Phil 200 Midterm P2

Socratic Definition

E: Definition of something that is i. Complete ii. Exclusive iii. Explanatory

C: Euthyphro, S asks for the form that makes all pious actions pious and points out the flaw in Euthyphros answer to what is piety as he only gives examples and does not actually define what the pious is.

Self Predication

E: Forms have the properties of the forms they are.

C: Phaedo, the form of F is F itself. Forms are paradigms.

Touchstone

E: An ideal person to test whether a soul has lived rightly. Contains 3 Qualities: Knowledge, Good will, Frankness

C: Gorgias, Socrates says Callicles is a good touchstone because of his frankness and one of few who can test Socrates.

Essential Property

E: Key property that cannot be lost without changing what it is

C: Phaedo, used in the immortality reasoning, The soul always brings life. Bringing life is an essentiental trait of the soul.

Teaching Persuasion

E:Teaching Persuassion produces actual knowledge rather than just conviction (conviction persuassion)

C: Gorgias, Gets gorgias to admit ordinary oratory’s produce convictions not knowledge or teaching.

Cloak

E: Weaver/Cloak Analogy, a weaver can outlast many cloaks but still die before the last cloak is destroyed

C: Phaedo, The weaver is the soul and the cloak is the body, basically refuting immortality because just because the soul outlives bodies does not mean it is immortal.

Pastry Baking

E: Flattery is only a knack and not an actual craft.

C: Gorgias, specific flattery related to medicine that a pastry is only a knack of the craft of medicine which produces baked goods that aim to imitate medicine rather than actually be based in it. (knacks only imitate knowledge rather than actually be based in knowledge)

Euthyphro Dilemma

E: Is something pious because it is loved by the gods or is it loved by the gods because it is pious

C: Euthyphro, shows being loved by gods is an effect of piety NOT the cause.

Harmony

E: Simmias idea that the soul might be produced by a harmony of bodily elements

C: Phaedo, objection to immortality, if soul is based in bodily elements, the soul could disappear when the body is destroyed.

Meno’s Paradox

E: Yk what yk and you can’t learn what you aren’t aware of.

C: Phaedo, Helps motivate Plato’s theory of recollection.

“Suffering Injustice”

E: Socrates argues that doing injustice is worse than suffering it

C: Gorgias, it is worse because it corrupts the soul.

Participation

E: Forms cause particular to have properties by participating in the corresponding form

C: Phaedo, explains why a beautiful thing is beautiful because it participates in the form of beauty itself.

Hedonism

E: Pleasure = good

C: Gorgias, Socrates argues against this with an Elenchus proving that pleasure cannot equal good as it would lead to a paradox.

The Affinity Argument

E: Soul resembles what is divine, deathless, and always the same while the body represents what is mortal, and changing

C: Phaedo, Soul is less likely to dissolve at death due to what it represents

Tyrant

E: Simone Polus thinks has a lot of power because they can kill, exile, confiscate, etc. what they see fit.

C: Gorgias, doing what one sees fit w/o true knowledge is not pleasurable nor a great power because doing what one sees fit does not always = what is good.

The Ascent

E: A person moving away from physical desires to pure beauty

C: Symposium, No clue yet come back

Oratory

E: Persuasion on matters in public courts or gatherings and are a form of flattery

C: Gorgias, Socrates gets gorgias to admit they create convictions rather than actual knowledge

Mixing and Unmixing

E: Generation and destruction is just mixing and Unmixing, coming to be is coming together and passing away is Unmixing

C: Phaedo (originally Anaxagoras), thus claims that “all things have a share of everything”

Method of Hypothesis

E: assume Hypothesis to see whether Consequences agree or disagree

C: Phaedo, Socrates uses when investigating cases and moves from a safe hypothesis to a more sophisticated conclusion

Hard Case

C: tests whether a definition actually works on more tough cases

C: Euthyphro, definition must be able to handle challenging cases to be acceptable and generalizable.