Abstract

This book is not about the theory of Forms as such, but about Plato’s epistemological realism, his view, in opposition to Protagorean relativism, that there is a realm of fact that counts as the common object of our true beliefs, judgments, and knowledge. This book fills a longstanding need for a lucid, condensed, readable account of aspects of Plato’s thought that emerge in certain of Plato’s middle and later dialogues and pose issues of contemporary philosophical merit. It is White’s contention that Plato’s discontent with the "method of hypothesis" tentatively tried in Meno, Phaedo, and Republic, and his theory of naming in the Cratylus, lead to the breakdown of his theory of knowledge and, eventually, of the possibility of meaningful inquiry, with the objects of inquiry framed in advance by a specification of the object. The key thesis in White’s contention appears to be a view that he attributes to the Cratylus, that "the genuine use of a name is thought to require the apprehension of its nominatum, in a way excluding any confusion of it with other things" ; for, if the only thing that can be named is a Form, and if believing, judging, and knowing are a kind of being confronted in one’s mental "visual" field with an object, and we cannot accept the beliefs of others for purposes of inquiry, then how is it possible to inquire about, or to define what one already apprehends and recognizes?