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 8 - Why does thinking of things require essences, or Forms?
Parmenides
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 considers Plato's claim, in Parmenides 135, that thinking about things requires Forms. It locates Plato's argument for this claim in 132 and, especially, in the second part of the dialogue (142ff.). It shows that the second part of the dialogue is just as much about thinking as it is about being.
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- Chapter
- Information
- Plato's EssentialismReinterpreting the Theory of Forms, pp. 179 - 201Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2021