Journal of the History of Philosophy

Notes and Discussions MUST Philebus 59A-C REFER TO TRANSCENDENT FORMS? The appearance of Robert Fahrnkopf's critique' of an argument in my monograph ' affords me the opportunity of re-presenting some of the relevant issues. I aimed in KRP (as I said, pp. 34-35) to begin, rather than to end, debate, ~and I am happy to continue the discussion. Fahrnkopf's general strategy in pages 202-5 is as follows: Plato must in Philebus 55c-62a be adhering either to Transcendent Realism (TR) or to Immanent Realism (IR). Shiner wants to deny that Plato adheres to TR; so he commits Plato to IR. But if Plato is committed to IR, various horrendous consequences follow. So Plato, after all, must be committed to TR, and Shiner must be wrong. The crucial claim in this argument is the first one; without it the argument collapses. However, to use this claim as a premise in an argument against my interpretation of this passage is question-begging. Let me make first some preliminary remarks.' A. There is a distinction between these two question: (I) What philosophically is it possible to believe about concepts and their relation to their instances? (2) What evidence is there that elsewhere Plato himself distinguished between such possibilities ? With respect to (1), there is a distinction between 'conception', 'concept' philosophically uninterpreted, and 'concept' philosophically interpreteted. Conceptions are personal, the possessions of individuals or groups of individuals (my conception of a first-class undergraduate essay, Carter's conception of human rights).' Concepts , on the other hand, are impersonal, something like, in C. I. Lewis's words, "the logical intension or connotation of a term.., exemplified by dictionary definitions where these are satisfactory.'" Empirical investigation could show us that someone's or some group's conception of X was not what we thought it was. Empirical investigation would not in the same way settle whether the concept of S was what someone thought it to be; only reflection on the "grammar" (Wittgenstein's sense) of the concept could do that. Suppose now that a philosopher replies to the above, "I do not see this distinction ' "Forms in the Philebus,'" this Journal, 15 (April, 1977):202-7. 2Knowledge and Reality in Plato's Philebus (Assen: Van Gorcum, 1974); hereafter cited as KRP. Fahrnkopf makes me out to be more dogmatic (p. 202). I do not conclude that there is no evidence incompatiblewith revisionism in the Philebus; I aim to present a case for saying there is none. Any definitive answer to the question of the interpretation of 59aft. and other passages requires a satisfactory account of the later ontologyand epistemology generally. I did not providesuch a comprehensive account in KRPand certainly willnot here. Moreover, 1do not concede that there is no positive evidence for revisionism in the Philebus; I say that the evidence can be seen to be in the Philebus only in the light shed on that dialogue by other later dialogues. That does not imply that such evidence is not there. ' These preliminary remarks summarize arguments made at greater length in chaps. I-5 ofKRP. Fahrnkopf does not refer to this material. 1find it hard to believe that if he had taken it into account his text would have remained unchanged. See Ronald Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1977), pp. 134ff. SMind and the World Order (New York: Scribners, 1929), p. 67. [71] 72 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY you are after; concepts are no more than conceptions." This remark shows the distinction I want to make between 'concept' philosophically uninterpreted and 'concept ' philosophically interpreted. This philosopher is presupposing a nonphilosophical independent life for both 'conception' and 'concept' when he says that concepts are no more than conceptions. He is taking a word, "concept," that has its own life in everyday discourse and is giving a philosophical interpretation of that term. Some other philosopher who says that concepts are unitary entities existing in their own transcendent world is also taking a term that has a currency in ordinary language and giving a philosophical interpretation of it -a rather different one from the reductionist above. In each case, the thought that there is a distinction between 'conception ' and...