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Discussing the Theaetetus and the Meno, two dialogs about knowledge.

We’re returning to Plato for a somewhat more thorough treatment than we gave him in Episode 1. This should be considered part two (Hume being #1) of three discussions intended to convey the main conflict in the history of epistemology between the empiricists (like Hume) and the rationalists (like Plato).

We slog through most of the Theaetetus, where Plato considers and rejects a series of mostly very lame conceptions of knowledge and replaces them at the end with… NOTHING. Seth is crushed. In the Meno, knowledge is “remembrance” (maybe), like anything worth knowing can’t be learned but only elicited out of the depths of your unconscious.

Plus, some discussion of recent blog activity here, like our Danto accolades and Wes’s comments on Jerry Fodor and Sam Harris.

Read along: http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/plato_theaetetus.htm and http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/plato_meno01.htm.

If you don’t like the funky background on those pages, just look these up via Project Gutenberg. I notice that those versions have an extensive commentary before the selection, which serves as a useful refresher AFTER you’ve read it as to what happened, as the twists and turns can be difficult to keep in mind.

Oh, and Seth did this diagram to express his love of the Meno.

End song: “Obvious Boy” by Mark Lint and the Fake from the album So Whaddaya Think? (2000).