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dialogues, dialectic, & thenature of "truth" & "knowledge"

prepared by dr. bonnie lenore kyburzsource: Rhetoric: Concepts, Definitions,Boundaries. William A. Covino (U ILL, Chicago)David A. Jolliffe (DePaul U)

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Plato (c. 429 - 347 BCE) & "truth" in P haedrusscreens P's philosophical rhetoric (pref to

"rhetoric" as taught by the Sophists)method: dialogue. represents give-and-takeof convo btwn 2 charactersconvo offers multiple viewpoints w/outprivileging any one, authorial perspectivethis interplay creates a productive kind of ambiguity (like good literature)

the convo is referred to as "dialectic," "amethod of inquiry" guided by ?'s andanswers, definitions and distinctions that ="philosophical truth"supposedly, (ideally) participants in dialecticdo not begin w/ predetermined positions, butin P haedrus , Socrates has a perspective inmind, and he leads Phaedrus to it.Socrates' moves to persuade Phaedrus aresimilar to the distasteful moves made byrhetors Socrates does not admire(ornamental, flowery ... mere flattery)alternatively, the Socratic method -- revealsby doing, via inquiry-driven dialectic

P was a "follower" or student of Socrates (469-399 BCE).P saw Socratic d ialectic as morevaluable than the "mere cookery"or the "false art" of rhetoric thatwas being taught -- it offers a"pleasant taste rather than goodhealth" and in this way "offers acrowd what they enjoy hearingrather than what is good for them."P saw this taught rhetoric as a"knack" rather than a talent (Covino& Jolliffe 74).

The Sophists were the teachers...

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the sophists. sophos = knowledge, wisdom

"The first sophists were teachers whotraveled in classical Greece teaching anumber of different subjects" ( in Plato'sGorgias , prior to P haedrus, we see P's Socratessuggest that "the practice of rhetoric does not

require any paritcular body of knowledge anddoes not aim at the good, [thus] it is a false art or "knack" rather than a true art") [...] They areespecially famous -- or infamous -- for relativistic views ["radically contingent" (Kent)] of truth and demonstrations of oratoricaldexterity; such demonstrations wereespecially popular as entertainments and asindications of the skills required of citizens innewly emerging democracies" (Covino & Jolliffe84).

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second sophistic movement

developed in 1st C. CE"highly stylized ceremonial" speechesrhetoric as "epistemic," or generativerather than merely representative of knowledge (it creates knowledge). Pworried how this concept troubled a

specific view of "stable philosophicaltruth," and he criticized them for thischallengeP called this epistemic rhetoric a kind of "image-making art, ... not divine, buthuman ... the juggling part of productiveactivity"

P sees sophists as jugglers of truth,manipulative (the early car salesperson)P CLEARLY worried the ways in whichthe sophists could enchant "the youth of today" with their trickslanguage as "Protean" (emergence!)

(Covino & Jolliffe 84)

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P's philosophical rhetoric Sophistic "protean" rhetoric

natural talentdivinityinspiredprivileged

ethical -- toward a stablenotion of "the good"kairoticessentials determined byGod-like philosophicalwanderings, soarings ...(concerns for essentialisms carriedthru the centuries ... 20th C.rhetorical theory & postmodernthought mov ed ...)

teachable (dissoi logoi)phronesis (practical wisdom)emergent (like learning)kairoticcontingent"potentially mesmerizing"understood limitations of human

knowledge (Protagoras (c. 481-411BCE) "Of all things the measure is man...") (Covino & Jolliffe 84) ; thus, given our flawed human nature, knowledge wasrelative , "radically contingent")

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prevailing concepts & binaries

privileged, stablephilosophical truthknowledge as stable,essentialthe gooddialecticknowledge as earnedthrough philosophical

divinity, arrived at by theman who knows good

radically contingent, skillsdriven performances "inthe moment"knowledge and generatedby human observation,experience, and artthe probablepoetics (also dialectic; for

the sophists, the split wasnot so very neat)knowledge as alwaysalready emerging, from avariety of circumstances