Professor Shelly Kagan:
We've begun to turn to Plato's
dialogue Phaedo,
and what I started doing last
time was sketching the basic
outlines of Plato's
metaphysics--not so much to give
a full investigation of
that--clearly we're not going to
do that here--but just to
provide enough of the essential
outlines of Plato's metaphysical
views so that we can understand
the arguments that come up later
in the Phaedo,
basically all of which or many
of which presuppose
something--certain central
aspects about Plato's
metaphysical views.
The key point behind his
metaphysics then was the thought
that, in addition to the
ordinary empirical physical
world that we're all familiar
with,
we have to posit the existence
of a kind of second realm,
in which exist the Platonic--as
they're nowadays called--the
Platonic forms or Platonic
ideas.
The sort of thing that perhaps
we might call or think of as
abstract objects or abstract
properties.
And the reason for positing
these things is because we're
clearly able to think about
these ideas,
and yet, we recognize that the
ordinary physical
world--although things may
participate in them to varying
degrees--we don't actually come
across these objects or entities
in the physical world.
So that we can talk about
things being beautiful to
varying degrees,
but we never come across beauty
itself in the actual empirical
world.
We are able to talk about the
fact that two plus one equals
three, but it's not as though we
ever come across numbers--number
three itself--anywhere in the
empirical world.
A further point that
distinguishes the empirical
world from this--this realm of
Platonic ideal objects--is that
indeed they--there's something
perfect about them.
They don't change.
In contrast,
physical objects are constantly
changing.
Something might be short at one
point and become tall at another
point, ugly at one point and
become beautiful--like the ugly
duckling.
It starts out ugly and becomes
a beautiful swan.
In contrast,
justice itself never changes.
Beauty itself never changes.
We have the thought that these
things are eternal,
and indeed, beyond change,
in contrast to the empirical
world.
In fact, if you start thinking
more about the world from this
perspective, the world we live
in is crazy.
It's almost insanely
contradictory.
Plato thinks of it as crazy in
the way that a dream is.
When you're caught up in the
dream, you don't notice just how
insane it all is.
But if you step back and
reflect on it,
"Well, let's see,
I was eating a sandwich and
suddenly the sandwich was the
Statue of Liberty,
except the Statue of Liberty
was my mother.
And she's flying over the
ocean, except she's really a
piece of spaghetti."
That's how dreams are.
And when you're in it,
it sort of all makes sense.
Right?
You're kind of caught up,
but you step back and say,
"That's just insane."
Well, Plato thinks that the
empirical world has something of
that kind of insanity,
something of that kind
contradictoriness,
built into it that we don't
ordinarily notice.
"He's a basketball player,
so he's really,
really tall,
except he's only six feet.
So he's really,
really short for a basketball
player.
This is a baby elephant,
so it's really,
really big--except it's a baby
elephant, so it's really,
really small."
The world is constantly
rolling--this is a Platonic
expression--rolling between one
form and the other.
And it's hard to make sense of.
In contrast,
the mind is able to grasp the
Platonic ideas,
the Platonic forms;
and they're stable,
they're reliable,
they are--they're law-like and
we can grasp them.
They don't change;
they're eternal.
That's, as I say,
the Platonic picture.
Now, it's not my purpose here
to try to argue for or against
Platonism with regard to
abstract entities.
As I suggested in talking about
the example of math last time,
it's not a silly view,
even if it's not a view that we
all take automatically.
But in thinking about math,
most of us are inclined to be
Platonists.
We all do believe something
makes it true that two plus one
equals three,
but it's not the fact that
empirical objects--We don't do
empirical experiments to see
whether two plus one equals
three.
Rather, we think our mind can
grasp the truths about numbers.
Plato thought everything was
like that.
Well, I'm not going to argue
for and against that view--just
wanted to sketch it,
so as to understand the
arguments that turn on it.
So for our purposes,
let's suppose Plato was right
about that and ask,
what follows?
Well, Plato thinks what's going
to follow is that we have some
reason to believe in the
immortality of the soul as,
again, as we indicated last
time, the picture is that the
mind--the soul--is able to grasp
these eternal Platonic forms,
the ideas.
Typically, we're distracted
from thinking about them by the
distractions provided by the
body--the desire for food,
drink, sex, what have you,
sleep.
But by distancing itself from
the body, the mind,
the soul, is able to better
concentrate on the forms.
And if you're good at that,
if you practice while you're
alive, separating yourself from
the body,
then when your body dies,
the mind is able to go up to
this Platonic heavenly realm and
commune with gods and other
immortal souls and think about
the forms.
But if you've not separated
yourself from the body while in
life, if you're too enmeshed in
its concerns,
then upon the death of your
body your soul will get sucked
back in, reincarnated perhaps,
in another body.
If you're lucky,
as another person;
if you're not so lucky,
as a pig or a donkey or an ant
or what have you.
So your goal,
Plato says, your goal should
be, in life, to practice
death--to separate yourself from
your body.
And because of this,
Socrates, who's facing death,
isn't distressed at the
prospect, but happy.
He's happy that the final
separation will take place and
he'll be able to go to heaven.
The dialogue ends,
of course, with the death
scene--Socrates has been
condemned to death by the
Athenians,
and it ends with his drinking
the hemlock, not distressed but
rather sort of joyful.
And the dialogue ends with one
of the great moving death scenes
in western civilization and as
Plato says--let's get the quote
here exactly right--"Of all
those we have known,
he was the best and also the
wisest and the most upright."
Just before the death scene,
there's a long myth,
which I draw your attention to
but I don't want to discuss in
any kind of detail.
Plato says it's a story;
it's a myth.
He's trying to indicate that
there are things that we can't
really know in a scientific way
but we can glimpse.
And the myth has to do with
these sort of pictures I was
just describing where we don't
actually live on the surface of
the Earth of in the light,
but rather live in certain
hollows in the dark where we're
mistaken about the nature of
reality.
Some of you who are maybe
familiar with Plato's later
dialogue The Republic may
recognize at least what seems to
me,
what we have here,
is a foreshadowing of the myth
of the cave, or the allegory of
the cave,
which Plato describes there as
well.
Our concern is going to be the
arguments that make up the
center of the dialogue.
Because in the center of the
dialogue, before he dies,
Socrates is arguing with his
friends.
Socrates is saying,
"Look, I'm not worried.
I'm going to live forever."
And his disciples and friends
are worried whether this is true
or not.
And so the heart of the
dialogue consists of a series of
arguments in which Socrates
attempts to lay out his reasons
for believing in the immortality
of the soul.
And that's going to be our
concern.
What I'm going to do is
basically run through my attempt
to reconstruct--my attempt to
lay out the basic ideas from
this series of four or five
arguments that Plato gives us.
I'm going to criticize them.
I don't think they work,
though I want to remark before
I turn to them that in saying
this I'm not necessarily
criticizing Plato.
As we'll see,
some of the later arguments
seem to be deliberately aimed at
answering objections that we can
raise to some of the earlier
arguments.
And so it might well be that
Plato himself recognized that
the initial arguments aren't as
strong as they need to be.
Plato wrote the dialogues as a
kind of learning device,
as a tool to help the reader
get better at doing philosophy.
They don't necessarily
represent in a systematic
fashion Plato's worked out
axiomatic views about the nature
of philosophy.
It could be that Plato's
deliberately putting mistakes in
earlier arguments so as to
encourage you to think for
yourself,
"Oh, this is--here's a problem
with this argument.
There's an objection with that
argument."
Some of these,
Plato then may address later
on.
But whether or not he does
address them--we're not doing
Plato any honor,
we're not doing him any
service,
if we limit ourselves to simply
trying to grasp,
here's what Plato thought.
We could do the history of
ideas and say,
"Here's Plato's views.
Aren't they interesting?
Notice how they differ from
Aristotle's views.
Aren't they interesting?"
and move on like that.
But that's not what the
philosophers wanted us to do.
The great philosophers had
arguments that they were putting
forward to try to persuade us of
the truths of their positions.
And the way you show respect
for a philosopher is by taking
those arguments seriously and
asking yourself,
do they work or not?
So whether or not the views
that are being put forward in
Socrates' mouth are the
considered,
reflective judgments of Plato
or not, for our purposes we can
just act as though they were the
arguments being put forward by
Plato,
and we can ask ourselves,
"Do these arguments work or
don't they?"
So I'm going to run through a
series of these arguments.
I'm going to,
as I've mentioned before,
be a bit more exegetical than
is normally the case for our
readings.
I'm going to actually pause,
periodically look at my notes
and make sure I'm remembering
how I think Plato understands
the arguments.
Of course, since the dialogue
is indeed a dialogue,
we don't always have the
arguments laid out with a series
or premises and conclusions.
And so it's always a matter of
interpretation,
what's the best reconstruction
of the argument he's gesturing
towards.
How can we turn it into an
argument with premises and
conclusions?
Well, that's what I'm going to
try to do for us.
Also going to give the
arguments names.
These are not names that Plato
gives, but it will make it easy
for us to get a fix,
roughly, on the different
arguments as we move from one to
the next.
So the first argument,
and the worry that gets the
whole things going,
is this.
So, we've got this nice
Platonic picture where Plato
says, "All right.
So the mind can grasp the
eternal forms,
but it has to free itself from
the body to do that."
And so, the philosopher,
who has sort of trained himself
to separate his mind from his
body,
to disregard his bodily
cravings and desires--the
philosopher will welcome death
because at that point he'll
truly,
finally, make the final break
from the body.
And the obvious worry that gets
raised in the dialogue at this
point is this:
How do we know that when the
death of the body occurs the
soul doesn't get destroyed as
well?
That's the natural worry to
have.
Maybe what we need to do is
separate ourselves as much as
possible from the influence of
our body without actually going
all the way and breaking the
connection.
If you think about it like a
rubber band, maybe the more we
can stretch the rubber band the
better;
but if you stretch too far and
the rubber band snaps,
that's not good,
that's bad.
It could be that we need the
body in order to continue
thinking.
We want to free ourselves from
the distractions of the body,
but we don't want the body to
die, because when the body dies
the soul dies as well.
Even if we are dualists,
as we've noticed before--even
if the soul is something
different from the body--it
could still be the case,
logically speaking,
that if the body gets
destroyed, the soul gets
destroyed as well.
And so, Socrates' friends ask
him, how can we be confident
that the soul will survive the
death of the body and indeed be
immortal?
And that's what prompts the
series of arguments.
Now, the first such argument I
dub "the argument from the
nature of the forms."
And the basic thought is fairly
straightforward.
The ideas or the forms--justice
itself, beauty itself,
goodness itself--the forms are
not physical objects.
Right?
We don't ever bump into justice
itself.
We bump into societies that may
be more or less just,
or individuals who may be more
or less just,
but we never bump into justice
itself.
The number three is not a
physical object.
Goodness itself is not a
physical object.
Perfect roundness is not a
physical object.
Now, roughly speaking,
Socrates' seems to think it's
going to follow
straightforwardly from that that
the soul must itself be
something non-physical.
If the forms are not physical
objects, then Socrates thinks it
follows they can't be grasped.
We can certainly think about
the forms, but if they're
non-physical they can't be
grasped by something physical
like the body.
They've got to be grasped by
something non-physical--namely,
the soul.
But although that's,
I think, the sketch of where
Socrates wants to go,
it doesn't quite give us what
we want.
On the one hand,
even if it were true that the
soul must be non-physical in
order to grasp the non-physical
forms,
wouldn't follow that the soul
will survive the death of the
body.
That's the problem we've been
thinking about for the last
minute.
And there's something puzzling.
We might wonder,
well, just why is it that the
body can't grasp the forms?
So there's a fuller version of
the argument that's the one I
want to focus on.
And indeed, I put it up on the
board.
So Platonic metaphysics gives
us premise number one--that
ideas, forms,
are eternal and they're
non-physical.
Two--that which is eternal or
non-physical can only be grasped
by the eternal and the
non-physical.
Suppose we had both of those.
It would seem to give us three,
the conclusion we want--that
which grasps the ideas or the
forms must be eternal or
non-physical.
What is it that grasps the
ideas or the forms?
Well, that's the soul.
If that which grasps the ideas
or the forms must be
eternal/non-physical,
well one thing we're going to
get is,
since that which grasps the
forms must be non-physical,
the soul is not the body.
Since that which grasps the
ideas or forms must be eternal
or non-physical--it's eternal,
it's immortal.
All right.
Let's look at this again more
carefully.
Ideas or forms are eternal;
they're non-physical.
Well, I've emphasized the
non-physical aspect,
and I've emphasized as well
that they're not changing.
But perhaps it's worth taking a
moment to emphasize the eternal
aspect of the forms.
Now, people may come and go,
but perfect justice--the idea
of perfect justice--that's
timeless.
Nothing that happens here on
Earth can change or alter or
destroy the number three.
Two plus one equaled three
before there were people;
two plus one equals three now;
two plus one will always equal
three.
The number three is eternal,
as well as being non-physical.
So the Platonic metaphysics
says quite generally,
if we're thinking about the
ideas or the forms,
the point to grasp is they're
eternal;
they're non-physical.
The crucial premise--since
we're giving Plato number
one--the crucial premise for our
purposes is premise number two.
Is it or isn't it true that
those things which are eternal
or non-physical can only be
grasped by something that is
itself eternal and non-physical?
Again, it does seem as though
the conclusion that he wants,
number three,
follows from that.
If we give him number two,
it's going to follow that
whatever's doing the
grasping--call that the soul
since the soul is just Plato's
word for our mind--if whatever's
doing the grasping of the
eternal and non-physical forms
must itself be eternal and
non-physical,
it follows that the soul must
be non-physical.
So the physicalist view is
wrong and the soul must be
eternal.
The soul is immortal.
So Socrates has what he wants,
once we give him premise number
two, that the eternal,
non-physical can only be
grasped by the eternal,
non-physical.
As Socrates puts it at one
point, "The impure cannot attain
the pure."
Bodies--corruptible,
destroyable,
physical, passing--whether they
exist or not,
whether they exist for a brief
period and then they cease to
exist--these impure objects
cannot attain,
cannot grasp,
cannot have knowledge of the
eternal, changeless non-physical
forms.
"The impure cannot attain the
pure."
That's the crucial premise,
and what I want to say is,
as far as I can see there's no
good reason to believe number
two.
Now, number two is not an
unfamiliar--premise number two
is not an unfamiliar claim.
I take it the claim basically
is that, to put it in more
familiar language,
it takes one to know one.
Or to use it,
slightly other kind of language
that Plato uses at various
points, "Likes are known by
likes."
But it takes one to know one is
probably the most familiar way
of putting the point.
Plato's saying,
"What is it that we know?
Well, we know the eternal forms;
takes one to know one.
So we must ourselves be
eternal."
Unfortunately,
this thought,
popular as it may be,
that it takes one to know one,
just seems false.
Think about some examples.
Well, let's see,
a biologist might study,
or a zoologist might study,
cats.
Takes one to know one,
so the biologist must himself
be a cat.
Well, that's clearly false.
You don't have to be feline to
study the feline.
Takes one to know one;
so, you can't be a Canadian and
study Mexicans,
because it takes one to know
one.
Well, that's just clearly
stupid.
Of course the Canadians can
study the Mexicans and the
Germans can study the French.
It does not take one to know
one;
to understand the truths about
the French, you do not yourself
need to be French.
Or take the fact that some
doctors study dead bodies.
Aha!
So to study and grasp things
about dead bodies,
corpses, you must yourself be a
dead body.
No, that certainly doesn't
follow.
So if we start actually pushing
ourselves to think about
examples--does it really take
one to know one--the answer is,
at least as a general claim,
it's not true.
It doesn't normally take one to
know one.
Now, strictly speaking,
that doesn't prove that premise
two is false.
It could still be that,
although normally you don't
have to be like the thing that
you're studying in order to
study it,
although that's not normally
true, it could be that in the
particular case of non-physical
objects,
in the particular case of
eternal objects,
you do have to be eternal,
non-physical to study them.
It could be that even though
the general claim,
"it takes one to know one" is
false,
the particular claim,
"eternal, non-physical can only
be grasped by the eternal,
non-physical," maybe that
particular claim is true.
And it's only the particular
claim that Plato needs.
Still, all I can say is,
why should we believe two?
Why should we think there's
some--Even though,
normally, the barrier can be
crossed and Xs can study the
non-X,
why should that barrier
suddenly become un-crossable in
the particular instance when
we're dealing with Platonic
forms?
Give us some reason to believe
premise two.
I can't see any good reason to
believe premise two,
and as far as I can see,
Plato doesn't actually give us
any reason to believe it in the
dialogue.
Consequently,
we have to say,
as far as I can see,
we haven't been given any
adequate argument for the
conclusion that the soul--which
admittedly can think about forms
and ideas--we have no good
reason yet to believe,
to be persuaded,
that the soul must itself be
eternal and non-physical.
That's the first argument.
As I say though,
Plato may well recognize the
inadequacy of that argument,
because after all Socrates goes
on to offer a series of other
arguments.
So let's turn to the next.
I call the second argument "the
argument from recycling"--not
the best label I suppose,
but I've never been able to
come up with a better one.
And the basic idea is that
parts get re-used.
Things move from one state to
another state and then back to
the first state.
So, for example,
to give an example that Plato
actually gives in the dialogue,
we are all awake now,
but previously we were asleep.
We went from being in the realm
of the asleep to being in the
realm of the awake,
and we're going to return from
the realm of the awake back to
the realm of the asleep and over
and over and over again.
Hence, recycling.
I think that actually a better
example for Plato's purposes,
not that I expect him to have
this particular example,
but, would be a car.
Cars are made up of parts that
existed before the car itself
existed.
There was the engine and the
steering wheel and the tires and
so forth.
And these parts got assembled
and put together to make up a
car.
So the parts of the car existed
prior to the existence of the
car itself.
And the time is going to come
when the car will cease to exist
but its parts will still be
around.
Right?
It'll get taken apart for
parts, sold for parts.
There will be the distributor
cap, and there will be the
tires, and there will be the
carburetor, there will be the
steering wheel.
Hence, the name,
that I dub the argument,
"the argument from recycling."
That's the nature of reality
for Plato.
And it seems like a plausible
enough view.
Things come into being by being
composed of previously existing
parts.
And then, when those things
cease to have the form they had,
the parts get used for other
purposes.
They get recycled.
If we grant that to Plato,
he thinks we've got an argument
for the immortality of the soul.
Because after all,
what are the parts that make us
up?
Well, there are the various
parts of our physical body,
but there's also our soul.
Remember, as I said,
in introducing the
Phaedo,
Plato doesn't so much argue for
the existence of something
separate,
the soul, as presuppose it.
His fundamental concern is to
try to argue for the immortality
of the soul.
So he's just helping himself to
the assumption that there is a
soul.
It's one of the parts that
makes us, that goes up into
making us up,
goes into making us up.
It's one of the pieces that
constitutes us.
Given the thesis about
recycling, then,
we have reason to believe the
soul will continue to exist
after we break.
Even after our death,
our parts will continue to
exist.
Our body continues to exist
even after our death.
Our soul will continue to exist.
Well, there's a problem with
the argument from recycling,
and it's this.
Even if the recycling thesis
shows us that we're made up of
something that existed before
our birth and that some kinds of
parts are going to have to exist
after our death,
we can't conclude that the soul
is one of the parts that's going
to continue to exist after our
death.
Consider some familiar facts
about human bodies.
As we nowadays know,
human bodies are made up of
atoms.
And it's certainly true that
the atoms that make up my body
existed long before my body
existed.
And it's certainly true that
after my death those atoms are
going to continue to exist.
So there's some--and will
eventually get used to make
something else.
So Plato's certainly right
about recycling as a fundamental
truth.
The things that make me up
existed before,
and will continue to exist
after my death.
But that doesn't mean that
every part of my body existed
before I was born,
and that every part of my body
will continue to exist after I
die.
Take my heart.
My heart is a part of my body.
Yet, for all that,
it didn't exist before my body
began to exist.
It came into existence as part
of, along with,
the creation of my body,
and it won't continue to exist,
at least not very long,
after the destruction of my
body.
There'll be a brief period in
which, as a cadaver I suppose,
my heart will continue to
exist.
But eventually my body will
decompose.
We certainly wouldn't have any
grounds to conclude my heart is
immortal, will exist forever.
That just seems wrong.
So even though it's true that
some kind of recycling takes
place, we can't conclude that
everything that's now a part of
me will continue to exist
afterwards.
It might not have been one of
the parts, one of the
fundamental parts,
from which I'm built--like the
heart.
And if that's right,
if there can be parts that I
have now that weren't one of the
parts from which I was made,
there's no particular reason to
think it's going to be one of
the parts that's going to
continue to exist after I die.
Once we see that kind of worry,
we have to see,
look, the same thing could be
true for the soul.
Even if there is an immortal
soul--Sorry.
Even if there is a non-physical
soul that's part of me,
we don't yet have any reason to
believe that it's one of the
fundamental building blocks that
were being recycled.
We don't have adequate reason
to conclude that it's something
that existed before I was put
together,
it's something that will be
recycled and continue to exist
after I fall apart,
after my body decomposes,
after I'm separated from my
body, or what have you.
Even if recycling takes place,
we don't have any good reason
yet to believe that the soul is
one of the recycled parts.
So it seems to me "the argument
from recycling," as I call it,
is not successful either.
Now, as I say,
many times when you read the
dialogue, this or other
dialogues by Plato,
it seems as though he's fully
cognizant of the objections that
at least an attentive reader
will raise about earlier stages
of the argument.
Because sometimes the best way
to understand a later argument
is to see it as responding to
the weaknesses of earlier
arguments.
And I think that's pretty
clearly what's going on in the
very next argument that comes up
in the dialogue.
The objection I just raised,
after all, to the argument from
recycling, said,
in effect, even though some
kind of recycling takes place,
not all my parts get recycled,
because not all of my parts
were among the pre-existing
constituent pieces from which I
am built up.
We don't have any particular
reason to think my heart's one
of the prior-existing pieces;
we don't have any good reason
to assume that my soul's one of
the prior-existing pieces.
Well, Plato's very next
argument attempts to persuade us
that indeed we do have reason to
believe that the soul is one of
the prior-existing pieces.
And this argument is known as
"the argument from
recollection."
The idea is,
he's going to tell us certain
facts that need explaining,
and the best explanation
involves a certain fact about
recollecting,
or a certain claim about
recollecting or remembering.
But we can only remember,
he thinks, in the relevant way
if our soul existed before the
birth of our body,
before the creation of our
body.
All right.
What's the crucial fact?
Well, let's start by--Plato
starts by telling us,
reminding us of what it is to
remember something.
Or perhaps a better word would
be what is it to be reminded of
something by something else that
resembles it but is not the
thing it reminds you of.
I might have a photograph of my
friend Ruth.
And looking at the photograph
reminds me of Ruth.
It brings Ruth to mind.
I start thinking about Ruth.
I remember various things I
know about Ruth.
The photograph is able to do
that, is able to trigger these
thoughts.
But of course,
the photograph is not Ruth.
Right?
Nobody would--who's thinking
clearly--would confuse the
photograph with my friend.
But the photograph resembles
Ruth.
It resembles Ruth well enough
to remind me of her,
and interestingly,
it can do that even if it's not
a very good photograph.
You might hold up the
photograph and I might say,
"Gosh, that really doesn't look
very much like Ruth does it?"
Even though I see that it is a
photograph of Ruth;
it reminds me of her.
Now, how could it be that a
photograph reminds me of my
friend?
Well, this isn't some deep
mystery.
Presumably the way it works is,
as I just said,
it looks sort of like her.
It doesn't have to look very
much like her.
It looks sort of like her.
Your young brother or sister,
or my little children,
can draw pictures of family
members that barely look like
family members.
My niece drew a picture of my
family once when she was three.
It didn't look very much like
us at all, but we could sort of
see the resemblance in a vague
kind of way, right?
So it's got to look at least
somewhat like the missing
friend.
But that's not enough.
You've never met Ruth,
let's suppose.
I hold up the photograph
without having told you anything
about her.
The photograph's not going to
remind you of Ruth.
Why not?
Well, you don't know Ruth.
So the pieces we need are not
only an image of Ruth,
even if an imperfect image of
Ruth, we also need some prior
acquaintance with Ruth.
That's pretty much what it
takes, right?
So on the one hand--temporal
sequence--first you know Ruth,
you meet Ruth,
you get to know Ruth.
Then at a later time you're
shown an image of Ruth--maybe
not even an especially good
image of Ruth--but good enough
to remind you.
And suddenly,
you're remembering things you
know about Ruth.
That's how recollection works.
All right.
Now, Plato points out that we
all know things about the
Platonic forms.
But the Platonic forms,
as we also know,
are not to be found in this
world.
The number three is not a
physical object,
perfect roundness is not a
physical object,
perfect goodness is not a
physical object.
We can think about these things;
our mind can grasp them,
but they're not to be found in
this world.
Yet, various things that we do
find in this world get us
thinking about those things.
I look at the plate on my
kitchen table,
it's not perfectly round,
it's got imperfections;
but suddenly I start thinking
about circles,
perfectly round objects.
I look at somebody who's pretty.
He or she is not perfectly
beautiful, but suddenly I start
thinking about the nature of
beauty itself.
Ordinary objects in the world
participate to a greater or
lesser degree in the Platonic
forms.
That's Plato's picture of
metaphysics.
And we bump up against,
we look at, we have
interactions with these everyday
objects and,
somehow, they get us thinking
about the Platonic forms
themselves.
How does it happen?
Plato has a theory.
He says, "These things remind
us of the Platonic forms."
We see something that's
beautiful to some degree,
and it reminds us of perfect
beauty.
We see something that's more or
less round, and it reminds us of
perfect circularity.
We see somebody who's fairly
decent morally,
and it reminds us of perfect
justice or perfect virtue.
It's just like the photograph,
perhaps the not very good
photograph, that reminds me of
my friend Ruth.
All right.
Well, there's an explanation of
how it could be that things that
are not themselves perfectly
round could remind us,
could make us think about
perfect roundness.
But then Plato says,
"Okay, but keep in mind
all of what you need in
order to have reminding,
to have recollecting take
place."
In order for the photograph to
remind me of Ruth,
I have to already have met
Ruth.
I have to already be acquainted
with her.
In order for a more or less
round plate to remind me of
roundness, Plato says,
I have to have already met
perfect roundness itself.
In order for a more or less
just society to remind me of
justice itself,
so that I can start thinking
about the nature of justice
itself,
I have to somehow have already
been acquainted with perfect
justice.
But how and when did it happen?
Not in this life,
not in this world.
In this world nothing is
perfectly round,
nothing is perfectly beautiful,
nothing is perfectly just.
So it's got to have happened
before.
If seeing the photograph of my
friend now can remind me of my
friend, it's got to be because I
met my friend before.
If seeing things that
participate in the forms remind
me of the forms,
it's got to be because I've met
or been acquainted directly with
the forms before.
But you don't bump up against,
you don't meet,
you don't see or grasp or
become directly acquainted with,
the forms in this life.
So it's got to have happened
before this life.
That's Plato's argument.
Plato says, thinking about the
way in which we grasp the forms
helps us to see that the soul
must have existed before birth,
in the Platonic heavenly realm,
directly grasping,
directly communing with,
directly understanding the
forms.
It's not taking place in this
life, so it has to have happened
before.
Well, look, now we've got the
kind of argument we were looking
for.
Earlier the objection was,
we had no good reason to think
the soul was one of the building
blocks from which we're
composed;
we have no good reason to think
it's one of the pieces that was
around before our body got put
together, before our birth.
Socrates says, "No.
On the contrary,
we do have reason,
based on the argument from
recollection,
to conclude that the soul was
around before we were born."
All right.
So the next question is,
is the argument from
recollection a good one?
Now, let's say,
I'm not really much concerned
with whether this was an
argument that Plato thought
worked or not.
Our question is,
do we think it works or
not?
Although this is a form of an
argument that Plato does put
forward in other dialogues as
well,
and so it strikes me so there's
at least some reason to think
this is an argument that he felt
might well be right.
The crucial premise--Again,
we're going to just grant Plato
the metaphysics.
The crucial question is going
to be, is it right that in order
to explain how it is we could
have knowledge of the forms now
that we have to appeal to a
prior existence in which we had
direct acquaintance?
It's not obvious to me that
that's true.
It's not obvious to me for a
couple of reasons.
One question is this:
Is it really true that in order
to think about the perfectly
straight,
I must have somehow,
somewhere at some point come up
against, had direct knowledge
of,
the perfectly straight?
Isn't it enough for me to
extrapolate from cases that I do
come up against in this life?
I come across things that are
bent;
I come across things that are
more straight,
more and more straight.
Can't my mind take off from
there and push straight ahead to
the idea of the perfectly
straight, even if I never have
encountered it before?
Let me stop with this idea.
Even if Plato is right,
that we need to have
acquaintance with the Platonic
forms themselves in order to
think about them,
and even if Plato is right that
we never get the acquaintance in
this world,
in the interaction with
ordinary physical objects,
why couldn't it be that our
acquaintance with the Platonic
forms comes about in this life
for the very first time?
That's the question,
or that's the objection,
that we'll turn to at the start
of next class.
 
