Uglietta, John (Author)
Apeiron: Journal for Ancient Philosophy and Science
Volume: 39
Issue: 4
Pages: 331-340
Can you have knowledge of the sensible world? The question seems rather odd. Yet Plato's account in the Republic seems to suggest a sharp division between the world as we experience it through our senses and the non-sensible world of the Forms. Our senses show us a world of impure and ever-changing images and copies, while the Forms are pure and permanent originals. Plato argues that we can have knowledge of the Forms. Yet the, at best, imperfect relationship between Forms and sensibles suggests that knowledge of sensibles may be impossible. In her essay, 'Knowledge and Belief in Republic V-VÏÏ',1 Gail Fine offers an account of Plato's theory of knowledge that allows for knowledge of sensibles. Among other things, Fine sets out to show that Plato 'argues only that all knowledge requires (not that it is restricted to) knowledge of Forms; and that, restricted to sensibles, one can at most achieve belief (Fine 86). She rejects the suggestion that Plato believes in two distinct worlds, one of intelligible Forms and one of sensibles, 'leav[ing] open the possibility that, once one knows Forms, one can apply this knowledge to sensibles so as to know them too' (Fine 86). Fine argues for a 'contents analysis' rather than an 'objects analysis' of Plato's theory, suggesting that knowledge and belief are not concerned with different objects. She then attributes to Plato a coherence theory of knowledge. I will focus on the second issue, the suggestion that Plato offers a coherence theory of knowledge. I shall argue that Fine's coherentist interpretation of Plato's theory is not adequately supported by Plato's discussion in the Republic, especially his image of the cave, and that such an interpretation also fails to account for the importance Plato places on Forms. However, I will first describe some of the conditions on knowledge that she finds in the Republic as well as the outlines of her coherentist interpretation.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Book
Gail Fine;
(2014)
The Possibility of Inquiry: Meno's Paradox from Socrates to Sextus
(/isis/citation/CBB620224771/)
Article
Boris Hennig;
(2021)
Meta Logou in Plato’s Theaetetus
(/isis/citation/CBB769475422/)
Book
Benson, Hugh H.;
(2000)
Socratic wisdom: The model of knowledge in Plato's early dialogues
(/isis/citation/CBB000111280/)
Article
Latona, Max;
(2004)
The Tale is Not My Own (ουκ εμος ο μυθος): Myth and Recollection in Plato
(/isis/citation/CBB000502256/)
Article
Martinez, Joel A.;
(2011)
Rethinking Plato's Conception of Knowledge: The Non-Philosopher and the Forms
(/isis/citation/CBB001250018/)
Chapter
Sandro Passavanti;
(2018)
Alterazioni sensoriali e delirio dai Presocratici al "Teeteto" di Platone. Medicina, sofistica, filosofia
(/isis/citation/CBB696971609/)
Book
Stern, Paul;
(2008)
Knowledge and Politics in Plato's Theaetetus
(/isis/citation/CBB000831074/)
Article
Gail Fine;
(2016)
The ‘Two Worlds’ Theory in the Phaedo
(/isis/citation/CBB074525784/)
Article
Dylan B. Futter;
(2018)
Spiritual Pregnancy in Plato’s Theaetetus
(/isis/citation/CBB137166866/)
Article
Nally, Edith Gwendolyn;
(2015)
Is Plato a Coherentist? The Theory of Knowledge in Republic V--VII
(/isis/citation/CBB001551202/)
Article
Richard Patterson;
(2007)
Diagrams, Dialectic, and Mathematical Foundations in Plato
(/isis/citation/CBB047903761/)
Article
Maria Michela Sassi;
(2023)
Blood and the Awareness of Perception. From Early Greek Thought to Plato’s Timaeus
(/isis/citation/CBB816845058/)
Article
Katayama, Errol G.;
(2011)
David Charles and Aristotle's Master Craftsmen
(/isis/citation/CBB001211446/)
Article
Lautner, Peter;
(2009)
Different Types of Λογοι and their Place in Empirical Knowledge and Noetic Understanding in Syrianus
(/isis/citation/CBB001211441/)
Book
Aphrodisias, Alexander of;
(2000)
On Aristotle's On Sense Perception
(/isis/citation/CBB000111277/)
Book
Anna Marmodoro;
(2014)
Aristotle on Perceiving Objects
(/isis/citation/CBB193959582/)
Chapter
Knuuttila, Simo;
(2008)
Aristotle's Theory of Perception and Medieval Aristotelianism
(/isis/citation/CBB000800096/)
Thesis
Szymanski, Ileana Fernanda;
(2008)
Sense-Perception as an Unusual Sort of Alteration in Aristotle's “De Anima”II.5
(/isis/citation/CBB001561314/)
Book
Harari, Orna;
(2004)
Knowledge and Demonstration: Aristotle's Posterior Analytics
(/isis/citation/CBB000500290/)
Article
Benjamin Robert Koons;
(2019)
Aristotle’s Infallible Perception
(/isis/citation/CBB285840262/)
Be the first to comment!