The Ontology of Socratic Questioning in Plato's Early DialoguesWinner of the 2013 Symposium Book Award, presented by the Symposium: Canadian Journal of Continental Philosophy Modern interpreters of Plato's Socrates have generally taken the dialogues to be aimed at working out objective truth. Attending closely to the texts of the early dialogues and the question of virtue in particular, Sean D. Kirkland suggests that this approach is flawed—that such concern with discovering external facts rests on modern assumptions that would have been far from the minds of Socrates and his contemporaries. This isn't, however, to accuse Socrates of any kind of relativism. Through careful analysis of the original Greek and of a range of competing strands of Plato scholarship, Kirkland instead brings to light a radical, proto-phenomenological Socrates, for whom "what virtue is" is what has always already appeared as virtuous in everyday experience of the world, even if initial appearances are unsatisfactory or obscure and in need of greater scrutiny and clarification. |
Contents
Virtues Ontological Excess and Distance | 33 |
Socratic Virtue in the Face of Excessive Truth | 117 |
Aporia in the Middle Dialogues | 153 |
Notes | 173 |
| 247 | |
| 261 | |
Other editions - View all
The Ontology of Socratic Questioning in Plato's Early Dialogues Sean D. Kirkland Limited preview - 2012 |
The Ontology of Socratic Questioning in Plato's Early Dialogues Sean D. Kirkland No preview available - 2012 |
Common terms and phrases
ale'theia already Apology aporia argues argument Aristotle Aristotle’s articulate asks benefit Benson Brickhouse and Smith Callias Charmides Chrm claim concerned condition confidence context courage Cratylus Critias defense define definition deinos discourse discussion distance divine doxa doxai early dialogues eidos elenctic emphasizes entail episte'me eristic essential etymology Euthd Euthphr Euthydemus Euthyphro everyday attitude excess experience explicitly find fine first Gorgias Greek Hippias Major human virtue human wisdom identified indicates initial appearances insofar interlocutors interpretation knowledge Laches logos means melete mode muthos Nehamas Nicias non-knowing objective reality one’s ontological opinion ousia pain paradox passage pathos philosophical activity philosophical project Plato’s early Plato’s Socrates position possess precisely present presume Protagoras questionworthy radical relation rhetoric seems sense significance simply Socratic elenchus Socratic philosophizing Socratic questioning sophists speaking specific subject matter teachable techne techne-like grasp term thereby things thinking tion translated truth unconcealment understanding understood verb virtuous Vlastos