One of the key strengths of Gerson’s work is his detailed comparative analysis of the core doctrines of Plato and Aristotle. — Dermot Griffin

If it seemed to me that these [philosophical] matters could adequately be put down in writing for the many or be said, what could be nobler for us to have done in our lifetime than this, to write what is a great benefit for human beings and to lead nature forth into the light for all? But I do not think such an undertaking concerning these matters would be a good for human beings, unless for some few, those who are themselves able to discover them through a small indication; of the rest, it would unsuitably fill some of them with a mistaken contempt, and others with lofty and empty hope as if they had learned awesome matters.

For this reason every man who is serious about things that are truly serious avoids writing so that he may not expose them to the envy and perplexity of men. Therefore, in one word, one must recognize that whenever a man sees the written compositions of someone, whether in the laws of the legislator or in whatever other writings, [he can know] that these were not the most serious matters for him; if indeed he himself is a serious man.

Any man, whether greater or lesser who has written about the highest and first principles concerning nature, according to my argument, he has neither heard nor learned anything sound about the things he has written. For otherwise he would have shown reverence for them as I do, and he would not have dared to expose them to harsh and unsuitable treatment.

In other words, according to Plato in the Seventh Letter there are no core doctrines or any doctrines at all in his writings that can rightly be attributed to him. — Fooloso4

That's a 21st century thesis in the sense that Plato and Aristotle died 2500 years ago and we can argue about their texts ad infinitum. — Leontiskos

"There is no treatise (suggramma) by me on these subjects, nor will there ever be." (341c) — Fooloso4

The problem is that Aristotle was Plato's literal student. Aristotle knew Plato, Aristotle was taught by Plato, Aristotle and Plato inevitably argued with one another about things, and Aristotle continued to argue with Plato in his own writings. — Leontiskos

The claim that Plato held no doctrines or positions is almost certainly false — Leontiskos

But crucially false is the claim that we cannot discern doctrinal differences between Plato and Aristotle from their writings, and especially from Aristotle's writings. — Leontiskos

differences can be found within the dialogues themselves and in the works of Aristotle themselves — Fooloso4

Some argue that the Seventh Letter was not written by Plato. — Fooloso4

Make of this what you will. If you want to discover Plato's doctrines in what one or more of his characters say in the dialogues then such claims must be weighed against what is said and by whom in other places both within that dialogue and in other dialogues. — Fooloso4

1. Did Plato and Aristotle argue?
2. Do we have a source for their disagreements in Aristotle's works?

He posits that Aristotle’s objections are directed at specific aspects of Plato’s formulations rather than at the underlying principles. — Dermot Griffin

In From Plato to Platonism, Gerson suggests that the common core of “Ur-Platonism” can be characterized in negative terms, as a conjunction of five “antis”: anti-materialism, anti-mechanism, anti-nominalism, anti-relativism, and anti-skepticism. Together these elements make up a sixth “anti-,” namely anti-naturalism. Thinkers in the Ur-Platonist tradition spell out the implications of this conjunction of “antis” in ways that differ in several details, but certain common themes tend to emerge, such as the thesis that ultimate explanation requires positing a non-composite divine cause, the immateriality of the intellect, and the objectivity of morality. ...

In Aristotle and Other Platonists, Gerson proposed a positive characterization of the tradition, as comprising seven key themes: 1. The universe has a systematic unity; 2. This unity reflects an explanatory hierarchy and in particular a “top-down” approach to explanation (as opposed to the “bottom-up” approach of naturalism), especially in the two key respects that the simple is prior to the complex and the intelligible is prior to the sensible; 3. The divine constitutes an irreducible explanatory category, and is to be conceived of in personal terms (even if in some Ur-Platonist thinkers the personal aspect is highly attenuated); 4. The psychological also constitutes an irreducible explanatory category; 5. Persons are part of the hierarchy and their happiness consists in recovering a lost position within it, in a way that can be described as “becoming like God”; 6. Moral and aesthetic value is to be analyzed by reference to this metaphysical hierarchy; and 7. The epistemological order is contained with this metaphysical order. — Join the Ur-Platonist Alliance!

My point is that it does not entail what you say it does. — Leontiskos

There is no treatise (suggramma) by me on these subjects, nor will there ever be. — Fooloso4

It seems you missed the point of my post. — Leontiskos

... a 21st century thesis in the sense that Plato and Aristotle died 2500 years ago ... — Leontiskos

If Plato held no knowable positions, then Aristotle could not have argued with Plato. — Leontiskos

Aristotle had access to Plato's person, not just his texts. — Leontiskos

Is there such clear evidence of this lingering-skepticism ... — ENOAH

the desire to know based on the knowledge of our ignorance. — Fooloso4

Plato himself gives us reason to doubt that he seriously held a theory of Forms. — Fooloso4

Any man, whether greater or lesser who has written about the highest and first principles concerning nature, according to my argument, he has neither heard nor learned anything sound about the things he has written. — Fooloso4, quoting Plato 7th Letter

Plato's explanation of why the deepest truths cannot be expressed in written form is famously abstruse. Before one attains the "thing which is cognizable and true" (gnōston te kai alēthes), one must have apprehended the "name," "account" (logos), "image," and "knowledge" (epistēmē). Name and account are approached through verbal description, while sense perception perceives the image. One attains knowledge only from the combination of verbal description and sense perception, and one must have knowledge before one can attain the object of knowledge (which Plato calls simply "the Fifth," name, account, image, and knowledge being "the Four"). The Fifth, moreover, differs from what is sensible and verbal expressions of it. Name and account provide the "quality" of a thing (to poion), but not its "essence" or "being" (to on). They are, moreover, akin to sense perceptions in that they are ever shifting and relative, not fixed. As a result, the student who attempts to understand the Fifth through name, account, image, and knowledge is confused; he seeks the essence, but always finds the quality intruding. Only certain kinds of student can scrutinize the Four, and even then the vision of the Fifth comes by a sudden flash.

Since this is how philosophy is conducted, no serious person would ever attempt to teach serious philosophic doctrines in a book or to the public at large.

With regard to Plato and Aristotle their shared common ground is that they are both Socratic skeptics, inquirers who know that they do not know. — Fooloso4

It should be understood that Socratic skepticism differs from other types of skepticism. It is the desire to know based on the knowledge of our ignorance. It is, as the root of the word indicates, the practice of doubt and inquiry.

With regard to evidence, we must follow the argument and action of the dialogues in Plato that lead to aporia and the dialectic of Aristotle. — Fooloso4

The heuristic I prefer is that forms or ideas don't exist - not because they're unreal, but because they are beyond existence (which is precisely what 'transcendent' means). We are blessed with the intellectual facility, nous, which is capable of grasping these forms (or perceiving rational principles) — Wayfarer

I am afraid we are not rid of God because we still have faith in grammar — F.N.

I.e. fallacy of reification / misplaced concereteness (which Nietzsche astutely points out is an inversion, or confusion, of effects & causes). — 180 Proof

Is there such a thing as health? Of course there is. Can you see it? Of course not. This does not mean that the forms are occult entities floating ‘somewhere else’ in ‘another world,’ a ‘Platonic heaven.’ It simply says that the intelligible identities which are the reality, the whatness, of things are not themselves physical things to be perceived by the senses, but must be grasped by thought. If, taking any of these examples—say, justice, health, or strength—we ask, “How big is it? What color is it? How much does it weigh?” we are obviously asking the wrong kind of question. Forms are ideas, not in the sense of concepts or abstractions, but in that they are realities apprehended by thought rather than by sense. They are thus ‘separate’ in that they are not additional members of the world of sensible things, but are known by a different mode of awareness. But this does not mean that they are ‘located elsewhere,’ or that they are not, as Plato says, the very intelligible contents, the truth and reality of sensible things.

It is in this sense, too, that Plato’s references to the forms as ‘patterns’ or ‘paradigms’, of which instances are ‘images,’ must be understood. All too often, ‘paradigm’ is taken to mean ‘model to be copied.’ The following has been offered as an example of this meaning of παράδειγμα (parádeigma) in classical Greek: “[T]he architect of a temple requiring, say, twenty-four Corinthian capitals would have one made to his own specifications, then instruct his masons to produce twenty-three more just like it.” Such a model is itself one of the instances: when we have the original and the twenty-three copies, we have twenty-four capitals of the same kind. It is the interpretation of forms as paradigms in this sense that leads to the ‘third man argument’ by regarding the form as another instance and the remaining instances as ‘copies’ of the form. This interpretation of Plato’s ‘paradigmatism’ reflects a pictorial imagination of the forms as, so to speak, higher-order sensibles located in ‘another world,’ rather than as the very intelligible identities, the whatnesses, of sensible things.

But forms cannot be paradigms in this sense. Just as the intelligible ‘look’ that is common to many things of the same kind, a form, as we have seen, is not an additional thing of that kind. Likewise, it makes no sense to say that a body, a physical, sensible thing, is a copy, in the sense of a replica or duplicate, of an intelligible idea. Indeed, Plato expressly distinguishes between a copy and an image: “Would there be two things, that is, Cratylus and an image of Cratylus, if some God copied not only your color and shape, as painters do, but also … all the things you have — Eric D Perl Thinking Being, p31 ff

Gerson's central focus, as a scholar, has been upon Plotinus and his contemporaries (broadly speaking). — Paine

Beyond the role of the mid-wife taking precedence over that of recollection, Socrates is heard defending Parmenides who also criticizes the Forms (in that named Platonic dialogue). — Paine

Ok, fair enough, but with the assurance that you will know? — ENOAH

To reify is to make a thing', — Wayfarer

... ideas [Forms?] don't exist - not because they're unreal, but because they are beyond existence (which is precisely what 'transcendent' means). — Wayfarer

... ideas [Forms?] are transcendental.

I had the idea it is impossible to admire both Nietszche and Plato.

Are you saying that Gerson's interpretation of Plato is through his reading of Plotinus? That seems right to me. — Fooloso4

In calling it an Unmoved Mover and characterizing it as ‘thinking about thinking’, he failed to see that thinking is essentially intentional and that for this reason alone his first principle could not escape the complexity found in thinking plus an object of thinking. In other words, the absolute simplicity of the first principle of all precluded thinking from being that principle. In addition, Aristotle erred in his hypothesis that the primary referent of ‘being’ is ousia. The main reason for this is that ousia or essence or ‘whatness’ is distinct from the existence of that essence, in which case complexity is once again introduced. So, Aristotle was in fact a dissident Platonist, but a Platonist after all. — Platonism Versus Naturalism, Lloyd P Gerson

If we look at the dramatic chronology of the dialogues Plato places Parmenides criticism of the Forms at an early stage of Socrates own philosophical education. This raises doubts as to whether Socrates own criticism of Forms should be explained away as the result of Plato having changed his mind in a later stage of his development. — Fooloso4

One thing that is verifiable is that Gerson's criticism of Aristotle is a repetition of Plotinus — Paine

Socrates is heard joining the criticism of Heraclitus but does not explain why he won't criticize Parmenides except to say he was wise. — Paine

Your post began by saying that the quote from the Seventh Letter was: — Fooloso4

How do you understand this if it does not mean what he said in the letter? — Fooloso4

Of course he could. He was responding to what was said in the dialogues. — Fooloso4

The letter does not say that Plato holds no positions, or that none of his positions are inferable from his texts, or that none of his positions are inferable from Aristotle's texts. — Leontiskos

In other words, according to Plato in the Seventh Letter there are no core doctrines or any doctrines at all in his writings that can rightly be attributed to him. — Fooloso4

I already addressed this in the parenthetical remark at the end of that paragraph. — Leontiskos

Therefore Plato held knowable positions (insofar as we accept Aristotle's depiction of Plato's thought) — Leontiskos

[E]very [written] speech rolls around everywhere, both among those who understand and among those for whom it is not fitting, and it does not know to whom it ought to speak and to whom not.

Are you claiming that Aristotle made public what Plato intended to keep private? — Fooloso4

Are you claiming that Plato did not intend to make anything whatsoever public? — Leontiskos

No. Both Plato and Aristotle write in ways intended to mitigate the problem of writing. Both have a salutary public teaching. — Fooloso4

I think all of our readings are by default modern. We cannot escape being modern. It is our cave.
— Fooloso4

Socrates says that the free prisoner would think that the world outside the cave was superior to the world he experienced in the cave ...
— Wayfarer

If you have escaped the cave then you would see things differently than us cave dwellers. I have not. I can only see things as I can from within the cave. — Fooloso4