Bluck -Logos and Forms in Plato. A Reply to Professor Cross.pdf

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Logos and Forms in Plato: A Reply to Professor CrossAuthor(s): R. S. BluckSource: Mind, New Series, Vol. 65, No. 260 (Oct., 1956), pp. 522-529Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of the Mind Association

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LOGOS AND FORMS IN PLATO:A REPLY TO PROFESSOR CROSS

In an nterestingrticlenMIND, vol. xiii, o. 252 October 954),Professorross aises problemfconsiderablemportancendsayssome erynterestinghingsbout t,buthe s edtopropoundviewofPlato'sForms hat eems o meuntenable. To this shouldiketo reply.

Professorross egins yreferringo Theaetetus02dsq., where

Socrates rgues hat fa logos s simplyhe nameshat

composet,

and each name is thenameofa simple ndthereforenknowableelement,hen he ogos s a mere ongeriesfunknowables,hilefthe ogos s something ore, new inguisticnit, twill tself e anewsimple, nd thereforenknowable;and he quotesProfessorRyle s sayinghat ifthedoctrinefFormswastheview hat heseverbs, djectives nd common ouns re themselveshenamesofsimple,f ofty, ameables,henSocrate's riticisms,peraccidens,a criticismfthedoctrinefForms,whetherlato realised hisornot , and again hat if a Forms a simple bject ra logical ubject

ofpredication,o matter ow sublime,hen tsverbalexpressionwillbe a name nd not sentence; nd f o,thent willnotbefalsebutnonsenseo speakofanyone nowingt (savoir) r notknowingit'. Cross eeksto avoidtheconclusiony denyinghepremiss,which e dentifiesith heviewdescribeds accepted rthodoxy')thatPlatonic orms re universalswhichexist imelesslyntheirownright partfromhe sensibleworld as ' real entitiesor sub-stances',and are knownbya kindof mmediate pprehensionr'knowledge y acquaintance'. He givesreasons or bandoningthatview,ndfornterpretingheFormsnstead s logicalpredicatesdisplayedn ogoi'. That s tosay,whennansweroa ' What sX?'questionn answersgivenorsupposedo begiveable)n theformofa logos X is so-and-so),he E18soor Form s givenus in thepredicate. We mightay', saysCross p. 447), that a Form, ofarfrombeinga "substantialentity", s muchmore ike "aformula.'

I wish irstoraise ertain ositive bjectionsoCross' iew f heForms,nd then o considerhereasons hathave edhim ohisnewinterpretation. hopeto show hatthese easons re nvalid,nd

eventhat n some nstancesheevidence ere oopoints ositivelyto an opposite onclusion. shall eaveto the last the difficultyraisedbyProfessoryle, ndthen ffer yown olutionf t.

We may beginbyasking xactlywhat t is thatCrosswants ointerprets thepredicatef statement. s itwhatPlato callstheEt1osofsomething,r is it what Plato meanswhenhetalks, orexample, bout vTor' TO LKatov? Or s the SoS0 of TO' 8bKatov the

522







LOGQS AND FORMS IN PLATO: REPLY TO PROFESSOR CROSS 523

same as avro To &L'KaLov? Cross nsists p. 448) that an E1aos is anJSos of something, nd always requires or implies a dependent

genitive; and this s what, n his view, should function s a logicalpredicate and not as a logical subject. That of which t is an Et.oS,

the logical subject (e.g. ro' 81Katov), is something different. Butwhen Cross comes to face the question, What then is the logicalsubject? , he can offerno satisfactory eply. On his theory-that'-he logos is not about the Forilafigure. The Form is displayedin the predicate , he can only suggestthat 'when we say that thesentence s about figure r about justice it looks as if what we mustmean is that the sentence is about the word " figure ", " justice ", andso on . . . logical truths about the way we talk about things'. Headmits, ndeed,thatPlato seems clearly o have thought hat he wasdealingwith things' (in fact,whatwe define s an ova3ua, accordingto Phaedo 78d); but he then leaves thismatteras 'in some sensea digression'. Now Plato, I suggest,regarded vi3oi o' X as beingtheEIOS ofX, and if o Cross'conception fthe toS must be wrong.The identificationppears clearly n certainpassages. In thePhaedo,at 100b,t is suggested Jval i-tKaAov avi3o Ka' aviro' KaL arya0ov Kat

Ey4a Kal iaa cava, and then, immediately after discussioiof the causal nature of these entities,we read at 102a-b, CITEL ...

LOyAOryEZTo watv t Kaciarov rcov E'Icov. Then at 103e, afterdiscussionof7TV^pn conjunctionwith -r 0Gep1'vndxucovn conjunc-tion with r OvXpov,we read, JUOaTeiq%Mouvovvi'ndr- E!Sos it4ovcaOat

rovyavrov^ dvo46aros Et, -rv aad Xpovov, aAAa Kat aAAo T. AtRepublic476a we read, Kat -TEpL&cKatov Kat a&'Kov Kat aGyaov- alKaKov Kat TaTrcovrcW EBcov iaEpt o av'T-d Ayos; and at 597a wefindthat the carpenter who makes a bed ov3 o'vovavi'T-dro%El&SS Tote,O'89 0apEvJa tvo' E'a0 tKAtK ,W'AAa KAV'qVnva, while God is responsiblefore ev Tn bU'Et oiYa [KAVi] (597b). At Hippias Major 289d

Socrates speaks of avt'o- rd KaAov as that c Kat ra&AAa aa'vTaKOaYlEtTat Kat KaAaacve-rat, E'ITEt8av iTpoayEvT]-rat 'KcEVO [notEKELVov] '-rd EtSo. It seems, therefore,that for Plato (avi'rd) r-dX istheEt>S ofX. But it swell known hat nhisworks he what isX?'questionregularly esolves tself ntothe question What is ai3'n 'r-

X? '; and it follows rom histhat nany reply o sucha question he8o,sofX, as being denticalwith vi'ro Tro'X, willbe, or rather will

be represented y,thelogical subject. Thepredicatewilldescribe t,butwill not itself onstitute heEtSos. As forCross' insistence hatthewordEt&s impliesa dependent genitive, nd that thereforenEtos cannot function n its ownright, am quite prepared o believ-thatPlato allowed t to do so forhis ownpurposes, nd Ross seemstome to be perfectlyustifiednhisremark quoted by Cross)that 'theForms are forPlato simple entities,but that is not what the wordmeans'.

Again, the E!8os, as we have seen above, appears as the divinepattern fterwhich ensibleobjectsand acts arecopied Rep. 597b),asthat whichmakes themwhat they are (Hipp. Ma. 289d), and as







524 R. S. BLUCK:

somethilnghat deserves o have thesame name applied to it for ver(Ph. 103e); and it s a thing f whichphenomenapartake Ph. 102B).

It looks from ll this as though t was more than a 'formula'; andAristotle ertainly ook whathe callsPlato's '&E'at o have been theob-jects of definitionMet. 987b). We may add that according o theSeventh etter he ogosof thing which, n Cross'view,wouldcontainthe tSos), so far frombeingor containing 'pattern', is inpcapableof indicatingzO o'v EKaWTov and can do no betterthan suggestroITO^LOV Tt ITEpL EKaaToV ... 'Ta ro 7ov Aoycov acTGEvES' 342a-e). Itis an indispensable lue towards heacquisitionofknowledge 342d-e),but like the o'vo'6ara and ,r)a-ra ofwhich t is composed it is not

/P3E3atov uta'aaOS (343b-c). ThePhaedrus oo,thoughprimarilyon-cernedwith peeches nd treatises, mplies hatany fixed ormulationof wordsmustbe lacking nflEBatO-r and ua vata (275d-e,277d-e).Further, f we are to take as Platonic doctrine he suggestionn theTheaetetushat simplenameablesareunknowable, hould we not alsoacceptwhat follows, hata logos consisting fnames of unknowablesmust itself be unknowable? If so, Cross' attemptto show that aPlatonic Form is the predicateof a logos does not, afterall, savePlato's theory, t least in such a way as Plato might wish. Forsince Forms alone are objects of knowledge,whatever s represented

bythe several names that make up a logoswill not be knowable;and neither, herefore,n Plato's view, will the logos itself,or anypart of t.

Thirdly, he Meno and the Republicare generally aken to meanthat the knowledgewhich s virtue cannot be taught by rule ofthumb. Yet ifthe EtSoS can be givenus in a formula, t is difficultto see why that cannot be done, especially if the sentence ofwhichthe formula s predicate s definingmerely 'word'. Andfourthly, hyshould there have been such a fuss n Aristotle bout

the 'separation' of such things fromphenomena, if they wereformulae?I turnnow to Cross' arguments n favour of his interpretation.

First after aising hedifficultyftheTheaetetus, hich shall eaveto the end) he examines the Meno, and observes (p. 440) (a) thatMenofindsno difficultyn the fact that there s something ommonto a groupofparticularswhich re called bythe same name ('on theorthodoxview of the theoryof Forms,a " universal '); (b) thatwhat he and Socrates are interested n is what thiscommon lementis; and (c) that Socrates llustrates he sort of answer he wantsto

the Whatis X? ' questionbydefining igure s theonlythingwhichalways follows colour (75b) or as the limit of a solid (76a). NowI agreewith Cross that Plato's Forms are not 'universals', that inthe Meno Socratesis askingfora definition fvirtue, nd that theanswerwantedis not simply There is a Form of X '. But it doesnot follow hat Plato's Formsare definitions,ormulae rpredicatesofstatements. In thefirst lace it is usuallysupposedthatPlatonicas opposed to Socratic EZ'&-gthat s to say, XcoptUraTE&)-do not







LOGOS AND FORMS IN PLATO: REPLY TO PROFESSOR CROSS 525

appear until after the time of the Meno. But this ' What is X? 'question,which dmittedly ccurs n later dialoguesalso, needmeanno more thanthat Plato believeda searchfordefinitions ofacilitatethe attainment fknowledge f the Forms. Ifthe PlatonicE'&7qweretrulyknowable only by 'acquaintance ', theremight still be occa-sion to employdefinition s an aid to Recollectionand the practiceof Dialectic. Although he natureof any suchreality could notbeadequately grasped or conveyed- y language, human thinking sconditionedby thewordswe use.

In discussing he vision of the Beautiful tself n the Symposium,Crossremarks p. 442), 'We are told that of this there s ov'E' nst

Ao,yos vi3E 'nst,

rLa4 . . - The suggestion s that it is aboveknowledge n any ordinary ense, and that with knowledge n itsordinary ense there always goes a logos'. But if there s no logosofav'ro' -ro'KaAov, is therethen no ESoS of it either? On the otherhand, theexistenceofan EtSo TrovKaAov seemsto be implied n thepassages quoted above from he Hippias Major (289d) and Phaedo(102b), and if there s an EtSo of it, but no logos, the EtSos cannotbe the predicateofa logos. (In fact, however,ov'E' -rsAoyos KTA.probablyonly means that the Beautiful tselfdoes not appear in theformofa particularbeautiful ogos or science,not that there can be

no logos orknowledge f t.)Cross hen tresses p. 444)howthroughouthedialogueknowledge,

Forms and logos occur together. This phenomenon is hardlysurprisingfPlato regarded ogoi, althoughdifferentrom nd onlyinadequately representing '&7q,as an indispensable aid towardsthe attainment fknowledge fthem; and nearly ll ofthepassagesthat Cross quotes are concernedwithDialectic. Politicus286a mayeven be treated-s evidenceagainst Cross' thesis: o' SEZ (JuEAE-dv

AoyovEKacYTOVvvarov dtvat &ovvatKa't SE`aaavt 'a yap aacoraza,

KaAAtcoTa o'vTa Kat rEytaTa,Aoyco tovov aAAcoE oVSEvL oacbsEL`KvvTat. This can hardlymean that Forms are logoi or parts oflogoi. If it did,what wouldtheaaco'zara be ? As logical subjects,wouldtheybe mere words'? Theyare KaAAloYTa Kat HeyaTaThe sense mustsurelybe that logoi are the onlymeansbywhich nour conversewe can convey any clear indicationof the nature ofForms. Crossalso quotesPhaedo78d, av3r) 5ovcia 4rsAo'yovI1opEvi-ov EtivatKatEpcoWv-reS at alToKpwo(LEVot. Here again, ifthe Formis contained n the logos,what is the ov3cra? Surelynot a ' word'?Elsewhere (pp. 441, 447) Cross finds Theaetetus 148d (cria-aEp raSras

vwAAasovuasa EvtEIStE -TEptE`AafEs,VTCOKat Ta-s voAAas EUta-r-iasEVIASo'yw u%ELvE'Ev)mportantbecause 'EvcAoyco s parallel withEVLE'tEL i3ut it would perhapsbe a little odd to have the part(the predicate)followedn thisway bythewhole (the logos),and inin any case E18osheremay perfectlywell be taken in its frequentnon-technical ense-' in a 'single lass'. Not one ofthe quotationsused by Cross requires hat the Platonic EgOS mustbe contained nthe logos, and there s onlyone that mightfora momentsuggest







526 R. S. BLUCK:

that t is so colitained. This s from armenides 35e,whereweread,OVK EaS El TOL OpciLEVO S

'V~ -TEpL ravra 77)v -aAa'v-v 'EITLkYKOITEWv,VKcccag v rotgpcoliEvots!

v8 et ava rv7Aarv7T0TeVacAAaTEpI EZva a rAAta'a rwav Ao6ycoMapotcat EYr1 av r1y77'aco

Evat. Cross,who wants to connect logos in Plato as closely aspossible with stating or saying , and to avoid the dea of reasonor thought , wouldrender he ast part of this, in referenceothosethingswhich re especiallygraspedby statement , etc. (p. 446). Thisis, however, littleawkward, f the things graspedare predicates,and thatAoyos n Plato can mean 'reasoning' (a process, perhaps,rather han a faculty) s shownby Republic 582e, EITaEL8 S' E'Ju-aEtp1'a

KaL Opov 'act Kat Aoyco sc. EKpLVETO Ta KpwvofEva), and to some extent

supported, perhaps, by 529d, a Sn' Aopycotv KaL Stavo'a Aypr1ia-o'Et 8'ov'.

I now come to theproblemwhichgivesProfessor rosshisstarting-point,the difficultyaisedbyProfessorRyle: ifthe Platonic Formsare 'simple nameables', an argumentwhich Plato puts into themouth of Socrates n the Theaetetus eems to provethattheycannotbe known,and yet Plato still, apparently-and here I agree withCross-did not abandon his Forms. Beforegiving myown answerto the problem, should like to,suggestthat Cross' solution,re-interpretinghe Forms as logical predicates, s-unsatisfactoryf

only because it is incomplete. I have already argued that Platomeans by the E0os9 of X the same as he means by avw'ro o X, andthat in a statementmade inreply o the' What is X ? questionthisentitywould have to be represented ythesubject. It maynow beadded that even if the LcSosof X weredistinctfromavTo' rTo,av'ro ro X would itself appear to qualify for description as asimple nameable', for Plato himselfdescribes it as incomposite.It is ov'ut'a o'Vwrsa vYua (Phaedrus 247c), and may be said Etvat

cog oto'v TE UaWurTa (Phaedo 77a); but as being constant and

invariable, t is likely also to be uncompounded Phaedo 78c sq.).aviro ro KaAov in the Symposium s aEt ov Kat OvWrE7LYVoJUEVOV OVWE

d-TroAAvl5uzEVoV211a), but t is also EtALKPLVE'S, aOapo'v, lutLKTov211e).What is this but a' simplereal' ? But these ntities re knowable(Phaedo 75c-d),and Cross does not showhowthis can be reconciledwiththe Theaetetusassage. Certainly v',ro To' X is not a formulaor a predicateof a statement; it is the ov'uta f which we give alogos (Phaedo 78d).

How then is thisproblemto be solved? Is Plato inconsistentnnot applyingthe Theaetetus heory o his Forms,which are simple

entities Should he not have recognisedthat that analysis ofknowledge s correct, nd abandonedhisForms accU1dfg1y- Platoindeed could hardlyhave accepted that analysis,beca se accordingto the ideas of his time orat anyrateofthetimewhenhe wrotehisearlierworks) n objectofknowledgemustbe real, ndonly 'thing'couldbe real. But this Iardly ffects he ssue,as Plato, I amgoingto submit,was concernedwith somethingdifferentromwhat weordinarily all knowledge.







LOGOS AND FORMS IN PLATO: REPLY TO PROFESSOR CROSS 527

First,whatwas hisview of E-7rls,Jj L The Theaetetus heory,

thatwhatcanbe knowns somethinghatcan be stated ndthat

'simples' cannot e statedbut onlynamed, s explicitlyejectedntheTheaetetustself. Firstwe have hepointhat f imple lementsare unknowable,omplex hingsomposedf hem realso unknow-able,and then ocrates oeson to see whetherhetheory ouldbeimprovedy nterpretingogos na-differentense that s,not implyas anenumerationfparts), utnone f he enses doptedsfoundto help t. Truebeliefor opining)was found t 201a-cnot to beknowledge,ndnow theaddition fa logos, n anyof the sensesadopted,s found ot ohelp. CornfordnhisPlato'sTheoryfKnow-

ledgepp. 151,142) points ut that the only hings ere ecognizedas possible bjects fknowledgere concretendividualhings,hatSQcrates rgueswithin he imits fthetheory e s criticizing,ndthatnone fthe ensesheregiven o logos s the sense hat tbearsintheMeno ndtheTimaeus. ThatPlato's own heory asof omekindofJirtaT4qoy direct acquaintance' (connac,tre)f simpleForms s a reasonablenferenceromwhat s said in thePhaedoaboutthe soul n a stateofpurity eholdingureForms, romheimageof he v7rEpoVpJvoSvT'rros0n thePhaedrus,ndperhaps venfromheTimaeus,where he Demiurge sesthe Forms s models.Study ftherelationshipetweenorms ndrecognitionf OWVUVX

among hemmayhave ed Platotopractise ta'pEutsandtoconcludethat ven ormsmay e nsome ense xtendednotOnebutMany);and (probablyater still)he seemsto have triedto reducetheForms o moreprimarylementsnd reached, s we gather romfragmentsfAristotle's lEp1ayaOov-Alex. n Met.56,7; 56, 34),theOne ndthe ndefiniteyad. These rethe lementsfnumberand,since Forms pparentlyre nownumbers,heelements lsoofForms. But even fwe deny hatPlato continuedo hold his

theory fRecollection,s Gulleyhas recently rguedwith somecogencyhathe did (ClassicalQuarterly,.S. iv [1954], 09 seqq.),the availableevidence uggests hat he continuedo believe nr.7jtUZ,7y' acquaintanceof omethingelf-evident,nd thattheproblemf he imple aturef heobjects f r ur4 didnotworryhim.

Nowwhatever emaybelieve oday o bethecorrectccount fintellectualnowledge,e should ecognizehatPlato ookeduponEITaTur of heGood ssomethinghatwemightescribeathersspiritualwarenessrreligiousonviction. urproblemhenbecomessomethingifferent:Was Platowrongn supposinghat there ssuch thing s spiritualwareness, hichomes ydirectacquain-tance ? It istrue, fcourse,hatPlatoseems oregardll theotherForms lso as known, riginally,y ,acquaintance-such indeedis thenecessarymplicationfthe doctrinefRecollection,s Rossobservesn hisPlato'sTheoryf deas (p. 25). FromRepublic11bit would ven eem hatall recollectednowledgewhichs a thingthatmust e boundfast yanunderstandingfcause , as weread







528 R. S. BLUCK:

in the Meno at 98a) followsat once upon awareness of the Good,which is, of course, the ultimate Cause. This raises the furtherquestion,has Plato confused ntellectualknowledgewithspiritualknowledge Even supposingwe allowed that knowledge of theGood mightbe a sort of religious xperience, an we grantthat allother knowledge s similar? Only, I suggest, f by 'knowledge'of a thing s meant having n understandingf tsteleologicalpurpose.But that is precisely what Plato had in mind. With his intenseinterest n teleologicalpurposehe was notconcernedwiththe sortofthing that we generally all knowledge. He was not talkingaboutthe same thing at all. What we call knowledge,he might say, is

something hat can be opined and therefore tated-aArOi's. &o'ea,in fact. But someofthe reasonsthat hegivesfordenying o aArqOr/so'ea the titleofEnu-rzu, that it is nota complete nderstanding f

all circumstances Theaetetus 01a-c) and that it does not embraceafull understanding f cause (Meno 98a), of themselvesshow howdifferents the thingwith which he is concerned from what weordinarilymean by knowledge; so, too, does his reasonfordenyingthat a logos can be known,that the elementscomposing t will beunknowable-as though he wanted a special sort of E'7rt n7X ateleological xplanation) ven of simples', of whichhis metaphysical

Forms may have seemed to allow. Whether he possibility fsuchan intuitively cquired teleologicalunderstanding xistscan hardly,perhaps,be proved as Plato thought t could,because ofournotionsof perfection) y rational argument, ut-and this s thepoint-wecan hardly blame Plato for not treating t in the way in which wemightwishto treat something lse. Ifit does exist,we may supposethat t can have a ' simple as its object quite as easily as a compoundentity.

Plato himselfundoubtedlybelieved that E7nu'razn (in his sense)

of a thing entailed the ability to give a logos of it (Rep. 534b), butonly a logos of a special kind: not a definition r description hatconstitutednowledge nd so could conveyknowledge rom ne personto another,but an explanatory ccountof theForm n questionthatshould indicate its relationship o otherForms. To the man whohad not ' recollected any of the Forms to which referencewasmade, this would still be a congeries f unknowns. That is preciselywhy language is so unsatisfactory. But such logoi could play animportant part in Dialectic, being capable of aidingRecollectionbecause of the kinship of one Form to another; and they might

also helptoinculcatedArq0r)s 'ea in theuninitiated.Two finalpoints. Cross remarks p. 450) that in the Republic

Plato 'seemsto envisagederiving orms by some processofdeductiveargument. This would seem to indicate that forms cannot besimpleentities. Forhoxvrcouldimple ntities e either he premissesor the conclusion of any sort of argument? But the procedurereferred o is much betterregarded s a confirmation, ot of variouspropositionsdeduced from statement-premiss,ut of our notions







LOG OS AND FORMS IN PLATO: REPLY TO PROFESSOR CROSS 529

(vlrroGE'ULsE)f the various Forms in the lightof a teleological firstprinciple. Cross' finalpoint is that we should remember,perhaps

at times with regret', that Plato has an affection or the materialmode of speech,and for xistentialpropositions,nd that we shouldto some extentdiscountthese. But if the whole object of Plato's

XcoptcrZosf Formsfrom henomenawas to give an ontological ndmetaphysicalbackingto the ideals ofSocrates-if hisFcrms, nfact,were uchas I have takenthemto be-there is no needto discountwordof whatPlato has written.

R. S. BLUCKQueenMary College,

University fLondon

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