ACLA 4565

FLRST PUBLIC EXAMINATION

Honour Moderations in Classics (Course IIA)

I-filary Term 2000 PLATO, EUTHYPHRO AND MENO Wednesday 8 March, 9.30 a.m. - 12.30 p.m.

Answer QUESTION 1 and TWO others

Please do not turn over until told that you may do so

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1.

Write critical c o m m e n t s on F O U R of the following passages:

SOCRATES: Then isn't being approved an exampleeither of coming to be so or of being affected by something? EUTHYPHRO: Certainly. SOCRATES: Then this too is comparable with the previous cases: something does not get approved because it's being approved by those who approve of it, but it's being approved because it gets approved? EUTHYPHRO: Necessarily. SOCRATES: Well then, what is it that we're saying about the holy, Euthyphro? Surely that it gets approved by all the gods, on your account. EUTHYPHRO: Yes. SOCRATES: Is that because it's holy, or for some other reason? EUTHYPHRO: No, that's the reason. SOCRATES: Then it gets approved because it's holy: its not holy by reason of getting

(a)

approved?

EUTHYPHRO: Presumably. SOCRATES: Whereas it's precisely because it gets approved that it is approved by the gods and 'divinely approved'. EUTHYPHRO" Of course. SOCRATES: Then the 'divinely approved' is not holy, Euthyphro, nor is the holy 'divinely approved', as you say, but it's different from this. EUTHYPHRO: How so, Socrates? SOCRATES: Because we've admitted that the holy gets approved for the reason that it's holy, but it's not because it gets approved that it's holy. Right? EUTHYPHRO" Yes. SOCRATES: But then again the 'divinely approved', because it gets approved by the gods is divinely approved by this very act of approval: it is not the case that it gets approved because it's divinely approved. EUTHYPHRO: That is true. (PLATO,

Euthyphro 10c7-e9)

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(b)

MENO: But it isn't difficulty to say, Socrates. First, if you w a n t to k n o w excellence in a man, it is easy to say that this is excellence in a man, to be capable of taking part in the affiars of the city, and in doing so to do good for his friends and h a r m to his enemies, and to take care that he does not himself suffer anything like that. If you w a n t to k n o w excellence in a w o m a n , it isn't difficult to describe it; she m u s t m a n a g e the h o u s e well, looking after its contents a n d being subject to er husband. A n d there is another sort of excellence in a child, both female a n d male, and in an old man, if you like, a freeman, or if you like, a slave. And there are m a n y other sorts of excellence, so that there is no difficulty in saying w h a t excellence is; for there is an excellence for each of us according to each activity and time of life, and for each task, and in the same way, I think, Socrates, with badness. (PLATO, Meno 71el-72a5)

SOCRATES: So it follows, from w h a t you agree to, that doing whatever one does, w i t h a part of excellence, that is excellence; for you say that justice and each of these things is a part of excellence. MENO- Well, so what? SOCRATES: This is w h a t I men, that while I asked you to say w h a t excellence is as a whole, you are far from saying what it is itself, but say that every action is excellence if it is done w i t h a part of excellence; just as if you h a d already said w h a t excellence is as a whole and I was going to k n o w , e v e n if you c h o p p e d it up into little pieces. So you n e e d to start again with the same question, as it seems to me, m y dear Meno; w h a t / s excellence, if every actio w o u l d be excellence if accompanied by a part of excellence? For that is w h a t s o m e o n e is saying, w h e n e v e r he says that every action, a c c o m p a n i e d by justice, is excellence. Or don't you think the same question is necessary again, and do you think that anyone knows w h a t a part of excellence is, w h e n he doesn't k n o w w h a t excellence itself is? ( P L A T O , Meno 79b4-c9)

(c)

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(d) SOCRATES: But does he have these opinions, or not? MENO: Necessarily so, it appears, Socrates. SOCRATES: But if it isn't by having acquired them in this present life, isn't this now clear, that at some other time he possessed them and h a d already learned them then? MENO: It appears so. SOCRATES: Then isn't this the time w h e n he wasn't a h u m a n being? MENO: Yes. SOCRATES: Well, if both in whatever tiem he is a h u m a n being and in whatever time he is not a h u m a n being there are going to be true opinions in him, which become knowledge w h e n they have been awoken by questioning, won't his soul for the whole of time be in a state of having learned? For it's clear that for the whole of time he either/s, or/s not, a h u m a n being. MENO: It appears so. SOCRATES: Then if the truth about the things that are is always present in our soul, won't the soul be immortal, so that you must confidently try to search for and to recollect what you don't happen to know n o w - - that is, what you don't happen to remember? MENO: I think you are right, Socrates, but I don't know how.
(PLATO, Meno 85e7-86b5)

(e)

SOCRATES: .... What I m e a n by 'starting from an assumption' is like the way in which the geometricians often consider some question someone asks them; for example, whether it is possible for this area to be inscribed in this circle as a triangle. Someone might say, "I don't yet know whether this is such that it can be inscribed, but I think I have a sort of assumption, a s it were, which is useful for the question, as follows: if this figure is such that, w h e n one places it alongside its given line, if falls short by a figure similar to the one that was placed alongside, I think one result will follow, and another, on the other hand, if ithis cannot happen to it. Making an assumption, then, I am willing to tell you the result concerning the inscribing of it in the circle, whether it is possible or not". (PLATO, M e n o 86e4-87b2)

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(f)

SOCRATES: .... For true opinions too are a very fine thing as long as they stay in their place, and produce all sorts of good things; but they are not willing to stay in their place for a long time, but run away out of a man's soul, so they are not worth very much, until someone ties them down by working out the explanation. This, my friend Meno, is recollection, as we have agreed in what we said before. When they are tied down, they first of all become pieces of knowledge, and then permanent; and it is for this reason that knowledge is more valuable than right opinion, and i t is by being tied down that knowledge differs from right opinion, MENO: Yes, indeed, Socrates, it seems to be something like that. SOCRATES: And yet I too speak as one not having knowledge, but making a conjecture; however, that right opinion is different from knowledge, this I don't think is conjecture on my part, but if there is anything I would say I know - - and there are few things of which I would say this - - I would coult this too as one of the things that I know. (PLATO, Meno 97e6-98b5) . Does the Euthyphro show that the n o t i o n of piety (r6 6otov) makes
no sense?

Does Socrates in the Euthyphro and in the Meno m a k e clear exactly w h a t features m u s t be present in a satisfactory definition of a term, and w h y ? Does Socrates' a r g u m e n t t h a t ' n o - o n e k n o w i n g l y d e s i r e s evil things' (Meno 77b6-78b2) require a fallacious step? Does the d o c t r i n e of anamnesis r e s o l v e M e n o ' s ' p a r a d o x of research' (that one cannot search either for w h a t one k n o w s or for w h a t one does not know: Meno 80d5-e5)? If not, h o w s h o u l d the p a r a d o x really be resolved? 'In a r g u i n g (Meno 87d2-89a5) that arete is to be i d e n t i f i e d w i t h phronesis, Socrates is in complete earnest, a n d this is the real climax of the Meno.' Discuss. Is the discussion w i t h A n y t u s (90b4-95al) irrelevant to the rest of the

Meno?
.

'In b o t h Euthyphro and Meno, Socrates scores cheap successes in a r g u m e n t a g a i n s t w e a k , u n p r a c t i s e d o p p o n e n t s ' . Is this a fair assessment?

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