scispace - formally typeset
Search or ask a question

Showing papers in "Phronesis in 1970"


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In the Theaetetus' argument against the notion of knowledge as caatqaL 1, this paper, a distinction between sensation and judgment is made, which has the consequence that the thinking we do about the deliverances of the senses, and not the mere use of senses, is the source of our knowledge.
Abstract: Plato's argument in the Theaetetus (184 b 186 e) against the proposal that knowledge be defined as caatqaL1 has, I think, not yet been fully understood or rightly appreciated. Existing interpretations fall into two groups. On the one hand, F. M. Cornford2 and others think that Plato rejects the proposal on the ground that the objects which we perceive are not the sort of objects of which one could have knowledge: only the unchanging Forms can be known. On the other hand, there are those3 who think Plato's argument has nothing to do with Forms but instead turns on a distinction between sensation and judgment which has the consequence that the thinking we do about the deliverances of the senses, and not the mere use of the senses, is the source of our knowledge. The interpretation which I advance in this paper belongs to the second of these two broad classes, but differs from others in providing a more careful account of the distinctions which Plato seems to be making in this passage. Much of the interest of the argument lies, I think, in the analysis of the process of perception which Plato produces by distinguishing carefully the contribution of the senses from that of the mind; but this analysis has not been given the attention it deserves. The complexities of the argument can be usefully indicated by a brief examination of Comford's interpretation. According to Cornford Plato's argument proceeds in two stages. In the first (184 b 186 a 1) Plato concludes that there is knowledge which is not a matter of per-

53 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In the case of the use of the words for "belief", "with" and "in", the order of exposition reverses the ordering of discovery as discussed by the authors, which was the reason why it was by noticing Plato's use of these words that I came to the philosophical points I made about them in section I of the paper.
Abstract: n the first section of this paper, I try to set out with a minimum of complication the philosophical considerations which bear upon the interpretation I offer in section II of Plato's account of false anticipatory pleasures. In the case of the uses of the words for "belief", "with" and "in", the order of exposition reverses the order of discovery: it was by noticing Plato's use of these words that I came to the philosophical points I make about them in section I of the paper. I am not here offering any general account of other kinds of false pleasures considered by Plato.

29 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that this claim is ill-founded and present a prolegomenon to an interpretation which locates the Dream section firmly within Plato's own philosophic concerns instead of seeking to account for it in terms of alien sources.
Abstract: In attempting to show that this claim is ill-founded I shall for the most part be concerned with matters peripheral to the interpretation of the Dream itself, but the discussion may be useful as a prolegomenon to an interpretation which locates the Dream section firmly within Plato's own philosophic concerns instead of seeking to account for it wholly or partly in terms of alien sources.

24 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The interpretation of Plato's account of how it is that these pleasures are false is still in doubt as discussed by the authors, and it has been argued that the concept of false pleasure is of considerable importance to the philosophy of mind owing to the analysis of pleasure which grounds it, but it is of importance to moral philosophy as well and of greater importance than Plato insists upon in the Philebus.
Abstract: The philosophical suggestiveness of Plato's discussion of false pleasure has been noted in some contemporary analyses of the concept of pleasure.' But the interpretation of Plato's account of how it is that these pleasures are false is still in doubt. J. C. Gosling and A. Kenny have debated this issue, centering their attention on the passage extending from 35 c to 41 b.2 In this paper I attempt to isolate an issue on which the debate has been inconclusive and move on from there to make some further suggestions for the interpretation of this controversial passage. WVhat I shall argue is that Plato does indeed make a mistake in his defence of the concept of false pleasure. But it will be my further claim that the mistake is not such a consequential one because the concept can be defended on other grounds. And, finally, I shall maintain that the concept is not only of considerable importance to the philosophy of mind owing to the analysis of pleasure which grounds it, but that it is of importance to moral philosophy as well and of greater importance than Plato insists upon in the Philebus.

23 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In the Cratylus, the main distinguishing feature is its plurality, as opposed to the unity characteristic of the "classical Form" as mentioned in this paper, which is a characteristic of Heracliteanism.
Abstract: In this paper I want to consider two passages of the Cratylus in some detail (389 a 390 e, and 439 c 440 d). Despite their familiarity to students of Plato, it is my belief that commentators have overlooked certain subtle but important distinctions that are to be discerned in them, distinctions which, if sound, modify the usual interpretations of the dialogue. Briefly, what I hope to show is that in the first passage we are introduced to a different kind of non-sensible entity, akin to the Form, but whose main distinguishing feature is its plurality, as opposed to the unity characteristic of the "classical Form". In the second, a short discussion of Heracliteanism, it seems to me that Plato's analysis of the doctrine of flux is far more intricate and complicated than is generally allowed.

21 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The notion of a "world-soul" was introduced in the Timaeus by Thompson, Gulley, and Bluck as discussed by the authors to explain how all nature can be recalled from the remembrance of a single thing.
Abstract: Plato's seemingly casual remark at Meno 81 d I that "all nature is akin" has been interpreted in a wide variety of ways, and had varying degrees of importance ascribed to it.' Since it occupies a significant position in Plato's initial formulation of the theory of anamnesis, it is worth getting clear about. Thompson, Gulley, and Bluck concur in the suggestion that it derives from Pythagorean (or some allied) doctrines. Thompson goes on to suggest that Plato develops the notion further in his "doctrine of the World-Soul" in the Timaeus. Gulley, in a similar vein, while observing that it is "introduced to explain further how everything can be recalled from the remembrance of a single thing", describes the doctrine which it purportedly reflects as the view "that the one spirit which pervades, like a soul, the whole universe, establishes a communion between Gods, men, and animals". However, neither Thompson nor Gulley attempt to make clear (what is not at all obvious) just how such a doctrine is supposed to function in this explanatory role. Bluck asserts that "Plato... is clearly thinking of a 'kinship' among all things that makes possible association of ideas. This conception is elaborated in the Phaedo (73 c sq.)". One trouble with the suggestion that the Meno's "kinship" is a precursor of "association" in the Phaedo is that the character of the connection between things which can serve as "reminders" of each other, in the Phaedo account, is explicitly left indeterminate. It could be any real or imagined, arbitrary link, as highly personal or idiosyncratic as one pleases. Two things have the requisite association just

20 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Ackrill's translation of the Categories and De Interpretatione has been used by as mentioned in this paper to investigate predication and inherence in the Categories of the Phronesis of the Greek language.
Abstract: In Categories and De Interpretatione (Oxford, 1963), J. L. Ackrill has performed the notable task of clearly delineating a number of questions and alternative answers to these questions involved in the interpretation of Aristotle's discussions about predication and inherence in the Categories. As a result of Ackrill's excellent translation and penetrating analysis of the text of the Categories, we have arrived at a point at which Aristotle's early distinction between predication and inherence may be discussed with some degree of exactness and clarity. Although I do not agree with everything that Ackrill has said about predication and inherence, my disagreement is grounded in an account of the text which his translation and analysis have helped to make possible. In recent papers G. E. L. Owen ("Inherence," Phronesis, 1965) and J. M. E. Moravcsik ("Predication in Aristotle," Philosophical Review, 1967) have attempted to improve upon Ackrill's account of Aristotle's distinction between predication and inherence. I shall use Ackrill's commentary and translation as a base from which to launch an investigation of predication and inherence in the Categories, but I shall find it convenient at times to refer to the comments of Owen and Moravcsik. I shall begin with a very rough summary of what I have to say about predication and inherence, and then discuss them in more exact terms.

14 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The Cratylus is a unified work, held together by a single overriding purpose which it eminently succeeds in accomplishing as discussed by the authors, and this purpose is of considerable importance for a theme that is central to Plato's philosophy throughout his life.
Abstract: Few, if any, of Plato's dialogues are correctly described as setting forth Plato's theory of some subject or other in the way in which the Essay Concerning Human Understanding may be said to set forth Locke's theory of knowledge. But neither are the Platonic dialogues merely slices of the philosophic life, showing how a series of more or less related problems are explored until fatigue, ill temper, pressing business, or a puzzlement still more profound than that with which the dialogue began brings it to its inconclusive end. Not many readers have been tempted to regard the Cratylus 'simply as constituting an exposition of Plato's theory of language or even just of naming, though within it Socrates certainly begins to sketch out an account of names. Too many readers, however, have acted as if the dialogue merely played with some problems about words in a series of ill-connected passages,' to be mined for bits and pieces of information about subjects Plato takes up elsewhere.2 But this ignores the fact that the Cratylus is a unified work, held together by a single overriding purpose which it eminently succeeds in accomplishing. This purpose, furthermore, is of considerable importance for a theme that is central to Plato's philosophizing throughout his life and it is of general philosophic interest. In this paper I wish to offer an interpretation of the Cratylus which will make manifest its unity and its philosophic aim. Needless to say, I shall be disagreeing as well as agreeing with other writers on this dialogue in the course of carrying out this goal; but for the sake of keeping the exposition and supporting arguments of my account reasonably uncluttered, polemics will be confined to an occasional footnote.

12 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The Alexandrian inclusion of the Rhetoric in the Organon and its unique elaboration in a hitherto neglected commentary of Alfarabi is discussed in this paper, where the author reviews the evidence for the Alexandrian addition of the rhetoric and the Poetics in the organon.
Abstract: The division of Aristotle's works according to the distinctioin ?ropeZv npxrCtv nOmLv and the acceptance of the Rhetoric as a treatise of "productive" philosophy have, since the Bekker edition, gained widespread approbation. In the Orient, on the other hand, as Margoliouth and Immisch pointed out, the Rhetoric and the Poetics had long been considered parts of the Organon.1 More recently, Tkatsch's monumental study of the Arabic Poetics likewise treated the "erweiterten Organon" as an exclusively Eastern arrangement.2 In 1934, however, Walzer's brilliant comparison of Alfarabi's views on poetry with those of Ammonius Neoplatonicus, Olympiodorus, Philoponus and Elias demonstrated the Greek origin of the extended Organon.3 This paper reviews the evidence for the Alexandrian inclusion of the Rhetoric in the Organon and its unique elaboration in a hitherto neglected commentary of Alfarabi.

8 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The De Fato is an unsatisfactory work, not only because it has come down to us incomplete, but also because Cicero wrote it in a perfunctory way, at a time when he was again thinking of taking an active part in politics after the death of Julius Caesar as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: The De Fato is an unsatisfactory work, not only because it has come down to us incomplete, but also because Cicero wrote it in a perfunctory way, at a time when he was again thinking of taking an active part in politics after the death of Julius Caesar. It is sometimes possible, however, to see what has gone wrong, and I believe this can be done at XVII-40, and that we have here an argument used by Epicurus. At 39, Cicero distinguished two opinions held by the old (veterum) philosophers, the first that everything happened by necessity (omnia ita fato fieri, ut id fatum vim necessitatis ad/erret), which he attributed to Democritus, Heraclitus, Empedocles, and, strangely, Aristotle, the second that there are voluntary movements of the mind which are not controlled by fate (sine ullo fato esse animorum motus voluntarii). He does not say who held this view. Between these opinions, Cicero says, Chrysippus tried to strike a mean, but leaned towards those who believe in freedom. However, he fell into difficulties and, in spite of himself, supported necessity. In 40 Cicero brings in the notion of assent, which he says he has treated at the beginning of his speech/now lost. Acts of assent, he says, were said to be determined by necessity by those old philosophers who thought that everything happened by fate (omnia fato lieri), but their opponents tried to free these acts from fate (lato assensiones liberabant), and argued like this: "If all things happen by fate, all things happen with an antecedent cause; and if this is true of desire (appetitus), it is true also of what follows desire, and therefore true of assent. But if the cause of desire is not within us, desire itself is not in our power: and if this is so, then those things which are brought about by desire are not within us. Therefore neither assent nor action is in our power. And from this it follows that neither praise nor blame are just, nor honours nor punishment." But, Cicero continues, since there is something wrong here, they think it right to conclude that not all things that happen happen of necessity. In 41 Cicero shows at length how Chrysippus tried to answer this argument by making distinctions between various kinds of causes. One difficulty here is that Cicero seems to connect the notion of

3 citations



Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, Hintikka succeeded in explaining in an entirely convincing manner the (prima facie strange) doctrine which we find in both Plato and Aristotle, viz., that knowledge (in the true sense of the word, which excludes such phrases as 'apparent knowledge', let alone 'false knowledge', as self-contradictory) can be had only of entities belonging to the realm of the changeless.
Abstract: II. n a brilliant paper,' Hintikka succeeded, apparently for the first time, in explaining in an entirely convincing manner the (prima facie strange) doctrine which we find in both Plato and Aristotle, viz., that knowledge (in the true sense of the word, which excludes such phrases as 'apparent knowledge,' let alone 'false knowledge,' as self-contradictory) can be had only of entities belonging to the realm of the changeless. Ultimately, Hintikka's explanation reads like this: because the Greeks were inclined to interpret knowledge (im '[Ir) as a kind of vision (intuition, Anschauung, witnessing), every assertion, regardless of the subject to which it might refer, implicitly contained for them a temporal index, a 'now,' this 'now' referring to the moment of the original vision by a particular speaker. We have learned to distinguish tenseless assertions (e.g., 'two is an even number'), in which what from the viewpoint of ordinary grammar is a present tense ('is'), is actually a timeless or omnipresent or tenseless tense, so that the whole assertion is tenseless, from tensed ones (e.g., 'Socrates walks'). But the Greeks were inclined to consider even tenseless assertions as being actually tensed. Therefore, to them, no knowledge of changeable entities was possible, as they might have changed since the moment when on the basis of an intuition somebody had asserted something about them. Thus, when I say 'Socrates sits,' somebody can refute me by saying 'Socrates walks' which obviously means that no such assertion can claim to be knowledge. In other words, all knowledge is ultimately intuitive (though the existence of discursive or dianoetic knowledge is admitted). But the objects of intuition are of two kinds, and so are the corresponding intuitions. Either these objects belong to the realm of the sensible and therefore changeable, and they are intuited by our senses. Or they are unchangeable, and they are intuited by some other mental faculty mostly called vok, i.e., intelligence; these objects themselves are