New technologies are emerging across the globe and are influencing our perceptions of the world, our behaviour and our understanding of what it means to be a human being. In particular, Klaus Schwab and others define the advancement of ‘cyber-physical systems’, coupled with new capacities for both machines and human beings, in terms of ‘The Fourth Industrial Revolution’. The South African Parliament placed the Fourth Industrial Revolution on its national agenda. It serves as a new foundation story for the country, (...) one that justifies, explains and facilitates the perceived shifts from previous understandings of reality, and one that currently plays out on an unevenly distributed continuum. To be an effective agent of change and a relevant voice for the voiceless and the powerless in this Fourth Industrial Revolution era, the church must facilitate immersive, yet provocative performances of the Gospels while simultaneously embodying and empowering others with wisdom to traverse this unchartered terrain of technological innovation with insight and discernment. The church’s message should be that, to live more godly, we all need to become more human, not post-human or trans-human. We cannot avoid the fact that we are entering an era in which technology will redefine who we are. However, the question is not only what technology can do for us but also what we as change agents should allow technology to do. Contribution: This article focuses on the role of the Christian church in our era of massive technological innovation. The creative role that faith communities could play in order to ensure a more humane approach to and interaction with various 4IR technologies are addressed. A short investigation is offered of a new ‘hermeneutical performance’ of the Bible as an immersive text in an interactive 4IR world. In this regard the emphasis on a new ‘metanoetic alignment with the mission of Jesus, which is explored in the article, links on to the theological scope of HTS Theological Studies in terms of new theological insights and new vistas for academic investigation. (shrink)

Recent developments within literary theory challenge the theological assumption that specific words can act as ‘transcendental signifiers’, claiming supra‐linguistic origin and divine authority. Within the postmodern theology of Mark Taylor this challenge is taken up in such a way as to obliterate the idea of divine revelation within language. However, this article contends that this position, which claims to be absolutely ‘post‐revelational’ results in self‐contradictory statements, hidden and unacknowledged forms of foundationalism, and a disregard for the radically other and different. (...) Karl Barth also addresses the problem of the radical relativity of words, but without denying the influence of divine revelation within language. Taking the nature of the ‘true Word’ as being radically Christological, Barth claims the miraculous nature of transcendence‐within‐language. However, this divine presence within the Word of God remains hidden, and thus does not inaugurate a violent miracle, whereby human language in all its relativity would be trivialized. Instead of claiming to have abolished transcendent foundations in the light of the challenge of relativism, as Taylor does, this article claims that Barth openly advocates a non‐violent, subtle form of transcendent foundationalism for theology, and thus maintains both the relativity of language and divine revelation as the ‘Word of God’. (shrink)

Cell line immortalisation is a growing component of African genomics research and biobanking. However, little is known about the factors influencing consent to cell line creation and immortalisation in African research settings. We contribute to addressing this gap by exploring three questions in a sample of Xhosa participants recruited for a South African psychiatric genomics study: First, what proportion of participants consented to cell line storage? Second, what were predictors of this consent? Third, what questions were raised by participants during (...) this consent process? 760 Xhose people with schizophrenia and 760 controls were matched to sex, age, level of education and recruitment region. We used descriptive statistics to determine the proportion of participants who consented to cell line creation and immortalization. Logistic regression methods were used to examine the predictors of consent. Reflections from study recruiters were elicited and discussed to identify key questions raised by participants about consent. Approximately 40% of participants consented to cell line storage. The recruiter who sought consent was a strong predictor of participant’s consent. Participants recruited from the South African Eastern Cape, and older participants, were more likely to consent; both these groups were more likely to hold traditional Xhosa values. Neither illness nor education were significant predictors of consent. Key questions raised by participants included two broad themes: clarification of what cell immortalisation means, and issues around individual and community benefit. These findings provide guidance on the proportion of participants likely to consent to cell line immortalisation in genomics research in Africa, and reinforce the important and influential role that study recruiters play during seeking of this consent. Our results reinforce the cultural and contextual factors underpinning consent choices, particularly around sharing and reciprocity. Finally, these results provide support for the growing literature challenging the stigmatizing perception that people with severe mental illness are overly vulnerable as a target group for heath research and specifically genomics studies. (shrink)

In this article I consider five anonymous quotations in Stephanus of Byzantium. The first is very probably an overlooked fragment of early mythography. The other four are much less likely to be early, but theoretically could be and are included for the sake of completeness.

Katalog der griechischen Handschriften der Bayerischen Staatsbibliothek München, Bd. 10,1. [Catalogus codicum manu scriptorum Bibliothecae Monacensium historia] Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz 2002. 176 S. Seit über 10 Jahren arbeitet die Verf. an der Neubeschreibung der griechischen Handschriften der Staatsbibliothek in München; das vorliegende Werk behandelt die Provenienz der Signaturengruppe Monac.gr. 1–323, die vor dem Jahr 1803 in die bayrische Metropole kamen. Die Analyse der Geschichte von Bibliotheken bzw. einzelner Manuskripte zeigt den Einfluß politischer Fährnisse im 17. Jh. Da der Herzog von Bayern (...) 1623 zum Kurfürst erhoben wird, muß auch sein Exlibris geändert werden. Dieses neue Exlibris wird jedoch über das alte Eignerzeichen geklebt, so daß beide Formen erhalten blieben. Nach dem Sieg der Truppen der katholischen Mächte bei Nördlingen 1634 kamen Handschriften aus Tübingen nach München, deren Herkunft nach Konstantinopel führt: Dort wurden sie von Stephan Gerlach für Herzog Ludwig von Württemberg erworben. (shrink)

This article explores Albert Stephanus Geyser’s understanding and application of the Christ-hymn, focusing especially on the use of the words μορφή θεοῦ. The tension between a literary-critical approach to the text versus a dogmatic understanding is exposed, as well as the challenge of a political ideology of power. Geyser’s understanding and application are measured in terms of the current state of New Testament exegetical research. In the footsteps of Stendahl and contemporary New Testament scholars, legitimacy is given to a (...) socio-political reading of the text. Geyser is appreciated as a public theologian with a deep consideration for the text as the source for theological and socio-political reflection and practice. (shrink)

The astronomical commentary of Stephanus of Alexandria is an important marker in the history and the transmission of Ptolemy's Handy Tables. Following the example of the Small Commentary of Theon of Alexandria, Stephanus however adjusts the tables and the astronomical data to the geographical coordinates of Byzantium. The treatise presents a problem of attribution because it's anonymous in most manuscripts. The text shows also small additions from the emperor Heraclius Ist. We are preparing a critical edition of the (...) commentary. These study presents several results of our work. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Book Reviews Bibliography on Plato's "'Laws, "" 1920-1970: With Additional Citations through May, 1975. By Trevor J. Saunders. (New York: Arno Press, 1976. Pp. i + 60. $15.00) The Penguin Classics translator of the non-Socratic Laws, as Leo Strauss called them, has here compiled in a most usable way a thorough bibliography of books and articles about the Laws or parts of them. The section "Texts, Translations, and Commentaries" (...) properly excludes translations not made directly from the Greek. In previous centuries this would, also properly, have excluded many a famous or popular translation, such as Thomas Taylor's or Victor Cousin's, worked out from the text of M. Ficino's "first edition" in Latin. Given the state of the Greek text and the practice, inaugurated by Ficino, of improving upon the Greek in the translatioias, some notation about the literalness of the translations cited would have been of additional value. Section B, in thirty pages, is the largest and also deliberately the most selective in striving to limit itself to work concerned exclusively or primarily with the Laws. But it cannot avoid including much material about some aspect of Plato in general rather than about the Laws; this is especially true of the subsection, B1, on comprehensive accounts. Section B2, on the text and its tradition, has overwhelmingly more citations about the indirect tradition than about the texts themselves, an interesting indication of the current state of this question. The next subsections, to B12, divide according to subject matter. BI3 lists studies on the influence of the Laws. The last section, in twenty-four pages, is most valuable. It lists, by Stephanus page number, an abundance of discussions of individual passages from Book I through Book XII wherever these discussions, bibliographically speaking, may have occurred. Students of the Laws will be well served by, and most grateful to, Professor Saunders for this bibliography. I can only second the intent of his parting epigraph that sends us back to the study of the Laws themselves. But I must add that more explicitly detailed work appears to be required both on the difficulties the text itself presents to students of Plato (one thinks of A. Boeckh's analyses of the prose in Books I through III) and on those which arise when the Laws is contrasted--from the point of view of design and intellectuality--with those of Plato's works that are comparable, if not in number of pages, at least in scale of conception and monumentality. V. TEJERA SUNY at Stony Brook Science and Philosophy in Aristotle's Biological Works. By Anthony Preus. (Hildesheim and New York: George Olms, 1975. Pp. ix + 404. DM.88) A reciprocal influence between Aristotle's philosophy and biology--if it could be demonstrated through step-by-step criticism and not merely asserted in generalities about functionalism--might help to explain both, and might also itself be philosophically interesting ; for it should clarify Aristotle's concepts of form, essence, universal, and species-concepts which have been mercilessly jumbled in the traditional interpretations. With the failure of Jaegerian developmental analyses, we can hardly now hope for help from detailed chronology. But a general dating of Aristotle's biological interest to the Assos-Mytilene period, when he was already aged forty, is accepted by most people (though not by Jaeger who [463] 464 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY put it at the end, nor by Ryle who put it at the beginning of Aristotle's career) and is the basis of Anthony Preus's contention in this book. For if Aristotle began serious biology only in middle life we could expect a tension between the antiphenomenal metaphysics of the Academy, which he had just left after twenty years there, and the kind of philosophizing and explaining that might seem demanded by living concrete organisms. Preus sets out to show such a tension, claiming on page 1 that "in P. A. and G. A. sometimes the philosophical position is bent to fit the observed facts, and sometimes the observations are adjusted to fit the philosophical position." The reader may be assured at once that this appalling accusation (which is repeated in the publisher's blurb) is not... (shrink)

The Phaedo is acknowledged to be one of Plato's greatest masterpieces, showing him both as a philosopher and as a dramatist at the height of his powers. For its moving account of the execution of Socrates, the Phaedo ranks among the supreme literary achievements of antiquity. It is also a seminal document for many ideas deeply ingrained in western culture, and provides one of the best introductions to Plato's thought. This new edition is a revised version of the Clarendon Press (...) translation, and is eminently suitable for readers new to Plato, and ideal for classroom use, thanks to the provision of Stephanus page and letter numbering. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more. (shrink)

When Ockham's logic arrives in Italy, some Dominican philosophers bring into question Ockham's ontological reductionist program. Among them, Franciscus de Prato and Stephanus de Reate pay a great attention to refute Ockham's claim that no universal exists in the extra-mental world. In order to reject Ockham's program, they start by reconsidering the notion of 'real', then the range of application of the rational and the real distinction. Generally, their strategy consists in re-addressing against Ockham some arguments extracted from Hervaeus (...) Natalis's works. Franciscus's and Stephanus's basic idea is that some universals are not acts of cognition, but extra-mental, predicable things. Such things are not separable from singulars, nonetheless they are not the same as those singulars. Consequently, it is not necessary to allow, as Ockham does, that if two things are not really identical, they are really different and hence really separable. According to them, it is possible to hold that two things are not really identical without holding that they are also really non-identical and hence really different. Basically, their reply relies on a different notion of the relation of identity. Identity is regarded as an intersection of classes of things, so that it is possible to say that two things are really identical without saying that they also are the same thing. Franciscus and Stephanus, however, do not seem to achieve completely their aim. (shrink)

In Plato’s Symposium, the mysterious Apollodorus recounts to an unnamed comrade, and to us, Aristodemus’ story of just what happened at Agathon’s drinking party. Since Apollodorus did not attend the party, however, it is unclear what relevance he could have to our understanding of Socrates’ speech, or to the Alcibiadean “satyr and silenic drama” (222d) that follows. The strangeness of Apollodorus is accentuated by his recession into the background after only two Stephanus pages. What difference—if any—does Apollodorus make to (...) the Symposium? Does his inclusion call the dramatic and philosophical unity of the work into question? I argue that despite initial appearances, Plato has important philosophical reasons for including Apollodorus as a character. Far from being an odd appendage to an otherwise complete narrative, the figure of Apollodorus is useful for our understanding of Socrates’s conception of eros later in the work. (shrink)

In the course of its 53 Stephanus pages Plato's Protagoras uses the verb διαλέγεσθαι 32 times: a frequency considerably greater than that of any other dialogue. The next largest total is 21 occurrences in the Theaetetus. In the vast bulk of the Republic διαλέγεσθαι occurs just 20 times over 294 Stephanus pages. The ratios are striking. In the Protagoras the verb turns up on average once every 1.65 Stephanus pages; in the Theaetetus once every 3.25 pages; in (...) the Republic only once every 14.7. The statistics reflect a fact evident to any reader of the Protagoras and Theaetetus, that the first of these dialogues is Plato's most sustained treatment of the comparative merits of the many different forms of διαλέγεσθαι, the second his most ambitious exhibition of the type of dialectic with which Socrates there wins his contest against Protagoras. It is the former dialogue that interests me here. (shrink)

Regarding the relation of Plato’s early and middle period dialogues, scholars have been divided to two opposing groups: unitarists and developmentalists. While developmentalists try to prove that there are some noticeable and even fundamental differences between Plato’s early and middle period dialogues, the unitarists assert that there is no essential difference in there. The main goal of this article is to suggest that some of Plato’s ontological as well as epistemological principles change, both radically and fundamentally, between the early and (...) middle period dialogues. Though this is a kind of strengthening the developmentalistic approach corresponding the relation of the early and middle period dialogues, based on the fact that what is to be proved here is a essential development in Plato’ ontology and his epistemology, by expanding the grounds of development to the ontological and epistemological principles, it hints to a more profound development. The fact that the bipolar and split knowledge and being of the early period dialogues give way to the tripartite and bound knowledge and benig of the middle period dialogues indicates the development of the notions of being and knowledge in Plato’s philosophy before the dialogues of the middle period. -/- Keywords Plato; early dialogues; middle dialogues; being; knowledge; development -/- Introduction The differences between two groups of the early and middle period dialogues have always been a matter of dispute. Whereas the developmentalists like Vlastos, Silverman (2002), Teloh (1981), Dancy (2004) and Rickless (2007) think that from the early to the middle dialogues Plato’s philosophy changes, at least in some essential points, the unitarists like Kahn, Cherniss and Shorey believe that there happens no development and the differences must be taken as natural, ignorable and even pedagogic. In his well-known article, Socrates contra Socrates in PLATO, Vlastos lists ten theses of difference between two groups of dialogues. The first group which includes Plato’s early dialogues he divides to 'elenctic' (Apology, Charmides, Crito, Euthyphro, Gorgias, Hippias Minor, Ion, Laches, Protagoras and Republic I) and 'transitional' (Euthydemus, Hippias Major, Lysis, Menexenus and Meno) dialogues. These transitional come after all the elenctic dialogues and before all the dialogues of the second group which compose Plato’s middle period dialogues, including (with Vlastos' chronological order) Cratylus, Phaedo, Symposium, Republic II-X, Phaedrus, Parmenides and Theaetetus (1991, 46-49). Vlastos asserts strictly that his list of differences are 'so diverse in content and method that they contrast as sharply with one another as with any third philosophy you care to mention, beginning with Aristotole’s' (ibid, 46). Vlastos’ list of differences between two Socrateses is considered a view breaking sharply between the early and the middle dialogues. Besides all ten differences between the two Socrateses in Vlastos’ list that can be supportive for our doctrine here, we intend to focus on some ontological as well as epistemological distinctions that have not completely been discussed hitherto. Contrary to the developmentalist theory of Vlastos, unitarian theory of Charles Kahn wishes to eliminate any substantial difference between the early and the middle dialogues. He distinguishes seven 'pre-middle' or 'threshold' dialogues including Laches, Charmides, Euthyphro, Protagoras, Meno, Lysis and Euthydemus from the other Socratic dialogues which he calls 'earliest group' (1996, 41). The threshold dialogues, Kahn thinks, 'embarke upon a sustained project' that is to reach to its climax in the middle period dialogues, namely Phaedo, Symposium and Republic. Believing in that there is no 'fundamental shift'between the early and middle dialogues (ibid, 40), Kahn thinks the Socratic dialogues are just the 'first stage' with a 'deliberate silence' towards the theories of later periods (ibid, 339). One of the reasons of the surprising fact that Plato gives no hint of the metaphysics and epistemology of the Forms in the early dialogues, he thinks, is the pedagogical advantages of aporia. He thinks that Plato 'obscurely', and mostly because of education, hinted to some doctrines and conceptions in his early dialogues and with the aim of clarifying them only in the later ones (ibid, 66). The seven threshold dialogues, Kahn asserts, 'had been designed from the first' to prepare the pupils and readers for the views expounded in the middle period dialogues (ibid, 59-60). To show that the differences of the two Socrateses of the early and middle period dialogue are in their onto-epistemological grounds and thence cannot be explained by a unitaristic view, we try to draw the ontological and epistemological principles of the early dialogues in the first part below in order to show, in the second part, that those principles have been developed in the middle period dialogues. -/- A. The Onto-Epistemologic Principles of the Early Dialogues Socratic dialogues are paradoxical about knowledge because while being knowledge-oriented always searching for knowledge, they deny it and even never discuss it directly. Three elements of Socrates’ way of searching Knowledge throughout the early dialogues, i.e. Socratic 'what is X?' question, his disavowal of knowledge and his elenctic method combined together produce something like a circle which works, more or less, in the same way in these dialogues. Though this circle is an embaressing inquiry always resulting in ignorance instead of knowledge, its motivation is surprisingly Socrates’ passionate enthusiasm for knowledge, an intensive love of wisdom. The starting point of this circle is Socrates’ confession of having no knowledge which might be explicitly asserted or presupposed, maybe because it was one of the famous characteristics of Socrates; a confession always paradoxically accompanied with his intense longing for knowledge (e.g., Gorgias 505e4-5). Every time Socrates encounters with someone who thinks he knows something (οἴεταί τι εἰδέναι) (Apology 21d5) and tries to examine him. This examination seems to be the simplest one asking just what it is that he knows. Socrates’ elenchus, therefore, is always connected with 'what is X?' (τίς ποτέ ἐστιν) question, a question that most of the early dialogues of Plato are concerned with; 'what is courage?' in the Laches, 'what is piety?' in Euthydemus, 'what is temperance?' in Charmides and 'what is beauty?' in Hippias Major. This question we call here 'Socratic question' and probably is the very question the historical Socrates used to employ, is tightly interrelated with both his disavowal and his elenchus. He disclaims knowledge because he cannot find the answer to the question himself and he rejects others’ since they cannot offer the correct answer too. Every interlocutor can claim he knows X, if and only if he can answer the Socratic question. Otherwise, he is more of an ignorant than of a knower of τί ποτέ ἐστι X. Knowing the answer to this question is, thus, knowledge’s criterion for Socrates. Having found out that he cannot answer what it is which he would claim to know, the interlocutor comes to the point Socrates was there at the beginning. The least advantage of this circle is that he becomes as wise as Socrates does about the subject, becoming aware that he does not know it. At the end of the circle they are both still at the beginning, not knowing what X is. So let us first take a glance at these three elements. Socratic disavowal of knowledge is strictly asserted in some passages. At Apology 21b4-5, Socrates says: -/- I do not know of myself being wise at all (οὔτε μέγα οὔτε σμικρὸν σύνοιδα ἐμαυτῷ σοφὸς ὤν) -/- Moreover, at 21d4-6: -/- None of us knows anything worthwhile (καλὸν κἀγαθὸν εἰδέναι) …. I do not know (οἶδα) neither do I think I know. -/- In Charmides Socrates speaks about a fear about his probable mistake of thinking that he knows (εἰδέναι) something when he does not (166d1-2). The somehow generalization of this disavowal can be seen in Gorgias. After calling his disavowal 'an account that is always the same' (509a4-5), Socrates continues (a5-7): -/- I say that I do not know (οἶδα) how these things are, but no one I have ever met, like now, who can say anything else without being absurd. -/- At the end of Hippias Major (304d7-8), Socrates affirms his disavowal of knowledge of 'what is X?' this time about the fine: -/- I do not know (οἶδα) what that is itself (αὐτὸ τοῦτο ὅτι ποτέ ἐστιν). Some other passages, however, made a number of scholars dubious about Socrates’ disavowal. Vlastos mentions Apology 29b6-7 as an evidence : 'that to do wrong and to disobey one’s master, both god and men, I know (οἶδα) to be evil and shameful'. He thinks that if we give this single text 'its full weight' it can suffice to show that Socrates does claim knowledge of a moral truth (1985, 7). Vlastos’ claim is not admittable since it would be too strange, I think, for a man like Socrates to violate his disavowal claim just after emphasizing it. We can see his claim just before the already mentioned passage: -/- And surely it is the most blameworthy ignorance to believe that one knows what one does not know. It is perhaps on this point and in this respect, gentlemen, that I differ from the majority of men and if I were to claim that I am wiser than anyone in anything it world be in this, that, as I have no adequate knowledge (οὐκ εἰδὼς ἱκανῶς) of things in the underworld, so I do not think I have (οὐκ εἰδέναι) (Apology 29b1-6) Vlastos tries to solve what he calls the 'paradox' of Socrates’ disavowal of knowledge distinguishing the 'certain' knowledge from 'elenctic' knowledge (1985, 11) and thinking that when Socrates avows knowledge, we must perceive it as an elenctic knowledge, a knowledge its content 'must be propositions he thinks elenctically justifiable' (ibid, 18). Irwin’s solution is the distinction of knowledge and belief. He approves that Socrates does not 'explicitly' make such a distinction, but still thinks that Socrates’ 'test for knowledge would make it reasonable for him to recognize true belief without knowledge, and his own claims are easily understood if they are claims to true belief alone' (1977, 40). While I agree with Vlastos up to a point, I strongly disagree with Irwin about the early dialogues. As I will try to show below, we are not permitted to consider any kind of distinction within knowledge in Socratic dialogues because only one category of knowledge is alluded to there and the distinction of knowledge and belief thoroughly belongs to the second Sorcates. Although no kind of distinction can be admittable here, I think Vlastos’ distinction can be accepted only if we regard it as a distinction between knowledge, which is unique and without any, even incomparable, rival, and a semi-idiomatic and ordinary one that is a necessary requirement for any argument, and thus, unavoidable even for someone who does not claim any kind of knowledge. An apparent evidence of this is Gorgias 505e6-506a4: -/- I go through the discussion as I think it is (ὡς ἄν μοι δοκῇ ἔχειν), if any of you do not agree with admissions I am making to myself, you must object and refute me. For I do not say what I say as I know (οὐδὲ γάρ τοι ἔγωγε εἰδὼς λέγω ἃ λέγω) but as searching jointly with you (ζητῶ κοινῇ μεθ᾽ ὑμῶν). -/- The minimal degree of knowledge everyone must have to take part in an argument, conduct it and use the phrase "I know" when it is necessary is what Socrates cannot deny. We can call it elenctic knowledge only if we agree that it is not the kind of knowledge that Socrates has always been searching, the one that can be accepted as the answer of Socratic 'what is X?' question. His disavowal of knowledge is applied only to the knowledge which can truly be the answer of Socratic question and pass the elenctic exam; a knowledge that, I believe, is never claimed by first Socrates. Socrates conducts his method of examining his interlocutors’ knowledge, our second element here, by almost the same method repeated in Socratic dialogues. That whether we are allowed to regard all the examinations of Socrates in the early dialogues as based on the same or not has been a matter of dispute. Vlastos himself (1994, 31) distinguished Euthydemas, Lysis, Menexenns and Hippias Major from the other Socratic dialogues because he thinks Socrates has lost his faith to elenchus in there. Irwin (1977, 38) distinguishes Apology and Crito where Socrates’ own convictions is present. Contrary to some scholars like Benson (2002, 107) who take elenchus in all the Socratic dialogues as a unique method, Michelle Carpenter and Ronald M. Polansky (2002, 89-100) argue pro the variety of methods of elenchus. Thomas C. Brickhouse and Nicholas D. Smith (2002, 145-160) even reject such a thing as Socratic elenchus which can gather all of the Socrates’ various arguments under such a heading. There can be no solution for the problem of elenchus, they think, is due to 'the simple reason that there is no such thing as 'the Socratic elenchos"'(p.147). Though we consider elenchus a somehow determined process and a part of Socratic circle in the early dialogues, all we assume is that whatever differences it might have in different dialogues, it has the same onto-epistemological principles and, thus, we are not going to take it necessarily as a unique method. This method sets out to prove that the interlocutors are as ignorant as Socrates himself is. That whether elenchus is constructive, capable of establishing doctrines as Vlastos (1994) or Brickhouse and Smith (1994, 20-21) believe or not is another issue to which this paper is not to claim anything. What is crucial for our discussion here is that elenchus does not reach to the very knowledge Socrates is looking for. This is strictly against Irwin who thinks that not only elenchus leads to positive results, 'it should even yield knowledge to match Socrates’ conditions'(1977, 68, cf. 48). He does not explain where and how they really yield to that kind of knowledge. He explains his elenctic method in his apology in the court (Apology 21-22), that how he used to examine wise men, politicians, poets and all those who had the highest reputation for their knowledge and every time found that they have no knowledge. If we accept, as I strongly do, that Socrates’ disavowal of his knowledge is not irony, it might seem more reasonable to agree that the process that has that disavowal as its first step cannot be irony as well. The key of the circle which can explain why Socrates disclaims knowledge and how he can reject others’ claim of having any kind of knowledge lies in the third element, Socratic question. In Hippias Major (287c1-2), Socrates asks: 'Is it not by Justice that just people are Just? (ἆρ᾽ οὐ δικαιοσύνῃ δίκαιοί εἰσιν οἱ δίκαιοι). He insists at 294b1 that they were searching for that by which (ᾧ) all beautiful things are beautiful (cf. b4-5, 8). At Euthyphro 6d10-11 it is said that the Socratic question is waiting for 'the form itself (αὐτὸ τὸ εἶδος) by which (ᾧ) all the pious actions are pious; and at 6d11-e1: -/- Through one form (που μιᾷ ἰδέᾳ) impious actions are impious and pious actions pious. -/- Since the X itself is that by which X is X, knowing 'X itself' is the only way of knowing X. It is probably because of this that Socrates makes the distinction between the ousia as a right answer to the question and effect as a wrong one: -/- I am afraid, Euthyphro, that when you were asked what piety is (τὸ ὅσιον ὅτι ποτ᾽ ἐστίν) you did not wish to make clear its nature itself (οὐσίαν … αὐτοῦ) to me, but you said some effect (πάθος) about it. (Euthp. 11a6-9) -/- 1. Knowledge of what X is Now it is time to look for the onto-epistemological principles of Socratic circle and its three elements. It cannot reasonably be expected from the first Socrates to present us explicitly and clearly formulated principles of his onto-epistemology when such explications cannot be found even in the second Socrates who has some obviously positive theoris. Since there must be some principles underlying this first systematic inqury of knowledge, we must seek to them and be satisfied with elicitation of the first Socratas’ principle. What will be drawn out as his principles cannot and must not, thus, be taken as very fix and dogmatic principles. Some very slightest principles and grounds suffice for our purposes here. The first principle that is the prima facie significance of the Socratic question and his implementation of all those elenctic arguments I call the principle of 'Knowledge of What X is' (KWX): -/- KWX To know X, it is required to know what X is. -/- Aristotle (Metaphysics 1078b23-25, 27-29, 987b4-8) takes Plato’s τί ἐστι question as seeking the definition of a thing that is the same as historical Socrates’ search but applying to a different field. That Plato’s 'what is X?' question was a search for definition became the prevailed understanding of this question up to now. I am going neither to discuss the answer of Socratic question nor to challenge taking it as definition. What I am to insist is that knowledge is attached firmly to the answer of the question: Knowledge of X is not anything but the knowledge of what X is. It entails, certainly, the priority of this knowledge to any other kind of knowledge about X but it also has something more fundamental about the relation of knowledge and Socratic question. Socrates’ exclusive focus on the answer of his question can authorize the consideration of such an essential role for KWX in his epistemolgoy. The total rejection of his interlocutors’ knowledge when they are unable to answer the question can be regarded as a strong evidence for it. Socrates’ elenctic method and his rejection of others’ knowledge in the early dialogues, which all end aporetically with no one accepted as knower and nothing as knowledge, prevent us from finding any positive evidence for this. We have to be content, therefore, of negative evidences which, I think, can be found wherever Socrates rejects his interlocutors’ knowledge when they are not able to give an acceptable answer to his 'what is X?' question. 2. Bipolar Epistemology Socrates’ rejection of his interlocutors’ knowledge has another epistemological principle as its basis. Let me call this principle Bipolar Epistemology' (BE): BE There is no third way besides knowledge and Ignorance. -/- BE says that about every object of knowledge there are only two subjective statuses: knowledge and Ignorance. Socrates’ disavowal, however, says nothing but that he is ignorant of knowledge of X because he does not know what X is. This means that BE is presupposed here. Socrates’ elenchus and his rejection of interlocutors’ having any kind of knowledge are the necessary results of the fact that he does not let any third way besides knowledge and ignorance. The first Socrates never let anyone partly know X or have a true opinion about it, as he would not let anyone know anything about X when he did not know what X is. -/- 3. Bipolar Ontology The principle of BE in first Socrates’ epistemology is parallel to another principle in his ontology. Plato’s bipolar distinction between being and not being is as strict and perfect as his distinction between knowledge and ignorance. This principle I shall call the principle of 'Bipolar Ontology' (BO): BO Being is and not being is not. BO is apparently the same with the well-known Parmenidean Principle of being and not being (cf. Diels-Kranz (DK) Fr. 2.2-5). Euthydemus’ statement against the possibility of false knowledge can be good evidence for this principle: -/- The things which are not surely do not exist (τὰ δὲ μὴ ὄντα … ἄλλο τι ἢ οὐκ ἔστιν). (Euthydemus 284b3-4) -/- He continues (b4-5): -/- There is nowhere for not being to be there (οὖν οὐδαμοῦ τά γε μὴ ὄντα ὄντα ἐστίν). -/- That BE does not let true opinion as a third option besides knowledge and ignorance seems to be related to BO’s rejecting a third option besides being and not being, which is itself the basis of the impossibility of false belief. Socrates’ elaborate discussion of the problem of false belief in Theatetus that leads to a more decisive discussion and finally to some solutions in Sophist can make our consideration of BO for the first group of dialogues authentive. -/- 4. &5. Split Knowledge and Split Being The fourth principle I shall call the principle of 'Split Knowledge' (SK): -/- SK Knowledge of X is separated from any other knowledge (of anything else) as if the whole knowledge is split to various parts. -/- This Principle is hinted and criticized as Socrates’ way of treating with knowledge in Hippias Major: -/- But Socrates, you do not contemplate the entireties of things, nor do people you have used to talk with (τὰ μὲν ὅλα τῶν πραγμάτων οὐ σκοπεῖς, οὐδ᾽ ἐκεῖνοι οἷς σὺ εἴωθας διαλέγεσθαι). (301b2-4) -/- Contrary to Rankin who regards the passage as 'antilogical, almost eristic in tone rather than presenting a serious philosophy of being' (1983, 54), I think it can be taken as serious. Hippias criticizes Sorcates that he does not contemplate (σκοπεῖς) the entireties of things (ὅλα τῶν πραγμάτων), a critique which Socrates is not its only subject but all those whom Socrates accustomed to talk with (ἐκεῖνοι οἷς σὺ εἴωθας διαλέγεσθαι). This last phrase, I think, extends this critic beyond this dialogue to other Socratic dialogues. Hippias’ use of the perfect tense of the verb ἔθω (to be accustomed) is a good evidence of this extension. We can get, thus, these ἐκεῖνοι as Socrates’ interlocutors in his other dialogues that hints that this criticism has the epistemological groundings of the previous dialogues as its subject. What ἐκεῖνοι οἷς σὺ εἴωθας διαλέγεσθαι points to is that Hippias does not have in mind Socrates’ way of treating things only in this dialogue, but he is also criticizing Socrates’ way throughout his dialogues. At 301b4-5, Socrates and his interlocutors’ way of beholding things is described as such: -/- You people knock (κρούετε) at the fine and each of the beings (ἕκαστον τῶν ὄντων) by taking each being cut up in pieces (κατατέμνοντες) in words (ἐν τοῖς λόγοις). This leads us to our next principle that is parallel to, and the ontological side of, SK, the principle of 'Split Being'(SB): -/- SB Everything (being) is separated from any other thing as if the whole being is split to many beings. -/- Socrates and his interlocutors and thus, as we saw, the Socratic dialogues are accused to regard everything as it is separated from all other things. This separation is en tois logois that, I think, can reasonably be taken as saying that Socratic dialogues (it refers of course to the dialogues before Hippias Major) cut up all things which have the same name/definition from all other things and try to understand them separately, without considering other things that are not in their logos. They, for example in Hippias Major, are cutting up to kalon and try to understand what it and all others inside this logos are by separating it from all other things. This is directed straightly against Socratic question and the way Socratic dialogues follow to find its answer, every time separating one logos. As Meyer (1995, 85) points out, every question 'presupposes that the X in question in a logos is something' and 'every answer to every question aims at unity' (84). The critique of Hippias Major is, therefore, at the same time a critique of SK and SB. It is also a critique of KWX because it is only based on KWX that Socratic dialogues could search for the answer of 'what is X' question supposing that knowing what X is is enough for the knowledge of X. SK and KWX are absolutely interdependent. What Socrates and all his previous interlocutors have neglected in Socratic dialogues, Hippias says, was 'continuous bodies of being' (διανεκῆ σώματα τῆς οὐσίας) (301b6). Either this theory actually belongs to the historical Hippias as it is being said or not, it is strictly criticizing SB. We have the same phrase with changing sūma to logos some lines later at 301e3-4: διανεκεῖ λόγῳ τῆς οὐσίας. Although this theory that can be observed as both an ontological and an epistemological theory is rejected by Socrates (301cff.), it is still against first Socrates’ onto-epistemological principles and might let us look at what is rejected as Socratic prineple. -/- 6. Knowledge is of Being The sixth principle that I think is presupposed by the first Socrates, is the 'Knowledge of Being' Principle (KB): -/- KB Knowledge is of Being. -/- This principle is obviously the source of the problem of false knowledge, a very important problem throughout Plato’s philosophy. We face this problem maybe for the first time in Euthydemus. In less than 20 Stephanus’ pages, 276-295, we are encountered with different interwoven problems about knowledge , all grounded in the problem of false opinion. Having challenged the obvious possibility of telling lies at 283e, at 284 Euthydemus discusses it saying that the man who speaks is speaking about 'one of those things that are (ἓν μὴν κἀκεῖνό γ᾽ ἐστὶν τῶν ὄντων)' (284a3) and thus speaks what is (λέγων τὸ ὄν) (a5). He must necessarily be saying truth when he is speaking what is because he who speaks what is (τὸ ὄν) and the things that are (τὰ ὄντα) speaks truth (τἀληθῆ λέγει) (a5-6). This is based on Parmenidean principle of the impossibility of being of not being which Euthydemus restates (284b3-4) and we mentioned discussing BO principle above. The things that are not are nowhere (οὐδαμοῦ) and there is no possibility for anyone to do (πράξειεν) anything with them because they must be made as being before anything else can be done, which is impossible (b5-7). The words, then, are of things that exist (εἰσὶν ἑκάστῳ τῶν ὄντων λόγοι) (285e9) and as they are (ὡς ἔστιν) (e10). The result is that no one can speak of things as they are not. It is this impossibility of false speach that is extended to thinking (δοξάζειν) at 286d1 and leads to the impossibility of false opinion (ψευδής … δόξα) (286d4). The general conclusion is asserted at 287a extending this impossibility to actions and making any kind of mistake. Not only knowledge is of being but speech, thought and action are of being simply because of the fact that nothing can be of not being. -/- B. First Socrates’ Principles in the Middle Period Dialogues Out of what were presupposed or criticized mostly in five dialogues, Euthyphro, Euthydemus, Hippias Major, Laches and Charmides, we tried to draw the first Socrates’ principles. Our inquiry here is directed to find out the fate of these principles in the three dialogues of the middle period, Meno, Phaedo and Republic. To do this, first we ought to check the situation of Socratic circle in these dialogues. The Socratic circle that was predominant in the early dialogues, does not look like a circle here anymore though they certainly have some features in common. Meno, Phaedo and Republic II-X are not committed to the principles of the circle and the whole circle in disrupted in them. The difference of the two Socrateses towards acquiring knowledge is obvious. The Socrates of Meno, Phaedo and Republic is evidently more self-confident that he can get to some truths during his arguments as he does. They are in their first appearance, as almost all other dialogues, committed to Socrates’ disavowal. All of them try to keep the shape of the Socratikoi Logoi genre, which is committed to the historical Socrates’ way of discussion; a dramatic personage who is to challenge his interlocutors, ask them and refuse the answers. Nevertheless, the fact is that what we have in common between two groups of dialogues is mostly a dramatic structure. Whereas the first group’s arguments are based on Socrates’ disavowal and lead to no positive results, the second group is decisively going to achieve some positive results. The aim of the first Socrates was to show others that they are ignorant of what they thought they knew. The new Socrates of Meno, on the opposite, makes so much efforts to show that the slave boy has within himself true opinions (ἀληθεῖς δόξαι) about the things that he does not know (οἶδε) (85c6-7). Despite his lack of knowledge, he has true opinions nevertheless. The way from these true opinions to knowledge, as Socrates states, is not so long. These true opinions are now like a dream but 'can become knowledge of the same things not less accurate than anyone’s' (οὐδενὸς ἧττον ἀκριβῶς ἐπιστήσεται περὶ τούτων) (c11-d1), if they be repeated by asking the same questions. The most outstanding text regarding Socrates’ disavowal is Meno 98b where he explicitly claims knowledge: -/- And indeed I also speak as (ὡς) one who does not know (εἰδὼς) but is guessing (εἰκάζων). However, [about the fact] that true opinion and knowledge are different, I do not altogether expect (δοκῶ) myself to be guessing (εἰκάζειν), but if I say about anything that I know (εἰδέναι) -which about few things I say- this is one of the things that I know (οἶδα). (98b1-5) This passage is very significant about Plato’s disavowal of knowledge. There can hardly be found, I think, anywhere else in Plato’s corpus where Socrates speaks about his knowledge of something as such. He says first that he speaks as someone who does not know. This ὡς οὐκ εἰδὼς λέγω comparing with what he used to say in the first group, οὐκ οἶδα, has this added ὡς. Socrates does not claim strongly anymore that he does not know anything but speaks only as someone who does not know. He needs this ὡς not only because he is going to accept that he does know some, though few, things immediately after this sentence, but also because he needs his previous disavowal to be loosened from Meno on. He does not merely say here that he knows something. It is then different from the examples mentioned before which could be taken as idiomatic or at least not emphatic. Socrates’ remarkable emphasis on distinguishing εἰδέναι from εἰκάζειν departs it from all other passages where he says only he knows something. Moreover, he claims definitely that he has knowledge about few (ὀλίγα) things. From the early to the middle dialogues, Socrates’ attitude to knowledge has totally renewed its face. He brings forth a new concept, true opinion, and he does not speak of knowledge as he used to before; the rough, perfect and unachievable knowledge of the first group has turned to something more smooth, realistic and achievable. Comparing with the early dialogues that did not set out from the first to reach positive results, the middle ones are extraordinarily and surprisingly positive and hence destroy the basis of the Socratic circle. The questions and answers are purposely directed to some specific new theories; most of them are not directly related to the topics or the main questions of the dialogues. They are suggested when Socrates draws the attention of the interlocutor away from the main question because of the necessity of another discussion. Even if the main question remains unanswered, we have still many positive theories, prominently of metaphysical type. These theories are so abundant and dominant in these dialogues, especially Phaedo and Republic, that one might think that they may appear to be arbitrarily sandwiched in there. This helps dialogues to keep their original Socratic structure while they are suggesting new theories. Hence, the Socratic question of 'what is X?', though is still used to launch the discussion, is loosened and is forgotten for most part of the dialogues. Meno that has first a differently formulated question, 'can virtue be taught?', leads finally to the Socratic question of 'What is virtue?'. Phaedo is dedicated to the demonstration of the immortality of soul and the life after death without having a central Socratic question. The case of Republic is more complicated. The first book, on the one hand, has all the criteria of a Socratic circle: its 'what is justice?' question, Socrates’ strong disavowal (e.g. 337d-e), his rejection of all answers and coming back to the first point without finding out any answer. This Book, considered alone, is a perfect Socratic dialogue, as many scholars regard it as early and separated from other books. The books II-X are, on the other hand, far from implementing a Socratic circle. They have still the 'what is justice?' question as their incentive leading question, but they are, in most of the positive doctrines and methods that encompass the main parts, ignoring the question. Even these books that, I believe, are the farthest discussions from the Socratic circle are so cautious not to break the Socratic structure of the dialogue as long as it is possible. What is changed is not the structure of the dialogue but the ontological and epistemological grounds based on which new theories are suggested. -/- 1. Knowledge of the Good We can clearly see in the second group of dialogues that the KWX principle loses the place it had before in our first group. It is not, of course, rejected, but still we cannot say that it has the same situation. KWX that was based on Socratic question, as we discussed before, was the leading principle of the first Socrates’ epistemology and of the highest position. Other epistemological principles, SK directly and BE indirectly, were relying on Socratic question and therefore on KWX. Such a position does not belong to KWX from Meno on. What makes it different in the second Socrates is another principle that is needed it not only as its complementary principle but also as what is more fundamental. Plato, then, does not reject KWX in this period, but, it seems, he transcends to another more basic principle; a principle we shall call the principle of 'Knowledge of the Good' (KG): -/- KG Knowledge of X requires knowledge of the Good. -/- Whereas all the dialogues of our first group are free from any discuscon about KG, it bears a very important role in the second group so as becomes the superior principle of knowledge in Republic. Trying to solve the problem of teachability of virtue, Socrates says that it can be teachable only if it is a kind of knowledge because nothing can be taught to human beings but knowledge (ἐπιστήμην) (Meno 87c2). The dilemma will be, then, whether virtue is knowledge or not (c11-12) and since virtue is good, we can change the question to: whether is there anything good separate from knowledge (εἰ μέν τί ἐστιν ἀγαθὸν καὶ ἄλλο χωριζόμενον ἐπιστήμης) (d4-5). Therefore, the conclusion will be that if there is nothing good which knowledge does not encompass, virtue can be nothing but knowledge (d6-8). What let us discuss KG as an epistemological principle for the second Secrates is the relation he tries to establish between knowledge and the Good which, though is alongside with the mentioned thesis and the idea of virtue as knowledge, goes much deeper inside epistemology asking to regard the Good as the basis of knowledge. The effort of Phaedo cannot succeed in establishing the Good as the criterion of explanation and knowledge since, I think, it needs a far more complicated ontology of Republic where Socrates can finally announce KG. What is said in Republic is totally compatible with Phaedo 99d–e and the metaphor of watching an eclipse of the sun. In spite of the fact that we do not have adequate knowledge of the Idea of the Good, it is necessary for every kind of knowledge: 'If we do not know it, even if we know all other things, it is of no benefit to us without it' (505a6-7). The problem of our not having sufficient knowledge of the Idea of Good is tried to be solved by the same method of Phaedo 99d-e, that is to say, by looking at what is like instead of looking at thing itself (506d8-e4). It is this solution that leads to the comparison of the Good with sun in the allegory of Sun (508b12-13). What the Good is in the intelligible realm corresponds to what the sun is in the visible realm; as sun is not sight, but is its cause and is seen by it (b9-10), the Good is so regarding knowledge. It has, then, the same role for knowledge that the sun has for sight. Socrates draws our attention to the function of sun in our seeing. The eyes can see everything only in the light of the day being unable to see the same things in the gloom of night (508c4-6). Without the sun, our eyes are dimmed and blind as if they do not have clear vision any longer (c6-7). That the Good must have the same role about knowledge based on the analogy means that it must be considered as a required condition of any kind of knowledge: -/- The soul, then, thinks (νόει) in the same way: whenever it focuses on what is shined upon by truth and being, understands (ἐνόησέν), knows (ἔγνω) and apparently possesses understanding (νοῦν ἔχειν). (508d4-6) -/- Socrates does not use agathon in this paragraph and substitutes it with both aletheia and to on. He links them with the Idea of the Good when he is to assert the conclusion of the analogy: -/- That which gives truth to the objects of knowledge and the power of knowing to the knower, you must say, is the Idea of the Good: being the cause of knowledge and truth (αἰτίαν δ᾽ ἐπιστήμης οὖσαν καὶ ἀληθείας) so far as it is known (ὡς γιγνωσκομένης μὲν διανοοῦ). (508e1-4) Knowledge and truth are called goodlike (ἀγαθοειδῆ) since they are not the same as the Good but more honoured (508e6-509a5). KG, which had been implicitly contemplated and searched in Phaedo, is now explicitly being asserted in Republic. As what was quoted clearly proves, this principle is the very one which we can observe as the most fundamental principle of the second Socrates in Republic, corresponding to the role KWX had in the first Socrates. The Form of the Good in Republic, of which Santas speaks as 'the centerpiece of the canonical Platonism of the middle dialogues, the centerpiece of Plato’s metaphysics, epistemology, ethics and …' (1983, 256) much more can be said. Plato’s Cave allegory in Book VIII dedicates a similar role to the Idea of the Good. The Idea of the Good is there as the last thing to be seen in the knowable realm, something so important that its seeing equals to understanding the fact that it is the cause of all that is correct and beautiful (517b). Producing both light and its source in visible realm, it controls and provides truth and understanding in the intelligible realm (517c). -/- 2. Tripartite Epistemology BE is thoroughy rejected in the second Socrates and substituted by its opposite, the principle of 'Tripartite Epistemolgy' (TE): -/- TE Opinion is an epistemological status between knowledge and ignorance. BE of the first Socrates was denying any third way besides knowledge and ignorance which was the foundation of Socratic circle without which Socrates could not reject his interlocutors’ possessing any kind of knowledge. We cannot say, however, that the first Socrates had a third epistemological status in mind but rejected it. Such a status was unacceptable for him so that one can say that he would reject any kind of such status if suggested. There were only two possibilities about knowledge: either one knows something or he does not know it. TE, thus, was not the first Socrates’ discovery and, I think it is not the second Socrates’discovery. All we can see in our second group of dialouges is that he uses this principle as an already demonstrated one. Having examined the slave boy in Meno for the prupose of showing the working of recollection, it truns out that he has some opinions in him while he still does not know. Without trying to prove it, Socrates takes this as the distinction between knowledge and opinion: -/- So, he who does not know (οὐκ εἰδότι) about what he does not know (περὶ ὧν ἂν μὴ εἰδῇ) has within himself true opinions (ἀληθεῖς δόξαι) about the same things he did not know (περὶ τούτων ὧν οὐκ οἶδε) (85c6-7). -/- The same distinction is set between ὀρθὴν δόξαν and ἐπιστήμην at 97b5-6 ff. (also cf. 97b1-2: ὀρθῶς μὲν δοξάζων … ἐπιστάμενος). He connects then their difference to the myth of Daedalus, the statue that would run away and escape. So are true opinions, not willing to remain long in mind and thus not worthy until one ties them down by αἰτίας λογισμῷ (98a3-4). Socrates says that this tying down is anamnesis. We face, in Phaedo, the same relation is settled between knowledge as the process of being tied down and getting the capability to give an account, on the one hand, and anamnesis, on the other hand. When a man knows, he must be able to give an account of what he knows (Phaedo 76b5-6) and since not all people are able to give such an account, those who recollect, recollect what once they learned (76c4). Although the distinction between knowledge and opinion is not explicitly used in Phaedo, referring to the parallel link between knowledge plus account and anamnesis in Phaedo and Meno, one can say that those who cannot recollect are not able to give account and, thus, are in a state of opinion. What is said at Phaedo 84a, though not yet a definite distinction between knowledge and opinion, makes a distinction between their objects so as we can agree that it is presupposed. The soul of the philosopher, Socrates says, follows reason, stays with it forever and contemplates the divine, which is not the object of opinoin (ἀδόξαστον) (84a8, cf. Meno 98b2-5). The distinction of knowledge and belief in Republic has a significant difference with what we discussed in Meno and Phaedo since the distinction of Meno was based on anamnesis and thus more an epistemological distinction. Even in Phaedo that we do not have any elaborate discussion about the distinction, the only hint to the matter at 76 is bound to the theory of anamnesis. In addition to the relation of the distinction with this theory, there is another evidence that does not permit us to consider the distinction as an ontological distinction. Let’s see Meno 85c6-7: -/- So, he who does not know about what he does not know has within himself true opinions about the same things he did not know (τῷ οὐκ εἰδότι ἄρα περὶ ὧν ἂν μὴ εἰδῇ ἔνεισιν ἀληθεῖς δόξαι περὶ τούτων ὧν οὐκ οἶδε). (85c6-7) -/- This last sentence persists that the objects of knowledge and true opinion are the same. What Socrates is to say here is that whereas he does not know X he has true opinion about the same X. I think Socrates’ sentence that the slave boy οὐκ εἰδότι ἄρα περὶ ὧν ἂν μὴ εἰδῇ and his restatement of it by saying περὶ τούτων ὧν οὐκ οἶδε is because he wants to emphasize that the slave boy who does not know, has true opinion about the same thing. Socrates could say this just with using τούτων and there would be no necessity to bring περὶ ὧν ἂν μὴ εἰδῇ for οὐκ εἰδότι if he did not want to emphasize. -/- 3. Tripartite Ontology The distinction between knowledge and true opinion in Republic, on other side, has nothing to do with recollection, but is based on an ontological principle, 'Tripartite Ontology' (TO): -/- TO There are things that both are and are not. -/- This principle I confine, among our three dialogues of the second group, to Republic not extended to Meno and Phaedo, is obviously the opposite of BO. Speaking about the lovers of sights and sounds in the fifth book, Socrates distinguishes them from philosophers because their thought is unable to understand the nature of beautiful itself besides beautiful things (476a6-8) and hence they can only have opinions. The philosopher who, on the contrary, believes in beautiful itself and can distinguish it from beautiful things (476c9-d3), has knowledge because he knows, contrasting others who have opinion because they only opine (d5-6). Since those whose knowledge were degraded as opinion will complain about Socrates’ such calling their thought, he provides them the following argument (476e7-477b1): -/- - Does the person who knows, knows (γιγνώσκει) something (τὶ) or nothing (οὐδέν)? - He knows something (τί). - Something that is (ὂν) or is not (οὐκ ὄν)? - Something that is (ὂν) for how could something that is not be known (πῶς γὰρ ἂν μὴ ὄν γέ τι γνωσθείη)? - Then we have an adequate grasp of this: No matter how many ways we examine it, what completely is (παντελῶς ὂν) is completely knowable (παντελῶς γνωστόν) and what is in no way (μὴ ὂν δὲ μηδαμῇ) is in every way unknowable (πάντῃ ἄγνωστον). - A most adequate one. - Good. Now, if anything is such as to be and also not to be (ὡς εἶναί τε καὶ μὴ εἶναι), won’t it be intermediate (μεταξὺ) between what purely is (εἰλικρινῶς ὄντος) and what in no way is (μηδαμῇ ὄντος)? - Yes, it’s intermediate. - Then as knowledge (γνῶσις) is set over what is (τῷ ὄντι), while ignorance (ἀγνωσία) is of necessity set over what is not (μὴ ὄντι) mustn’t we find an intermediate between ignorance (ἀγνοίας) and knowledge (ἐπιστήμης) to be set over the intermediate, if there is such a thing? -/- From the third status of being we must reach to the third status of knowledge. The simple reading of this text can be an existential reading, taking the "is" of the mentioned sentences as existence. The problem is that when it is said that there is something that both is and is not reading "is" existentially, it sounds too bizarre to be acceptable. It cannot easily be understandable to have something as both existent and non-existent at the same time. This problem arose so many debates and led many scholars to reject the existential reading of "is" and suggest some other readings like predicative or veridical readings. I think though Plato’s complicated ontology of Republic cannot be correctly understood by a simple existential reading, this "is" cannot be free from existential sense of being and, thus, cannot be reduced to just a predicative or veridical sense of being. -/- 4. Bound Knowledges In addition to KG, the Good is also the basis of another principle in the second Socrates, namely the principle of 'Bound Knowledge' (BK): -/- BK Knowledge of everything is bound to the knowledge of the Good. -/- We distinguished BK from KG because we want to insist, in BK, on what had not been insisted upon in KG, that is, the binding role that the Good plays in the second Socrates, contrasting the absence of such a role in the first Socrates. Socrates remembers, in Phaedo, his wonderful keen on natural philosophers' wisdom when he was young. The origin of this enthusiasm was Socrates’ hope to know the cause of everything as they used to claim. When he was searching the matters of his interest on their basis, Socrates says, he became convinced he can get no acceptable answer from them and found himself blind even to the things he thought he knew before. One day he hears Anaxagoras’ theory that 'it is Mind that arranges and is the cause of everything (ὡς ἄρα νοῦς ἐστιν ὁ διακοσμῶν τε καὶ πάντων αἴτιος)' (Phd. 97c1-2 cf. DK, Fr.15.8-9, 11-12, 12-14) and thinks that he can finally find what he has always expected, i.e. something which can explain all things. What I intend to show here is that what makes Socrates hopeful is that Anaxagoras’ theory tries 1) to explain all things by one thing and 2) this explanation is understood by Socrates as if it is based on the concept of the Good. That Socrates was searching for one explanation for all things can be proved even from what he has been expecting from natural philosophers. The case is, nonetheless, more clearly asserted when he speaks about Anaxagoras’ theory. In addition to διακοσμῶν τε καὶ πάντων αἴτιος of 97c2 mentioned above, we have τὸ τὸν νοῦν εἶναι πάντων αἴτιον (c3-4) and τόν γε νοῦν κοσμοῦντα πάντα κοσμεῖν (c4-5) all emphasizing on the cause of all things (πάντα) which can clearly prove that one of the reasons which caused Socrates to embrace it delightfully was its claim to provide the cause of all things by one thing. Another reason was that Anaxagoras’ Mind, at least in Socrates’ view, was attempting to explain everything by the concept of the Good. This connection between Mind and Good belongs more to the essential relation they have in Socrates’ thinking than Anaxagoras’ theory because there are almost nothing about such a relation in Anaxagoras. The reason for Socrates’ reading can be that Mind is substantially compatible with Socrates’ idea of the relation between good and knowledge. Both the thesis 'no one does wrong willingly' and the theory of virtue as knowledge we pointed to above are evidences of this essential relation. Nobody who knows that something is bad can choose or do it as bad. The reason, when it is reason, that means when it is as it should be, when it is wise or when it knows, works only based on good-choosing. In this context, when Socrates hears that Mind is considered as the cause of everything, it sounds to him like this: good should be regarded as the basis of the explanation of all things. We see him, thus, passing from the former to the latter without any proof. This is done in the second sentence after introducing Mind: -/- I thought that if this were so, the arranging Mind would arrange all things and put each thing in the way that was Best (ὅπῃ ἂν βέλτιστα ἔχῃ). If one then wished to find the cause of each thing by which it either perishes or exists, one needs to find what is the best way (βέλτιστον αὐτῷ ἐστιν) for it to be, or to be acted upon, or to act. On these premises then it befitted a man to investigate only, about this and other things, what is the most excellent (ἄριστον) and best (βέλτιστον). The same man must inevitably also know what is worse (χεῖρον), for that is part of the same knowledge. (97c4-d5) This passage is a good evidence of Socrates’ leap from Anaxagoras’ Mind to his own concept of the Good that can explain why Socrates found Anaxagoras theory after his own heart (97d7). Mind is welcomed because of its capability for explanation on the basis of good to 'explain why it is so of necessity, saying which is better (ἄμεινον), and that it was better (ἄμεινον) to be so' (97e1-3). What Socrates thought he had found in Anaxagoras can indicate what he had been expecting from natural scientists before. Socrates could not be satisfied with their explanations because they were unable to explain how it is the best for everything to be as it is. It can probably be said, then, that it was the lack of the unifying Good in their explanation that had disappointed him. We must insist that we are discussing what Socrates thought that Anaxagoras’ theory of Mind should have been, not about Anaxagoras’ actual way of using Mind. Phaedo 97c-98b, is not about what Socrates found in Anaxagoras but what he thought he could find in it. On the contrary, it should also be noted that it was not this that was dashed at 98b, but Anaxagoras’ actual way of using Mind. It was Anaxagoras’ fault not to find out how to use such an excellent thesis (98b8-c2, cf. 98e-99b). Socrates gives an example to show how not believing in 'good' as the basis of explanation makes people be wanderers between different unreal explanations of a thing. His words δέον συνδεῖν (binding that binds together) as a description for the Good we chose as the name of BK principle: They do not believe that the truly good and binding binds and holds them together (ὡς ἀληθῶς τὸ ἀγαθὸν καὶ δέον συνδεῖν καὶ συνέχειν οὐδὲν οἴονται). (99c5-6) -/- Having in mind Plato’s well-known analogy of the sun and the Good at Republic 508-509, we can dare to say that his warning of the danger of seeing the truth directly like one watching an eclipse of the sun in Phaedo (99d-e) is more about the difficulty of so-called good-based explanation than its insufficiency, a difficulty which is precisely confirmed in Republic (504e-505a, 506d-e). Moreover, BK is asserted in a more explicit way in the Republic, where the Good is considered not only as a condition for the knowledge of X, as was noted above discussing KG, but also as what binds all the objects of knowledge and also the soul in its knowing them. At Republic VI, 508e1-3, when Socrates says that the Form of the Good 'gives truth to the things known and the power to know to the knower (τοῦτο τοίνυν τὸ τὴν ἀλήθειαν παρέχον τοῖς γιγνωσκομένοις καὶ τῷ γιγνώσκοντι τὴν δύναμιν ἀποδιδὸν)', he wants to set the Good at the highest point of his epistemological structure by which all the elements of this structure are bound. This binding aspect of the Good is by no means a simple binding of all knowledges or all the objects of knowledge, but the most complicated kind of binding as it is expected from the author of the Republic. The kind of unity the Good gives to the different knowledges of different things is comparable with the unity which each Form gives to its participants in Republic: as all the participants of a Form are united by referring to the ideas, all different kinds of knowledge are united by referring to the Good. If we observe Aristotle's assertion that for Plato and the believers of Forms, the causative relation of the One with the Forms is the same as that of the Forms with particulars (e.g. Metaphysics 988a10-11, 988b4), that is to say the One is the essence (e.g., ibid, 988a10-11: τοῦ τί ἐστὶν, 988b4-6: τὸ τί ἢν εἶναί) of the Forms besides his statement that for them One is the Good (e.g., ibid, 988b11-13) the relation between the Good and unity may become more understandable. Since the quiddity of the Good (τί ποτ᾽ ἐστὶ τἀγαθὸν) is more than discussion (506d8-e2), we cannot await Socrates to tell us how this binding role is played. All we can expect is to hear from him an analogy by which this unifying role is envisaged, the sun. The kind of unity that the Good gives to the knowledge and its objects in the intelligible realm is comparable to the unity that the sun gives to the sight and its objects in the visible realm (508b-c). The allegory of Line (Republic VI, 509d-511), like that of the Sun, tries to bind all various kinds of knowledges. The hierarchical model of the Line which encompasses all kinds of knowledge from imagination to understanding can clearly be considered as Plato’s effort to bind all kinds of knowledges by a certain unhypothetical principle. The method of hypothesis starts, in the first subsection of the intelligible realm, with a hypothesis that is not directed firstly to a principle but a conclusion (510b4-6). It proceeds, in the other subsection, to a 'principle which is not a hypothesis' (b7) and is called the 'unhypothetical principle of all things' (ἀνυποθέτου ἐπὶ τὴν τοῦ παντὸς ἀρχὴν) (511b6-7). This παντὸς must refer not only to the objects of the intelligible realm but to the sensible objects as well. Plato does posit, therefore, an epistemological principle for all things, a principle that all things are, epistemologically, bound and, thus, unified by. -/- 5. Bound Beings The ontological aspect of BK we shall call the principle of 'Bound Beings' (BB): -/- BB Being of all things are bound by the Good. -/- We saw in our principle of Split Being (SB) how the first Socrates was criticized because of his approach to split being and separate each thing from other things. The principle of Bound Beings intends to make the things more related, a duty which is done again by the Good. In the allegory of Sun, there are two paragraphs that evidently and deliberately extend the binding role of the Good to the ontological scene: -/- You will say that the sun not only makes the visible things have the ability of being seen but also coming to be, growth and nourishment. (509b2-4) -/- This clearly intends to remind the ontological role the sun plays in bringing to being all the sensible things in order to display how its counterpart has the same role in the intelligible realm (b6-10): -/- Not only the objects of knowledge (γιγνωσκομένοις) owe their being known (γιγνώσκεσθαι) to the Good, but also their existence (τὸ εἶναί) and their being (οὐσίαν) are due to it, though the Good is not being but superior to it in rank and power. That the Good is here represented as responsible for being of things in addition to their being known means, in my opinion, that Plato wants to posit BB in addition to BK. The allegory of Cave at the very beginning of the seventh Book (514aff.) can be taken as another evidence. The role of the Good, one might say, is confined to the intelligible realm because it is asserted that the role the Good plays in this realm is corresponding to that of the sun in the visible realm. The fact that Plato wants to observe the Good also as the ontological cause of the sensible things is obvious from his saying, in the allegory of Cave, that the Form of the Good 'produces light and its source (τὸν τούτου κύριον) [i.e. the sun] in the visible realm' (517c3). We can conclude, then, that the ontological function of the Good is not confined to the intelligible realm in which it is the lord and provides truth and understanding (c3-4) because it is also responsible to produce τὸν κύριον of light. 6. Proportionality of Being and Knowledge Insofaras BE and BO principles of the first Socrates gave way to TE and TO principles of the second Socrates, we cannot expect him to preserve KB in the same way as it was in the first Socrates. The new tripartite ontology and epistemology necessitates some modifications in KB which results in the principle of 'Proportionality of Being and Knowledge' (PBK): -/- PBK To every class of being there is a proportionate category of knowledge. -/- This principle, of course, does not entail the refutation of KB and thus is not kind of rejecting PBK but only a more complicated version of it. Based on PBK, we can still agree that knowledge is of being (KB) but the issue is that since none of the concepts of knowledge and being in the second Socrates are as simple as they were for the first Socrates, we need a more complicated principle for their relation here. Although from Meno 97a where the distinction of knowledge and true opinion is drawn out in the second group of the dialogues, we can expect a new relation, it is articulated in its most complete way in Republic and specifically in the allegory of Line. All the beings are divided there hierarchically to four classes, to each of them belongs a class of knowledge: imagination to images, belief to the sensible things (more correctly: the things of which they[in previous class] were images (ᾧ τοῦτο ἔοικεν)), thought to mathematical objects (?) and understanding to the Forms and the first principle. The degree of clarity that each of the classes of knowledge shares in (σαφηνείας ἡγησάμενος μετέχειν) is proportionate to the degree that its object shares in truth (ἀληθείας μετέχει). (511e2-4) -/- Conclusion From the six onto-epistemilogical principles of the first Socrates, four principles turn to their opposite in the middle period dialogues. While bipolar epistemology and ontology of the early dialogues give place to tripartite epistemology in the middle period dialogues and tripartite ontology in Republic, the split knowledge and being of the first Socrates are inclined to be substituted by bound knowledges and bound beings in the second Socrates and specifically in Republic. Not all our system of principles in this article is necessarily determinative. Either they are rightly formulated or not, our result would not be vulnerable if we accept that 1) making the distinction of knowledge and belief, 2) accepting the being of not being and 3) trying to bind both being and knowledge by the concept of the Good happens only in middle period dialogues, having been absent in the early ones. These are the favourite results all those somehow arbitrary and even oversimplified principles were to illustrate; that there is kind of a development in the epistemological as well as the ontological grounds of Plato’s philosophy. -/- Notes . (shrink)

All surviving manuscripts of the Dialexeis of Maximus of Tyre descend from the oldest, Parisinus Graecus 1962 . Where they diverge, they do so as a result either of error or of attempts at correction. The history of the conjectural emendation of the Dialexeis thus begins with the second oldest manuscript, Vaticanus Graecus 1390 , which dates from the third quarter of the thirteenth century. Since that time, the most significant contributions have come from two scholars, one of the fifteenth (...) century and one of the eighteenth: Zanobi Acciaiuoli, librarian at the monastery of San Marco in Florence, many of whose corrections found their way anonymously into the editio princeps of 1557 via the manuscript used by Stephanus; and Jeremiah Markland, whose ideas are recorded as an appendix to the second, posthumous edition of John Davies's Maximus, published in 1740. J. J. Reiske's edition of 1774–5 and Friedrich Duebner's of 1840 also contain valuable material. But the field is by no means yet picked clean: witness most recently the useful articles of Professors Koniaris and Renehan. I offer the following gleanings of my own. (shrink)

In editing Plato's Sophist for the new OCT vol. I, ed. E. A. Duke, W. F. Hicken, W. S. M. Nicoll, D. B. Robinson, and J. C. G. Strachan , there was less chance of giving novel information about W = Vind. Supp. Gr. 7 for this dialogue than for others in the volume, since Apelt's edition of 1897 was used by Burnet in 1900 and was based on Apelt's own collation of W. The result was better than the somewhat (...) confused information printed by Burnet, even in his 1905 reprint, for W for the other dialogues in vol. I. But in the Sophist as elsewhere in vol. I collations largely due to Dr W. S. M. Nicoll added new facts about all of BDTWP and their correctors, and the search for testimonia largely carried out by Dr E. A. Duke added new facts in that area. A reviewer counts 66 changes in our text of the Sophist, which may perhaps be a slight over-estimate. Classification of changes as substantive or as falling into different groups is sometimes difficult, but I think plausible figures are as follows. We have in 25 places made a different choice of readings from the primary mss. and testimonia. We have printed conjectures where Burnet kept a ms. reading in 17 places, but conversely we have reverted to a ms. reading where Burnet had a conjecture in 8 places. We have printed alternative conjectures to conjectures adopted by Burnet in 6 places. So we have actually departed from the primary sources on at most 9 more occasions overall than Burnet. What must be noted is that Burnet had already printed conjectures on something like 87 occasions , so our percentage addition to Burnet's departures from the primary sources is modest. Moreover Burnet printed about 25 readings from testimonia; we have followed him in 20 or so of these cases, and this in turn implies that the primary mss. are in error at these further 20 places. It needs to be underlined that though Burnet undoubtedly deserved to be regarded as a safe and cautious editor, nevertheless he departed from the primary mss. on average about twice per Stephanus page in this dialogue. Sometimes, of course, testimonia showed him right to do this, but testimonia cover only a quite small part of this dialogue. Otherwise Burnet accepted almost 90 conjectures. For the Politicus the figures are fairly similar; Burnet accepted 22 Byzantine conjectures and 35–40 more modern ones. The new OCT there adds 15 or so more conjectures. (shrink)

In his exemplary edition of the papyrus fragments of Callimachus' Victoria Berenices, P. J. Parsons briefly considered the spelling of the name of Hercules' host, who played such a major role in Callimachus' ατιον on the founding of the Nemean games. At B iii 2 the papyrus has M[λ]ορκοϲ. On this Professor Parsons noted ‘elsewhere Mλορχοϲ: the unusual spelling, which no doubt comes from the text, reappears in Apollodorus, Bibl. 2.5.1 , Nonnus, Dion. 17.52 and Stephanus of Byzantium s.v. (...) Mολορκα ’. (shrink)

In his exemplary edition of the papyrus fragments of Callimachus' Victoria Berenices, P. J. Parsons briefly considered the spelling of the name of Hercules' host, who played such a major role in Callimachus' ατιον on the founding of the Nemean games. At B iii 2 the papyrus has M[λ]ορκοϲ. On this Professor Parsons noted ‘elsewhere Mλορχοϲ: the unusual spelling, which no doubt comes from the text, reappears in Apollodorus, Bibl. 2.5.1, Nonnus, Dion. 17.52 and Stephanus of Byzantium s.v. Mολορκα (...) ’. (shrink)

Die Reedition der von den Verfassern nunmehr Excerpta Vaticana et Laurentiana genannt wird, findet ihre Begründung darin, dass der Erstherausgeber, der berühmt Rechtshistoriker Contardo Ferrini offenbar auf eine Kollationierung beider Codices verzichtet hat und im Übrigen, aus welchen Gründen auch immer, bei der Edition selbst nicht unwesentliche Versehen verschuldet hat. Der Codex Vaticanus Palatinus ist wohl in der ersten Hälfte des 14. Jahrhunderts entstanden, der Codex Laurentianus 80.6 in der ersten Hälfte des 15. Jahrhunderts. Grundsätzlich sind die Verfasser der Meinung, (...) die mit zahlreichen plausiblen Argumenten vorgetragen wird, dass der Schreiber des Codex Laurentianus 80.6, ein gewisser Stephanus of Medea, als Vorlage den heutigen Codex Vaticanus Gr. 19 vor sich liegen hatte, und als intelligenter Kopist verschiedene Emendationen vorgenommen hat. Eine große Mehrheit der Fragmente der Excerpta Vaticana et Laurentiana von 1–193 muss einem Juristen Anatolius zugeschrieben werden. Jene Person, die sie zusammengestellt hat, muss ein altes Manuskript mit der Summa Codicis des Anatolius verwendet haben. In dieser Summa waren die Termini technici immer noch in lateinischer Sprache verfasst. Zur Selektion der Texte führen die Verfasser an, dass überdurchschnittlich großes Interesse dem Strafrecht und dem Familienrecht gewidmet ist, während etwa Eigentumserwerb, Erbrecht und große Teile des Obligationenrechtes kaum Behandlung finden. Die Exzerpierung der Summa Codicis muss aus diesem Grunde von jemand vorgenommen worden sein, der eine besondere Affinität gerade zu diesen Bereichen des Rechtes hatte. Nach diesen grundsätzlichen und grundlegenden Ausführungen, die ich allesamt nicht nur begrüße, sondern voll mittragen möchte, widmen sich die Verfasser kurz aber prägnant der Person des Anatolius (24–30). Ein Anatolius wird zusammen mit sieben anderen Antecessores in der Constitutio Omne genannt, sowie in der Constitutio Tanta vom 16. Dezember 533 als einer der vier Professoren, denen die Kompilation der Digesten anvertraut worden war. Er bekleidete die Funktion eines Magister Officiorum und wurde aus diesem Grunde als Vir Illustris bezeichnet. Anatolius entstammte einer Juristenfamilie aus Beirut und lehrte dort selbst als Professor. Zachariae von Lingenthal (Griechische Bearbeitung des Codex 70) und Van der Waal (Comentar 111) hatten die Ansicht vertreten, dass es zwei Anatoli gegeben habe: Der eine Mitglied der justinianischen Kompilation, der andere der Autor des Codex-Kommentares. Dem gegenüber vertreten die Autoren die Ansicht, dass Anatolius ein einziger gewesen sei, der, nachdem er maßgeblich an der Kompilation in Konstantinopel mitgearbeitet hatte, etwa zwischen 530 und 533 als Lehrer nach Beirut zurückgekehrt sei, um dort an einer der prestigeträchtigsten Universitäten des Reiches die neue juristische Studienordnung durchzusetzen und ruhmreich zu begründen. Der Kommentar des Codex diente dazu, einen grundsätzlichen lateinischen Text griechischen Studenten zu verdeutlichen, und zwar ausgehend von einer reinen Übersetzung bis zu einem juristischen Kommentar. Die Autoren lösen die Quellenproblematik derart, dass sie davon ausgehen, dass Anatolius das Buch 4 seines Kommentares noch in Konstantinopel vollendet und mit dem 8. Buch des Kommentares in Beirut wieder begonnen hat. Die klare und deutliche Argumentationsweise der Autoren, unpolemisch aber doch tiefgreifend, sollte in Zukunft übernommen werden. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Book Reviews Bibliography on Plato's "'Laws, "" 1920-1970: With Additional Citations through May, 1975. By Trevor J. Saunders. (New York: Arno Press, 1976. Pp. i + 60. $15.00) The Penguin Classics translator of the non-Socratic Laws, as Leo Strauss called them, has here compiled in a most usable way a thorough bibliography of books and articles about the Laws or parts of them. The section "Texts, Translations, and Commentaries" (...) properly excludes translations not made directly from the Greek. In previous centuries this would, also properly, have excluded many a famous or popular translation, such as Thomas Taylor's or Victor Cousin's, worked out from the text of M. Ficino's "first edition" in Latin. Given the state of the Greek text and the practice, inaugurated by Ficino, of improving upon the Greek in the translatioias, some notation about the literalness of the translations cited would have been of additional value. Section B, in thirty pages, is the largest and also deliberately the most selective in striving to limit itself to work concerned exclusively or primarily with the Laws. But it cannot avoid including much material about some aspect of Plato in general rather than about the Laws; this is especially true of the subsection, B1, on comprehensive accounts. Section B2, on the text and its tradition, has overwhelmingly more citations about the indirect tradition than about the texts themselves, an interesting indication of the current state of this question. The next subsections, to B12, divide according to subject matter. BI3 lists studies on the influence of the Laws. The last section, in twenty-four pages, is most valuable. It lists, by Stephanus page number, an abundance of discussions of individual passages from Book I through Book XII wherever these discussions, bibliographically speaking, may have occurred. Students of the Laws will be well served by, and most grateful to, Professor Saunders for this bibliography. I can only second the intent of his parting epigraph that sends us back to the study of the Laws themselves. But I must add that more explicitly detailed work appears to be required both on the difficulties the text itself presents to students of Plato (one thinks of A. Boeckh's analyses of the prose in Books I through III) and on those which arise when the Laws is contrasted--from the point of view of design and intellectuality--with those of Plato's works that are comparable, if not in number of pages, at least in scale of conception and monumentality. V. TEJERA SUNY at Stony Brook Science and Philosophy in Aristotle's Biological Works. By Anthony Preus. (Hildesheim and New York: George Olms, 1975. Pp. ix + 404. DM.88) A reciprocal influence between Aristotle's philosophy and biology--if it could be demonstrated through step-by-step criticism and not merely asserted in generalities about functionalism--might help to explain both, and might also itself be philosophically interesting ; for it should clarify Aristotle's concepts of form, essence, universal, and species-concepts which have been mercilessly jumbled in the traditional interpretations. With the failure of Jaegerian developmental analyses, we can hardly now hope for help from detailed chronology. But a general dating of Aristotle's biological interest to the Assos-Mytilene period, when he was already aged forty, is accepted by most people (though not by Jaeger who [463]... (shrink)

Heinrich Dörrie has demonstrated that the text of two long passages of Ovid's Heroides depends entirely on a single witness, the printed edition of the complete works published at Parma in 1477 by Stephanus Corallus. The passages in question are from the letters of Paris and Cydippe. In this paper I limit myself to a single question: whether these verses are by the same hand as the rest of the epistles of Paris and Cydippe. Since, however, I see no (...) reason to doubt that all the double epistles are by Ovid, this means in effect that I shall be asking whether the disputed passages are his. (shrink)

It has been strongly disputed that Philoponus is the author of the commentary on the third book of De Anima printed in vol. xv of CAG under his name, and Stephanus of Alexandria has been taken to be its real author. The evidence for the authorship of Stephanus is as follows: Codex Parisinus gr. 1914, written in the twelfth century, has an adscript by a later hand saying βιβλ⋯ον τρ⋯τον ⋯π⋯ ϕωνης στεϕ⋯νου, and the same appears in the (...) fifteenth-century Codex Estensis iii F 8. In 543.9 there is a clause saying ὡς ⋯ν τῷ περ⋯ ⋯ρμηνε⋯ας ⋯μ⋯θομεν, which was taken by M. Hayduck to be direct reference to Stephanus' commentary on the De Interpretatione, edited also by Hayduck in vol. xiii/3 of CAG. The third book, says Hayduck, is short and jejune, in contrast to the verbosity of the preceding two books. The commentary on the third book of De Anima is divided into lectures, but the first two books are not. Some locutions are used constantly in the third book and in Stephanus' in De Interpretatione as well. In the Codex Vaticanus gr. 241 fol. 6 we are told that Stephanus also wrote a commentary on the De Anima. (shrink)

To this day no consensus has been reached concerning the authorship of the 3rd book of Philoponus’ on the Soul. I will begin this article by surveying the discussion of the authorship. In this first section I go into some detail concerning the arguments of scholars who attribute the DAC 3 to Philoponus, and those who do not believe that it is by Philoponus, including those who attribute it to Stephanus of Alexandria. The second section of the paper consists (...) in an analysis and evaluation of the arguments involved in the debate. Finally, I conclude by presenting my own position, including new arguments in favor of the attribution of the DAC 3 to John Philoponus. (shrink)

Burent's and Robin's collations of W differ for the text of the Phaedo in about 130 readings of a more than orthographical interest.✝ A new inspection of the manuscript has shown that Robin very often corrected Burnet, but added some twenty mistakes. The actual readings of W and of its second handW2 are given in the following list; each of them is followed, after a colon, by Burnet's and Robin's misreadings. The Stephanus numeration refers to Burnet's edition.

Burent's and Robin's collations of W differ for the text of the Phaedo in about 130 readings of a more than orthographical interest.✝ A new inspection of the manuscript has shown that Robin very often corrected Burnet, but added some twenty mistakes. The actual readings of W and of its second handW2 are given in the following list; each of them is followed, after a colon, by Burnet's and Robin's misreadings. The Stephanus numeration refers to Burnet's edition.

The text of Theaetetus 155b1-2 as recorded in the manuscripts and printed in current editions of the dialogue is marked by a syntactical anomaly (ἀλλά postpositum) and a logical non sequitur (arbitrary transition from a copulative to an existential use of εἷναι and vice versa). Attempts at emendation by Proclus, Stephanus and Campbell have all been unsuccessful. To find the way back to Plato's original text, the reader will have to fight his way through a logical tangle (the result (...) of a double negation) and abandon the modish, but erroneous, belief that there is no difference in ancient Greek between ``complete'' and ``incomplete'' uses of εἷναι. (shrink)