Identity and Explanation in the Euthyphro
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CRATYLUS by Plato Translated by Benjamin Jowett the Project Gutenberg Ebook of Cratylus, by Plato
CRATYLUS By Plato Translated by Benjamin Jowett The Project Gutenberg EBook of Cratylus, by Plato INTRODUCTION. The Cratylus has always been a source of perplexity to the student of Plato. While in fancy and humour, and perfection of style and metaphysical originality, this dialogue may be ranked with the best of the Platonic writings, there has been an uncertainty about the motive of the piece, which interpreters have hitherto not succeeded in dispelling. We need not suppose that Plato used words in order to conceal his thoughts, or that he would have been unintelligible to an educated contemporary. In the Phaedrus and Euthydemus we also find a difficulty in determining the precise aim of the author. Plato wrote satires in the form of dialogues, and his meaning, like that of other satirical writers, has often slept in the ear of posterity. Two causes may be assigned for this obscurity: 1st, the subtlety and allusiveness of this species of composition; 2nd, the difficulty of reproducing a state of life and literature which has passed away. A satire is unmeaning unless we can place ourselves back among the persons and thoughts of the age in which it was written. Had the treatise of Antisthenes upon words, or the speculations of Cratylus, or some other Heracleitean of the fourth century B.C., on the nature of language been preserved to us; or if we had lived at the time, and been 'rich enough to attend the fifty-drachma course of Prodicus,' we should have understood Plato better, and many points which are now attributed to the extravagance of Socrates' humour would have been found, like the allusions of Aristophanes in the Clouds, to have gone home to the sophists and grammarians of the day. -
Plato's Euthyphro and Meno
Plato's Euthyphro and Meno Reading and Essays Questions Exeter College, Oxford University, HT13 Tutor: Simona Aimar E-mail: [email protected] Weekly Meetings: TBA General Information This is a syllabus for eight weeks work for the first-year course on Plato’s Meno and Euthyphro. Please email your assignments to me 24h before the tutorials. I am afraid that I will not be able to write comments on essays that are handed in later than this (unless – for exceptional reasons, e.g. illness – I have agreed to this beforehand). You are required to do at least five essays in the course of the term, plus one set of gobbets. You should each write an essay for the first tutorial. In week 7, you will write gobbets (comments on passages) instead of an essay. In any week when you do not do an essay/gobbets, you should do the reading and think about the question in advance of the tutorial, so that you are ready to discuss the essay question in the tutorial. We shall focus each week on one of the essays in the tutorial, alternating between you and the other student who will be attending the tutorials with you. If we are focusing on your essay, I’ll ask you to summarize it at the start of the tutorial. If we are focusing on someone else’s essay, you should have read her/his essay before the tutorial, and have spent some time thinking about whether you agree with it and how it might be improved. -
PLATO's SYMPOSIUM J
50 ccn~ PLATO'S SYMPOSIUM j - - -- ________j e Library of Liberal Arts PLATO'S SYMPOSIUM Tran lated by BENJAMIN JOWETT With an Introduction by FULTON H. ANDERSON Professor of Philosophy, University of Toronto THE LIBERAL ARTS PRESS NEW YORK CONTENTS SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY .. .... ................................... ......... ... ........... 6 EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION ................... ............................................. 7 SYMPOSIUM APOLLODORUS 13 THE SPEECH OF PHAEDRUS ...... .......................... .......................... .. 19 THE SPEECH OF PAU ANIAS ................. ... ................................. ... .. 21 THE SPEECH OF ERYXIMACHUS 27 THE SPEECH OF ARISTOPHAN E .. ............................... .................. 30 THE SPEECH OF AGATHON ............ .............................................. .. 35 THE SPEECH OF SocRATES ................................ .. ................... ..... .. 39 THE SPEECH OF ALCIBIADES ................. ............... ... ........... ...... .... .. 55 8 PLATO INTROD CTION 9 crescendo, and culminates in the report by Socrates on wi dom and epistemology, upon all of which the Symposium ha bearing, learned from the "wi e" woman Diotima. are intertwined, we m ay set down briefly a few of the more general The dialogue i a "reported" one. Plato himself could not have principles which are to be found in it author's many-sided thought. been present at the original party. (What went on there was told The human soul, a cording to Plato, is es entially in motion. time and time again about Athens.) He was a mere boy when it It is li fe and the integration of living functions. A dead soul is a con took place. Nor could the narrator Apollodorus have been a guest; _lladiction in terms. Man throughout his whole nature is erotically he was too young at the time. The latter got his report from motivated. His "love" or desire i manifest in three mutually in Aristodemus, a guest at the banquet. -
EUTHYPHRO and the LOGIC of MIASMA Maureen ECKERT
EUTHYPHRO AND THE LOGIC OF MIASMA Maureen ECKERT ABSTRACT: Euthyphro is a Socratic interlocutor claiming enormous religious expertise, while his portrayal in the eponymous dialogue raises questions the reliability of his beliefs. This paper closely examines how Euthyphro justifies his case against his father, identifying an argument that relies on the concept of miasma (pollution). In so far as miasma is considered in isolation, Euthyphro has a good argument. Unfortunately, there is more than miasma at stake when considering why one could prosecute one’s own parent. Introducing the other relevant concepts, honor and shame, we find his case reflects a dilemma at the source of ancient Greek religious thought. It would not be possible for Euthyphro or anyone else to know what to do in his case. KEYWORDS: Plato, Euthyphro, Dilemma, Miasma, Pollution This is why even now I go around in accordance with the God, seeking out and investigating both citizens and foreigners, any whom I suppose are wise, and when someone doesn’t seem so to me, I make it clear they are not wise, assisting the god. (Appology 23b)1 Euthyphro is a classic Socratic interlocutor, one who claims expertise in religion and is then shown that he does not know what he claims to know. Plato’s vivid characterization of Euthyphro’s variety of quirks, his claims of superiority, his lack of self-awareness, his susceptibility to Socrates’ mocking flattery, the outrageousness of his case, make it easy to lose sight of any philosophically significant elements contained in his claims. While he exemplifies the type of epistemic hubris Socrates is out to cure, it would be a mistake to write him off ad hominem. -
Plato's "Euthyphro"
24.231 Ethics – Handout 1 Plato, “The Euthyphro” I. Plato’s Dialogue Plato’s Question: What is it to be pious? - He is not looking for a list of things that are pious - He is not looking for a property that (even all) pious things have. Euthyphro’s (best?) answer: To be pious is to be loved by all the gods. Plato’s Argument against Euthyphro’s answer: Perhaps all and only those things/actions that are loved by the gods are pious. But why is that? Are pious things loved by the gods because they are pious, or are they pious because they are loved by the gods? Socrates and Euthyphro agree that they must be loved by the gods because they are pious. But, says Socrates, in that case, being pious cannot be the same thing as being god-beloved. Because something that is god-beloved is so because it is loved by the gods. But something that is pious isn’t so because it is loved by the gods; rather, it is loved by the gods because it is pious. Being loved by the gods causes god-belovedness, but being loved by the gods does not cause piety. So god-belovedness and piety cannot be the same thing. (This kind of argument will be relevant again in the selection from Moore that we’re reading for Wednesday.) II. The “Euthyphro Problem” Socrates’ question about whether what’s loved by the gods is pious because it is loved by them, or loved by them because it is pious, forms the lynchpin of an important contemporary debate about what moral philosophers call “Divine Command Theory.” According to DCT, morally good actions are good because they are commanded by God. -
The Highest Good for Plato Goodness Is an Abstract Concept That Is Very
The Highest Good for Plato Goodness is an abstract concept that is very difficult to define, and saying what counts as the highest good is perhaps even more so. In Republic, Plato attempts to say something about what makes things good, but his answer is very vague in the end. Still, we can get some clarity on what he would have answered if asked what the highest good is, from what he says in this text. What counts as the highest good for Plato can be said to be knowledge of the Form of the Good, because it is necessary for knowing and using the other Forms well. The nature of the Forms is not clear in Republic; Plato writes about them as if his audience already knows what they are. Still, we can get some sense of what forms are like from the text. In several places he says that when two or more things share the same name, then they share a form. For example, in Book IV Socrates and Glaucon talk about the form of justice: “…are things called by the same name, whether they are bigger or smaller than one another, like or unlike with respect to that to which the name applies? Alike. Then a just man won’t differ at all from a just city in respect to the form of justice; rather he’ll be like the city” (435 a-b). But what is a Form, exactly? We can start to get a sense of what Plato means by a Form by looking back at Euthyphro. -
Socrates II PHIL301 the Euthyphro
Socrates II PHIL301 The Euthyphro - Setting and cast o Socrates encounters Euthyphro as both proceed to court. Socrates is to hear whether he will be indicted. Euthyphro is prosecuting his father for murder. o Socrates, we think, is faithfully depicted by Plato, in this dialogue. o Euthyphro is (evidently) a “mantis”, a kind of prophet of conservative, traditional religious views. He takes the stories of the Theogony as literal truth, for example. See RAGP, p. 97, n. 1. o Euthyphro takes his task to be one of “piety”, to prosecute a murder, which the gods disapprove of as unjust. It is unclear whether he is right to do so, given the circumstances: the murdered man is himself clearly a murderer; Euthyphro’s father has captured and bound the murderer, who subsequently dies accidentally, though owing also to the father’s negligence. Is it truly pious to prosecute the father? o Note the apparent tension between two sets of moral obligations – those to one’s family and other intimates, and a more general, universal set, 4b-c. o The elements of the drama bring out the role of Socrates as moral gadfly. It is all too common for persons like Euthyphro to act on a presumed knowledge of piety (or justice, etc.), where their actions in fact reflect significant or even profound ignorance. o Moral Risk: In this connection, see 4e and 16d, where Socrates expresses the primary moral concern with respect to ignorance: if we do not know the moral truth, we risk committing an injustice. Compare Apology 28a, 30d, 36c, 38a, 38e, and esp. -
Theory of Forms 1 Theory of Forms
Theory of Forms 1 Theory of Forms Plato's theory of Forms or theory of Ideas[1] [2] [3] asserts that non-material abstract (but substantial) forms (or ideas), and not the material world of change known to us through sensation, possess the highest and most fundamental kind of reality.[4] When used in this sense, the word form is often capitalized.[5] Plato speaks of these entities only through the characters (primarily Socrates) of his dialogues who sometimes suggest that these Forms are the only true objects of study that can provide us with genuine knowledge; thus even apart from the very controversial status of the theory, Plato's own views are much in doubt.[6] Plato spoke of Forms in formulating a possible solution to the problem of universals. Forms Terminology: the Forms and the forms The English word "form" may be used to translate two distinct concepts that concerned Plato—the outward "form" or appearance of something, and "Form" in a new, technical nature, that never ...assumes a form like that of any of the things which enter into her; ... But the forms which enter into and go out of her are the likenesses of real existences modelled after their patterns in a wonderful and inexplicable manner.... The objects that are seen, according to Plato, are not real, but literally mimic the real Forms. In the allegory of the cave expressed in Republic, the things that are ordinarily perceived in the world are characterized as shadows of the real things, which are not perceived directly. That which the observer understands when he views the world mimics the archetypes of the many types and properties (that is, of universals) of things observed. -
Plato's Symposium: the Ethics of Desire
Plato’s Symposium: The Ethics of Desire FRISBEE C. C. SHEFFIELD 1 Contents Introduction 1 1. Ero¯s and the Good Life 8 2. Socrates’ Speech: The Nature of Ero¯s 40 3. Socrates’ Speech: The Aim of Ero¯s 75 4. Socrates’ Speech: The Activity of Ero¯s 112 5. Socrates’ Speech: Concern for Others? 154 6. ‘Nothing to do with Human AVairs?’: Alcibiades’ Response to Socrates 183 7. Shadow Lovers: The Symposiasts and Socrates 207 Conclusion 225 Appendix : Socratic Psychology or Tripartition in the Symposium? 227 References 240 Index 249 Introduction In the Symposium Plato invites us to imagine the following scene: A pair of lovers are locked in an embrace and Hephaestus stands over them with his mending tools asking: ‘What is it that you human beings really want from each other?’ The lovers are puzzled, and he asks them again: ‘Is this your heart’s desire, for the two of you to become parts of the same whole, and never to separate, day or night? If that is your desire, I’d like to weld you together and join you into something whole, so that the two of you are made into one. Look at your love and see if this is what you desire: wouldn’t this be all that you want?’ No one, apparently, would think that mere sex is the reason each lover takes such deep joy in being with the other. The soul of each lover apparently longs for something else, but cannot say what it is. The beloved holds out the promise of something beyond itself, but that something lovers are unable to name.1 Hephaestus’ question is a pressing one. -
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. -
Can God's Goodness Save the Divine Command Theory
CAN GOD’S GOODNESS SAVE THE DIVINE COMMAND THEORY FROM EUTHYPHRO? JEREMY KOONS Georgetown University School of Foreign Service in Qatar Abstract. Recent defenders of the divine command theory like Adams and Alston have confronted the Euthyphro dilemma by arguing that although God’s commands make right actions right, God is morally perfect and hence would never issue unjust or immoral commandments. On their view, God’s nature is the standard of moral goodness, and God’s commands are the source of all obligation. I argue that this view of divine goodness fails because it strips God’s nature of any features that would make His goodness intelligible. An adequate solution to the Euthyphro dilemma may require that God be constrained by a standard of goodness that is external to Himself – itself a problematic proposal for many theists. The Euthyphro dilemma is often thought to present a fatal problem for the divine command theory (aka theological voluntarism). Are right acts commanded by God because they are right, or are they right because they are commanded by God? If the former, then there is a standard of right and wrong independent of God’s commands; God’s commands are not relevant in determining the content of morality. This option seems to compromise God’s sovereignty in an important way. But the second horn of the dilemma presents seemingly insurmountable problems, as well. First, if God’s commands make right actions right, and there is no standard of morality independent of God’s commands, then that seems to make morality arbitrary. Thus, murder is not wrong because it harms someone unjustly, but merely because God forbids it; there is (it seems) no good connection between reason and the wrongness of murder. -
The Form of Soul in the Phaedo »
PRINCE, Brian D., « The Form of Soul in the Phaedo » THE FORM OF SOUL IN THE PHAEDO Brian D. PRINCE The Phaedo’s two most prominent philosophical topics are the theory of Forms and the immortality of souls.1 So the intersection of these should also be of central importance, and in particular, the question whether there is a Form of Soul in which individual souls participate. This question is salient for two reasons: first, souls receive specially focused attention in Plato’s texts, and second, if the fact that a thing is a soul were not to be explained by participation in a Form, this would make souls highly unusual among the non-Form items in Plato’s universe.2 That is, the Form of Soul occupies — or fails to occupy — a special slot in the metaphysics of the Phaedo: either it exists, and therefore souls have the same metaphysical explanation as visible items, or the Form of Soul does not exist, and therefore there is some quite different explanation of why something is a soul. As I shall argue, there is a Form of Soul, and it plays a central role in the Phaedo’s final argument for immortality. If this is correct, this Form will have other consequences for the relations between individual souls and Forms, and between individual souls and visible items. For example, if there is a Form of Soul, it seems clear that individual souls will follow the same pattern as visible items in their participation in eponymous Forms. The Form of Soul would raise other questions, including why it is never mentioned directly by Plato.