Abstract
Aristotle tells us that Plato claimed that the Forms are separate from and prior to particulars (e.g. Metaphysics M4.1078b30–32, 9.1086b1–2, Z6.1031b11–15), and later scholars have usually agreed with Aristotle.1 Unfortunately, there is no agreement about what Plato’s claim amounts to. In this article, I examine and refute one proposed interpretation of Plato’s thesis. According to this interpretation, the separation and priority of the Forms consisted, for Plato, in the propositions that (A) there can be, and in fact are, Forms which have no instances, but (B) there cannot be things which are F (‘F’ a general term) if there is no Form of Fness. I shall concentrate on (A) throughout and eliminate (B) only in passing. In outline, my course will be this: In the remainder of Section I, I distinguish different versions of (A); in Sections II–IV, I show the falsity of the Empty Forms Thesis (hereafter, ‘EFT’), i.e. the thesis that Plato accepted (A). In Section II, I show conditionally that EFT is false for an important subclass of Forms; in Section III, that it is unconditionally false for all Forms that can have particulars as instances; and in Section IV, that there are no Forms other than those discussed in Section III.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Bibliography
Adam, J. (ed.), The Republic of Plato, 2 Vols., Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1902.
Allen, R. E., Plato’s Euthyphro’ and the Earlier Theory of Forms, Routledge and Kegar Paul, London, The Humanities Press, New York 1970.
Allen, R. E. (ed.), Studies in Plato’s Metaphysics, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London The Humanities Press, New York 1965.
Armstrong, D. M., ‘Toward a Theory of Properties’, Philosophy 50 (1975), 145–155. Bolton, R., ‘Essentialism and Semantic Theory in Aristotle’, Philosophical Review 8: (1976), 514–544.
Bolton, R., Plato’s Distinction between Being and Becoming’, Review of Metaphysic 29 (1975), 66–95.
Burnet, J., Early Greek Philosophy, 4th ed., Meridian Books, Cleveland 1957.
Burnet, J., Plato ‘s Phaedo, Oxford University Press, Oxford 1911.
Cherniss, H., Aristotle’s Criticism of Plato and the Academy, Johns Hopkins Pres Baltimore 1944.
Cherniss, H.,‘The Philosophical Economy of the Theory of Ideas’, American Journal c Philosophy 57 (1936),445–456, reprinted in R. E. Allen (ed.), Studies in Plato Metaphysics,pp. 1–12, and G. Vlastos (ed.), Plato I,pp. 16–27.
Cherniss, H. The Sources of Evil According to Plato’, Proceedings of the America Philosophical Society 98 (1954), 23–30, reprinted in G. Vlastos (ed.), Plato I pp. 244–258.
Cohen, S. M., ‘The Logic of the Third Man’, Philosophical Review 80 (1971), 448–47
Cornford, F. M., Plato’s Cosmology, The Liberal Arts Press, New York 1957.
Crombie, I. M., An Examination of Plato’s Doctrines,2 Vols., Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, The Humanities Press, New York 1962–1963.
Dancy, R., ‘On Some of Aristotle’s First Thoughts about Substances’, Philosophical Review 84 (1975), 338–373.
Diels, H. (ed.), Doxographi Graeci, 4th ed., Walter de Gruyter and Co., Berlin 1965.
Faris, J. A., Plato’s Theory of Forms and Cantor’s Theory of Sets, The Queen’s University, Belfast 1968.
Frazer, J. G., The Growth of Plato’s Ideal Theory, Russell and Russell, New York 1967.
Gallop, D. (transl.) Plato’s PhaedoOxford University Press, Oxford 1975.
Ginet, C., ‘Can the Will Be Caused?’, Philosophical Review 71 (1962), 49–55.
Gosling, J. C. P. (transl.), Plato ‘s Philebus, Oxford University Press, Oxford 1975.
Grube, G. M. A. (transl.), Plato’s Republic, Hackett Publishing Co., Indianapolis 1974.
Guthrie, W. K. C., A History of Greek Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1967.
Guthrie, W. K. C., ‘Plato’s Views on the Nature of the Soul’, in G. Vlastos (ed.), Plato II, pp. 230–243.
Hardie, W. F. R.,A Study in Plato, Oxford University Press, Oxford 1936.
Herter, H., ‘Urathen der Idealstaat’, Palingenesia 4 (1969), 108–134.
Hintikka, J., Time and Necessity: Studies in Aristotle’s Theory of Modality, Oxford University Press, Oxford 1973.
Jaeger, W., Aristotle: Fundamentals of the History of His Development, transl. R. Robinson, 2d ed., Oxford University Press, London 1962.
Kane, R. H., ‘Nature, Plenitude and Sufficient Reason’, American Philosophical Quarterly 13 (1976), 23–31.
Keyt, D., The Mad Craftsman of the Timaeus’, Philosophical Review 80 (1971), 230235.
Krohn, A. A., Der platonische Staat, R. Muhlmann, Halle 1876.
Lloyd, A. C., ‘Plato’s Description of Division’, in R. E. Allen (ed.), Studies in Plato’s Metaphysics,pp. 219–230.
Lovejoy, A. O., The Great Chain of Being, Harvard University Press, Cambridge Mass. 1936.
Maula, E., ‘On Plato and Plenitude’, Ajatus 29 (1967), 12–50.
Nehamas, A., ‘Plato on the Imperfection of the Sensible World’, American Philosophical Quarterly 12 (1975), 105–117.
Nehamas, A., ‘Predication and Forms of Opposites in the Phaedo’, Review of Metaphysics 26 (1973), 461–491.
Owen, G. E. L., ‘Dialectic and Eristic in the Treatment of the Forms’, in G. E. L. Owen (ed.), Aristotle on Dialectic,pp. 103–125.
Owen, G. E. L., ‘The Place of the Timaeus in Plato’s Dialogues’, Classical Quarterly 2 N.S. (1953), 79–95, reprinted in R. E. Allen (ed.), Studies in Plato’s Metaphysics,pp. 313–338.
Owen, G. E. L., ‘Plato on Not-Being’, in G. Vlastos (ed.), Plato I, pp. 233–267.
Owen, G. E. L., ‘Plato and Parmenides on the Timeless Present’, Monist 50 (1966), 317–340, reprinted at A. P. D. Mourelatos (ed.), The Pre-Socratics (Modern Studies in Philosophy), Anchor Books, Doubleday, Garden City, New York 1974.
Owen, G. E. L., ‘A Proof in the peri idedn’, Journal of Hellenic Studies 77 (1957), 103–111, reprinted in R. E. Allen (ed.), Studies in Plato’s Metaphysics, pp. 293–312.
Owen, G. E. L. (ed.), Aristotle on Dialectic: The Topics. Proceedings of the Third Symposium Aristotelicum, Oxford University Press, Oxford 1968.
Putnam, H., ‘On Properties’, in N. Rescher (ed.), Essays in Honor of Carl G. Hempel, The Humanities Press, New York 1970, pp. 235–254.
Rankin, H. D., ‘Plato’s Eugenic eü iuLa. and àarbfleais in Republic, Book V’, Hermes 93 (1965), 407–420.
Raven, J. E., Plato’s Thought in the Making, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1965.
Ross, W. D., Aristotle’s Metaphysics, 2 Vols., Oxford University Press, Oxford 1924.
Ross, W. D., Plato’s Theory of Ideas, Oxford University Press, Oxford 1951.
Russell, B., The Problems of Philosophy, William and Norgate, London 1912.
Ryle, G., ‘Dialectic in the Academy’, in G. E. L. Owen (ed.), Aristotle on Dialectic, pp. 69–79.
Skemp, J. B. (transi.), Plato’s Statesman, Yale University Press, New Haven 1952.
Solmsen, F., Intellectual Experiments of the Greek Enlightenment, Princeton University Press, Princeton 1975.
Strang, C., ‘Plato and the Third Man’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Suppl. 37 (1963), 147–164, reprinted in G. Vlastos (ed.), Plato I,pp. 184–200.
Taylor, A. E., A Commentary on Plato’s Timaeus, Oxford University Press, Oxford 1928.
Taylor, A. E., ‘Parmenides, Zeno, and Socrates’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 16 (1915–16), 234–289, reprinted A. E. Taylor, Philosophical Studies, Macmillan, London 1934.
Taylor, A. E., Plato: The Man and His Work, Meridian Books, New York 1957.
Vlastos, G., ‘Creation in the Timaeus: Is it a Fiction?’, in R. E. Allen (ed.), Studies in Plato’s Metaphysics,pp. 401–419.
Vlastos, G., ‘Degrees of Reality in Plato’, in R. Bambrough (ed.), New Essays on Plato and Aristotle,Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, The Humanities Press, New York 1965, pp. 1–19, reprinted in G. Vlastos, Platonic Studies,pp. 58–75.
Vlastos, G., The Disorderly Motion in the Timaeus’, The Classical Quarterly 33 (1939), 71–83, reprinted in R. E. Allen (ed.), Studies in Plato’s Metaphysics, pp. 379–399. Vlastos, G., Platonic Studies, Princeton University Press, Princeton 1973.
Vlastos, G., ‘Reasons and Causes in the Phaedo’, Philosophical Review 78 (1969), 291325, reprinted in G. Vlastos (ed.), Plato I,pp. 132–166 and in Platonic Studies,pp. 76–110.
Vlastos, G., Review of I. M. Crombie, ‘An Examination of Plato’s Doctrines II’, Philosophical Review 75 (1966), 526–530.
Vlastos, G., The Third Man Argument in the Parmenides’, Philosophical Review 63 (1954), 319–349, reprinted in R. E. Allen (ed.), Studies in Plato’s Metaphysics,pp. 231–263.
Vlastos, G., ‘The Unity of Virtues in the Protagoras’, Review of Metaphysics 25 (1972), 415–459, reprinted in Platonic Studies,pp. 221–269.
Vlastos, G. (ed.), Plato I—II (Modern Studies in Philosophy), Anchor Books, Doubleday, Garden City, New York 1970–71.
Wedberg, A., Plato’s Philosophy of Mathematics, Almqvist and Wiksell, Stockholm 1955.
Wilpert, P., Zwei aristotelische Fr1thschriften, J. Habbel, Regensburg 1949.
Wyttenbach, D., Platonis Phaedon, Apud Haakios et Honkoopios, Lugduni-Batavorum 1810.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1980 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Rohr, M.D. (1980). Empty Forms in Plato. In: Knuuttila, S. (eds) Reforging the Great Chain of Being. Synthese Historical Library, vol 20. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-7662-8_2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-7662-8_2
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-90-481-8360-9
Online ISBN: 978-94-015-7662-8
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive