Plato's Meno: Knowledge Is Justified True Belief
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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. -
Glaucon's Dilemma. the Origins of Social Order
[Working draft. Please do not circulate or cite without author’s permission] Glaucon’s Dilemma. The origins of social order. Josiah Ober Chapter 2 of The Greeks and the Rational (book-in-progress, provisional title) Draft of 2019.09.20 Word count: 17,200. Abstract: The long Greek tradition of political thought understood that cooperation among multiple individuals was an imperative for human survival. The tradition (here represented by passages from Plato’s Republic, Gorgias, and Protagoras, and from Diodorus of Sicily’s universal history) also recognized social cooperation as a problem in need of a solution in light of instrumental rationality and self-interest, strategic behavior, and the option of free riding on the cooperation of others. Ancient “anthropological” theories of the origins of human cooperation proposed solutions to the problem of cooperation by varying the assumed motivations of agents and postulating repeated interactions with communication and learning. The ways that Greek writers conceived the origins of social order as a problem of rational cooperation can be modeled as strategic games: as variants of the non-cooperative Prisoners Dilemma and cooperative Stag Hunt games and as repeated games with incomplete information and updating. In book 2 of the Republic Plato’s Glaucon offered a carefully crafted philosophical challenge, in the form of a narrative thought experiment, to Socrates’ position that justice is supremely choice-worthy, the top-ranked preference of a truly rational person. Seeking to improve the immoralist argument urged by Thrasymachus in Republic book 1 (in order to give Socrates the opportunity to refute the best form of that argument), Glaucon told a tale of Gyges and his ring of invisibility.1 In chapter 1, I suggested that Glaucon’s story illustrated a pure form of rational and self-interested behavior, through revealed preferences when the ordinary constraints of uncertainty, enforceable social conventions, and others’ strategic choices were absent. -
Marathon 2,500 Years Edited by Christopher Carey & Michael Edwards
MARATHON 2,500 YEARS EDITED BY CHRISTOPHER CAREY & MICHAEL EDWARDS INSTITUTE OF CLASSICAL STUDIES SCHOOL OF ADVANCED STUDY UNIVERSITY OF LONDON MARATHON – 2,500 YEARS BULLETIN OF THE INSTITUTE OF CLASSICAL STUDIES SUPPLEMENT 124 DIRECTOR & GENERAL EDITOR: JOHN NORTH DIRECTOR OF PUBLICATIONS: RICHARD SIMPSON MARATHON – 2,500 YEARS PROCEEDINGS OF THE MARATHON CONFERENCE 2010 EDITED BY CHRISTOPHER CAREY & MICHAEL EDWARDS INSTITUTE OF CLASSICAL STUDIES SCHOOL OF ADVANCED STUDY UNIVERSITY OF LONDON 2013 The cover image shows Persian warriors at Ishtar Gate, from before the fourth century BC. Pergamon Museum/Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin. Photo Mohammed Shamma (2003). Used under CC‐BY terms. All rights reserved. This PDF edition published in 2019 First published in print in 2013 This book is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial- NoDerivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0) license. More information regarding CC licenses is available at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ Available to download free at http://www.humanities-digital-library.org ISBN: 978-1-905670-81-9 (2019 PDF edition) DOI: 10.14296/1019.9781905670819 ISBN: 978-1-905670-52-9 (2013 paperback edition) ©2013 Institute of Classical Studies, University of London The right of contributors to be identified as the authors of the work published here has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Designed and typeset at the Institute of Classical Studies TABLE OF CONTENTS Introductory note 1 P. J. Rhodes The battle of Marathon and modern scholarship 3 Christopher Pelling Herodotus’ Marathon 23 Peter Krentz Marathon and the development of the exclusive hoplite phalanx 35 Andrej Petrovic The battle of Marathon in pre-Herodotean sources: on Marathon verse-inscriptions (IG I3 503/504; Seg Lvi 430) 45 V. -
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. -
Dr. Ionescu's CV
Dr. Cristina Ionescu Associate Professor School of Philosophy The Catholic University of America Washington, D.C. Tel. 202 319 6641 [email protected] Academic Positions: 2015- present: Associate Professor, School of Philosophy, The Catholic University of America 2009 –2015: Assistant Professor, School of Philosophy, The Catholic University of America 2005–2009: Assistant Professor, Campion College, University of Regina, Canada Education: 2000–2005: Ph.D., University of Guelph. Title of Ph.D. Dissertation: “Plato’s Meno: An Interpretation.” Advisor: Kenneth Dorter 1999–2000: M.A., University of Bucharest, Faculty of Philosophy 1995–1999: B.A., University of Bucharest, Faculty of Philosophy Area of Specialization: Ancient Greek Philosophy (Plato) Area of Competency: Metaphysics, Heidegger, Modern Philosophy Publications: Books: On the Good Life: Thinking through the Intermediaries in Plato’s Philebus, SUNY Press, NY: 2019. Plato’s Meno: An Interpretation, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, Lexington Books, MD: 2007. Journal articles: “Elenchus and the Method of Division in Plato’s Sophist”, Platonic Dialectic (Routledge Press, forthcoming 2021). “Images and Paradigms in Plato’s Sophist and Statesman”, Ancient Philosophy 40, 2020. “Elenchus, Recollection, and the Method of Hypothesis in the Meno”, The Plato Journal 17, 2017: 9-29. “Due Measure and the Dialectical Method in Plato’s Statesman”, Journal of Philosophical Research 41, 2016: 77-104. “The Place of Pleasure and Knowledge in the Fourfold Articulation of 1 Reality in Plato’s Philebus” in Proceedings of the Boston Area Colloquium in Ancient Philosophy, XXX: 1-32: 2015. “Dialectical Method and Myth in Plato’s Statesman”, Ancient Philosophy 34, 2014: 1-18 “Dialectic in Plato’s Sophist: Division and the Communion of Kinds”, Arethusa 46, 2013: 41-64. -
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. -
Plato's Third Man Argument
Greek Philosophy (Essays) Theo Todman Does the Third Man Argument refute the theory of forms? Fine [1993] recognises four versions of the Third Man Argument (TMA). However, she argues persuasively that these are similar arguments with similar tacit premises, though with different emphases. Consequently, we will consider only that in Parmenides 132a1- b2. Fine’s translation runs as follows, with Parmenides speaking to Socrates: I suppose it is because of the following sort of thing that you think that (1) each form is one: (2) Whenever many things seem large to you, there perhaps seems to you to be, when you have looked at them all, some one and the same idea. Hence you think (3) the large is one. …. (4) What, then, if in the same way you look in your soul at all these – at the large itself and the other large things? (5) Will not some one large appear again, by which all these will appear large? …. So another form of largeness will appear besides the large itself and its participants. (6) And in addition to these, yet another, by which all these will be large. (7) And so each of the forms will no longer be one for you, but infinitely many. There are two things we need to address in this essay. Firstly, we need to understand the TMA itself, determining its premises, logical structure and validity. Secondly, we need to determine what Plato wants us to learn from it, and what its consequences are for his theory of Forms. The Argument Vlastos [1954] generalises Fine’s steps (2) and (5) as: (V2) If a number of things a, b, c, are all F, there must be a single Form F-ness, in virtue of which we apprehend a, b, c as all F. -
Mercenaries, Poleis, and Empires in the Fourth Century Bce
The Pennsylvania State University The Graduate School College of the Liberal Arts ALL THE KING’S GREEKS: MERCENARIES, POLEIS, AND EMPIRES IN THE FOURTH CENTURY BCE A Dissertation in History and Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies by Jeffrey Rop © 2013 Jeffrey Rop Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy May 2013 ii The dissertation of Jeffrey Rop was reviewed and approved* by the following: Mark Munn Professor of Ancient Greek History and Greek Archaeology, Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies Dissertation Advisor Chair of Committee Gary N. Knoppers Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies, Religious Studies, and Jewish Studies Garrett G. Fagan Professor of Ancient History and Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies Kenneth Hirth Professor of Anthropology Carol Reardon George Winfree Professor of American History David Atwill Associate Professor of History and Asian Studies Graduate Program Director for the Department of History *Signatures are on file in the Graduate School iii ABSTRACT This dissertation examines Greek mercenary service in the Near East from 401- 330 BCE. Traditionally, the employment of Greek soldiers by the Persian Achaemenid Empire and the Kingdom of Egypt during this period has been understood to indicate the military weakness of these polities and the superiority of Greek hoplites over their Near Eastern counterparts. I demonstrate that the purported superiority of Greek heavy infantry has been exaggerated by Greco-Roman authors. Furthermore, close examination of Greek mercenary service reveals that the recruitment of Greek soldiers was not the purpose of Achaemenid foreign policy in Greece and the Aegean, but was instead an indication of the political subordination of prominent Greek citizens and poleis, conducted through the social institution of xenia, to Persian satraps and kings. -
Robert C. Bartlett, Trans., Plato: “Protagoras” and “Meno.” Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2004, 155 Pp., $12.50 Paper
Book Review: Plato: “Protagoras” and “Meno” 291 Robert C. Bartlett, trans., Plato: “Protagoras” and “Meno.” Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2004, 155 pp., $12.50 paper. A NDREA L. KOWALCHUK UNIVERSITY OF DALLAS [email protected] Robert Bartlett’s Plato: “Protagoras” and “Meno” is a significant contribution to Platonic scholarship. His thoughtful translations are literal without being awkward, and consistent regarding words of philosophic importance. Where there are problems with the manuscripts, discrepancies are indicated, and where there are words that can be variously translated, alternatives are supplied. Notes regarding context, background, definitions, people, and history are also helpful without being burdensome. The interpretive essays are terse and brief, yet dense and full of penetrating questions, suggestions, and insights. Even for those who might disagree with Bartlett’s interpretations, these essays are valuable since they constitute a challenge to more generally accepted views of Platonic psychology, morality, and, ultimately, of the Platonic approach to philosophy simply. What emerges most prominently from Bartlett’s treatments of the two dialogues is the careful and consistent focus on the two title characters, in and through which we gain wonderful insight into the moral self-understanding (or lack thereof) of both Protagoras and Meno. Bartlett’s analysis brings to life, respectively, a sophist and a future criminal (and with less emphasis, a future accuser of Socrates in Anytus), by sifting through and illuminating the particular qualities of each character’s moral confusion, which he also shows to be connected with each man’s view of the cosmos. As the source or sources of their respective confusions come to sight, we are led further into the question of the philosopher’s relationship to virtue, and into the unifying question of the two dialogues: whether virtue can be taught—an “apparently epistemolog- ical question [that] is (also) a thoroughly political one” (138). -
Persian-Thessalian Relations in the Late Fifth Century BC
The Prince and the Pancratiast: Persian-Thessalian Relations in the Late Fifth Century B.C. John O. Hyland EAR THE END of the fifth century B.C. the famous Thes- salian pancratiast Poulydamas of Skotoussa traveled to Nthe Achaemenid court at the invitation of Darius II. Scholars have noted the visit as an instance of cultural inter- action, but Persia’s simultaneous involvement in the Pelopon- nesian War suggests the possibility of diplomatic overtones. A political purpose for Poulydamas’ travel would be especially at- tractive given the subsequent cooperation between Darius’ son, Cyrus the Younger, and a cabal of Thessalian guest-friends. These episodes may be linked as successive steps in the restora- tion of the old xenia between Xerxes and Thessalian leaders, dormant since 479. By examining what Persian and Thessalian elites stood to gain from renewing their old partnership, we can shed new light on an under-appreciated dimension of Graeco- Persian political relations. The pancratiast’s visit: Poulydamas, Darius II, and Cyrus Poulydamas’ victory at the Olympic games of 408 made him a living legend in Greece, a strongman comparable to Herakles (Paus. 6.5.1–9).1 Plato’s Republic testifies to his fame outside of Thessaly in the first half of the fourth century, citing him as the 1 For the date see Luigi Moretti, Olympionikai: i vincitori negli antichi agoni Olympici (Rome 1957), no. 348. For Poulydamas’ emulation of Herakles, and similar associations for Milo and other Olympic victors see David Lunt, “The Heroic Athlete in Ancient Greece,” Journal of Sport History 36 (2009) 380–383. -
Plato's Epistemology
Plato’s Epistemology: a Coherent Account in Meno , Phaedo and Theaetetus Chuanjie Sheng Submitted in accordance with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Leeds Department of Classics August 2015 II The candidate confirms that the work submitted is his own and that appropriate credit has been given where reference has been made to the work of others. This copy has been supplied on the understanding that it is copyright material and that no quotation from the thesis may be published without proper acknowledgement. © 2015 The University of Leeds and Chuanjie Sheng The right of Chuanjie Sheng to be identified as Author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. III Acknowledgements I appreciate all the persons that helped me to complete this thesis. I would like to express my greatest gratitude to my supervisors, Dr. Elizabeth E. Pender and Professor Malcolm F. Heath. As an enlightened teacher, Dr. Pender has offered me valuable comments and suggestions for my dissertation. Working with her is a stimulating intellectual experience. She patiently suggested on the structure of my thesis and corrected all the chapters line by line. As a wonderful friend, she brings happiness, pleasure and fruitful experience into my life in Leeds. Professor Heath has read all the chapters of my thesis and has given me feedbacks on each of the chapters. During the supervisions, he has given me valuable academic advice and comments, which has saved me from a large number of mistakes and errors in this dissertation. -
Any 37 Anytus of Euonymon, Son of Anthemion I Pl
Any 37 Anytus of Euonymon, son of Anthemion I Pl. Meno 90a speaker [PA/APF 1324 LGPN2 4 PAA 139460 DPhA Pl. Ap. 18b, 23e, & 227 RE 3 OCD3 PP !Aνυτ%ς 'Aνθεµι+ων%ς schol. present (Eυ' ωνυµευ+ ς)] Xen. Apol. 29–31 ≤443–>396 Xen. Hell. 2.3.42, 44 father of an unnamed son Andoc. 1.150 prosecutor of Socrates Lys. 13.78–9, 22.8 Isocr. 18.23–4 D. S. 13.64–6, 14.37.7 Hell. Oxy. 6.2 Aristoph. Thesm. 809, unnamed Arch. Fishes fr. 31 (K 30) Theo. Strat. fr. 58 (K 57) [Aristot.] Ath. Pol. 27.5, 34.3 Life. Anytus was the son of a self-made man who was highly praised in Plato’s Meno (90a): Anthemion, son of Diphilus, a thete who became a hippeus ([Aristot.] Ath. Pol. 7.4; Poll. 8.131) “through his own wisdom and effort” (Meno 90a). His demotic is virtually certain (Raubitschek 1949). If Anytus was in fact a lover of Alcibiades III (Pl. Ap. schol.), his date of birth should be earlier than 451, and nothing that is known about his career makes that early date implausible. If this datum falls away, however, as suggested in detail in APF, Anytus’ birth would be no later than 443, if he served on the Council in 413/2, and no later than ±440 in any case. Anytus inherited a successful tannery from his father (Xen. Apol. 29; Pl. Ap. schol.), but the comic playwrights reduced his occupation to one rather more common for slaves, “shoemaker” (Theo.; Arch.).