Theaetetus

Plato
Socrates and Theaetetus are discussing
what it is to have knowledge, and in this
particular excerpt, Socrates shows that
knowledge cannot be identified as true
judgment with an account.

At the beginning of this article

Socrates begins to examine the suggestion that

knowledge is true judgment with an account.

After a preliminary discussion about mereology,

Socrates moves on to examine the claim that knowledge
consists in true judgment with an account.

He first asks what could be meant by giving an account, and he

gives three possibilities:

1) Making ones thought plain by means of speech

2) Being able, when one is asked what anything is, to

provide the questioner with an answer in terms of its
elements

3) Being able to state some mark by which the thing

one is asked for differs from everything else

Regarding the first suggestion

Socrates points out that if it were true, there would be

no way to distinguish correct judgment from
knowledge.

Because everyone who makes any judgments

whatsoever is usually able to make their thoughts plain
by means of speech, this reading would have nearly any
correct judgment at all count as knowledge.

Regarding the second suggestion

Socrates points out that there would still be cases where someone
had true belief with an account but did not have knowledge.

Socrates offers something like the following argument: Just

because someone is able to state the first few letters in
Theaetetuss name doesnt mean that that person has knowledge
of the first syllable of his name.

After all, they would give the same beginning letters for the
name Theodorus.

So being able to specify elements does not help to show that one
has knowledge of the syllable made out of those elements.

Regarding the third suggestion

Socrates thinks that this suggestion fails as well, for one

of two reasons.

Either it is completely unhelpful or it begs the

question.

If I didnt already have the ability (3) indicates, how could I

possibly have had a judgment about the thing in question as
opposed to some other thing?

It seems part of what it is to have a judgment about something

is that you can differentiate it from everything else.

So if you say that (3) needs to be added to true judgment, this

seems unintelligible, and so unhelpful.

On the other hand, if you say that to have knowledge, you

must know what it is that differentiates that thing from
everything else, then our analysis is circular.

Either way, (3) doesnt help.

Socrates concludes that knowledge is not just a matter of true

judgment with an account.

Epistemology

Plato
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