Theaetetus 'Cold Wind' Argument

1. Theaetetus first proposes that knowledge is nothing but perception as one who knows something is perceiving the thing he knows. Socrates presents the ‘cold wind’ argument in an attempt to show how things appear to the individual and how they are to for the individual by explaining that sometimes when the same wind is blowing, one could feel chilly while the other could not. There is no way in return that knowledge could then be defined as perception for four reasons. There is no truth about anything due to man being the measure of all things and each have their own conceptions for what is truth and real. For example, the world appears radically different to a color blind person that it does to someone with normal vision. The objects that

we perceive as colored then must not be the real objects but just our experience of these objects that is determined by the individuals subjective point of view. Socrates concludes that there are therefore no objective qualities of objects and nothing can be named. Then nothing is ‘one’ or definite except the forms; everything else is in flux. If everything is in flux since we cannot see the forms, then there is no being; everything is becoming. It is clear that when attempting to define knowledge, Theaetetus’ proposal was disregarded quickly by Socrates as he comes to illogical conclusions from this definition.

2. Theaetetus’ final proposal is that knowledge is true judgment with an account, or justified true belief. I would like to propose an example on how we can use this definition in the real world. Let’s say I have a true belief on the subject of how to make a loaf of bread. To give an account of the elements in a loaf of bread, I know you need 500g of bread flour, 7g of yeast, 1 tsp of salt, 300ml of warm water, 2 tbsp of sunflower oil, and 1 tbsp of honey. Knowing the ingredients alone would not be enough knowledge to have justified true belief as we do not know how the elements are arranged to form the loaf of bread. For the sake of the example say we know the directions; tip the flour into a bowl and mix in the yeast with the salt. Stir in the water, oil, and honey and bring together to make a soft dough with your hands. Tip the dough on a floured surface, knead for 10 minutes, put the dough in a tin, bake uncovered at 200c for 30 minutes or until golden. We now know give an account of the elements of bread and know how the elements are arranged; but does this mean I have justified true belief on the subject?

Socrates would argue against my example by referring to the Puzzle of Misidentification. Socrates believed that a person can give an account of elements of a subject and know how the elements are arranged but can still give false belief without knowing the Forms. It is proposed that false belief occurs when someone misidentifies or switches knowledge with one thing as another. He refutes that in all epistemological cases, you either know or don’t know, if you know something you can’t not know it and vice versa. If you know two things, you also can’t mistake the two for you would not know them and if you don’t know something you can’t mistake it for what you do know. Socrates refers subtly to the Forms, saying that the world has unifying attributes that aren’t physical but are rather formal and the Forms make a thing be what it is. Those who cannot see the forms cannot posses justified true belief.

3. Plato presented his theory of Forms by explaining that there are two realms in reality, the physical world and the world in which we cannot observe, located out of space and time, made of eternal transcendent ‘forms’. Forms are perfect, unchanging templates used as ultimate reference points for all objects we sensualize in the physical world and although we cannot see the Forms or know exactly what they are, they are more real to us than we realize. A form is a quality or property of an object. For example, if we separate the properties found on a checker board such as color and weight and considered the squareness (shape) by itself, you are thinking of the form of squareness. Whenever you evaluate one thing as ‘better’ than another, you assume that there is an absolute to which you can compare the two objects. For example, how do you know that a dog with four legs is better than a dog with 3? Plato answers this by saying that everyone can picture what qualities a perfect dog should have (making Forms universal), and this picture we all bring to our head is the Form of a dog.

Forms are said to be essential to explain the structure of reality because the Forms provide explanation of why any thing is the way it is and are the source or origin of the being of all things. We must remember that forms only exemplify one property, material objects are impure as they are a combination of properties. The cave metaphor illustrates a connection between the material world and the properties of Forms. The shadows on the wall represent material objects that we see but the real objects passing in front of the fire creating these shadows are the Forms. When relating this analogy to reality, Plato believes the real world to be the world of the Forms and our world is a shadow of that world; the objects we see provide a poor imitation of the Forms. From this analogy, we can see that the Forms are the cause of all that exists, hence why it is vital in Plato’s eyes to understand the Forms in order to begin to explain the structure of reality.

4. The theory of the Forms holds that individual things have their properties because they participate in Forms that give them those properties. Socrates presents the ‘Whole Pie Model’ of participation, for X to partake of Y is for X to get the whole of Y as its share of Y. For example, the entire Form of beauty could be found in a painting by Van Gough, Michelangelo, and Rembrandt. All of the paintings are beautiful by virtue of partaking in the Form of beauty. If the entire Form of beauty lies in each object at separate places, then causality and the Whole Pie Model suggests that a Form could exist in two separate places at the same time. Socrates and Parmenides conclude that this is logically impossible because in order to retain its oneness, a Form must exist in one location at one time and it cannot separate from itself. Therefore, if Socrates wants to retain the theory of Forms, then he must abandon the Whole Pie Model completely.

Socrates presents a day analogy in order to solve the problem of this theory of participation relating to the Whole Pie Model. Suppose that a form is like a day and just as a day can be in many separate places at the same time without being separate from itself, a Form can be in many separate places at the same time without being separate from itself. Parmenides immediately counters that Socrates’ day analogy is like that of a sail. A sail can cover many separate people only if each person is covered by a different part of the sail just as a day can be in many separate places at the same time only if the different parts of it are over the separate places. This analogy shows that the only way Socrates’ day analogy could be possible is through the use of the Piece of Pie Model, which was disproven when it was agreed that a Form cannot be separated or divided due to the theory of participation.

5. Parmenides raises the ‘greatest difficulty’ that the theory of the Forms faces. He gives an argument stating that Forms are entirely separate, Forms only relate to each other and particulars relate only to each other. If this is true, it’s impossible for humans to know the Forms. We come to grant that knowledge of Forms is more precise than knowledge in humans. Since Gods have more precise knowledge than humans, only Gods know the Forms. Since no Form is human and humans cannot know the Forms, the knowledge of Forms in the Gods is not present in humans. Therefore, we come to conclude the gods don’t know human affairs.

6. The virtue of piety is regarded as a manner of living that fulfills one’s duty both to gods and to humanity. It is important to address what piety is as Socrates had recently been charged with impiety and is about to be tried before Athenian court to determine his fate. The significance of this question should also show importance to Euthyphro, who is a plaintiff going to court to charge his father of murder. If Euthyphro cannot define a difference between piety and impiety, who is to say Socrates’ charges could be held in court or if Euthyphro should testify against his father? We are poised instantly with the question whether the gods love us because we’re good, or whether we are good because they love us. More simply put, Socrates wants Euthyphro to clarify whether a person has a quality of piety, whether this quality is something pleasing to the gods and therefore the gods love that person, or if the gods love a particular person and therefore that individual is pious.

Both speakers accept the first option, but point out that if both options were true, it would create an endless circle.

What makes the god-beloved the god-beloved is the fact that the gods love it, whereas what makes the pious the pious is something else entirely. The gods can love many things for many reasons and therefore, whatever is pious may be loved by the gods, but what is loved by the gods is up to discretion. For instance, he points out that the gods argue over not questions that can be reached through calculation but over questions such as what is just and what is good. Socrates asks Euthyphro if people who are pious are also just in which he responds yes, but there is a part of justice that cares to the gods and part that cares to the men. The problem with this statement lies in the notion of ‘care’. With some things such as horses and men, care implies some way of making them better but when applied to gods, care cannot have this meaning as men cannot make the gods better. He states that prayer and sacrifices are not beneficial to god as god doesn’t need our acknowledgement but the practices are only beneficial to the believer. If we can do nothing to benefit god, then the first part of justice is irrelevant and we must focus on other men or moral conduct according to Socrates. Euthyphro then defines pious as not what is beneficial to the gods but as what is pleasing to them. We come to conclude that neither Socrates nor Euthyphro knows what the true nature of piety is as they cannot explain the origin or why piety is the way it is. We are left with the initial question of what is

piety?

7. Meletus has accused Socrates of ‘impiety’ by teaching the youth about new gods and disregarding the commonly accepted ones. This accusation leads Socrates to his inevitable death, but Socrates brought up an argument against ‘his corruption of the youth’ that I would like to note in the form of the horse trainer analogy. He begins by questioning Meletus about who improves the youth if he has such a bad influence on the youth in which Meletus replies laws, jurymen, the spectators, members of the Council, and the whole population of Athens but Socrates. This brings Socrates to present his first defense with an equestrian analogy.

The reader is presented with a horse that you want to improve. One would think to take a horse needing improvement to a horse-trainer, a specialized individual who has the ability to improve horses. He claims that most people without the skillset possessed by the horse-trainer would have a negative influence with the possibility of making the horse worse. If it takes such expertise to improve a horse, then that would imply that only an expert is capable of improving the youth. This undermines Meletus’ first main accusation against him in an attempt to show the court that he is ignorant of the very knowledge necessary to make the relevant charge. I only find Socrates’ argument convincing when such improvement needed is knowledge. We cannot compare making a horse physically fit to making a human virtuous as the tasks differ drastically.

8. When Socrates was younger, he recounts having a passion for the natural sciences, intent on learning what caused things and their attributes to continue or cease being. However, all scientific explanations only acknowledge the laws governing the behavior of materials and do not lay out any reason for why they behave as they do. He gives an example saying that he used to think people grew larger by consuming external nourishment but this fails to answer what makes one person larger than another? Socrates then turns away from the studying of natural science thinking it would make him soul-blinded, saying they caused him to unlearn many of the things he thought he had previously known. He comes to conclude that intelligence organizes all things and aims to discover the reason for anything’s coming to be, ceasing to be, or continuing to be, and ask how that things should best be. This is where Socrates’ study of the philosophy of man and human nature comes about with his theory of Forms.

9. Every lesson I found myself pondering important questions brought up by Plato. The question “What is Love” struck me instantly as I found this concept extremely interesting. I enjoyed the way Plato wrote the Symposium and the dialogue was one of the easiest to read as he introduced his lessons carefully. Some questions I found myself asking were; what is loves ultimate object, does one have to ignore the previous rung on Plato’s love ladder in order to advance, can one attain the highest form of love on the ladder modern day, how long does it take to fall in love with the next rung, and so forth. I also questioned this entire semester his theory of the forms. I understand what they are and their purpose, I just find it hard to conceptualize how we can know about the forms if they do not exist in our ‘physical realm’. I ponder the thought of if we ever did see a Form in the physical sense in the past. The biggest question brought to my attention is how can we apply what Plato teaches the reader to real life? How can I apply his teachings and better myself day by day? What does it mean to fulfill the good life?