Abstract
Recollection is central to the epistemology of Plato’s Meno. After all, the character Socrates claims that recollection is the process whereby embodied human souls bind down true opinions (doxai) and acquire knowledge (epistêmê). This paper examines the exchange between Socrates and Meno’s slave to determine (1) what steps on the path to acquiring knowledge are part of the process of recollection and (2) what is required for a subject to count as having recollected something. I argue that the key to answering these questions is to get clear on the kind of process recollection is supposed to be. In particular, I argue that recollection is a process akin to the kind of process Aristotle calls “changes” (kinêseis or incomplete energeiai). The key feature of such processes is that they aim at an end beyond themselves and are not complete until that end comes about. In the case of recollection, the end is knowledge, but inferior mental states, such as false opinion, puzzlement (aporia), and true opinion can come about because of a process of recollection without making it the case that the subject has recollected anything. I argue that this interpretation provides a textually supported and philosophically coherent understanding of Socrates’ conception of recollection.
References
Benson, H. 1990. “Meno, the Slave Boy, and the Elenchos.” Phronesis 35: 128–58.10.1163/156852890X00088Search in Google Scholar
Benson, H. 2000. Socratic Wisdom: The Model of Knowledge in Plato’s Early Dialogues. New York: Oxford University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Benson, H. 2015. Clitophon’s Challenge: Dialectic in Plato’s Meno, Phaedo, and Republic. New York: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199324835.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Bluck, R. 1961. Plato’s Meno. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Burnyeat, M. 1980. “Socrates and the Jury: Paradoxes in Plato’s Distinction between Knowledge and True Belief, Part I.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 54 (suppl.): 173–91.10.1017/CBO9780511974069.007Search in Google Scholar
Burnyeat, M. 2008. “Kinêsis Vs. Energeia: A Much-Read Passage in (But Not Of) Aristotle’s Metaphysics.” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 24: 219–91.10.1017/9781009049146.008Search in Google Scholar
Calvert, B. 1974. “Meno’s Paradox Reconsidered.” Journal of the History of Philosophy 12: 143–52.10.1353/hph.2008.0445Search in Google Scholar
Dancy, R. M. 2004. Plato’s Introduction of Forms. Cambridge.Search in Google Scholar
Dimas, P. 1996. “True Belief in the Meno.” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 14: 1–32.Search in Google Scholar
Ebrey, D. 2014. “Meno’s Paradox in Context.” British Journal for the History of Philosophy 22 (1): 4–24.10.1080/09608788.2013.869488Search in Google Scholar
Fine, G. 2004. “Knowledge and True Belief in the Meno.” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 27: 41–81.10.1093/oso/9780198746768.003.0003Search in Google Scholar
Fine, G. 2014. The Possibility of Inquiry: Meno’s Paradox from Socrates to Sextus. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199577392.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Friedman, J. forthcoming. “Inquiry and Belief.” Noûs. early view. https://doi.org/10.1111/nous.12222.Search in Google Scholar
Gentzler, J. 1994. “Recollection and “The Problem of the Socratic Elenchus”.” Boston Area Colloquium in Ancient Philosophy 10: 257–95.10.1163/2213441794X00148Search in Google Scholar
Landry, E. 2012. “Recollection and the Mathematician’s Method in Plato’s Meno.” Philosophia Mathematica 20: 143–69.10.1093/philmat/nks005Search in Google Scholar
Moravcsik, J. M. E. 1971. “Learning as Recollection.” In Plato, Volume 1: A Collection of Critical Essays (Anchor Books), edited by G. Vlastos. Garden City, NY 53–69.10.1007/978-1-349-86203-0_5Search in Google Scholar
Nehamas, A. 1985. “Meno’s Paradox and Socrates as a Teacher.” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 3: 1–30.Search in Google Scholar
Ryle, G. 1976. “Many Things are Odd about Our Meno.” Paideia 5: 1–9.Search in Google Scholar
Schwab, W. 2015. “Explanation in the Epistemology of the Meno.” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 48: 1–36.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198735540.003.0001Search in Google Scholar
Scott, D. 1995. Recollection and Experience. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511597374Search in Google Scholar
Scott, D. 1999. “Platonic Recollection.” In Plato 1: Metaphysics and Epistemology, edited by G. Fine, 93–124. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Scott, D. 2006. Plato’s Meno. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511482632Search in Google Scholar
Smyth, H. W. 1920. A Greek Grammar for Colleges. New York: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Vlastos, G. 1965. “Anamnesis in the Meno.” Dialogue 4: 143–67.10.2307/j.ctv24rgc46.17Search in Google Scholar
Weiss, R. 2001. Virtue in the Cave: Moral Inquiry in Plato’s Meno. New York: Oxford University Press.10.1093/0195140761.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Wilkes, K. 1979. “Conclusions in the Meno.” Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie 16: 143–53.10.1515/agph.1979.61.2.143Search in Google Scholar
© 2020 Walter de Gruyter Inc., Boston/Berlin