Lecture 14 Rationalism Plato Meno The School of Athens by Raphael (1509-1511) 1
Agenda 1. Plato 2. Meno 3. Socratic Method 4. What is Virtue? 5. Aporia 6. Rationalism vs. Empiricism 7. Meno s Paradox 8. Socrates Answer 9. Evaluation 2
Plato Plato (427 347 BCE) was a Greek philosopher. He was a student of Socrates (469 399 BCE) and the teacher of Aristotle (384 322 BCE). Socrates never wrote anything down. We know of his thought through the dialogues that Plato wrote. Plato founded the Academy, the first institution of higher learning in the Western World. Alfred North Whitehead famously said, the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato. 3
Meno Meno is visiting Athens from Thessaly. He is a student of Gorgias, a prominent sophist. Sophists were teachers of philosophy and rhetoric, who primarily taught young statesmen or the nobility. Socrates and Plato often criticized the sophists, especially for charging money for educating others and for passing on their wisdom to others. The word sophistry now means the use of specious or fallacious reasoning. 4
The Socratic Method Dialectic (Conversation) Proposal Criticism New and Better Proposal 5
What is Virtue? Definition One: Virtue of a man, a woman, a child, an elderly man, and a slave. Criticism: Even if they are many and various, all of them have one and the same form which makes them virtues, and it is right to look to this when one is asked to make clear what virtue is (4). Socrates wants to know what is in common between these virtues for different people that is, he wants to know what virtue itself is, not just individual instances of virtue. Man, Woman, and Child by Pablo Picasso (1906) 6
What is Virtue? Definition Two: Virtue is the ability to rule over people. Criticism: Virtue can t be just ruling over people, but must be ruling over people justly. But justice is a virtue. Is it virtue, Meno, or a virtue? We are having the same trouble again, Meno, though in another way; we have found many virtues while looking for one, but we cannot find the one which covers all the others (5). 7
What is Virtue? Definition Three: Virtue is to desire beautiful things and have the power to acquire them (7). Criticism: To desire beautiful things is to desire good things. But no one desire bad things, so this is an empty statement. Criticism: Virtue is thus the power to secure good things. But mustn t we add the qualification, to secure good things justly? The Hope Diamond Criticism: This, however, begs the question since justice is a part of virtue and is used to define virtue. 8
Aporia (Perplexity) State of confusion that comes about when you realize you don t know something you thought you knew. What is the value of aporia? 9
Rationalism versus Empiricism What is the source of knowledge? Rationalism: Some knowledge is independent of experience. It is innate or inborn. Plato and Socrates Empiricism: All knowledge comes from experience. There are no innate ideas. John Locke 10
Meno s Paradox M: How will you look for it, Socrates, when you do not know at all what it is? How will you aim to search for something you do not know at all? If you should meet with it, how will you know that this is the thing that you did not know? S: I know what you want to say, Meno. Do you realize what a debater s argument you are bringing up, that a man cannot search either for what he knows or for what he does not know? He cannot search for what he knows since he knows it, there is no need to search nor for what he does not know, for he does not know what to look for (9). 11
Meno s Paradox Meno s Paradox: the impossibility of learning anything new. If you know something, there is no need to inquire about it. If you don t know something, it is impossible to inquire about it since you don t know what it is. 12
Socrates Answer What is Socrates answer to Meno s Paradox? Socrates concedes that learning is impossible. He argues instead that our immortal souls already know everything. Learning then is really just the soul remembering or recollecting what it already knows. This is known as the Theory of Recollection. 13
Socrates Proof How does Socrates prove or demonstrate his Theory of Recollection? 4 ft 2 2 ft. 14
Socrates Proof 8 ft 2? 4 ft 15
Socrates Proof 4 ft 2 4 ft 2 4 ft 2 4 ft 2 4 ft 16
Socrates Proof 9 ft 2 3 ft 17
Socrates Proof 2 ft 2 2 ft 2 2 ft 2 2 ft 2 2 ft. 2 ft. 18
Socrates Proof 8 ft 2 To double the area of a square, take the diagonal as the base of the new square. 2 ft. 19
Questions Does Meno s paradox make sense? What do you think of Socrates answer to Meno s paradox? Is Socrates proof of the Theory of Recollection convincing? Does Socrates proof show that knowledge is innate? 20
Evaluation of Meno Meno s Paradox may rest on an ambiguity regarding what you know. Is it really impossible to search for the answer to a question? You know what question you are asking, although you do not know the answer. Does Socrates metaphysics of an immortal soul knowing all things make sense? 21
Evaluation of Meno Is Socrates really not teaching the slave anything? Socrates asks leading questions to the slave. Also, he points out the diagonal himself. Does Socrates show that all knowledge is innate or just some domains of knowledge, like mathematics? 22
The Search for Wisdom We will be better men [people], braver and less idle, if we believe that one must search for the things one does not know, rather than if we believe that it is not possible to find out what we do not know and that we must not look for it (12). 23