Plato Logic and Ontology

Plato, Logic, and Ontology
By Ryan Haecker
Undergraduate Philosophy Association - Guest Lecture
University of Texas at Austin
4/30/2015
I. 1. Introduction: Why Study Plato?
Alcibiades tells us, in Plato’s Symposium, that the “bite of philosophical reasoning is more acute
for a young and gifted mind than that inflicted by a tooth of a serpent. Once you have suffered
that bite, you never know what you will do or say... As I look around this room, all of you have
participated in the same madness: the Bacchic frenzy that possesses the lover of wisdom.” Today
I see in your eyes some faint spark of that fiery madness and crystalline wisdom that might have
once enriched Plato’s Academy. I ask that you open your thoughts and direct your minds to
search with me for this poisonous promise of philosophic wisdom.
Why should the “icy laws of outer fact” and science bend its knee to philosophy’s “private
dream”? (William James, The Will to Believe, 1896) Plato answers that scientific knowledge
today - no less than yesterday - requires that we, not only explain the necessary conditions for
any consequence, but, moreover, apprehend these Ideas with a most erotic passion; and that it is
better to “suffer anything” than live unreflectively through the fatuous misery of false opinions.
(Rep. 516d)
Modern natural science follows Plato’s example in searching for the essential conditions that
cause all natural phenomena. For every anomaly, science hypothesizes some new law, force, or
element from which it may necessarily deduce the possibility of what has been observed. This
'hypothetical-deductive' scientific method, which Karl Popper called the “logic of scientific
discovery” (1934), was founded in Plato's logic of Ideas. Hermann Cohen writes: Plato is the
founder of the system of philosophy because he founded logic... by establishing logic's
connection to science, and thus grounding logic... in the concept of the Ideas. (1902 446-7)
Plato's logic of Ideas is the earliest common ancestor of Aristotelian syllogistic logic, Hegelian
dialectical logic, and modern symbolic logic: for Plato provided the ontological infrastructure for
Aristotle's formalization of logic into an array of valid syllogisms; the unity, division, and
mixture of concepts that motivates Hegel's self-oppositing dialectic; and the universal Ideas of
predicates and functions for Frege and Russell 's symbolic quantified logic. Even in the ancient
world, Plato’s dialogues were mined for the roots of classical logic, (Alcinous) and even today
he has provided fresh inspiration for recent alternatives to classical logic. (Priest 2012)
Ryan Haecker © 2015
Yet Plato’s most abiding and decisive contribution has been in the realm of theology. Within
living memory of his teacher, Xenocrates had identified Plato's supreme Idea with Zeus, the king
of the gods, and the lesser Ideas as his divine thoughts, sprung like Athena from his hallowed
head. Numenius described Plato as 'Moses speaking Greek'. Philo and Origin of Alexandria later
adapted Hellenistic Platonism to formulate the classical definition of God, as the one,
transcendent, and perfect being. (Hartsthorne 2000 76) William Inge reflected that “Platonism is
part of the vital structure of Christian theology... There is an utter impossibility of excising
Platonism from Christianity without tearing Christianity to pieces.” (Gifford Lectures 1917)
The philosophy of Plato has, without exaggeration, been “the inspiration of innumerable poets
and prophets who have called upon men to rise above ephemeral interests to the contemplation
of all time and all being.” (More 1917 270) With this lecture on the logic and ontology of Plato, I
hope, in some small measure to turn your thoughts to become, in the words of Ezra Pound,
“suddenly conscious of the reality of the nous, of mind, apart from any man's individual mind, of
the sea crystalline and enduring, of the bright as it wore molten glass that envelops us, full of
light."
I. 2. Plato’s Predecessors: Parmenides, Heraclitus, and Cratylus
Socratic dialectic, or elenchus, is the art of questioning to expose the contradictions that emerge
through the discursive elaboration of conflicting assumptions: for any thesis, Socrates advances a
counter-thesis that, once agreed upon, results in a contradiction that may only be resolved by
rejecting one of the contraries. (Vlastos 1983) Since contradictions are silent as to which of the
contraries should be rejected, some further assumptions are invariably required to resolve the
truth and falsity of the contraries. Yet if these further assumptions are also contradictory, then
Socratic questioning must begin anew until all the contradictions among the conflicting
assumptions have been completely resolved. Socratic dialectic thus proceeds from the
contradictions between conflicting assumptions, to their tentative resolution in some further
assumptions; and then, from any further contradictions, toward the resolution of all
contradictions into knowledge of all truth and being.
This dialectic of conflicting assumptions can also be observed to operate in the history of Greek
philosophy. Eduard Zeller writes that the “history of philosophy too has its own system of
laws… One problem rather grows out of another by an inner necessity... Thus the history of the
philosophy of a people mirrors the development of its thought.” (1889/1955 28) Parmenides had
identified speech and thought with Being itself, but could not explain the contrary opposition
between Non-Being inscribed in every determination of Being. Heraclitus purported to explain
this opposition as the coincidence of contrary opposite properties in all beings, but could not
explain the possibility of non-contradictory knowledge of beings. Socrates answered that, by
exposing and rejecting false definitions, we might come to know the definitions of all beings;
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and Plato individuated Parmenides’ Being into a plentitude of universal Ideas, each of which
perfectly unites the thought and being of some predicate-property.
Plato’s logic of Ideas may re-construct Aristotle’s syllogistic logic on the basis of universal Ideas
of subject and predicate terms, which flow from universal Ideas to particular instances according
to the higher-order Ideas of the laws of logic. This logic of Ideas is grounded, unlike Aristotle’s
formal logic, in Plato’s ‘unwritten’ ontology: the original opposition of the One and the Dyad is
mixed in the Triad to generate the numerical dyad, the Idea-numbers, and all complex
mathematical and geometrical forms which comprise the World-Soul. This original opposition of
the Dyad motivates the division of genera into many species, as well as the exclusion,
opposition, and contradiction between the various assumptions of Socratic dialectic; even as the
One unites these differences into ever richer triadic mixtures. In the waning years of the ancient
world the promise of Plato’s ontology was unwittingly transmogrified - beyond all
comprehension - by the external reflection of thinking into the poisonous thought of being
beyond being to freeze thinking in an icy mystery. Yet through the incarnation of God the One in
Jesus Christ the Nous within the World-Soul, Christianity reanimated this thought to think itself.
A. Parmenides: Transcendent Opposition of Being and Non-Being
Parmenides planted the earliest seed of the simple identity of logic and being, or ontology, in the
Greek imagination. He has been described as not only the “first full-blooded metaphysician”
(Barnes 1979 139) but also as the “father of metaphysics.” (Durant 1980) Bertrand Russell writes
that Parmenides “invented a form of metaphysical argument that, in one form or another, is to be
found in most subsequent metaphysicians down to and including Hegel.” (1945 66) Hegel writes
that with “Parmenides began philosophy proper. A man now constitutes himself free from all
ideas and opinions, denies their truth, and says necessity alone, Being, is the truth.” (LHP I)
In his poem On Nature, Parmenides presents a deductive argument for a fundamental logical
distinction between Being and Non-Being when he writes that "what can be thought and spoken
of is; for it is possible for it to be, and it is not possible for, what is nothing to be... For this shall
never be proved, that the things that are, are not... It is the same thing that can be thought and for
the sake of which the thought exists." (VI-VIII) All that can be thought and spoken of is a
possible Being, just as it is not possible for Non-Being to be. Neither can Non-Being be thought
or spoken, for, since Being is not Non-Being, it can never be demonstrated either that Non-Being
is Being or that Being is Non-Being.
Parmenides’ major assumption that Being is not Non-Being, or that ‘things that are, are not’,
results from the conjunction of two distinct senses of the term 'being': the ordinary sentential
sense of 'being' is here conjoined with the extraordinary existential sense of 'being'. The
proposition ‘Being is not Non-Being’ thus simultaneously signifies not only how Being is
described in this sentence, but also – what is of supreme importance – the essential quality of
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Being in-and-of-itself. This further significance of the speech of being, imparts a new
significance to the proposition, as a logic of Being itself, or as an onto-logy.
The earliest seed of ontology, in Parmenides, rests upon this fundamental distinction, opposition,
and transcendent contradiction of Being from Non-Being: Being is distinguished in thought and
speech from Non-Being by the negation of Being; this negative Being, that is Non-Being, is then
opposed to positive Being; but since Being is the most generic and indefinite term of thought and
speech, and may only be thought or spoken to either be or not be, this negative opposition forces
Being and Non-Being into an insoluble contradiction, that might only be resolved by rejecting
one of the contrary terms.
Since it has previously been assumed that all that can be thought and spoken is Being, and Non-
Being can neither be thought nor spoken, Parmenides’ is expressly compelled to reject and
annihilate Non-Being to affirm and preserve the truth of Being. To preserve the possibility of
Being for thought Non-Being is thus cast into the exterior darkness of unthought. The
consequence is a monistic conception of the simple unity of Being and Thought, purified of any
admixture of Non-Being. Heidegger comments: "'Thought and Being are one’ such that, to
perceive the 'Truth' is to perceive Being and vice versa.” (Freiburg Lecture 1943)
Parmenides' pure thought of the simple unity of Being is the intellectual seed from which will
sprout the tree of ontology; from whose sap all later logicians will drink; and in whose branches
all later metaphysicians will nest. Yet if Parmenides succeeded in preserving Being, he failed to
annihilate Non-Being. Not only is the annihilation of nothing as inconceivable as the
'nothingness of nothing', but the very thought of Non-Being remains indelibly inscribed in the
thought of Being itself. Since Being has been previously defined by Parmenides through the
distinction, opposition, and contradiction of the negation of Being, that is Non-Being, Being has
and must be thought as not Non-Being, just as Non-Being may only be thought as not Being.
B. Heraclitus: Contrareity of Something and Nothing in Becoming
Where Parmenides opposed Being to Non-Being, but rejected Non-Being to think only Being,
Heraclitus externalized this transcendent contradiction to include the immanent contrariness of
specific sensible beings. In between the two ontic levels of Being and Non-Being, Heraclitus
attributes to individual beings the contrary being and non-being of properties. He writes: “You
cannot step twice into the same river, for other waters and yet others go ever flowing on” (fr. 21)
and “Into the same rivers we step and do not step. We exist and we do not exist.” (fr. 110) Plato
writes that “He compares things to the current of a river: no one can go twice into the same
stream.” (402a) This suggests that the properties of all specific beings are continually changing
from being to non-being, and vice versa, just as the water of a river is always turning over, and
never the same, as it flows through the currents of space and time.
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Heraclitus further reified this metaphor of the flow of space and time in the hypothesis of an ever
'living fire' that pervades and animates the entire cosmos. He writes: This universe… always has
been, is, and will be, an ever-living fire, kindling itself by regular measures and extinguishing
out by regular measures.” (fr. 29) This cyclical kindling and extinguishing of all properties in
space and time is called Heraclitean Flux, and implies that no property may remain fixed as
either being or non-being, as everything continually flows from being to non-being and vice
versa. Being and non-being are opposed yet united in Heraclitean Flux. Heraclitus writes: “The
way up and the way down are one and the same” (fr. 108) and “in the circumference of the circle
the beginning and the end are common.” (fr. 109) Where Parmenides separates and rejects the
opposite of Being, or Non-Being, Heraclitus unites and affirms the opposed cardinalities and
trajectories of beings in Being. Hegel thus comments that where Parmenides thought that “Being
is alone the truth”, Heraclitus thought that the “truth is only the unity of different opposites and,
indeed, of the pure opposition of being and non-being.” (LHP I)
Where Parmenides' transcendent contradiction motivated him to oppose Being to itself and
annihilate Non-Being, amidst the immanent contrariness of Heraclitean Flux, the being and non-
being of properties remain united in a process of becoming. Aristotle reports that Heraclitus
believed that “Being and Non-Being are the same; everything is and yet is not.” (Meta. IV.3,7)
Since Being and Non-Being are the most all-inclusive categories of thought, the transcendent
contradiction of Being and Non-Being could only be resolved, and the truth of Being preserved,
by rejecting Non-Being. Yet since the being and non-being of properties are included alongside
others within these most generic categories, their immanent conflict may always possibly be
resolved into some further interchange of being and non-being. Such an interchange would not
separate but unite the opposition of being and non-being as alternating moments in the cyclic
process of turning being into non-being and vice versa. Heraclitus writes: “From many things
comes oneness, and out of oneness come the many things.” (fr. 112)
Heraclitus’ immanent mixture of contraries produces an explosive concoction. The simultaneous

and coincident opposition of being and non-being may be preserved and united only by negating
another being. Since its violence must be directed elsewhere, Heraclitus’ immanent contrariness
must be serially reproduced and projected into a distant place and indefinite future. This serial
reproduction of contrariness negates not every fixed being and non-being, not only in this time
and place, but also everywhere and always. Neither being, nor thought, nor even the words we
speak may remain as they are, as each and all disintegrate in the same fiery maelstrom. Hegel
thus comments that “since everything is and is not, Heraclitus hereby expressed that everything
is becoming. Not merely does origination belong to it, but passing away as well; and both are not
independent, but identical.” (LHP I)
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C. Cratylus: Semantic Contradictions for Definitions and Knowledge
Aristotle reports that “Plato accepted [Socrates’] approach [to definitions] but was led by it to
think that it must be concerned with things other than the sensible. For it is impossible to
formulate a general definition of any sensible thing, since all is in flux.” (Meta. 987a29)
Heraclitean Flux implies that in every moment any sensible object must possess some contrary
opposite properties. Socrates reports "Heraclitus is supposed to say that all things are in motion
and nothing at rest: he compares them to the stream of a river, and says that you cannot go into
the same water twice." (402a) It is impossible to step into the same flow of a river twice because
the properties of all beings in the flow of space and time continually change from what they are
to what they are not. This ontic flux of all beings can be paraphrased into (a) the temporal thesis
of Cronus and (b) the spatial thesis of Rhea: (a) the temporal thesis of the succession of opposites
states that some or all properties of a substance that are present at an initial moment of time will
not be present in the next successive moment of time; and (b) the spatial thesis of the
compresence of opposites states that there are materially distinct or non-distinct contrary
properties present together in one substance.
The ontic flux of all beings in time (a. Cronus) and space (b. Rhea) further implies the semantic
flux of the meanings of all of the terms of speech and judgment. This semantic flux forecloses
any possibility of completing Socrates’ project of defining the key terms of virtue and knowledge
(e.g. wisdom, temperance, justice, etc.): for where the (a) succession of opposites results in the
contradiction of properties successively affirmed and denied of the same subject in time, the (b)
compresence of opposites just as much results in the contradiction of properties that are affirmed
and denied of the same subject in space. Since all sensible objects possess contrary properties,
and definitions must minimally denote some consistent set of predicates, but no consistent set of
predicates may refer to an inconsistent set of properties, Heraclitean Flux implies that it is
impossible to give any definition for sensible objects. With no definitions there could be no
knowledge. Thus Socrates complains, in the Cratylus (440a), that “we cannot even say that there
is any knowledge, if all things are changing and nothing remains fixed.”
Aristotle reports (Meta. 1086b6-7) how Socrates and Plato proposed to answer these ontic and
semantic implications of Heraclitean Flux by hypothetically postulating universal Ideas: "They
considered that the particulars in the sensible world are in a state of flux, and that none of them
persists, but that the universal [Ideas] exist beside them as something distinct from them." Since
definitions are required for explanations, and without definitions there could be no explanatory
knowledge, the impossibility of definitions seems also to render scientific knowledge altogether
impossible. For Socrates, every explanatory property corresponds to an idea, but Socratic ideas
are not yet conceived as Platonic Ideas logically distinct from sensible substances. (Fine 1991
51) Socratic ideas are merely the “objects of definition[s]” and the “ontological correlates of real
definitions” or essences. (Fine 1991 49) For example Socrates requests, in the Meno, one
definition of virtue for many defined virtues: "Even if they are many and various, yet at least
they all have some common character that makes them virtues." (72c)
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I. 3. Plato's Theory of Ideas
A. Three Arguments for the Ideas
Plato was the first to logically distinguish Ideas from the sensible objects because he accepted, as
a consequence of Heraclitean Flux, that there could be no explanatory knowledge derived from
the sensible world if all explanatory knowledge was in some way derived from definitions and
there could be no definitions of imminently contrary sensible objects. (Fine 1991 56) Since
explanations should be possible, there should be some supersensible universal Ideas with which
to explain all properties in sensible objects. Plato's theory of Ideas is thus the hypothesis that, if
we are to ever explain a plurality of sensible objects that each share some common property we
should, to avoid contradictions, postulate there to be one unchanging supersensible universal
Idea, which is itself the prior ground of being and necessary condition for knowledge of each
property in each particular sensible object.
(a) In the Phaedo, Socrates suggests that true knowledge is only possible of supersensible beings
uncontaminated by “all contact and association with the body.” (66a-67b) In support of this
possibility, Plato presents the One-Over-Many Argument (74a) that knowledge of any term, such
as ‘equality’, requires some recognition of the perfect exemplar, or paradigm, of that term.
Socrates comments that there is one single perfect paradigm for the "various multiplicities to
which we give the same name." (Reb. 596a) The many sensible instances of equality, such as
between “stick to stick and stone to stone”, are not perfectly equivalent, but at best only adequate
imitations that imperfectly approximate this paradigm. (74e) Sensible instances of equality are
imperfect because of the infinite divisibility of sensible magnitudes: since, any magnitude of
either extension in space or the duration in time may be infinitesimally subdivided, and
afterwards inconspicuously increased or diminished, the possibility that sensible objects are less
than perfectly equal can never be completely guaranteed. Since, then, all sensible objects are
possibly unequal, each may be imperfect and none can be certainly known to be perfectly equal.
The perfect paradigm of equality is, however, distinct from all sensible instances of equality
simply because it is, not a sensible object, but a totally supersensible Idea. (74c)
(b) To explain the possibility of knowledge of perfect paradigms beyond all sensibility, Plato
presents the Transcendental Argument. Transcendental arguments claim that some antecedent
condition is necessary for the possibility of a consequence, and since the consequence is assumed
to be true, the antecedent necessary condition must also be true. Socrates conjectures: “we must
somewhere have acquired the knowledge that there is such a thing as absolute equality.
Otherwise we could never have realized, by using it as a standard for comparison, that all equal
objects of sense are desirous of being like it, but are only imperfect copies.” (75b) Since we
assume it is possible to use the concept of equality as a standard of comparison between
equivalent things, but this would be altogether impossible without knowledge of the perfect
paradigm of equality, we must necessarily assume knowledge of the Ideas. Yet since knowledge
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of the Ideas of “beauty, goodness, and virtue” cannot be acquired from sensible objects in space
and time, it must be somehow acquired from an innate and immediate mental intuition. (75d)
Socrates thus describes, in the Theaetetus (187a), that “we have progressed so far, at least, as not
to seek for knowledge in perception at all, but in some function of the soul.”
(c) In the Republic, Socrates further reifies the Ideas by presenting an Argument from Science.
Scientific knowledge is defined, in terms reminiscent of Parmenides, as "naturally related to that
which is, to know that and how that which is is" (477b) and "the condition of that which is."
(478a). Opinion is, to the contrary, distinguished as that which "partakes of both, of what is, and
of what is not." (478e) Where scientific knowledge describes the existence and conditions of real
beings, opinion merely describes the inconsistent mixture of being and non-being. Since the
objects of scientific knowledge are pure beings, with no admixture of non-being, and - following
Parmenides - being is prior to non-being, the objects of scientific knowledge must be logically
prior and onto-logically superior to the shadow-play of opinions. Socrates thus calls the men who
"have opinions about all things but know nothing of the things they opine" the lovers of opinion,
or doxaphilists, but the men who "contemplate the very things themselves in each case, ever
remaining the same and unchanged" the lovers of wisdom, or philosophers. (479e-480a)
Aristotle's lost work On Ideas is reported by Alexander of Aphrodisias to have summarized these
three arguments for Plato's theory of Ideas: (a) the One-Over-Many Argument (80.8-81.22) states
that if many subjects truly share the same predicate, then this shared predicate must be one
perfect paradigm that is logically prior to the various instances in which it is predicated of many
other subjects; (b) the Transcendental Argument (also called the Argument from Thought)
(81.25-82.7) states that the possibility of thinking any term of thought necessarily requires this
object to invariantly endure as one everlasting Idea; and (c) the Argument from Science (79.3-
80.6) states that, since truth is a correspondence between propositions and reality, and every
scientific deduction begins with one axiomatic proposition, the truth of every axiom, and the
very possibility of scientific knowledge, necessarily requires real Ideas. (cf. Fine 1993) These
three arguments are cumulative and produce a single theory of Ideas: (a) the One-Over-Many
Argument argues from many semantic predicate instances to the epistemic concept of one
possible universal paradigm; (b) the Transcendental Argument argues from the possibility of this
universal paradigm to the necessity of an everlasting Idea; and (c) the Argument from Science
argues from the logical necessity of the everlasting Idea for any scientific knowledge to the ontic
reality of the Ideas. The arguments for Ideas thus lead the “soul’s ascension” (517b) from (a)
possible semantics, to (b) necessary epistemic concepts, to (c) the reality of the Ideas themselves.
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The Ontology of Parmenides, Heraclitus and Plato
B. The Abductive Logic of Universal Ideas

The Ideas of Plato are described as pure (66a), unique (78b), simple (78c), immutable (79d), and
eternal (37e) beings (478a) of immediate mental intuition. Since on this theory, all predicate-
properties are merely imperfect instantiations of the Ideas, every particular instance may be said
to participate to greater or lesser degrees of perfection in the universal Ideas. Socrates thus says
that “whatever else is beautiful apart from absolute beauty is beautiful because it partakes of that
absolute beauty, and for no other reason.” (100c) The universal Ideas are also the logical
conditions for the very being and intelligibility of particular instances: for there is “no other way
in which any given object can come into being except by participation in the reality peculiar to
its appropriate universal” Idea (101c). Knowledge of the Ideas allows us to reflexively
participate in them, for “he who has this science or knowledge which knows itself will become
like the knowledge which he has… [and] he who has that knowledge which is self-knowing, will
know himself” (169d); and divine wisdom is only possible when the soul participates “in the
realm of the pure, everlasting, immortal, and changeless” Ideas. (79d) Finally, knowledge of the
logical conditions of Ideas, “without which [there] could not be a cause”, is said to confer a
power of scientific explanation “more mighty, immortal, and all-sustaining than Atlas.” (99b)
Edward N. Zalta, from the Stanford University Metaphysics Research Laboratory, has developed
a formal notational convention to express Plato's theory of the universal Ideas in quantified
predicate logic: ΦF signifies the universal form of a property F; Fn signifies the set of all
particular instances of F; and nF signifies the set of all particular instances of F that participate in
ΦF. (2000 165-202) Universal Ideas can also be represented as universal sets, such that the
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universal form ΦF designates the set of F that includes as its elements all particular instances nF
that participate in ΦF: i.e. F={nF}. With the aid of modern formal logic and set theory, Plato’s
theory of universal Ideas may thus be formally represented as the conjunction of seven
hypothetical assumptions (See my essay Plato’s Contest). Alcinous also described, in his
Handbook of Platonism, how universal Ideas might explain the Analogy of Being by
“illuminating the truth contained” in multiple predicate instances (165.20-27)
Platonists are often thought to have conceived of the universal Ideas as real substances separate
from the particulars instances. Immanuel Kant inaugurated the idealist interpretation of Plato by
highlighting the epistemic aspect of Ideas as ‘regulative’ hypothetical postulates of scientific
knowledge. (1797 B370, cf. Trendelenburg 1826) Paul Natorp further argued that Platonic Ideas
are primarily postulated as logical hypotheses to explain the possibility of knowledge, or
epistemic, and only, as a consequence of their explanatory function, constituents of ontology.
(1903 21) This Idealist interpretation is partially supported by Plato’s original formulation of the
Ideas. Socrates recounts in the Phaedo: "I must have recourse to theories, and use them in trying
to discover the truth of things… I first lay down the theory which I judge to be sound, and then
whatever seems to agree with it - with regard either to causes or to anything else - I assume to be
true, and whatever does not I assume not to be true." (100a) Alcinous similarly described how
Plato used hypotheses “when seeking to establish any proposition”, for “one postulates that very
thing, and then sees what follows… until one arrives at a principle which is non-hypothetical.”
(157.36) Plato's logic of Ideas may thus be tentatively characterized as a logic of hypothetical
abduction.
Abduction is a special mode of inference from a possible hypothesis to the best explanation. It is
similar to deduction insofar as it purports to infer conclusions from assumed hypothetical
premises, and similar to induction insofar as it generalizes some hypothetical antecedent
condition to explain the observed consequences. The inferences of abductive logic are not
necessary but merely hypothetical because, by proposing one hypothesis among many possible
hypotheses to be true, the significance of the conclusions exceeds what is analytically contained
in the premises. The truth of any one hypothesis can only be judged in relation to every other
possible hypothesis. Yet since only this one hypothesis, and not many others, is directly signified
by the terms, the hypothesis does not directly, but only indirectly, signifies those many other
hypotheses. Since one hypothesis may only be ultimately verified with the rejection of every
other hypothesis, the possible truth of this hypothesis must signify some negative relation to the
impossibility of all other hypotheses: only once all other hypotheses have been eliminated, may
this one hypothesis be affirmed as necessarily true. Abduction thus depends for its meaning and
truth upon a whole range of logical possibilities, through which hypothetical thought continually
progresses, indefinitely forward, towards absolute completion. The possibility of an abductive
logic of universal Ideas thus depends upon a supremely generic Idea of the totality of being.
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C. The Supreme Idea of the Good
In the Republic, Plato describes how logic first “advances from its assumptions” (510b) by
“treating its assumptions not as absolute beginnings but literally as hypotheses” (511b) before
advancing towards the principles of pure Ideas that “transcend assumption.” The Idea of the
Good is introduced as “the cause of knowledge and of truth” (508e) in “all things”, “the author of
life”, and “the authentic source of truth and reason.” (517c) The Good is not only the supreme
principle that logically conditions all individual Ideas (509b), but also the eternal fountain in
whose “surpassing power” all things participate, and, by participation, receive intelligibility and
being. Later Platonists called this flowing of being, reason, and goodness ‘emanation’. Plotinus
writes: “Think of a spring which has no other origin, but gives the whole of itself to rivers, and is
not used up by the rivers but remains itself at rest.” (Enneads III.8.10) Since all Ideas are beings,
and all beings are good, every Idea must be a particular instance of the Good. Yet this super-Idea
is paradoxically both included and excluded from the set of all universal Ideas: for since it is
multiply instantiated in all good things, it is functionally included as one universal Idea over
many particular instances; but since it is also the universal condition for the being and goodness
of any particular universal Idea, it is also excluded from the set of universal Ideas. Since it is
both included in and excluded from the set of universal Ideas, the Idea of the Good signifies a
paradoxical set that both includes and excludes itself. Moreover, because it is the prior condition
of the being of all universal Ideas, the Good must also somehow transcend even the being and
thought of the Ideas. (508e)
Since the universal Ideas are distinct as supersensible conditions, yet united by the emanation of
being to the particular instances, they are not separate in being but merely logically distinct from
sensible objects. The Ideas, having no spatio-temporal location, are not separated from the
appearances in an otherworldly heaven beyond the faintest starts, but simply coincide in every
particular instance. J.N. Findlay writes: “the apartness of Ideas from instances is an apartness of
type, or essential nature, and does not preclude, but in fact requires, the most intimate relations
between Ideas and instances.” (1978 30) The Ideas are essentially different from, but identical in
being with, each of their particular instances. Yet since all being is said to emanate from the Idea
of the Good, which is paradoxically both included in and excluded from beings, the three-tiered
ontological hierarchy of the super-Idea of the Good, the universal Ideas, and the particular
instances might suggest that the Ideas are somehow excluded and separated from the sensible
world. This suggestion has been called Plato’s two-world ontological dualism. Prof. T.K. Seung
writes: “The Republic has given a two-world view: the world of Forms and the world of
Phenomena.” (1994 145) Such an ontological dualism would fatally conflict with the purpose of
Plato's epistemological monism. Since every predicate-property for any plurality of sensible
objects must have one single explanation, there must also be one explanatory Idea for these two-
worlds of beings; yet since any explanation must postulate one further universal Idea over many
particular beings, the consequence is a further set of beings that is inconsistently both one and
11
many. Moreover, since each universal Idea is itself a particular being when conceived of in
relation to other universal Ideas, and every plurality of particular beings must be explained by
some further universal Idea, this plurality of all universal Ideas must also be explained by one
further universal Idea over all universal Ideas, and so on ad infinitum. The many criticisms that
Plato arrayed against his own theory of universal Ideas in the Parmenides (130a-134e) result
from the absurd consequences of two-world ontological dualism, for which Aristotle reports that
"it is not possible to acquire knowledge without the universal, but separating is the cause of the
difficulty arising." (Metaphysics 1086a32)
II. 1. The Challenge of the Parmenides
The proliferation of hypothetical Ideas might suggest Plato was more interested in dogmatic
metaphysics than critical philosophy. But in the Parmenides Plato delivers six devastating
criticisms to his own theory of Ideas, drawn, perhaps, from early critics, such as his nephew
Speusippus (Dancy 1989). These criticisms are said to have divided Plato’s interpreters between
Unitarians who claim Plato did not revise his theory of Ideas because he considered them to be
invalid, and Revisionists who claim Plato recognized them as valid and sought to revise his
theory of Ideas. John Pepple (1997) argues that each position is unsatisfactory: for if Plato
thought the challenge invalid he never provided an explicit answer; and if Plato thought the
challenge valid then he never explicitly revised his theory of Ideas. Aristotle adds a further
complication to the question, because he seem to have treated the criticisms as obviously valid
but never described Plato's answer. Gail Fine concludes that the “best explanation of [Aristotle's]
silence is that he does not think that Plato abandoned” the doctrine of the Ideas. (1991 37)
The Parmenides recounts a dispute between the elderly Parmenides (age 65), the mature Zeno
(age 40), and the young Socrates concerning the Theory of the Ideas. After reading a treatise on
the absurdity of a plurality of beings, Zeno is questioned by Socrates as to whether the same
argument might also repudiate the Ideas. (127e) Parmenides then joins the controversy by
presenting a battery of explosive criticisms to challenge the Theory of Ideas. (130a-134e) He
concludes that “these difficulties and many more besides are inevitably involved in the forms”
(135a), and recommends a “severe training” of dialectical exercises by which the theory might
yet be saved. (135d) No consensus has yet been reached on how to interpret these bewildering
exercises. Thomas K. Seung describes them as “the most obscure and enigmatic pieces Plato
ever wrote.” (1994 185) Many ancient scholars interpreted the Parmenides as a discourse on
theology which described "all things that get their reality from the One.” Some modern scholars
have - more modestly – interpreted the dialogue as either a “record of honest perplexity” or as
merely a “gymnastic exercise, not a disclosure of supreme divinity.” (Vlastos 1939 131)
Since the criticisms of the Parmenides present Plato’s most explicit critical examination of the
Theory of the Ideas, interpretations of this dialogue may establish the place Ideas in Plato's
12
mature philosophy: if Parmenides’ criticisms may be answered then Plato could have affirmed,
but if not then Plato should have rejected, the Theory of the Ideas. Plato admits that Ideas are
necessary for understanding when he writes that “if someone, having an eye on all the difficulties
we have just brought up and others of the same sort, won’t allow that there are forms for things
and won’t mark off a form for each one, he won’t have anywhere to turn his thought, since he
doesn’t allow that for each thing there is a character that is always the same. In this way he will
destroy the power of dialectic entirely.” (Parm. 135b-135c) Scholarly disagreement on the
interpretation of this dialogue thus pivots on the gigantomachy of Plato’s Academy between the
idealist 'gods' who defended the universal forms and the materialist 'giants' who wished to “drag
everything down to earth out of heaven.” (246a) If the Platonic dialogues may be read as a
dramatic conflict, in which each unresolved aporia ends in tragedy, then the Parmenides
concludes at the height of tragic agony: for not only do the criticisms of Parmenides deal a
devastating blow to the central pillar of Plato’s ontology, but neither do the dialectical exercises
clearly provide any satisfactory answer.
The six arguments against Plato’s Theory of the Forms are arrayed in ascending order of
difficulty: (1) the Extent of the Ideas Argument (130a-e); (2) the Whole-Part Dilemma (130e-
131e); (3) the Third Man Argument (132a-b); (4) the Conceptualism Argument (132b-c); (5) the
Resemblance Regress (132c-133a); and (6) the Greatest Difficulty (133a-134a). The first two
arguments (1 & 2) suggest some problems defining the extent (1) and composition (2) of the
Ideas. The next three arguments (3, 4, & 5) argue that the assumptions of One-Over-Many (OM),
Self-Predication (SP), and Non-identity (NI) initiate an infinite regress of universal Ideas,
regardless of whether the universal Ideas are defined as predicative (3), conceptual (4), or
resembling (5) entities. The final and greatest difficulty (6) argues that, even if this infinite
regress were blocked, then the assumptions of One-Over-Many (OM) and Non-Identity (NI)
would nonetheless produce a two-world ontological dualism to render knowledge of the
universal Ideas impossible. Answering the challenge of the Parmenides thus requires some
demonstration of how the semantic distinctions of the Third Man Argument (II.2) and - more
importantly - the ontological divisions of the Greatest Difficulty Argument (II.3) may be
altogether subsumed in-and-through an integrally united in a grand ontological hierarchy.
II. 2. Answering the Third Man Argument
The Third Man Argument argues that for any plurality of particular instances of a universal Idea
ΦF2 (e.g. manhood), in which ΦF2 is self-predicated (i.e. ΦF2 is F, or F(ΦF2)), then One-Over-
Many (OM) implies that there must be some third universal Idea ΦF3 that is the universal Idea of
both the universal Idea Fn1 and ΦF2 (i.e. Fn1(ΦF2(ΦF3))). However, since this third universal
Idea ΦF3 is not identical (NI) to either ΦF2 or Fn1, One-Over-Many further implies that there
must be some fourth universal Idea ΦF4, and so on ad infinitum (i.e. Fn1(ΦF2(ΦF3... (ΦF∞)))).
This infinite regress of universal Idea contradicts the assumption of the Uniqueness (U), such
13
that there is one and only one universal Idea (e.g. manhood) for each plurality of property
instances (e.g. men). More importantly, if there is an infinite regress of universal Ideas for any
property, then no purported explanation, which assumes some universal Idea to explain particular
instances, may ever explain anything at all for the simple reason that for any universal Idea we
should require some further explanation and some further universal Idea, and so on forever. The
devastating consequence implied by the Third Man Argument is that the universal Ideas, which
purport to explain particular instances, could neither explain the particular instances nor even the
universal Ideas themselves.
The Third Man Argument is, however, an ignorant refutation that could only ever succeed in
refuting a vulgarized version of Platonism in which the universal Ideas are re-conceived as
particular substances rather than as universal Ideas. John Niemeyer Findlay writes: “The [Third
Man Argument is] among the most total ignorationes elenchi in the whole of philosophical
history.” (1974 33) Aristotle, for example, re-casts Plato's universal Ideas as separate and
particular substances when he publicized the Third Man Argument in On Ideas (93.1), the
Metaphysics (990b17, 1079a13, 1039a2), and the Sophistical Refutations (178b36). This re-
conception of universal Ideas as particulate substances mistakenly assumes that each of Plato's
universal Ideas adventitiously predicate itself as an externally related particular substance rather
than as an internally and essentially self-related universal Idea. Plato's universal Ideas cannot,
however, be understood to be externally predicated in this way because, according to
Participation (P), each particular instance must be qualitatively determined by its own internal
participation in a universal Idea. The Third Man Argument thus conflates two distinct kinds of
predication: the ordinary predication of externally related particular instances and the
extraordinary predication of internally-related universal Ideas. Bertrand Russell recognized this
error and proposed to distinguish the meaning of the ‘is’ of identity that implies the equivalence
of all the properties of the terms from the meaning of the ‘is’ of predication that merely implies
that the predicate term signifies some properties of the subject term.
Constance Meinwald (1992 365-396) has further refined this semantic distinction into a
distinction between garden variety pros ta alla predication in relation to others and tree type pro
heauto predication in relation to itself: pros ta alla predications are “our common garden
predications” in which the meaning of the predicate is extrinsic and not essential to the meaning
of the subject, while pro heauto predications are special genus-species tree predications in which
the meaning of the predicate is intrinsic and essential to the meaning of the subject “in virtue of a
relation internal to the subject’s own nature.” Meinwald explains that pro heauto predication is
exemplified in the genus-species tree in which “what it is to be S [species] is to be P [genus] with
a differentia” so that the genus P may be predicated of the species S just as S is self-predicated of
S because pro heauto predication is “grounded in the structure of the nature” of S. (378)
Meinwald claims that her pro heauto predication “straightforwardly answers” the objection of
the Third Man Argument because the meaning of pro heauto predications are intrinsic rather
than extrinsic to the essential structure of the subject, so that the self-predication of the universal
forms “will always be true” in virtue of their essential and self-related nature.
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Constance Meinwald concludes that Plato composed the third part of the Parmenides to guide
the reader to recognize how Socrates’ immature “mistake in semantics” could be answered by
Plato's mature semantic distinction. (374) However, Bryan Frances objects that any pros ta alla
self-predicated universal Idea would initiate an infinite regress of universal Ideas, and so
Meinwald’s answer to the Third Man Argument would fail if there were even one universal form
that could be predicated pros ta alla. Frances observes at least four examples of universal Ideas
(e.g. Being, Rest, Eternality, and the One) that can be predicated pros ta alla on Meinwald’s
interpretation of the Parmenides, and thus concludes that “Meinwald has [only] proven that Plato
had a plausible partial response to the third man argument.” Frances recommends instead, as
there is “both reason to reject and no reason to accept” this assumption, Plato could have “solved
the third man argument in the Parmenides” by rejecting Non-identity. (1996 47-64)
Gregory Vlastos argues, because the Third Man Argument (TM) crucially depends on the
premises of One-Over-Many (OM), Self-Predication (SP), and Non-Identity (NI) (i.e. TM ≡ OM
& SP & NI), and Non-Identity is inconsistent with Self-predication (SP ⊥ NI), that no universal
Idea can be consistently predicated of itsef (viz. Self-Predication) and the Third Man Argument
is invalid. (1954 326) Vlastos concludes that he “can show that Plato had a perfectly good way of
refuting the Third Man Argument” by rejecting non-identity, but that this very rejection of non-
identity “would have been fatal to the separation theory and the degrees of reality theory which
are central to [Plato’s] explicit metaphysics.” (1954 343, 348) However, Gail Fine answers that
Plato’s ontology can be saved by the distinction between the logical non-identity and the ontic
separation of the universal forms and the particular instances: logical Non-Identity (NI) is
minimally the assumption that the particular instances of a form (nF) are not identical in every
respect to the universal Idea itself (i.e. NI ≡ ΦF ≠ nF); while ontic Separation (S) is the
additional existential assumption that the universal Idea is separate from its particular instances if
the universal Idea can exist without their particular instances (i.e. S ≡ ¬⋄∃x∀F(nF) →
□∃Φ∀F(ΦF)).
Fine concurs that the Third Man Argument requires the assumptions of Self-Predication and
Non-identity, but suggests two important distinctions. Fine distinguishes between narrow and
broad Self-Predication: Narrow Self-Predication (NSP) is the assumption that universal Ideas are
self-predicated as sensible particular instances are predicated (i.e. the garden variety pros ta alla
predication); while Broad Self-Predication (BSP) is the assumption that universal Ideas are self-
predicated, not as sensible particular instances, but to explain that the universal Idea is a member
of the class of itself (i.e. the tree-type pro heauto predication of essential genus-species
membership with itself). (1995 62) Fine also distinguishes strong from weak Non-Identity:
Strong Non-Identity (SNI) is the assumption that nothing is identical to itself in virtue of itself,
not even the universal forms; while Weak Non-Identity (WNI) is the assumption that only
sensible objects are not identical to themselves in virtue of themselves. (1995 207) She argues
that while either ontic Separation (S) or Strong Non-Identity (SNI) may imply Weak Non-
Identity (WNI), neither Weak nor Strong Non-Identity implies ontic Separation (i.e. ¬ (SNI ⊨ S)
15
& ¬ (WNI ⊨ S)). Hence, because the logical Non-Identity of universal Ideas and particular
instances does not imply ontic Separation, logical Non-Identity does not imply the rejection of
ontic Separation or the “degrees of reality theory” of Platonic ontology. Fine concludes that the
Third Man Argument may thereby be satisfactorily answered by rejecting Strong Non-Identity in
favor of Weak Non-Identity (WNI), and Narrow Self-Predication in favor of Broad Self-
Predication (BSP). (1995 225)
The Third Man Argument alleges that the self-predication of universal Ideas must initiate an
infinite regress of universal Ideas that contradicts both their Uniqueness and
Explanation. However, this argument ignorantly conflates the externally-related predication of
ordinary discourse with the internally-related predication of Platonic Participation. Meinwald
distinguished between garden variety pros ta alla and tree-type pro heauto predication, for which
only the former may initiate the infinite regress of the Third Man Argument. Frances found this
distinction of Self-Predication to be inadequate to block every instance of pros ta alla Self-
Predication, and recommended the further rejection of Non-Identity. Vlastos objected that
rejecting Non-Identity would imply the rejection of Separation and the whole edifice of Platonic
ontology, but Fine answered that the rejection of Strong Non-Identity does not imply the
rejection of either ontic Separation or Platonic ontology. Therefore, the Third Man Argument
may be answered with Meinwald’s semantic distinction for Self-Predication and Fine’s
ontological distinction for Non-Identity. The consequence of these distinctions is the concrete
identity of abstractly differentiated particular instances in universal Ideas: Meinwald's pro heauto
Self-Predication allows universal Ideas to predicate themselves as particular differentiated
species within a universal and identical genus, while Fine's Weak Non-Identity allows universal
forms to be asymmetrically identical to sensibly differentiated particular instances. However,
even if the Third Man Argument is satisfactorily answered, there remains the challenge that Plato
himself names the ‘Greatest Difficulty’.
II. 3. Answering the Greatest Difficulty Argument
The Third Man Argument has come to be regarded as the most decisive objection to Platonism,
yet Plato passes over it without reply to address an even greater difficulty. The Greatest
Difficulty pierces the explanatory heart of Platonism by alleging the impossibility of knowing
the universal Ideas according to the Two-World Theory of the Ideas. It purports to show that the
assumptions of ontic Separation and logical Non-Identity imply an unbridgeable ontological
duality of the beings of the universal Ideas and particular instances which renders impossible
knowledge of the particular instances of human affairs for gods (134c), and knowledge of
universal Ideas for men (134a). The devastating consequence of the Greatest Difficulty is thus an
unbridgeable dualism between two mutually exclusive sets of beings: the set of all universal
Ideas and the set of all particular instances.
16
Since the universal Ideas are both epistemic and ontic, this unbridgeable dualism can be
interpreted in two aspects: as an epistemic dualism between knowledge of particular instances
and universal Ideas that precludes knowledge of the universal Ideas; or as an ontological dualism
between the beings of the particular instances and universal Ideas. Meinwald and Fine’s
distinctions (§III) might be thought to bridge this divide because weak non-identity (WNI) and
broad pro heauto self-predication (BSP) may allow many pros ta alla self-predicated instances
to be vertically predicated under pro heauto self-predicated universal Ideas, and predicative
judgments may allow knowledge of universal Ideas through the predication of themselves and
their particular instances. Since, however, the two-world theory of the Ideas implies there are at
least two mutually exclusive set of beings, this ontological dualism implies an epistemic dualism
between two exclusive domains of reference and knowledge. Meinwald and Fine's semantic
answer to the Third Man Argument, therefore, cannot answer the Greatest Difficulty Argument
because it assumes the possibility of referring to the very integrally united ontology that the
Greatest Difficulty purports to divide. Answering both the epistemic and the ontic aspects of the
Greatest Difficulty requires some further demonstration of how the differentiated sets of beings
may be horizontally re-united in a monistic ontology.
Pelletier and Zalta have shown how, with the additional assumptions of One-Over-Many (OM),
Non-Identity (NI), and Self-Predication (SP), Platonic universal Ideas (ΦF) can be translated into
the mathematical sets that include all of the members of any instance of a Ideas (e.g. ΦF = { Fn |
Fn1, Fn2,… Fnx}). (2000: 165-202) While the universal Ideas are each one universal Idea over
many particular instances, the consequence of the Greatest Difficulty is that the set of all
universal Ideas and the set of all particular instances are divided as particular sets of beings.
Since One-Over-Many (OM) implies that for any set of many particulars Fn there must be one
corresponding universal form ΦF, and Plato’s ontological dualism implies there are two sets of
particular beings (which minimally share the property of being), there must be some further
universal Idea (e.g. Being) that is both over and within the set of all universal Ideas. The
consequence of the Greatest Difficulty for Plato’s Theory of the universal Ideas is thus a
universal Idea ΦF that designates a set G that is both included and excluded from the set of all
universal Ideas.
This consequence of the Greatest Difficulty argument, in which two sets of beings both share and
do not share a common universal Idea, can be translated into Bertrand Russell’s famous paradox,
in which there is a set that is both included in and excluded from itself. If the universal Idea ΦF
designates a set G such that G contains all member Fx with the property F that cannot be
predicated of the universal Idea ΦF, then G is the set of Fx such that Fx is excluded from the set
of Fx (i.e. G = {Fx | Fx ∉ Fx}). Since, however, Self-Predication (SP) requires all universal Ideas
to predicate the property that they exemplify of themselves, F must be predicated ΦF (i.e.
F(ΦF)). Predication implies that the predicated property (Fx) is included (∈) in the set of the
properties that constitute the subject of predication (i.e. F(ΦF) ⊨ F ∈ ΦF). Thus, Fx must be
included in set G that is designated by the universal Idea ΦF. This also implies that Fx is
17
included in the set G that is included in itself (i.e. Fx ∈ (ΦF = G = {Fx}) ⊨ Fx ∈ Fx ⊨ G ∈ G).
However, since G is the set of Fx such that Fx is not included in itself, the set of G must be both
included and excluded from itself (i.e. G ∈ G ≡ G ∉ G). This paradoxical set of beings is
therefore just as much a consequence of a naive Platonic theory of universal Ideas, which allows
for the self-predication of non-self-predicable properties, as it is a consequence of a naive set
theory with an unrestricted comprehension axiom, which allows for the inclusion of sets that do
not include themselves. Aristotle similarly objected that the theory of universal Ideas must admit,
but could not tolerate, a universal Idea of Inequality, because the Idea of Inequality must
predicate itself as both equal to and unequal to itself. (cf. Fine 1993)
Pelletier and Zalta warn that the “first and foremost worry for a theory of Forms is to avoid the
Russell paradox." (2000 24) There are two standard answers to Russell's Paradox: the axiomatic
answer that introduces an axiom to artificially restrict the range of possible sets to consistent
sets; and the hierarchical answer that constructs a hierarchy of sets in which each superset
restricts the predicative scope of its subsets. Pelletier and Zalta propose the axiomatic answer to
restrict the scope of the predication of universal forms by a comprehension principle such that
“any predicate which is formulable without pros heauto predication designates a property"
(i.e.∃F∀x(Fx ≡ φ)). (2000 27) This restriction is meant to eliminate the inconsistent set of
Russell’s Paradox by the introduction of a further axiom which excludes universal Ideas of the
property corresponding to pro heauto and not pros ta alla predication. In Principia Mathematica,
Bertrand Russell proposed the hierarchical answer by replicating this restriction to consistent sets
at every level of the set theoretic model. Russell's Type Theory consists in a hierarchy of sets in
which the predication of each set is defined by a higher level set, such that supersets always
define the predicative scope of their subsets. Unfortunately, both of these answers to Russell’s
Paradox fail to resolve the paradox for Platonism because each attempts to eliminate the
inconsistent set by introducing a higher universal Idea to restrict the scope of predication to
consistent sets: the axiomatic answer introduces the restricting axiom, while the hierarchical
answer introduces the ramified hierarchy. Since, however, each of these higher principles must
be one further universal Idea that stands over and is non-identical to many particular forms, and
Russell’s Paradox for Platonism may be generated from any instance of One-Over-Many and
Non-Identity, each of these answers reiterates the paradox that it claims to resolve.
I propose that Plato intended the enigmatic dialectical exercises of the Parmenides to guide
students of philosophy to answer the Greatest Difficulty Argument by subsuming the semantic
scope of all possible hypotheses including the inconsistent sets described by Russell’s
Paradox. The semantic scope of each hypothesis is the extent of possible meanings signified the
hypothesis. A set with a lesser range of possible meanings (A) can be subsumed by a set with a
greater range of possible meanings (B), when all of the members of the lesser subset are
contained within the greater superset (i.e. A ⊂ B). Rather than dogmatically restricting the scope
of the sets designated by universal Ideas, Plato proposes a hierarchical answer to Russell's
Paradox in which inconsistencies may be located at every level within a hierarchy of sets. Plato
18
was, of course, ignorant of both modern set theory and Russell’s Paradox. However, since
universal Ideas designate the set of their particular instances, and the ontic dualism resulting
from the Greatest Difficulty implies an inconsistent set of beings that can be translated into
Russell’s Paradox, Plato may have recognized this possibility of answering the challenge of the
Parmenides through the re-unification of the differentia of all sets of beings designated by
universal Ideas.
In the bewildering second part of the Parmenides, Parmenides proposes a severe training of eight
dialectical exercises to explore the hypothetical possibilities of predicating one of many and
many of one. Plato indicates that the one and the many are not meant to specifically refer to one
universal form and many sensible objects, but are rather meant to more generally refer to every
possible object of predication; first, when Parmenides praises Socrates for not restricting the
scope of his previous discourse with Zeno to visible objects (135e); and, second, when Zeno
describes Parmenides’ exercises, in similar terms, as a “devious passage through all things.”
(136e) Parmenides then proposes to explore the hypotheses that: (a) the One either is or is not;
(b) the One is itself or other than itself (i.e. Many); and (c) the One or the Many is either related
(R) to or not related (NR) to itself. The eight hypotheses are the product of these three
dichotomies (i.e. a x b x c = 2 x 2 x 2 = 23 = 8), which may be read in any one of at least one
hundred and seventy non-linear sequences: Let (a) be the first combinatory pair of hypotheses;
(b) be the combination of (a) and another pair of hypotheses; and (c) be the total combinatory
sequence of (a) and (b); then a = (8x8)-8; b=(ax4)-1a; c=(bx2)-1b; c=170.
The One is (First Tetrad) The One is Not (Second Tetrad)
The One is itself H1 (NR) H2 (R) H5 (R) H6 (NR)
The One is not itself

H3 (R) H4 (NR) H7 (R) H8 (NR)
(Many)
Francis M. Cornford describes two major ancient interpretations of the dialectical exercises: the
logical or semantic interpretation of the Middle Platonists (c. 130 – 68 BC) in which the
hypotheses are logical exercises for the construction of possible predications of the One and the
Many; and the metaphysical or ontological interpretation of the Neo-Platonists (c. AD 200 –
526) in which the hypotheses are the building blocks of the structure of being that constituted
“Plato’s own metaphysical doctrine.” (1939 v-xi) For example, Plotinus famously identified the
first three hypotheses with the three divine Neo-Platonic hypostases or supreme beings of the
One, the Logos, and the World-Soul. However, Cornford objects that this ontological
interpretation fails to even consistently conjoin the first two hypotheses: the first hypothesis
19
concludes that the One is simple and not predicable, while the second hypothesis concludes that
the One is complex and predicable..Moreover, not only is each individual hypothesis internally
contradictory, but also each pair, and pair of pairs of hypotheses (i.e. tetrads), is riddled with an
insoluble multitude of contradictions. This multitude of contradictions threatens to trivialize the
dialectical exercises and render them totally incapable of consistently of answering Parmenides'
challenge.
Contradictions can, however, be resolved in either a hard or a soft way: the hard way is to reject
one of the contradictory propositions (e.g. if q = not-p, and p & q, then not-q); while the soft way
is to distinguish some further quality of at least one of the apparently contradictory propositions
so that it does not genuinely contradict the other (e.g. if q = not-Ap, and p & q, then p = Bp
where Ap ≠ Bp). (1994 203) Accordingly, the hard solution to the contradictions of the
Parmenides is to reject some of the propositional assumptions of the Theory of the Universal
Ideas. The soft solution is to show how, because the contradictions are merely an apparent
degree of contrary opposition, the more contrary hypotheses may be subsumed by the less
contrary hypotheses. While the hard solution may revise the Theory of the Universal Ideas by
rejecting some of its underlying assumptions, it cannot provide any instruction to answer
Russell’s Paradox for Platonism. Only the soft solution of subsuming the less into the more
consistent hypotheses allows for the construction of a satisfactory hierarchical model of sets.
Thomas K. Seung proposes a semantic interpretation in which the semantic scopes of some of
the hypotheses may be “incorporated” as subsets of the semantic scopes of other hypotheses. He
argues, for example, that H3 is semantically equivalent to H2 because the many of H3 partake of
the one of H2. Seung concludes that the positive result of the dialectical exercises of the
Parmenides is to force an “ontological decision” between the semantic subsumption of the pair
H2 & H3 into the pair H5 & H7 or vice versa; and recommends H5 & H7 to account for both the
“changing material objects and the unchanging eidetic objects.” (1994 202-14) Each of the
individual hypotheses and pairs of hypotheses may thus be interpreted to be subsumed into any
of the other hypotheses or pairs of hypotheses so long as the semantic scope of the former subset
is included in the semantic scope of the latter superset. Through this method of subsuming the
subset hypotheses into superset hypotheses, and pairs of hypotheses into tetrads of hypotheses,
we can construct a hierarchical set theoretic model that formally represents a semantic
interpretation of the dialectical exercises.
This method of subsuming subset hypotheses into superset hypotheses further implies that the
subordinate hypotheses may be predicated of the superordinate hypotheses simply because any
subset is analytically contained in its superset and whatever is analytically contained may be
predicated of the containing subject. Consequently, each of the individual hypotheses, i.e. Hn,
may be predicated of their containing individual, pair, or tetrad of hypotheses (e.g. Hnx…
Hnb(Hna)). Since Meinwald’s tree-type pro heauto mode of predication is “strictly tied to objects
with definitions,” the semantic subsumption of each subordinate hypothesis into a superordinate
hypothesis can be translated into Constance Meinwald’s tree-type pro heauto predication
20
according to Pelletier and Zalta participation predication of (i.e. xF). Since Platonic participation
is both ontic and epistemic, the construction of such a hierarchical set theoretic model of the
sequence of pro heauto participative predication also signifies a grand tree-branch ontology in
which the being of each of the subordinate hypothesis participates in the being of the
superordinate hypotheses (e.g. (xFa)Fb… Fx). A semantic interpretation of the participative
predication of the hypotheses of the Parmenides may therefore anticipate a “skeletonized and
ordered summary” of Plato’s ontology. (Lynch 1959 viii)
Answering the challenge of the Parmenides minimally requires a demonstration of the possibility
of a single non-contradictory interpretation. The Greatest Difficulty purported to show that the
assumptions of ontic separation and logical non-identity implied an ontological dualism which
rendered knowledge of universal forms and Plato’s Theory of the Universal Ideas impossible.
The devastating consequence of this ontological dualism was a universal Idea that designated the
inconsistent set of Russell’s Paradox, which, because it is both one and many, was both included
and excluded from the set of all universal forms. Plato could have responded to this challenge by
constructing a hierarchy of sets, in which each superset hypothesis restricts the predicative scope
of its subset hypotheses and the inconsistent set is universally replicated at every level as a basic
constituent of the set theoretic model. Since, therefore, the ontological dualism of the Greatest
Difficulty implies the inconsistent set of Russell’s Paradox, and this paradox may be answered
by the construction of set theoretic hierarchy, the Greatest Difficulty may be answered by
hypothetically re-uniting all of the differentiated sets of beings into a grand Platonic ontology.
III. 1. Logic
Aristotle is traditionally credited with the invention of formal logic. In contrast to all other arts
that had been handed down from others, Aristotle boasts that before his formalization of logic
absolutely “nothing existed at all.” (185b34) Joseph Maria Bochenski O.P.similarly concludes
that it is “no exaggeration to say that Aristotle... was the first formal logician.” (1961 40) When
Plato is mentioned at all, he is presented as little more than an informal prelude to Aristotle. Yet
Platonists have traditionally asserted the primacy of Plato: Plethon even accused Aristotle of
sophistry for not acknowledging his debt to Plato. (1532 23, cf. Lutoslawski 1897 8-11) No one
could doubt that Plato displays some acumen for valid deductive inferences: for example, in the
Alciabides (115a) Plato presents the Barbara syllogism: “(All) just things are fine; (all) fine
things are good; therefore (all) just things are good.” Nor could it ever be doubted that Plato
elevated the movements of reason to the adamantine heights of necessary knowledge. In the
Timaeus he writes: “God invented and gave us sight to the end that we might behold the courses
and intelligences in heaven, and apply them to the course of our own intelligences which are akin
to them.” (47a) Plato's logic of Ideas is, to my mind, more than merely an ontological prototype
for Aristotle's formal logic. He also planted the seeds for a viable alternative to classical logic.
21
We can understand why Platonists traditionally prioritized Plato’s logic over Aristotle’s
syllogistic logic if we consider how Plato’s Ideas can provide the ontological resources to resolve
a skeptical dilemma at the foundations of formal logic. In the Prior Analytics, Aristotle defined a
syllogism as "an argument in which, certain things having been assumed, something other than
these follows of necessity from their truth." (24b18–20) He further distinguished the content of
what is spoken from the form of the argument. Since he says that “deduction is more general
than demonstration” (25b30), the logical forms of deduction must be prior to, and independent
of, the content that is signified by terms. This priority of deduction further presupposes the
existence of some formal laws of deductive reasoning, or the laws of logic. The classical laws of
logic are the Law of Identity that states that any subject term is equal to itself (i.e. 'S is S'); the
Law of the Excluded Middle that states that any subject term must be either affirmed or denied
(i.e. 'S is either S or not S'); and the Law of Non-Contradiction that states that no subject term
can be both affirmed and denied in one and the same way (i.e. 'no S is both S and not S').
Any skeptic who questions these laws of logic confronts a fundamental dilemma: either the laws
of logic are absolutely prior to every use of logic, and so must be dogmatically but non-logically
assumed with no prior logical deduction, or they are posterior to and deduced through the use of
logic. Yet since any use of logic must assume the laws of logic, it seems that any logical
deduction that purports to generate these laws must fallaciously assume the very laws that they
purport to generate (petitio principii). The traditional answer to this skeptical challenge has
instead been, first, to claim that any demonstration must assume certain axioms, of which the
most indubitable are the laws of logic; and, second, to claim that every judgment of reason must
use the laws of logic, so that there is no possibility of even raising this skeptical dilemma without
having first assumed the very laws which it purports to question: for example, one must suppose
the Law of Excluded Middle to distinguish between the two horns of the dilemma, in which the
laws of logic exist either prior and posterior to the use of logic. Yet this claim, that every
judgment of reason must use the laws of logic, cannot alone answer the skeptical dilemma
because it also assumes (petitio principii) the existence and universality of the very laws of logic
that are called into question.
This skeptical dilemma might be resolved by affirming the first horn of the dilemma,
hypothesizing a substantial identity between the laws of logic and the Ideas of Plato, and
grounding the non-logical assumptions of the laws of logic in the Ideas of Platonic ontology. Yet
there is an immediate difficulty with this straight-forward identification of the laws of logic with
universal Ideas: if the laws of logic are hypothesized to exist prior to the use of logic, but the
Ideas are meant to be logically constructed, then these Ideas of the laws of logic must also
somehow exist prior to both logic and Ideas. This would require the laws of logic to be
hypothesized as Ideas beyond Ideas, or 'Meta-Ideas' at the limits of intelligibility (532b). In the
Sophist (254d) Plato enumerates three opposed couplets of six Meta-Ideas: being and (relative)
non-being; rest and motion; identity and difference. Hans Joachim Krämer interprets (1990 81)
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these Meta-Ideas as superordinate Ideas that regulate, condition, and “pervade” (255e) the
subordinate predicate-universal Ideas.
Since the One-Over-Many Argument requires every multiplicity to be united in one universal
Idea, even these Meta-Ideas must be further united in one supreme principle of all Ideas. In the
Republic, Plato calls this principle the Good, but later in the Philebus he describes it as the cause
of all things (26e), and “king of heaven and earth” (28c), from whence emerges the opposition
between the Limit and the Unlimited (23c). The principles of the Limit and the Unlimited seem
to have been derived from an earlier Pythagorean tradition. For example, Philolaus wrote that the
cosmos and everything in it was “was fitted together out of things which are unlimited and out of
things which are limiting.” (fr. 1) At the conclusion of the Philebus, Plato transforms the
supreme principle of the Good into the mixture of the “two fountains” of the limiting of
Intelligence and the unlimitedness of Pleasure: since “neither of the two can be the perfect thing
that everyone desires, the absolute Good… we must not look for the Good in the unmixed life
but in the mixed.” (61a) The Meta-Ideas can thus be placed, with Krämer, at an intermediate
level in Platonic ontology midway between the supreme Principles and the universal Ideas: from
the supreme Principle of the Limit emanates the limiting of identity, being, and rest; while from
the Unlimited, difference, non-being, and motion; so that the Limit identifies subjects with
themselves according to the Law of Identity, while the Unlimited differentiates and opposes
subjects according to the laws of Excluded Middle and Non-Contradiction.
In the Republic, Plato formulated an epistemic version of the Law of Non-Contradiction, which
extended Parmenides' prohibition on the coincidence of being and non-being to the coincidence
of contrary opposites in one and the same thought. Socrates says: “It is obvious that the same
thing will never do or suffer opposites in the same respect in relation to the same thing and at the
same time.” (436b) Yet since a contradiction between two assumptions is incapable of indicating
which of the contrary assumptions is either true or false, Plato was compelled to search for some
further positive method of justifying true knowledge. Donald Davidson describes (1990 7) how
Plato experimented with successively more refined methods of positive justification, including
the methods recollection, or anamnesis, in the Meno; of hypotheses of Ideas, or noesis, in the
Phaedo and the Republic; and the method of collection and division, or diaresis, in the Phaedrus
(265e) the Sophist (219a) and the Statesman (258d). Each successive method produced more
sophisticated logical machinery for the construction of Plato's ontology: recollection received
innate Ideas in memory; hypotheses re-produced these Ideas as mental postulates; and collection
and division constructed an ideal taxonomy of different species within identical genera. These
methods were meant to establish the non-contradictory ground of justified knowledge, yet the
challenge of the Parmenides demonstrated how even the Ideas must possess contrary properties.
The Divine Method of Plato’s Philebus (16c-17a) combined the method of collection and
division with the ontological construction of Ideas for the purpose of answering this challenge by
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resolving all contrary Ideas in a grand ontological hierarchy. (Sayre 1983 126) Socrates calls the
Divine Method “a gift from the gods to men... for which there neither is nor ever will be a better
way" (16a-c); superior to all arts of measuring and numbering (57c); for the purpose of acquiring
pure formal knowledge of unchanging forms (58c) rather than changing opinions (59c).
University of Texas Professor T.K. Seung has outlined, in his book Plato Rediscovered, how the
Divine Method may be used to generate “empirical concepts, or forms, by imposing a system of
hypothetical Ideas or paradigms on an empirical-manifold continuum.” (1996 224) He explains:
"The divine method introduces order into the phenomenal world of indeterminate manifold... An
indeterminate continuum... can be organized into an ordered whole by… a system of paradigms”
that are “the ontic basis for the logic of paradigms." Prof. Seung's logic of paradigms is first an
eidetic, or formal, construction of concepts, and second an ontic construction of beings. He
writes: “The eidetic construction generates the elements, which are required for the ontic
construction... These two modes of construction, eidetic and ontic, together constitute the theory
of Platonic construction.” (228)
Aristotle's formal logic may be ontologically re-constructed as a Platonic logic of Ideas by

grounding the laws of logic in the Meta-Ideas, and the Meta-Ideas in the supreme Principles.
Pelletier and Zalta have outlined (2000 21) how Aristotle syllogisms may be straightforwardly
translated into a formal logical notation of Platonic Ideas using a variation of Frege's quantified
logic: let PTA(s, p) mean the predicate term is extrinsically related to the subject (pros ta alla),
and PH(s, p) mean that it is intrinsically and essentially related (pro heauto) to the subject; then
the syllogism '(P1) Socrates is a man; (P2) all men are mortal; (P3) therefore, Socrates is a
mortal', can be translated into '(P1) Socrates is related to the Idea of manhood (PTA(s, ΦM1));
(P2) the Idea of manhood is essentially related to the Idea of mortality (PH(ΦM1, ΦM2)); (P3)
therefore, Socrates is essentially related to the Idea of mortality (PTA(s,ΦM2 ))'. Since the terms
of particular instances necessarily instantiate the terms of universal Ideas, the instantiation of
particular instances in universal Ideas may also function as a necessary deduction from universal
Ideas to particular instances. Plato’s theory of Ideas can thus function as an ontological prototype
for the deductive inferences of formal logic. Such a Platonic logic of Ideas would not be
abstractly formal but concretely ontological, because the simple unity of thought and being in
Platonic Ideas re-unites the form of valid reason with the content of being signified by terms.
The great problem for Plato’s logic of Ideas is to explain how many beings may be analytically
deduced from one supreme principle: for if the One is simple and not composed of many, then
the many derivatives may not be deduced from the One; and, alternatively, if the One is not a
being, and nothing may come from nothing, then no beings may be deduced from the One
'beyond being'. Since any analytic deduction requires the consequence to be contained within the
antecedent, Platonists could only respond by hypothetically impregnating the One with
multiplicity and being. This impregnation of being in non-being and Many in the One would
seem to disastrously violate the laws of classical logic: for if a subject must either be or not be,
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then it cannot both be and not be. Platonists have responded by multiplying their hypotheses and
mystifying their hypostases: for example, Speucippus, the second scholararch of the Old Platonic
Academy, responded by multiplying the One into as many as five different 'ones' (Dillon 2003
44), while his successor Xenocrates responded by mythologizing the supreme Principles into
many different divinities (102). Later, Plotinus would affirm the ineffability of the One, and
Proclus would distinguish ordinary negation from hyper-negation so as to deny the applicability
of the laws of classical logic to the supreme principle altogether. (IP 1099 32-35)
Plato’s logic of Ideas has the power to dialectically resolve these contrary concepts into a
dynamic mixture of opposites. Dialectical logic is principally distinguished from classical logic
by its use of contrariness to motivate the division and reunion of contrary opposite concepts into
a higher, dynamic, and synthetic unity-of-opposites. Gustav Emil Müller explains: “The task of
dialectic is to show the possibility of a synthesis of opposites” (1935 210) and “the whole opus
of Plato can and should be interpreted from the point of view of his solemn declaration [Rep.
502] that dialectic is the logic of all philosophy.” (1965 183) Alcinous has accordingly
schematically divided Plato’s Dialectical Logic into the superior discipline of (a) division and
definition “from above” and the inferior discipline of (b) analysis and induction “from below”.
(156.25-35) Division, or Diaresis, is ontologically superior to definition, analysis, and induction
because it is only by first dividing the “furniture” of reality at its natural joints that genera and
species may first be defined, analyzed, and observed. (Phaedrus 265e) Since the laws of logic are
derived from the supreme Principles, which are the supremely generic universals of all specific
universal Ideas, the laws of logic neither properly apply to the Principles nor the derivative
relation between universal Ideas and particular instances. Since the Law of Non-Contradiction
does not apply to the paradigmatic relation between universals and particulars, Plato can
potentially resolve the apparent contradiction of deriving many from the One by constructing
various unified mixtures of contrary opposites in universal Ideas.
Plato’s Dialectical Logic is, I propose, meant to construct grand ontological hierarchy for the
purpose of dividing and defining all universal Ideas. Hegel’s Dialectical Logic conversely
divides, not Ideas, but contrary concepts, since he says that it is only by their opposition that “it
creates for itself the possibility of a higher existence” that is “all the greater, the greater the
opposition from which it has returned into itself.” (PhG §340) Where Plato’s Logic descends by
emanation of mixtures from the highest Idea to the lowest instance, Hegel’s Logic ascends by the
synthesis of opposites from the simplest to the most complex concept. Hans Joachim Krämer
explains the “the schema of the ordering of being of the Logic, in Hegel, goes not toward the
lower, but from the lower to the higher, and only at the end with an increasing enrichment and a
concretization of the basic empty and abstract categories, lead to the absolute.” (1990 158) The
absolute Idea, for Hegel, is the “unity of these differences", in which opposed differences are
resolved into the highest synthetic unity of “a universal which has resolved and resolves
contradictions into itself, is concrete in itself, and by this sublation is affirmed and annulled in
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itself; as the affirmative union of opposites.” Hegel concludes that the “main point and only
knowledge of Platonism is the one being identical with itself and with the other.” (LHP I)
III. 2. Cosmogony
Harold F. Cherniss called the 'Riddle of the Old Academy' the “discrepancy between Aristotle’s
account of Plato’s theory of ideas and that theory as we know it from Plato’s writings.” (1945
31) Aristotle attributes doctrines to Plato, such as the Pythagorean One and the Indefinite Dyad,
that are nowhere explicitly evidenced in Plato’s dialogues. This has led ancient and modern
scholars to hypothesize an oral tradition of ‘unwritten doctrines’ alongside the written dialogues.
Plato strongly suggests that he taught unwritten doctrines in the Seventh Letter (341c) when he
writes that “concerning the greatest things I have not written and never will. The knowledge of
these things is not entirely communicable as other knowledge, but after much discussion about
these things, and after a communality of living together, suddenly, like a flame which is lighted
from a spark which springs forth, it is born in the soul and from itself is nourished.”
Aristoxenus reports, in the Elements of Harmony (II 30-31), how Aristotle often told the story of
Plato's public lecture On the Good, in which Plato was said to have attempted to mathematically
demonstrate that “the Good is One.” The Tübingen School of Plato interpretation attempts to re-
construct the 'unwritten doctrines' of this lost lecture from the many hints left in Plato's dialogues
and the testimony of later authors. Giovanni Reale explains: “Plato’s written dialogues are not
wholly self-sufficient but instead stand in need of their author, who offers the key which opens
all the doors… His best students wrote down what Plato’s Unwritten Doctrines were about; using
that evidence, we can fill out the dialogues with what is lacking from them.” (1997 xv) Plato is
conjectured to have taught his philosophy through (a) exoteric written dialogues, (b) private
discussions with the students of the Academy, and (c) esoteric discussions with an inner circle of
select students. Konrad Gaiser concludes: “the lecture on the Good was not a typical event for
Plato, but rather an exceptional and unique affair... [in which] Plato addressed his doctrine of
first principles to the public, whereas otherwise he kept it for discussion within the inner circle of
his associates.” (1980 25)
Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz wrote that “if someone can reduce Plato to a system, he will have
performed a great service for mankind.” (Letter to Remond) The Tübingen School proposes to
realize the dream of Leibniz by re-constructing the ontology of Plato. H.J. Krämer describes how
the “most important of the Aristotelian reports on the unwritten doctrines of Plato... clearly
presents… [that] the Ideas are the causes of all the remaining things, so the principles are the
causes and elements of the Ideas themselves.” (1990 77) J.N. Findlay similarly writes that the
“The main development of Plato’s mathematical philosophy was, however, inspired by
Pythagoreanism, and consisted in looking for basic Principles of Number, and of constructing or
26
generating the Numbers out of these” (1974 57) and "that all physical, biological, psychical,
ethical, and political patterns rest on the same simplicities of principles found in arithmetic and
geometry [and] point upward to an ultimate source." (1978 5) Under the influence of the
Pythagoreans, Plato is conjectured to have transformed the Principle of Limit into the One, and
the Principle of the unlimited “Great and Small” into the Indefinite Dyad. (59) The One is
hypothesized to virtually contain all differences within its simple self-identity. Since the
differences within this absolute identity are distinguished by their contrary opposition to the One,
the One also virtually contains all contrary opposition of the Dyad within itself. And since all
contrary opposition remains united within the simple self-identity of the One, every instance of
contrary opposition must also ultimately resolve into a further Mixture.
A. Supreme Principles of the unitary One, the oppistory Dyad, and the Triad mixture
I. The Unitary One

The One is hypothetically postulated as the perfect self-exemplar and paradigmatic cause of both its own self-
identical unity and, by the negation of its other, of all determinate division of itself from its other, i.e. of determinate
negation (determinatio est negatio). Thus, not only unity, but all divisibility, and also the mixture of unity and
divisibility is thought to be virtually contained in the One as its potential effects.
a. Hypothetical axiom of supreme unconditioned condition
b. Singular Aspect: simple self-identical unity
c. Multiple Aspect: absolutely complex virtually contained universality
II. The Oppository Dyad

The One first determines itself for itself in its own self-identical unity. By determining itself for itself, it
simultaneously determines itself as not what is other than itself; as not its other; and in opposition to otherness. In
this oppositing determination, the One distinguishes itself from the dyad that is not the One because it is both itself
and other than itself. Where the One is the perfect exemplar and paradigmatic cause of unity and self-identity, the
Dyad is the opposite perfect exemplar and paradigmatic cause of divisibility and difference.
a. Opposition of (I.b) one simple unity and (I.c) many complex universality
b. Oppositing of the definite One into the indefinite Dyad
c. Indefinite extension of Dyad into infinitely Great and infinitesimally Small
III. The Mixing Triad

The One mixes the One (I) and the Dyad (II) by equalizing the indefinite diversity into self-identical but mutually
differentiated elements. This equalization of diverse elements results in the particularization of the indefinite
continuum of an infinite set into an infinite profusion of particular infinitely larger supersets and infinitesimally
smaller subsets. The infinite and infinitesimal profusion of sets continue to participate in the one, both in the unity of
their self-identity and by the indefinite unity of the set of all sets.
a. Indefinite extension of dyad (II.c) within the universality of One (I.c)
b. Great and Small (II.c) related to the (I.b) simple self-identity of the One
c. Self-oppositing Dyad particularly equalized in triad of two-related-in-One
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B. The Generation of Numbers in Nous

All real numbers are subsequently generated from this (A.III.c) infinite and infinitesimal proliferation of particularly
equalized sets. The infinitely multiplied (i.e. {1,2,3,4,..., n, etc.}) and infinitesimally divided (i.e. {1, ½, ¼,..., 1/n,
etc.}) collection of particularly equalized sets are then united by the One into an infinite Set of all sets, from whence
all real numbers may afterwards be constructed by basic arithmetic.
I. Equalization of the Great and Small in the Numerical Dyad

a. Equalization of particular infinite set (i.e. {}) of indefinite dyad (A.III.c)
b. Further particularization to divide infinite set into particular subsets (i.e. {{}})
c. First particularization of the numerical Dyad, i.e. two numerical units (i.e. 2={n{m}})
II. The Oppository Halving and Doubling towards all Even natural numbers
a. Indefinite extension of particularization (B.I.b) to all numerical units
b. Particularization of multiple doubles of the numerical dyad, i.e. m x n^2
c. Particularization of multiple halves of the numerical dyad, i.e. m / n^2
III. The Adding and Subtracting towards all Odds, Interstitial, and real Numbers
a. Particulate division of all Evens (B.II.b) into all Odd, finite & natural numbers
b. Arithmetic operations of addition from the uniting coupling, and subtraction from the dividing de-
coupling of finite natural numbers
c. Construction of all real numbers from addition and subtraction (B.III.b)
C. The Construction of the geometrical world in the World-Soul

The set of all real numbers (B.III.c) is then united by the One into a line and then divided by the Dyad into infinitely
many line segments. Those line segments are combined by the One into all Polygons (e.g. triangle, square,..., n-
sided polygon ~ circle). Those polygons are divisibly particularized and multiplied by the Dyad, and then re-
combined by the One to construct all Polyhedra (e.g. tetrahedron, cube,..., n-faced polyhedron ~ sphere). Those
those Polyhedra are multiply particularized and divided by the Dyad and then recombined , within the sphere by the
One to construct all extended geometrical forms in spatio-temporal matrix.
I. Infinite sequence of all real numbers to represent a Line

a. All Evens (B.II.c) and all Odds (B.III.c) constitute all rational numbers
b. All rational numbers are particularized as an infinitely denumerable set
c. An infinitely denumerable set is represented as an interminable line
II. Mixture of Lines to construct all Polygons, Polyhedra, and Geometricals

a. Particular lines (C.I.c) combined to construct all polygons:
e.g. triangle, square,..., n-sided polygon ~ circle.
b. Particluar polygons (C.II.a) combined to construct all polyhedra:
e.g. tetrahedron, cube,..., n-faced polyhedron ~ sphere.
c. Particular polygons (C.II.a) and polyhedra (C.II.b) combined to construct
all complex geometrical objects, elements, and complexes
III. Mixture of all Geometricals in Time to construct the World-Soul

a. Construction of geometricals (C.II.c) from simple parts to complex wholes consists in prior and posterior
semi-temporal moments.
b. All semi-temporal moments constitute a temporal procession.
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c. The construction of all mathematical-geometrical complexes (C.II.c) within the matrix of space (C.II.b)
and time (C.III.b) is the World-Soul
The supreme Principles of the unitary One and the oppository Dyad, which are jointly mixed in
the many-in-one Triad, altogether comprise the generative emanation, which later Platonists
attributed to the One (A). The generation of all real numbers from the division, equalization, and
particularization of the infinite set of the indefinite Dyad constitutes the Idea-numbers from
which arithmetic is constructed, and which later Platonists identified with the cosmic
intelligence, universal reason, or Nous that is presented as the Demiurge in the Timaeus (B). The
construction of all geometrical forms (e.g. lines, polygons, and polyhedra) within a spatio-
temporal matrix is the immanent and living dynamism of the World-Soul (C). The world of
appearances (D), which may be alternatively described as the material universe, is merely a
limited shadowy apprehension of the imminently contrary sensible objects and inconsistent
opinions resulting from various stable mixtures of the Supreme Principles (A) and the Nous (B)
within the sphere of the World-Soul (C). The triad of One (A), Nous (B), and World-Soul (C)
that forms the material world (D) thus comprises an immanent cosmic triad (i.e. A-B-C) that
reflects the transcendent acosmic triad of the Supreme Principles of the One (A.I), the Dyad
(A.II), and the Mixture (A.III): i.e. One : One :: Dyad : Nous :: Mixture : World-Soul.
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The laws of logic can be re-conceived within Plato's ontology as Meta-Ideas that emanate from
the supreme Principles of the One and the Dyad in the various mixtures of human discursive
reasoning: for the identity of every subject with itself is reflexively formalized in the Law of
Identity by the One; just as the exclusion and contrary opposition of distinct subjects is likewise
formalized in the Law of Excluded Middle and Non-Contradiction by the Dyad. Similarly, the
inclusion or exclusion of elements within the sets of set theory, from which may be constructed
all universal Ideas, can be understood to result from the identity of multiple elements in one set
by the One, as well as the non-identity, exclusion, and contrary opposition of elements of one set
to another by the Dyad. Since higher order arithmetic and mathematics may be uncontroversially
constructed from the basis of set theory, the Meta-Ideas of the laws of logic and the universal
Ideas of set theory allow for the Pythagorean construction of the mathematical universe. For
example, the basic functions of modern symbolic logic may be constructed from the application
of the Meta-Ideas of logic to the universal Ideas of set theory: where affirmation is the result of
the pure self-positing of the One; negation is the result of the pure self-oppositing of the One
from itself into the Dyad; and where conjunction is the necessary union of two sets by the One;
disjunction is the exclusive opposition of alternatively possible sets by the Dyad; and, finally,
conditional implications are the successive movements from antecedent conditions to
conditioned consequences resulting from division by the Dyad and the reunion by the One.
The laws of Excluded Middle and Non-Contradiction can also be shown to have been preserved
rather than violated by Platonic ontology. The supreme Principle of the One is the absolute
identity of all differentia, division, exclusion, and contrary opposition. Every derivative genus-
species branch at each successive ontological level reproduces various instantiations of this
original archetypal identity-in-difference. Identity of difference does not primarily conflict with
the Law of Non-Contradiction, but with the Law of the Excluded Middle: for where the Law of
Excluded Middle prohibits any middle option between exclusive and oppository terms, identity-
in-difference implies there exists this very middle option as a mediating identity between
mutually exclusive elements. To escape the charge of inconsistency, Plato must restrict the
application of the Law of the Excluded Middle to the relation between many particulars, which
are excluded from one another by their mutual limits, but not the relation of universal Ideas,
which both virtually contain all of their particular instances and are hence unlimited in the scope
of their possible instantiations. Since the more elevated, general, and universal levels of Plato's
ontology are not limited by the mutual exclusivity of the more specific and particular elements,
there are no exclusive limits between universals and particulars. With no exclusive limits, the
Law of Excluded Middle does not apply to the Platonic identity-in-difference participation of
particular instances in universal Ideas.
Neither does Plato's ontology violate the Law of Non-Contradiction, for Plato elevates
contradiction to the inner opposition of his very first Principles. Since the primary archetype of
all contrariness is the originary opposition of the One to the Dyad, and every instance
30
imperfectly instantiates its perfect paradigm, every instance of contrariness and contradiction
must derive from the transcendent contrary opposition of these supreme Principles. Contrariness
is more general than contradiction, because every instance of contradiction is an instance of
contrariness, but not every contrary is a contradiction: for where contrariness applies to any
opposition between subjects (e.g. large is opposed to small) realized at the relative expense of its
other, contradiction only applies to subject-predicate propositions that are affirmed or denied in
the same way (e.g. 'A is larger than B' and 'B is larger than A'). Where each successive level of
emanation involves an instance of contrary opposition, contradiction is only instantiated and
recognized among propositions at the discursive level of the spatio-temporal cosmos. Since even
the the perfect paradigm of the contrary opposition of the One and the Dyad remains united
within the One, every imperfectly derived instantiation of contrariness, including all
contradictions, must also be united by participation in universal Ideas. And since there may be a
Platonic Idea for every consistent thought, every apparent contradiction may be possibly
resolved in some further non-contradictory identity of differences. Finally, Plato's ontology may
also suggest an ontological explanation for the Principle of Explosion, by which an antecedent
contradiction implies any consequence: for where contrary opposition can be resolved into a
further mixture, contradiction results in the annihilation of the being and truth of the unity of the
contraries; but since the annihilation of being is also retained as relative non-being unrelated to
being, this non-being may be related to every being, and thus imply the truth of any proposition.
III. 3. Conclusion: Platonic Ontology and Trinitarian Ontotheology
Once the universal Ideas are hypothetically postulated as the prior ontological conditions for the
being or thought of any particular instance, all instances become the conditioned consequences
that logically flow, or emanate from, the universal Ideas. Answering the Third Man and Greatest
Difficulty arguments requires all beings to be systematically united through the construction of a
set-theoretic hierarchy of universal Ideas, crowned by the supreme Principle of the One. Since
the One is the supreme logical condition of all conditioned beings it is not a being at all, but
totally beyond being, and cannot be spoken of, predicated, or even judged as any finite,
particular, or formally defined being. (508e) Neither is it a universal Idea because all Ideas are
beings that are apprehended as one perfect paradigm over many imperfect and inconsistent
instances. (74a) Neither is it immanent in space and time, because all beings are judged within a
representational space-time matrix. Since, moreover, the One virtually contains all beings within
itself, the One paradoxically is both exclusive and inclusive of all beings, and thus so continually
exceeds its own being. Since the One is both exclusive and inclusive of the space-time matrix of
the World-Soul (C) and the temporal material world (D), the emanation of beings from the One
is neither simply eternal nor temporal, but is both eternal and temporal, as an eternal-temporal
procession. Since the One virtually includes all beings, all beings continuously and
synchronously emanate from and assimilate to the One in a sempiternal procession.
31
This sempiternal procession of emanation and assimilation consists in the emanation of the
immanent triad (i.e. One, the Nous, and the World-Soul) from the transcendent triad (i.e. One,
the Dyad, and the Triad), and the assimilation of the immanent triad to the transcendent triad. In
representational terms, emanation is the original outward process though which the One exceeds,
differentiates, and particularizes itself into many instances; while assimilation is the final inward
process through which these many instances are united in-and-with the absolutely identical
whole. Since the One is self-identical but virtually contains both the differentiating process of
emanation and the unifying process of assimilation, it is an original identity of all differences.
Moreover, since the One virtually contains not only the transcendent and immanent triads, but
also all beings emanating from and assimilating to those triads, it is also the supreme identity of
the differentia of all triads. For example, Plato had described, at the conclusion of the Philebus,
the highest good as the mixture and conjunction of the three Ideas of “beauty, proportion [i.e.
rational measure (65d)], and truth” in which these three are regarded “as one.” (65a) The
supreme identity of all differentia in the structure of triads similarly results in the formulation of
the Platonic Trinity of Xenocrates, Plotinus, and Proclus, which J.N. Findlay describes as "an
early and inevitable development of Platonic systematic idealism." (1978 34)
The Christian Trinity is distinguished from this Platonic Trinity, not because of a distinction
between an impersonal One and a personal God (for the One also virtually possesses the attribute
of personality), but rather because of the novel Christian doctrine of the incarnation of God as
Jesus Christ. The Platonic trinity had divided the Nous from the World-Soul to be united -
beyond all thought and being - in the totally ineffable One. The Christian doctrine that Christ is
fully God and fully man further unites these hypostases, in a hypostatic union in which the divine
Logos of Nous is personally united with a human body within the space-time matrix of the
World-Soul. As a consequence of this hypostatic union of divinity and humanity, Christ the
incarnate Nous contains within himself the full divinity of God the One. Since, moreover, the
incarnation, life, death, and resurrection of Christ are recounted in the Gospels as historical
events, the personal union of the One and the Nous in Christ is also contained within the space,
time, and history of the World-Soul. The identity of the divine Nous and humanity in Christ, and
Christ in history, further implies that the universal reason of Nous is operative, through Christ
and the Church, in the progressive development of the spirit of humanity. Once divinity is
confessed to cooperate with humanity for the salvation of the world throughout all ages,
narratives of human history and divine providence become inseparably conjoined in reciprocal
motion towards one and the same progressive purpose.
A myriad of historical accidents are often alleged to have precipitated the erosion of Platonism in
late antiquity: blame may be cast upon the conversion of Constantine, the death of Julian the
Apostate, or even the Fall of the Western Roman Empire. Bertrand Russell, for example, writes
of Plotinus: “He turned aside from the spectacle of misery in the actual world, to contemplate an
32
eternal world of goodness and beauty.” (1945 271) Yet the truly essential cause must be
discovered within the inner logic of Platonism itself. Recall that Plato had hypothesized Ideas as
the individual identity of thought and being of some predicate-properties. Since each Idea was
thought as an individual identity of being in-itself, the Ideas may be thought to subsist as
externally reflected entities essentially independent of human thought. By this external reflection
of the being of thought into an independent object, human thought is alienated from itself into an
external object. For example, in the first generation of Platonism, Xenocrates located the Ideas,
not in our thoughts, but in the mind of the immortal god Zeus. (Dillon 2003 120)
The fatal flaw that siphoned the spiritual life from Platonism resulted from a contradiction in its
original formulation. Since the Ideas are abductive hypothetical entities, and every hypothesis
requires further verification, but the verification of an abductive hypothesis is only possible after
every other alternative hypothesis has been rejected, the verification of the Theory of Ideas
requires a complete science of Ideas. Since the Ideas are individual identities of thought and
being, Plato's theory of Ideas thus initiated an epoch-making project to construct a complete
science of the total structure of being, or ontology. Since the Ideas were located in the mind of
God, Platonic ontology extended to encompass theology, as an onto-theology. Since the Ideas
were each objective entities of externally reflected thought, a complete science of onto-theology,
constructed from the building-blocks of these Ideas, must be external and alien to human
thinking. Although life, intellect, and humanity were undoubtedly contained as virtual attributes
of the One, the freedom and spiritual dignity of man finds no home in Platonism.
The latent nihilism of Platonism is the consequence of this alienation of thought from thinking in
the objectified structure of being, or ontotheoloogy. Once thought is hypothetically identified
with the being of the Ideas, and all these beings are fixed in-and-through the construction of a
grand ontological hierarchy that is known only in-and-by the mind of God, Platonism petrifies
subjective thinking in an ineffable mystery. The unintelligibility of the supreme Principles
pervade every successive level of reality. Since every thought of the divine mind inscrutably
transcends all possible cognition, Platonic ontotheology objectifies subjective thinking as an
objective thought that can only be thought as it is not thought. Since this paradoxical set of the
thought of non-thought is totally alienated from thinking thought, thought remains bound in
eternal servitude to non-thought beyond all thought and being. The structure of divine being is
thus emptied as Platonic ontotheology is unwittingly transmogrified into a meontotheology, and
the liberating light of Platonic wisdom proves to have been nothing more than a mirage. Once
this image of the structure being is unmasked as an abyss of non-being, the philosopher's happy
dream of ascending from the cave of unknowing to a blessed life, in communion with Ideas of
the truth, beauty and goodness, is made a most miserable slavery to a totally alien nothingness.
After this deadly poison of philosophy was distributed the furthest reaches of the known world
by the great pupil of the greatest student of Plato, the structure ontology came to appear as an
otherworldly reflection of the strangling structures of worldly dominion.
33
In the sunset years of late antique philosophy, the candlewax of Platonic learning dripped to tears
as Platonic Athens was abandoned for Christian Jerusalem. Christianity promised the same
heavenly ascent to the Ideas, knowledge of eternal goodness and truth, and mystical rapture as
had Platonism, but newly championed by a personal savior who, for us and our salvation, offered
himself as a perfect sacrifice to reconcile God and man. Where in Platonism, the possibility of
divine assimilation was only available to a philosophic few, in Christianity the 'kingdom of
heaven' was said to be planted as a mustard seed in the hearts of all. (Lk. 13:19) This portal of
universal salvation was opened by a theological revolution in speculative ontology. In Neo-
Platonism, the World Soul was subordinated to and contained within Nous, and Nous in the One.
Yet in Christianity, the One is also personally identified with the incarnate Nous of Christ the
Logos, and Christ in the World-Soul in-and-through the historical development of the Church
(Mt. 18:20). Christianity, in this way, inverted the structural relations of divine hypostases:
where Neo-Platonism had formerly structured being in an ontological hierarchy from the highest
Principles to the lowest matter, Christianity promised to overturn every structural subordination
in heaven and earth; so that, just as the man on the cross was honored above the prince of the
world; so might the greatest become servants (Mt. 23:11); and the poor in spirit be blessed to
inherit the kingdom of heaven. (Mt. 5:3)
Plato's fatal flaw of alienating the thought by external reflection into objectified Ideas was
resolved by the new identity of the essence of man with Platonic ontotheology. Where Platonism
had estranged the objectified thought of the Ideas from subjective thinking, Christianity portrays
thought and thinking as eternally and historically reconciled in Jesus Christ, who is thought
incarnated thinking itself. The esoteric significance of Pontius Pilate's exclamation “behold the
man” (Jn. 19:5) is the revelation of precisely this essential identification of God and man: for
because God has become man, man may potentially become like God. This christological
identification of divine thought with human thinking initiates a theological transformation of
anthropology, by which the essence of man is intrinsically linked to the essence of God. Once the
supreme Idea of God is humanized, and humanity divinized, the paradoxical set of the Good,
which includes and excludes itself, may be figuratively rethought as the sempiternal activity by
which the divine being exceeds every set, just as the intellective being of human thinking
continuously surpasses its own limits. In the Christian Trinity, unlike the Platonic Trinity, the
pure self-relation of God is truly exceeded as the Son proceeds from the Father, and the Holy
Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. Through this triadic movement of one into two and
two into two-in-one, every contrary opposition can be resolved and mediated through an identity
of many specific differences within one generic and universal Idea. Since it is Christ, the thought
that thinks himself, who is the absolute identity of all differentia, and in whom divine thought
and human thinking are indistinguishably united, Christianity preserves, just as Platonism
servers, this intrinsic link between the freedom of thinking and thought of the Ideas.
34

Plato Logic and Ontology

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Plato, Logic, and Ontology

I. 1. Introduction: Why Study Plato?

I. 2. Plato’s Predecessors: Parmenides, Heraclitus, and Cratylus

A. Parmenides: Transcendent Opposition of Being and Non-Being

B. Heraclitus: Contrareity of Something and Nothing in Becoming

Heraclitus’ immanent mixture of contraries produces an explosive concoction. The simultaneous

C. Cratylus: Semantic Contradictions for Definitions and Knowledge

I. 3. Plato's Theory of Ideas

A. Three Arguments for the Ideas

The Ontology of Parmenides, Heraclitus and Plato

B. The Abductive Logic of Universal Ideas

C. The Supreme Idea of the Good

II. 1. The Challenge of the Parmenides

II. 2. Answering the Third Man Argument

II. 3. Answering the Greatest Difficulty Argument

The One is (First Tetrad) The One is Not (Second Tetrad)

The One is itself H1 (NR) H2 (R) H5 (R) H6 (NR)

The One is not itself

Aristotle's formal logic may be ontologically re-constructed as a Platonic logic of Ideas by

I. The Unitary One

II. The Oppository Dyad

III. The Mixing Triad

B. The Generation of Numbers in Nous

I. Equalization of the Great and Small in the Numerical Dyad

C. The Construction of the geometrical world in the World-Soul

I. Infinite sequence of all real numbers to represent a Line

II. Mixture of Lines to construct all Polygons, Polyhedra, and Geometricals

III. Mixture of all Geometricals in Time to construct the World-Soul

III. 3. Conclusion: Platonic Ontology and Trinitarian Ontotheology

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