WEEK #7

THE THEORY OF RECOLLECTION, THE

METHOD OF HYPOTHESIS, AND THE THEORY OF FORMS

(Phaedo)(2-28-06)

Agenda• Outline of Phaedo• The Theory of Recollection in Phaedo• The Method of Hypothesis in Phaedo• Does Plato have a Theory of Forms?

– Is Plato committed to the existence of Forms?– What is it to be so committed?

• Evidence for a Theory of Forms– Passages which refer to Forms– Arguments for Forms– Motivations for Forms

• Arguments for Forms• Motivations for Forms

Cast of Characters: 59b-c• Phaedo• Apollodorus - narrator of Symposium• Critobulus• Critobulus’ father - Crito - Apology 33d-e; Diogenes Laertius 2.121• Hermogenes - son of Hipponicus and brother of Callia (Ap. 20a) - in

Cratylus • Epigenes - in list at Apology 33d-e• Aeschines - Socratic fragments - • Antisthenes - reputed founder of the Cynic school - Socratic fragments• Ctesippus - in Lysis & Euthydemus• Menexenus - in Lysis & Menexenus• Simmias of Thebes (a center for Pytahgoreanism) - in Crito• Cebes of Thebes - in Crito• Phaedondes - Xenophon Memorabilia 1.2.48• Euclides of Megara - founder of the Megarian school - in Theaetetus • Terpsion of Megara - in Theaetetus • Aristippus (grandson was founder of Cyreniac), Cleombrotus, and

Plato are mentioned as absent

Outline of PhaedoA. Prologue (57a-59c)B. Socrates in prison (59c-69e)

1. Setting of scene (59c-61b)2. Tension (61b-63e)

a. No one ought to commit suicideb. Philosophers would be better off dead

3. Philosophers should willingly die (64a-69e)Three Arguments that Wisdom is better acquired when soul is

separated from bodya. Bodily pleasures interfere with the pursuit of truth and

wisdom (64d-65a)b. Perception is inaccurate/only reasoning (logizesthai) is

accurate (65b-d)c. Forms, the objects of wisdom, cannot be viewed by

perception, but only by thought (dianoia) or reasoning (logismos) (65d-66a)

C. The Argument(s) for the immortality of the soul

1. The Cyclical Argument (70c-72d)2. The Recollection Argument (72c-77a)

a. The Conditional: If TR -> immortality (73e3-73a6)

b. First Argument for antecedent (73a7-b2)c. Second Argument for antecedent (73b3-76d)

i. Principles concerning recollection (73b3-74a8)ii. The Equality Argument (74b7-c5)iii. The Recollection Argument (74c7-75d5)iv. Responses to objections (75d6-76d)

d. Recapitulation (76d-77a)

3. The Survival Objection (77b-c)4. The Affinity Argument (78b-84b)5. Simmias’ & Cebes’ Objections (85e-88b)

a. The soul as harmony (85c-86e)b. The soul as a cloak (86e-88b)

6. Arguments Against Simmias/Harmony (91e-95a)

7. Argument Against Cebes/Cloak (95a-107b)a. Introduction (95a-96a)b. Socrates’ Philosophical Biography (96a-102b)

i. Natural Science Phase (96a-97b)ii. Anaxagoras Phase (97b-99d)iii. Second Voyage/Method of Hypothesis (99d-102b)

X is F because x participates in F-ness

c. The Final Argument (102c-107b)i. Simmias/Socrates/Cebes case (102b-103a)

ii. Objection and reply (103a-c)

iii. The Clever view (103c-105c)

X is F because x participates in G-ness and G-ness entails F-ness

iv. The immortality argument (105c-107b)

D. The Myth (107c-115a)

E. The Death Scene (115a-118a)

General Structure of the Argument from 64a-69e

1. Death is separation of the soul from the body

2. Philosophers seek wisdom and truth

3. Wisdom and truth can only (or best) be gained when the soul is separated from the body

4. So, philosophers seek separation of the soul from the body

5. So, philosophers seek death

6. So, philosophers should willingly die

Recollection in the Phaedo

• Second Argument for the Immortality of Soul (72e-78b): If TR -> Soul is immortal– Furthermore, Socrates, Cebes rejoined, such is also the

case if that theory (logos) is true that you are accustomed to mention frequently, that for us learning (mathesis) is no other than recollection (anamnesis) [Phaedo 71e3-6; Grube trans.]

• Arguments for TR– First Argument: the slave boy example (73a-b)– Second Argument for TR (73b-76d)

Second Argument1. “if anyone is to be reminded of a thing, he must have known that thing at

some time previously.” [73c1-2; Gallop trans.] • x is reminded by y of z at t x knew z before t.

2. “if someone, [a] on seeing a thing, or hearing it, or getting any other sense-perception of it, [b] not only recognizes that thing, but also thinks of something else, [c] which is the object not of the same knowledge but of another, don’t we then rightly say that he’s been ‘reminded’ of the object of which he has got the thought?” [73c6-d1; Gallop trans.]

• [a] A perceives x, [b] A thinks of/knows y, and [c] knowledge of x ≠ knowledge of y A recollected y

3. There is equality (74a9-b1)4. We know what it is (74b2-3)5. We got this knowledge of equality by perceiving equal things (74b4-7) –

[2a]6. Equality is distinct from equal things (74b8-74c6) – [2c]7. We learn equality by perceiving equal things by noticing the latter’s

deficiency to the former (74c7-75a10) – [2b]8. So, we knew equality before noticing this deficiency (75b1-c6)9. Generalized to all forms (75c7-d5)10. But, we have not always had this knowledge (75d6-76d6)11. So, TR <-> Forms (76d7-77a5)

Differences between Meno & Phaedo

• Meno: robust knowledge acquisitionPhaedo: concept formation ?

• Meno: mathematicsPhaedo: no mathematics

• Meno: no stress on sense perceptionPhaedo: sense perception

• Meno: introduced to meet a problemPhaedo: introduced to prove immortaltiy

• No commitment to Forms in Meno

Hypothesis in Phaedo• The problem

– It is no unimportant problem that you raise, Cebes, for it requires a thorough investigation of the cause of generation and destruction. I will, if you wish, give you an account of my experience in theses matters. Then if something I say seems useful to you, make use of it to persuade us of your position. [95e9-96a4; Grube trans.]

• The method of the natural scientists [96a-97b]– I do not any longer persuade myself that I know why a unit or

anything else comes to be, or perishes or exists by the old method of investigation, and I do not accept it, but I have a confused method of my own. [97b3-7; Grube trans.]

• The method of Anaxagoras [97b-99c]– I would gladly become the disciple of any man who taught the

workings of that kind of cause. However, since I was deprived and could neither discover it myself nor learn it from another, ... [99c6-9; Grube trans.]

• The method of hypothesis [99c-101e]– ... do you wish me to give you an explanation of how, as a second

best, I busied myself with the search for the cause, Cebes? [99c9-d2; Grube trans.]

The Method of Natural Science

When Socrates was young he was keen on the wisdom (sophia) called natural (peri phuseos historian); he thought it would be splendid to know (eidenai) answers to questions like the following: (96a6-c1)

1. Do living things develop whenever the hot and the cold give rise to putrefaction?

2. Is it blood, air or fire by which we think?3. Or is it none of these, but is it that the brain provides the

senses, from which memory and doxa become?4. Does knowledge come to be in this way from memory and

doxa when they acquire stability (heremein)?5. How these things are destroyed?

Socrates discovers, however, that he has no gift for this sort of inquiry

This investigation made me quite blind even to those things which I and others thought that I clearly knew before, so that I unlearned what I thought I knew before, about many other things, but specifically about how men grew. [96c3-7; Grube trans.]

• Three sets of examples of things that Socrates thought he could explain but no longer does: (96c7-97b3)a. the growth of a human being (96c7-d6)

b. one thing’s being larger than another (96d8-e4)

c. one thing’s becoming two (96e6-97b3)

• His reason for his thinking that he can no longer explain a thing’s becoming two is apparently that it violates the following principle

• (Causal Law) x’s opposite must not be an aitia for anything being F (97a7-b3, cf. 101b9-c2, c7-8)

Conclusion (97b3-7)

Conclusion (97b3-7)

And I no longer believe that I know (epistamai) by this method (methodou) even how one is generated or, in a word, how anything is generated or is destroyed or exists, and I no longer admit this method, but have another confused way of my own. [97b3-7; Lamb trans.]

What Socrates had hoped to learn from Anaxagoras (97b7-98b6)

• If then one wished to know the cause of each thing, why it comes to be, or perishes or exists, one had to find what was the best way for it to be, or be acted upon, or to act. On these premises then it befitted a man to investigate only, about this and other things, what is best. The same man must inevitably also know what is worse, for that is part of the same knowledge (epistemen). [97c6-d5; Grube trans.]

As I reflected on this subject I was glad to think that I had found in Anaxagoras a teacher (didaskalon) about the cause of things after my own heart, and that he would tell me, first, whether the earth is flat or round, and then would explain why it is so of necessity (anagken), saying which is better (ameinon), and that it was better to be so. If he said it was in the middle of the universe, he would go on to show that it was better for it to be in the middle, and if he showed me those things I should be prepared never to desire any other kind of cause. [97d7-98a2; Grube trans.]

• Once he had given the best for each as the cause for each and the general cause of all, I thought he would go on to explain the common good for all, and I would not have exchanged my hopes for a fortune. I eagerly acquired his books and read them as quickly as I could in order to know the best and the worst as soon as possible. (98b1-6; Grube trans.]

Socrates’ Disappointment (98b7-c8)

Imagine not being able to distinguish the real cause from that without which the cause would not be able to act as a cause. It is what the majority appear to do, like people groping in the dark; they call it a cause, thus giving it a name that does not belong to it. [99b2-6; Grube trans.]

Conclusion

• I would gladly become the disciple of any man who taught the workings of that kind of cause. However, since I was deprived and could neither discover it myself (autos heurein) nor learn it from another (par’ allou mathein), ... [99c6-9; Grube trans.]

• ... do you wish me to give you an explanation of how, as a second best (deuteron ploun), I busied myself with the search for the cause, Cebes? [99c9-d3; Grube trans.]

Metaphor of the SunAfter this, he said, when I had wearied of investigation things (ta onta skopein), I thought that I must be careful to avoid the experience of those who watch an eclipse of the sun, for some of them ruin their eyes unless they watch its reflection in water or some such material. A similar thought crossed my mind, and I feared that my soul would be altogether blinded if I looked at things (ta pragmata) with my eyes and tried to grasp them with each of my senses. So I though I must take refuge in discussions (logou) and investigate the truth of things by means of words (skopein ton onton ten aletheian). However, perhaps this analogy is inadequate, for I certainly do not admit that one who investigates things by means of words is dealing with images any more than one who looks at facts. [Phaedo 99d4-100a3; Grube trans.]

General Description

However, I started in this manner: taking as my hypothesis (hupothemenos) in each case the theory that seemed to me the most compelling, I would consider as true, about cause and everything else, whatever agreed (sumphonein) with this, and as untrue whatever did not so agree. But I want to put my meaning more clearly for I do not think that you understand me now. 100a3-100a8; Grube trans.]

ApplicationThis, he said, is what I mean. It is nothing new, but what I have never stopped talking about, both elsewhere and in the earlier par of our conversation. I am going to try to show you the kind of cause with which I have concerned myself. I turn back to those oft-mentioned things and proceed from them. I assume the existence of a Beautiful, itself by itself, of a Good and a Great and all the rest. If you grant me these and agree that they exist, I hope to show you the cause as a result, and so to find the soul to be immortal. Take it that I grant you this, said Cebes, and hasten to your conclusion. [Phaedo 100b1-c2; Grube trans.]

Phaedo 101d1-e3But you , ..., would cling to the safety of your own hypothesis and give that answer. If someone then attacked your hypothesis itself, you would ignore him and would not answer until you had examined whether the consequences that follow from it agree with one another or contradict one another. And when you must give an account of your hypothesis itself you will proceed in the same way: you will assume another hypothesis, the one which seems to you best of the higher ones until you come to something acceptable, but you will not jumble the two as the debaters do by discussing the hypothesis and its consequences at the same time, if you wish to discover the truth. [Grube trans.]

Examination/Confirmation of Equivalent Question

• First one identifies a further hypothesis from which the original hypothesis can be derived and shows how this derivation goes until one reaches something adequate and [upward path]

• Second one examines the consequences of the hypothesis to be whether they are consistent with other background beliefs or information concerning the topic under discussion [downward path].

Questions

• What are the alternative methods?• Is the method of hypthesis second best?

– To the alternatives mentioned?– To some other alternative?

• What is the hypothesis?• Downward path

– Comes first in Phaedo– ‘Agree with’

• Consistent with• Entailed by

• Upward path– What makes something adequate?

Does Plato Have a Theory of Forms

• Annas 1981

• Is Plato committed to Forms?

• What is it to be so committed?

• Aristotle– Eidos/idea– Genos– Ousia

Metaphysics XIII.4 1078b17-1079a4The theory of Forms (peri ton eidon doxa) occurred to those who enunciated it because they were convinced as to the true nature of reality by the doctrine of Heraclitus, that all sensible things are always in a state of flux; so that if there is to be any knowledge or thought about anything, there must be certain other entities, besides sensible ones, which persist. For there can be no knowledge of that which is in flux. Now Socrates devoted his attention to the moral virtues, and was the first to seek a general definition of these [20] (…); and he naturally inquired into the essence of things; for he was trying to reason logically, and the starting-point of all logical reasoning is the essence (to ti estin). … There are two innovations which, may fairly be ascribed to Socrates: inductive reasoning and general definition. Both of these are associated with the starting-point of scientific knowledge. But whereas Socrates regarded neither universals nor definitions as existing in separation, the Idealists gave them a separate existence, and to these universals and definitions of existing things they gave the name of Ideas.

Metaphysics 1086a30-b14… but as for those who speak of the Ideas, we can observe at the same time their way of thinking and the difficulties which befall them. For they not only treat the Ideas as universal substances, but also as separable and particular. … The reason why those who hold substances to be universal combined these two views was that they did not identify substances with sensible things. They considered that the particulars in the sensible world are in a state of flux, and that none of them persists, but that the universal exists besides them and is something distinct from them. This theory, as we have said in an earlier passage, was initiated by Socrates as a result of his definitions, but he did not separate universals from particulars; and he was right in not separating them. This is evident from the facts; for without the universal we cannot acquire knowledge, and the separation of the universal is the cause of the difficulties which we find in the Ideal theory. Others, regarding it as necessary, if there are to be any substances besides those which are sensible and transitory, that they should be separable, and having no other substances, assigned separate existence to those which are universally predicated; thus it followed that universals and particulars are practically the same kind of thing.

Metaphysics 987a29-b13The philosophies described above were succeeded by the system of Plato, which in most respects accorded with them, but contained also certain peculiar features distinct from the philosophy of the Italians. In his youth Plato first became acquainted with Cratylus and the Heraclitean doctrines -- that the whole sensible world is always in a state of flux, and that there is no scientific knowledge of it -- and in after years he still held these opinions. And when Socrates, disregarding the physical universe and confining his study to moral questions, sought in this sphere for the universal and was the first to concentrate upon definition, Plato followed him and assumed that the problem of definition is concerned not with any sensible thing but with entities of another kind; for the reason that there can be no general definition of sensible things which are always changing. These entities he called “Ideas,” and held that all sensible things are named after them sensible and in virtue of their relation to them; for the plurality of things which bear the same name as the Forms exist by participation in them. (With regard to the “participation,” it was only the term that he changed; for whereas the Pythagoreans say that things exist by imitation of numbers, Plato says that they exist by participation -- merely a change of term. As to what this “participation” or “imitation” may be, they left this an open question.)

Evidence

• Passages which presuppose the theory of Forms

• Arguments for the theory of Forms

• Motivations for the theory of Forms (Cherniss)

Arguments for the Theory of Forms

• Phaedo 74a9-c5 – The Equality Argument

• Republic V.475d-476b – The Argument from Opposites

• Republic X.596a5-b4 – The One Over Many Argument

• Timaeus 51d3-e6 – The Argument from Knowledge

The One Over Many Argument

Do you want us to begin our examination, then, by adopting our usual procedure? As you know, we customarily hypothesize a single form in connection with each of the many things to which we apply the same name. Or don't you understand?

I do.Then let's now take any of the manys you like.

For example, there are many beds and tables.Of course.But there are only two forms of such furniture,

one of the bed and one of the table. (Republic X.596a5-b4; Grube/Reeve trans.]

The Argument from KnowledgeIf understanding and true opinion are distinct, then these "by themselves" things definitely exist-these Forms, the objects not of our sense perception, but of our understanding only. But if-as some people think-true opinion does not differ in any way from understanding, then all the things we perceive through our bodily senses must be assumed to be the most stable things there are. But we do have to speak of understanding and true opinion as distinct, of course, because we can come to have one without the other, and the one is not like the other. It is through instruction that we come to have understanding, and through persuasion that we come to have true belief. Understanding always involves a true account while true belief lacks any account. And while understanding remains unmoved by persuasion, true belief gives in to persuasion. And of true belief, it must be said, all men have a share, but of understanding, only the gods and a small group of people do. (Timaeus 51d3-e6; Zeyl trans.)

Motivations for the Theory of Forms

• TF accounts for objectivity in ethics (Cherniss)

• TF accounts for the distinction between knowledge and sensation/opinion (Cherniss)

• TF accounts for the instability in the phenomena (Cherniss)

• TF accounts for how words get their meaning (White)

Motivations from the Elenctic Dialogues

• TF may provide substance to Socratic Eudaemonism

• TF may account for the possibility of inquiry (and knowledge in general)

• TF may provide a justification for the Socratic concern with definition