Skeptic Approach to Socrates' Knowledge about Knowledge
Date Submitted: 10/20/2003 06:13:01
In Plato's Republic Book V lines 476d to 478e, Plato's main characters Socrates and Glaucon have an interesting discussion about epistemology. The argument in this passage serves to prove that knowledge and opinion are not the same. This argument is based on the premise that knowledge is set over the complete existence of things, whereas opinion is set over "intermediate" existence of things. In this paper, I will first divide the completeness into two categories,
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defined a power as a class that enables us to do whatever we are capable of doing. However, since we are not capable of knowing justice particularly and knowing anything moral in general, knowledge cannot be a power in the sense Socrates applies it to every case. As a result, the distinction between knowledge and opinion gets blurry, and consequently, the argument loses its soundness. Socrates needs further justification to "console and persuade me" (476e).
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