Finally I went to the craftsmen, for I was conscious of knowing practically nothing, and I knew that I would find that they had knowledge of many fine things. In this I was not mistaken; they knew things I did not know, and to that extent they were wiser than I. (22d)
the arguments where "false judgement" is shown to be impossible. — Metaphysician Undercover
I’m going to allow myself to take exception to Plato’s notion of “the good”, preferring to relegate the idea to the irreducible ground for a specific moral philosophy. — Mww
With regard to justified true belief, this is a long standing but, in my opinion, incorrect interpretation of the Theaetetus. — Fooloso4
Soc: And it’s totally silly, when we’re inquiring about knowledge, to claim that it’s correct opinion along with knowledge, whether about differentness or about anything whatever. Therefore, Theaetetus, neither perception nor true opinion, nor even an articulation that’s become attached to a true opinion would be knowledge. — Plato. Theaetetus 129b, translated by Joe Sachs
For if a book has been written for just a few readers that
will be clear just from the fact that only a few people understand it. The book must
automatically separate those who understand it from those who do not. Even the
foreword is written just for those who understand the book.
Telling someone something he does not understand is pointless, even if you add
that he will not be able to understand it. (That so often happens with someone you love.)
If you have a room which you do not want certain people to get into, put a lock on
it for which they do not have the key. But there is no point in talking to them about it,
unless of course you want them to admire the room from outside!
The honorable thing to do is to put a lock on the door which will be noticed only
by those who can open it, not by the rest.
– Ludwig Wittgenstein, Culture and Value, 7-8
I was stunned to learn how prevalent this interpretation is. — Paine
Because the dialogue is given through the form of a drama, perhaps this has a double nature. — Paine
The good, being beyond being, is not something that is entirely. — Fooloso4
The proposed answer, justified true belief, is Theaetetus', not Socrates. It proves to be inadequate. It faces the same problem. What justifies an opinion? After all, the Sophists were skilled at giving justifications for opinions, both true and false. In order to determine if an argument is true, to have the ability to discern a true from a false logos, requires knowledge. But this knowledge is not itself a justified true belief. — Fooloso4
I’d even go so far as to say, for its time, both those guys thought deeper into the human condition than any one else ever has, at least those present in the historical record. — Mww
Sidebar: I would like to say there are no false judgements. Regarding….
the arguments where "false judgement" is shown to be impossible.
— Metaphysician Undercover
…..what was the conclusion? Are they, or are they not, possible? — Mww
This is clearly derived from or descended from Parmenides, is it not? — Wayfarer
false judgement is shown to be impossible. — Metaphysician Undercover
All that aside, I, for one, fully accept that there is a such a thing as the 'philosophical ascent', although whether I personally will ever succeed in getting to the first base is well and truly moot. — Wayfarer
In contrast, it is often said that Platonism posits a higher, real world and deprecates what we nowadays take to be the real world i.e. the sensory domain. — Wayfarer
Cornford's epochal work still had shadows of Kant, especially in being mindful of the unknowable noumenal universe and its original in Plato. What can be known is limited by our senses. rational resources, plus what humanity brought into the world. For Plato that is the objectively real Ideas that guide us. Without this guidance we are lost.The Forms are excluded in order that we may see how we can get on without them; and the negative conclusion of the whole discussion means that, as Plato had taught ever since the discovery of the Forms, without them there is no knowledge at all. — F.M. Cornford, Plato's Theory of Knowledge, page 28
Theaetetus ... shows the need for an intelligible world not possible through the relativity of Protagoras or Heraclitus. It is done without recourse to Anamnesis and the separate realm of Forms — Paine
Therefore, Theaetetus, neither perception nor true opinion, nor even an articulation that’s become attached to a true opinion would be knowledge. — Plato. Theaetetus 129b, translated by Joe Sachs
….false judgement is shown to be impossible. But this conclusion is derived from the premise that knowledge is true judgement. — Metaphysician Undercover
There's another thing which this brings to mind. It occurs with respect to 'akrasia', a term used by Socrates to describe the state of acting against one's better judgement, or weakness of will. It refers to a lack of self-control or discipline, where an individual acts on their desires or emotions rather than following their rational beliefs. Akrasia is often considered a form of moral failing or lack of virtue. Famously, in Protagoras, Socrates attests that akrasia does not exist, claiming "No one goes willingly toward the bad" (358d). If a person examines a situation and decides to act in the way he determines to be best, he will pursue this action, as the best course is also the good course, i.e. man's natural goal. — Wayfarer
Socrates denies that it is possible to act against your better judgement. — Wayfarer
Judgement. All-important, hardly comprehensible. As in other things, the ancients didn’t attribute to judgement its due, while on the other hand, subsequent philosophies may just as well have made theoretical expositions regarding it, damn near incomprehensible.
At the very least, seriously complicated. Like…what is it, are there different kinds, from different sources, relating, and related to, different conditions. Is it its own faculty, or is it part of another.
All that being said, I’ve come to reject JTB as inadequate, and “knowledge as true judgement” as misplaced functionality. Which, of course, are themselves merely judgements of mine. — Mww
If Protagoras had been allowed into the argument at this point he would have thanked Plato for properly developing Protagorian subjective knowledge. The difference is that subjectively I can always be certain of my knowledge of this moment and thi — magritte
If we dismiss the Forms as abstract nonsense then which way should we look for an answer? — magritte
So I thought I must take refuge in discussions and investigate the truth of beings by means of accounts [logoi] … On each occasion I put down as hypothesis whatever account I judge to be mightiest; and whatever seems to me to be consonant with this, I put down as being true, both about cause and about all the rest, while what isn’t, I put down as not true.”
But if man means mankind a stronger argument can be made. — Fooloso4
Plato himself made the 'man is the measure' doctrine sufficiently clear in the Theaetetus. “just as each thing appears to me, so too it is for me, and just as it appears to you, so too again for you” (Theaetetus 152a) The meaning of 'appears' was and still is ambiguous because the ancients couldn't have a clear distinction between sensation, psychological perception or insight, and logical judgment based on memories of personal experience. Plato suggested all of these for Protagoras (157d, 170a–171a). Mathematics and today's public scientific facts are not in the scope of subjective philosophy.What the claim that man is the measure means is still a matter of dispute. — Fooloso4
No he is not able to do any such thing. A refutation would need to show that Protagorean premises are inconsistent or absurd and Plato can't do that, nor can anyone else because it is logically impossible. It then comes down to looking for the flaws or fallacies in Plato's arguments as presented with an eye on the list of ancient sophistical refutations. Typically, Plato saddles his opponents with one or more absurd premises just for the purpose.Plato argues against the claim that the man, that is, each person is the measure, and thus is able to refute it. — Fooloso4
Fabulous, isn't it? Unfortunately this scientific method in search of forms, occupying an intermediate position between knowledge and ignorance, does not come up in the Theaetetus.Socrates describes his "second sailing" (Pheado 99d-100a). Rather than looking at things themselves:
~~So I thought I must take refuge in discussions and investigate the truth of beings by means of accounts [logoi] … On each occasion I put down as hypothesis whatever account I judge to be mightiest; and whatever seems to me to be consonant with this, I put down as being true, both about cause and about all the rest, while what isn’t, I put down as not true~~.” — Fooloso4
judgement it appears sometimes to be associated with reason, as logic forces judgement, and sometimes it appears to be associated with will — Metaphysician Undercover
Aquinas shows a similar issue, will he says, is generally subservient to reason. — Metaphysician Undercover
I think I would prefer to completely remove will from the intellect — Metaphysician Undercover
Plato himself made the 'man is the measure' doctrine sufficiently clear in the Theaetetus. “just as each thing appears to me, so too it is for me, and just as it appears to you, so too again for you” — magritte
The meaning of 'appears' was and still is ambiguous because the ancients couldn't have a clear distinction between sensation, psychological perception or insight, and logical judgment based on memories of personal experience. — magritte
... today's public scientific facts are not in the scope of subjective philosophy. — magritte
Plato argues against the claim that the man, that is, each person is the measure, and thus is able to refute it.
— Fooloso4
No he is not able to do any such thing. — magritte
Plato saddles his opponents with one or more absurd premises just for the purpose. — magritte
Unfortunately this scientific method in search of forms, occupying an intermediate position between knowledge and ignorance, does not come up in the Theaetetus. — magritte
On the second, however, I think I’d go with judgement associated with desire rather than will, in which case the judgement is aesthetic, in association with practical reason, but in accordance with a particular feeling, or perhaps more accurately, in accordance to some arbitrary degree of a general feeling. As has been hinted elsewhere herein, account must be made for necessarily different causalities corresponding to these thoroughly incongruent kinds of objects. — Mww
Ehhh….I’m reluctant to let the will be subservient to anything within the human condition. If there is any way whatsoever, in which the subject has even the slightest modicum of self-control, in which he is the arbiter of his own circumstance, only restrained by natural limitations, then there must be a means for it, and if that means is called will, so be it. It’s as simple and certainly as plausible as….we might think we can talk and swallow at the same time, only to find out we cannot, an altogether empirical determination, but we can always think a thing within our limitations we might do, then find out we can either cause or not cause the doing of it, which is a rational rather than empirical determination.
———— — Mww
then according to Protagoras what Socrates says is true, in which case what Protagoras says is false. — Fooloso4
Judgement (…) is an instance of willing. — Metaphysician Undercover
But there appears to be some sort of loop hole which allows for a type of random action, exempt from the laws of natural order. — Metaphysician Undercover
I still haven't really freed the will from the need for an end, and the need for a judgement. — Metaphysician Undercover
….completely remove will from the intellect — Metaphysician Undercover
I think will ought to be separated from judgement. — Metaphysician Undercover
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