The question of ontological commitment in Plato’s Hippias Major has been important in disputes over the dialogue’s place in the corpus, its meaning, and its authenticity. But this question seems to have been settled—the Hippias Major is not committed to the ‘forms.’ Such an ontological conclusion has been vigorously defended, but its defenses rest on a problematic meta-ontological framework. This paper suggests a more adequate framework and brings more evidence to the evaluation of the question of ontological commitment in the (...) Hippias Major. It concludes that the dialogue is indeed committed to some kind of form. (shrink)

This paper investigates the hypothesis that Heraclitus was a formative influence on the Hippias Major. Specifically, it establishes connections between the dialogue's presentation of "the fine" (τὸ καλόν) and Heraclitus's "unity of opposites" idea. It argues that the fine is characterized by specifically Heraclitean oppositions, and it concludes that this makes a difference for the reading of certain passages in the dialogue and for philosophical conclusions regarding the fine.

This paper argues that Plato’s arguments at Cratylus 386e-390d are more robustly analogical than is generally supposed. Accordingly, it first establishes the nature of the main analogues. It then demonstrates the argument’s underlying structural relation, extending it to the target domain and to Socrates’ chosen method for evaluating that domain.

Both Derrida and Ricœur address philosophy’s relation to metaphor, and both take Aristotle as their starting points. However, though Ricœur’s The Rule of Metaphor is largely a response to Derrida’s “White Mythology,” Ricœur seems to pass right over Derrida’s critically important interpretation of Aristotle. In this essay, I dispel concerns that Ricœur may have been intellectually irresponsible in his engagement with Derrida on this point, and I demonstrate how Study 1 makes better sense as a detailed response to Derrida.