Bubner I 35
Knowledge/Cave-Parable/Plato/Bubner: the knowledge acquired by the few should not lead to theoretical self-sufficiency.
The rare insight into the nature of the good is to be implemented politically. It is not a question of the value neutrality of a supreme object.
The philosophers must descend again to share life with fellow prisoners. They are committed to do this because of the peculiarities of what they have seen! (Good).
Only the one who has a goal in life can act rationally (reason).
Summary: the idea of the good must be understood literally. The parable-like dress does not point to an ontological secret doctrine.
The philosopher who, with this question of the meaning and purpose of the theory, relativizes the possibilities of the theory itself, becomes a dialectician. (Dialectic).
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Good/Plato, >
Dialectic/Plato.
I 119
Knowledge/Menon/Plato: Aporia: either you cannot learn anything, or only what you already know.
Plato responds to this with the myth of Anamnesis. (Remembrance of the past life of the soul).
Knowledge/AristotleVsPlato (Menon): no knowledge arises from nothing.
In the case of syllogism and epagogé (nowadays controversial, whether to be seen as an induction) there is prior knowledge.
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Knowledge/Aristotle, cf. >
Knowledge paradox.
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Gaus I 311
Knowledge/governance/Plato/Keyt/Miller: in the Statesman [Politikos] the Eleatic Stranger pursues the idea of the rule of reason to its logical terminus and draws a conclusion that in the Republic remains tacit - that knowledge by itself provides sufficient warrant for the application of force, even deadly force, when persuasion fails (for the antithesis see Plt. 296bl, 304d4).
It is within the bounds of justice, according to the Eleatic Stranger, for the true statesman, the man who possesses the political art and is 'truly and not merely apparently a knower' , to purge his polis, with or without law, with or without the consent of his subjects, by killing or banishing some of its members (Plt. 293a2-e2).
The only true constitution is the one ruled by such a person. Since such persons are exceedingly rare (Plt. 292el-293a4, 297b7-c2), a central question is how a polis bereft of a true statesman can share in reason. The answer of the Eleatic Stranger is that it can share through law, law being an imitation of the truth apprehended by the true statesman (Plt. 300c5-7, 300el 1-301a4).
Imitation: Since the true statesman rules without law, there is a better and a worse way of imitating him. The rulers of a polis can imitate reason's rule by ruling according to reason's reflection in law, or they can imitate reason's lawlessness by ruling contrary to law (Plt. 300e7-301 c5). Given that the rulers are one, few, or many, there are three good and three bad imitations of the one true constitution. Since the fewer the rulers the stronger the rule, the six imitations form a hierarchy, fewer rulers being better when rule is according to law but worse when it is contrary (Plt. 302b5- 303b5).
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Governance/Plato.
Keyt, David and Miller, Fred D. jr. 2004. „Ancient Greek Political Thought“. In: Gaus, Gerald F. & Kukathas, Chandran 2004. Handbook of Political Theory. SAGE Publications
