Understanding Platonic Epistemology: Key Concepts Explained

Posted on Dec 7, 2024 in Philosophy and ethics

Comment

Once placed in its historical context, we proceeded to highlight some of the terms that we understand may have greater interest in expressing with clarity some of the ideas characteristic of the Platonic doctrine. In this case, given the epistemological nature of the text, these terms allow us to more confidently refer to some of the most characteristic elements of the Platonic theory of knowledge. It could not be otherwise since, in such a short text, we can hardly find terms from which we can reflect on the full knowledge of the doctrine of Plato, which is, moreover, a very complex doctrine.

We believe that these terms could well be those of ‘understood’, ‘science of dialectics’ (very similar to the first in the text and in the Platonic doctrine), and the term ‘discursive thought’. The latter, ‘discursive thought’, appears three times, while the term ‘understood’, which is directly related to the term ‘intelligence’ (that is, intelligible, that of which you can have intelligence), appears four times. We think it is interesting to note that these terms are referred to as such, i.e., as terms in one hand and in the same sentence that differs from one another. Specifically, one in which Plato writes, “I think you call ‘discursive thought’ the mental state of the surveyors and the like, but the ‘intelligence’.” This would justify those single quotes that appear in the text by the translator’s decision. In any case, it is interesting to note how in that sentence in which these two terms appear, as intended by the author, they are separated or distinguished: ‘discursive thought’ from the fact of intelligence seen in a more general way. This should not be construed as an attempt to oppose each other; if anything, it is to distinguish them, as ‘discursive thought’ in the Platonic doctrine does not exhaust the possible knowledge or ‘intelligence’ that could be reality, but is only one phase of it: a phase in which the formal (as eidetic) begins to highlight. We believe that when Plato writes that ‘discursive thought’ is a reference to “the mental state of the surveyors and the like”, he is trying to clarify with this example the formal (eidetic) that this stage of knowledge represents. In another previous sentence, we also see quite clearly intended to distinguish this ‘discursive thought’ from other upstream (and lower scope) forms of knowledge. We refer to the sentence in which the purpose of the principles (not the ‘assumptions’ that are only beginning to be called ‘art’) Plato writes that “those who study them are forced to study by means of discursive thought, but not senses.” So that discursive thought is the beginning of this phase of epistemic knowledge that is more rigorous and reliable, leaving behind those other times of false beliefs (eikasía) or only probable conjectures (pistis) to get into the higher stages of knowledge that lead us to the truth: dianoia (discursive thinking), and finally on the horizon, the noesis or contemplating the eide.

Despite its shortness, this text is very dense and rich in nuances. We hardly have time now to refer to another term that we find particularly interesting in relation to Platonic epistemology: the ‘science of dialectics’. We had pointed out the relationship between the content of the terms ‘intelligible’ – ‘intelligence’ and the term ‘science of dialectics’. The explanation of this relationship cannot be found explicitly in the text, but in Plato’s doctrine in its epistemological aspect: it is dialectical any time when there is a move towards knowledge, having now some denial (which is exceeded, the thing that intelligence does not resign: the false assumptions) and some claim (what is said, if only as a goal: the knowledge of the truth from the approach to the principles on which it is stated).

This dialectical character permeates the entire text under discussion, as the highlight of the same idea, in our opinion, is that knowledge is a process, that this process of approaching the principles is the ultimate goal, and that “distinguish what’s real and understandable” are things that are constituted as objects of our knowledge, which is the ultimate goal for our ability to reason.

To conclude our analysis, we can say that, despite its shortness, a short but important set of epistemological proposals is present. Namely: that the science of dialectic is interested in making intelligible realities that, at first, cannot seem (to not appear ‘understandable’); that this progress of reason to the intelligibility plays a major role in ‘discursive thought’, that dianoia, and that this involves a process of detachment from the opinions and, perhaps, from the principles established in earlier phases of this development (sensitive phase) and an approach to the dimension of the eidetic, which is actually the closest to the truth.