Book contents
- Plato’s Essentialism
- Plato’s Essentialism
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 Why cannot the ti esti question be answered by example and exemplar?
- Chapter 2 Why cannot essences, or Forms, be perceived by the senses?
- Chapter 3 Why are essences, or Forms, unitary, uniform and non-composite? Why are they changeless? Eternal? Are they logically independent of each other?
- Chapter 4 The relation between knowledge and enquiry in the Phaedo
- Chapter 5 Why are essences, or Forms, distinct from sense-perceptible things?
- Chapter 6 Why are essences, or Forms, the basis of all causation and explanation?
- Chapter 7 What is the role of essences, or Forms, in judgements about sense-perceptible and physical things?
- Chapter 8 Why does thinking of things require essences, or Forms?
- Chapter 9 Why are essences, or Forms, separate from physical things?
- Chapter 10 What yokes together mind and world?
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- General Index
- Index Locorum
Chapter 1 - Why cannot the ti esti question be answered by example and exemplar?
Hippias Major
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 June 2021
- Plato’s Essentialism
- Plato’s Essentialism
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 Why cannot the ti esti question be answered by example and exemplar?
- Chapter 2 Why cannot essences, or Forms, be perceived by the senses?
- Chapter 3 Why are essences, or Forms, unitary, uniform and non-composite? Why are they changeless? Eternal? Are they logically independent of each other?
- Chapter 4 The relation between knowledge and enquiry in the Phaedo
- Chapter 5 Why are essences, or Forms, distinct from sense-perceptible things?
- Chapter 6 Why are essences, or Forms, the basis of all causation and explanation?
- Chapter 7 What is the role of essences, or Forms, in judgements about sense-perceptible and physical things?
- Chapter 8 Why does thinking of things require essences, or Forms?
- Chapter 9 Why are essences, or Forms, separate from physical things?
- Chapter 10 What yokes together mind and world?
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- General Index
- Index Locorum
Summary
The chapter argues that Plato, in the Hippias Major gives due consideration to the question whether, for some qualities F, such as beauty, it is possible to give an account of what F is by pointing to an example-and-exemplar. He takes seriously, and gives cogent reasons in defense of, an affirmative answer to this question in a manner comparable to Geach – although he argues that these reasons lead to inconsistency, if combined with the view that it is possible to make comparisons in regard to F among significantly different examples-and-exemplars of a thing that is F.
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- Plato's EssentialismReinterpreting the Theory of Forms, pp. 17 - 22Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2021
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