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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 February 2016
Interest in Plato Metaphysicus has been as intense, and even more sustained, than interest in Plato Politicus. Some thinkers who might well dislike his political doctrine have found themselves caught up in controversy over his metaphysics, or his discussion of the meaning of the verb ‘to be’. It is a sheer impossibility to present a résumé of the actual discussions in the confined area of a brief summary: all that can be attempted is a chronicle of the issues that have occasioned most controversy in recent years. This will entail crossing dialogue boundaries and treating ‘themes’, though one should remember that each dialogue really has its particular quality and makes its own approach to the question or questions it considers.
l. This is not to disparage in any way the careful and detailed analyses made by Ross in his book. These are still of great value.
2. There is a good discussion of these alternative languages inPhronesis 19 (1974) by Noio Fujisawa.
3. Gulley, Norman, Plato ‘s Theory of Knowledge (London, 1962)Google Scholar, is an honourable exception.
4. I have not included any report on discussion of Being in the second part of the Parmenides. Anyone wishing to approach this esoteric realm might well read Malcom Schofield’s article in CQ N.S. 23 (1973), 29–44 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
A radical reappraisal of the Greek usage of the verb ‘to be’ is now offered by Kahn, Charles H., The Verb ‘Be’in Ancient Greece (Dordrecht, 1973)Google Scholar; it was reviewed by Kerferd, G. B. in Archiv für Geschichte des Philosophie 58 (1976), 60 CrossRefGoogle Scholar–4.
5. We may ask ourselves but are not told whether Theaetetus runs’, untrue but possible, is any different from ‘Theaetetus flies’—which Icarus’ fate proved impossible.
6. Peck, A. L. in Phronesis 7 (1962), 46–66 CrossRefGoogle Scholar, criticizes Ackrill and other writers radically.
7. I support Neal in saying that it is dangerous to interpret the Sophist on the level of logic rather than of metaphysics (18–19). I believe that the logical content and the ontological basis for the logic were not separated for Plato, though we tend to regard the problem as logical.
8. This is a revision of his article in PhQ 19 (1969), 289-301. This may be more accessible, and the revision is not fundamental.
9. Yet it is not the last word on it, and my statement above may prove to be a rash one. In PhR 82 (1973), 451–70, Sandra Petersen offers ‘A reasonable self-predication premise for the Third Man Argument’, and claims that some self-predication is permissible without being caught in the ‘third man’ dilemma. Pauline predication (‘Charity suffereth long and is kind’ rather than ‘Charity is charitable’) is now a fashionable term, though Phronesis 20 (1975), 11–21, already carries a warning article on ‘Some Perils of Paulinity’!