the Arrangement of the Platonic Dialogues I. Thrasyllus a. Diogenes Laertius (D.L.), Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers 3.56: “But, just as long ago in tragedy the chorus was the only actor, and afterwards, in order to give the chorus breathing space, Thespis devised a single actor, Aeschylus a second, Sophocles a third, and thus tragedy was completed, so too with philosophy: in early times it discoursed on one subject only, namely physics, then Socrates added the second subject, ethics, and Plato the third, dialectics, and so brought philosophy to perfection. Thrasyllus says that he [Plato] published his dialogues in tetralogies, like those of the tragic poets. Thus they contended with four plays at the Dionysia, the Lenaea, the Panathenaea and the festival of Chytri. Of the four plays the last was a satiric drama; and the four together were called a tetralogy.” b. Characters or types of dialogues (D.L. 3.49): 1. instructive (ὑφηγητικός) A. theoretical (θεωρηµατικόν) a. physical (φυσικόν) b. logical (λογικόν) B. practical (πρακτικόν) a. ethical (ἠθικόν) b. political (πολιτικόν) 2. investigative (ζητητικός) A. training the mind (γυµναστικός) a. obstetrical (µαιευτικός) b. tentative (πειραστικός) B. victory in controversy (ἀγωνιστικός) a. critical (ἐνδεικτικός) b. subversive (ἀνατρεπτικός) c. Thrasyllan categories of the dialogues (D.L. 3.50-1): Physics: Timaeus Logic: Statesman, Cratylus, Parmenides, and Sophist Ethics: Apology, Crito, Phaedo, Phaedrus, Symposium, Menexenus, Clitophon, the Letters, Philebus, Hipparchus, Rivals Politics: Republic, the Laws, Minos, Epinomis, Atlantis Obstetrics: Alcibiades 1 and 2, Theages, Lysis, Laches Tentative: Euthyphro, Meno, Io, Charmides and Theaetetus Critical: Protagoras Subversive: Euthydemus, Gorgias, and Hippias 1 and 2 :1 d.
    [Show full text]
  • The Cult of Socrates: the Philosopher and His Companions in Satie's Socrate
    Utah State University DigitalCommons@USU Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects Honors Program Spring 2013 The Cult of Socrates: The Philosopher and His Companions in Satie's Socrate Andrea Decker Moreno Utah State University Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/honors Part of the Music Commons Recommended Citation Moreno, Andrea Decker, "The Cult of Socrates: The Philosopher and His Companions in Satie's Socrate" (2013). Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects. 145. https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/honors/145 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Honors Program at DigitalCommons@USU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@USU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. THE CULT OF SOCRATES: THE PHILOSOPHER AND HIS COMPANIONS IN SATIE’S SOCRATE by Andrea Decker Moreno Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of HONORS IN UNIVERSITY STUDIES WITH DEPARTMENTAL HONORS in Music – Vocal Performance in the Department of Music Approved: Thesis/Project Advisor Departmental Honors Advisor Dr. Cindy Dewey Dr. Nicholas Morrison Director of Honors Program Dr. Nicholas Morrison UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY Logan, UT Spring 2013 The Cult of Socrates: The philosopher and his companions in Satie's Socrate Satie's Socrate is an enigma in the musical world, a piece that defies traditional forms and styles. Satie chose for his subject one of the most revered characters of history, the philosopher Socrates. Instead of evaluating his philosophy and ideas, Satie created a portrait of Socrates from the most intimate moments Socrates spent with his followers in Plato's dialogues.
    [Show full text]
  • Revised New Summary of Philebus
    New Summary of Philebus REVISED 1. (11) Philebus maintains that pleasure, enjoyment, rejoicing, and their kind, are the best things for all animals, while Socrates maintains, for those able to partake of them, wisdom, mind, memory, and their kind, are the best. Each side must agree that it is a condition and disposition of soul that produces happiness. Stipulation: if some other life superior to both is found, then the victor will be he whose champion is closer to this hypothetical best life. a. (12c) Problem: are pleasure and likewise knowledge, both like and unlike themselves, because they each have various aspects and shapes? And are some of these shapes bad and some good? b. (14c) We must investigate this question with the aid of the principle that the one is many and the many are one. This is obvious and common property when applied to things that come to be and perish, but when applied to things like man, ox, beauty, and good, there are perplexities. i. (15b) The perplexities (there is unclarity about exactly what these three questions are): 1. Do such unities exist? 2. How do they, while remaining themselves, enter the domain of becoming? 3. How are they both one and many? ii. (15d) The identification of the one with the many arises everwhere from the nature of discourse itself—it entrances the young. iii. (16c) A gift of the gods: all things contain limit and the unlimited. We must not pass from the one to the infinite too quickly or slowly, but instead note all the intermediate numbers.
    [Show full text]
  • The Italian Academies and Rabbi Simone Luzzatto's Socrate
    Michela Torbidoni The Italian Academies and Rabbi Simone Luzzatto’s Socrate:the Freedom of the Ingenium and the Soul 1Introduction Simone Luzzatto, chief rabbi of the Jewish community of Venice, ahighlytalented classicistconversant with Latin and Greek literature as well as apassionate reader of medievalItalian culture, wasthe author of the well-known apologetic treatise Dis- corso circa il stato degli Hebrei et in particular dimoranti nell’inclita città di Venetia (‘Discourse Concerningthe Condition of the Jews, and in Particular Those Living in the Fair City of Venice’), publishedinVenice in 1638, and also of Socrate overo dell’humano sapere (‘Socrates or on Human Knowledge’), which appearedinVenice in 1651.The scope and purpose of this latter work are indicated in the book’sextend- ed title: Esercitio seriogiocoso di Simone Luzzatto hebreo venetiano.Operanellaquale si dimostraquanto sia imbecilel’humano intendimento,mentre non èdiretto dalla div- ina rivelatione (‘The Serious-Playful Exercise of Simone Luzzatto, Venetian Jew. A Book That ShowsHow Incapable Human IntelligenceCan Be When It Is Not Led by DivineRevelation’). Thus, the work is meantasademonstration of the limits and weaknesses of the human capacity to acquire knowledge without being guided by revelation. Luzzatto achievedthis goal by offering an overviewofthe various and contradictory gnosiological opinions disseminated since ancient times: he analyses the human faculties, namely the functioningofthe external (five)senses, the internal senses (common sense, imagination, memory,and the estimative faculty), the intel- lect,and alsotheir mutualrelation.¹ In his work, Luzzatto gave an accurate analysis of all these issues by getting to the heart of the ancientepistemological theories. The divergence of views, to which he addressed the most attention, prevented him from giving afixed definition of the nature of the cognitive process.
    [Show full text]
  • ARISTOTLE and the IMPORTANCE of VIRTUE in the CONTEXT of the POLITICS and the NICOMACHEAN ETHICS and ITS RELATION to TODAY Kyle Brandon Anthony Bucknell University
    Bucknell University Bucknell Digital Commons Honors Theses Student Theses 2010 ARISTOTLE AND THE IMPORTANCE OF VIRTUE IN THE CONTEXT OF THE POLITICS AND THE NICOMACHEAN ETHICS AND ITS RELATION TO TODAY Kyle Brandon Anthony Bucknell University Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.bucknell.edu/honors_theses Part of the Philosophy Commons Recommended Citation Anthony, Kyle Brandon, "ARISTOTLE AND THE IMPORTANCE OF VIRTUE IN THE CONTEXT OF THE POLITICS AND THE NICOMACHEAN ETHICS AND ITS RELATION TO TODAY" (2010). Honors Theses. 21. https://digitalcommons.bucknell.edu/honors_theses/21 This Honors Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Theses at Bucknell Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Honors Theses by an authorized administrator of Bucknell Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Table of Contents Introduction 1 Chapter 1 What does it mean to live a good life? 7 The virtuous life 8 Ethical virtue 13 Bravery as an ethical virtue 20 Justice 22 Chapter 2 The Politics and the ideal polis 28 Development of a polis 29 Features of an ideal polis 32 What does it mean to be a citizen of a polis? 40 Aristotle’s views on education 42 Social groups in a polis who are not recognized as citizens 45 Non-ideal political systems 51 Chapter 3 Connections between the Politics and the Ethics 57 Chapter 4 Difficulties in applying Aristotle’s theories to a modern setting 68 Conclusion Where do we go from here? 87 Bibliography 89 iv Acknowledgements First off, I have to thank God, as He helped me endure this project and gave me the courage to press on when I became frustrated, angry, and ready to quit.
    [Show full text]
  • Plato's Hypothetical Inquiry in the Meno Naoya Iwata
    Plato’s Hypothetical Inquiry in the Meno Naoya Iwata At Meno 86e2–4 Socrates proposes to Meno that they should consider the question whether virtue is teachable on a hypothesis. Partly because its concrete procedure is illustrated by a baffling geometrical example, there has still been wide disagreement among scholars as to how he actually carries out this hypothetical inquiry into virtue. The basic structure of the argument at 87b2–89a5 appears very simple: Socrates converts the original question whether virtue is teachable to the question whether it is knowledge, and then examines the latter on the basis of his agreement with Meno that virtue is good. Apart however from that agreement being, as it is explicitly called, a ‘hypothesis’, opinion is divided on what other hypothesis Socrates posited. Some think of it as the conditional ‘if virtue is knowledge, it is teachable’ or as ‘knowledge is teachable’ (Bedu-Addo 1984, 7–9; Wolfsdorf 2008, 44–6 and 58–60),1 and others as the bi-conditional ‘if virtue is knowledge, it is teachable, but if not, not’ or as ‘knowledge alone is teachable’ (Grgić 1999, 34–6; Weiss 2001, 131; Zyskind and Sternfeld 1976, 132). 2 But most scholars, in contrast, identify it with the simple proposition ‘virtue is knowledge’ (Bedu-Addo 1984, 7–9; Benson 2003, 107–25; Bluck 1961, 17–19 and 85–91; Bostock 1986, 165–6; Canto-Sperber 1991, 98–102; Cherniss 1947, 140; Hackforth 1955, 140–1; Kahn 1996, 310; Robinson 1953, 116–18; Rose 1970, 3–7; Sayre 1969, 29 n. 40; Scott 2006, 137–40 and 221–4; Sharples 1985, 167).3 It is also suggested that Socrates’ new philosophical tool does not involve any process of positing a hypothesis but only aims to establish the equivalence between teachability and knowledge (Ebrey 2013, 76 and 83–4).
    [Show full text]
  • Gregory Vlastos
    Gregory Vlastos: A Preliminary Inventory of His Papers at the Harry Ransom Center Descriptive Summary Creator: Vlastos, Gregory, 1907-1991 Title: Gregory Vlastos Papers Dates: circa 1930s-1991 Extent: 100 document boxes (42.00 linear feet) Abstract: The papers of philosopher Gregory Vlastos, a scholar of ancient Greek philosophy who spent most of his career studying the thought of Plato and Socrates, document his studies, his writings, and his career as an educator at several American universities. Call Number: Manuscript Collection MS-4361 Language: English, with Ancient Greek, French, German, Italian, Latin, Modern Greek, and Spanish Access: Open for research Administrative Information Acquisition: Gifts, 1993-2010 (G9070, G9134, G9163, G9225, G9252, G9628, G9979, G9982, G10214, G10288, G11877, 10-03-014-G) Processed by: Hope Rider, 2006; updated by Joan Sibley, 2016 Repository: The University of Texas at Austin, Harry Ransom Center Vlastos, Gregory, 1907-1991 Manuscript Collection MS-4361 Scope and Contents The papers of philosopher Gregory Vlastos (1907-1991), a scholar of ancient Greek philosophy who spent most of his career studying the thought of Plato and Socrates, document his studies, his writings, and his career as an educator at several American universities, especially Cornell, Princeton, and The University of California at Berkeley. The papers are arranged in six series: I. Correspondence and Offprint Files, II. Study, Lecture, and Teaching Files, III. Works, IV. Works by Others, V. Miscellaneous, and VI. Offprints Removed from Manuscripts. The Correspondence and Offprint Files (35 boxes) in Series I. represent Vlastos' extensive correspondence with other philosophers, classicists, former students, academics, and others. The files are arranged alphabetically by correspondent name, and generally include not only letters received, but copies of Vlastos' responses.
    [Show full text]