interlocutors can discard the false opinions abouttruth that they hold. Yet, this discarding of false
opinion would then make possible the second stage of Socratic questioning, the purpose of which
is to bring about recollection.
In this second stage the purpose of Socratic questioning is to allow the interlocutor to recollect the
universal truths or ideas that were in their souls but which they had forgotten and had been obscured
by the false opinions which they had previously held. Having swept away our false opinions
Socratic questioning can help us bring to mind the universal truths we do hold, and Socratic
technique is a preparatory stage for the transformative experience or pathway to discovery that
Socratic questioning can bring.
But this still leaves us with another key problem. In the first stage of Socratic questioning, the
ideas sought for, such as the idea of virtue, although distinct do not necessarily exist separate or
apart from their particular manifestations in this world: they are not conceived of as self-subsisting.
In the second stage of Socratic questioning, however, having been contemplated by the soul when
separated from the human body and its senses, the ideas are conceived of as self-subsisting as they
are eternal and exist apart from their particular manifestations that come to be and pass away. How
to reconcile these two ideas remains yet to be solved.
Notes
1 Leo Strauss,The City and Man(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1964), 119.
2 Jacob Klein,A Commentary on Plato’s Meno(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1965),
95 – 96, 131.
3 Gregory Vlastos,“Anamnesisin theMeno,”inPlato’sMenoinFocus, Jane M. Day, ed. (London:
Routledge, 1994), 102; Steven S. Tigner,“On‘Kinship’of‘All Nature’in Plato’sMeno,”Phronesis
15/1 (1970): 4; R.E. Allen,“Anamnesis in Plato’sMenoandPhaedo,”The Review of Metaphysics13/1
(Sep. 1959): 167–70, 172.
4 Vlastos,“Anamnesis,”102, and Allen,“Anamnesis,”171.
5 Plato,Apology of Socrates,inFive Dialogues: Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Meno, Phaedo, G.M.A. Grube,
trans. (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 2002). All subsequent citations will be taken from here.
6 David Leibowitz,The Ironic Defense of Socrates: Plato’s Apology(Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2010), 64–65, 87, 101; Claudia Baracchi,“The‘Inconceivable Happiness’of‘Men and Women’:
Visions of Another World in Plato’sApology of Socrates,”Comparative Literature Studies43/3 (2006):
277 – 78; Arlene W. Saxonhouse,Free Speech and Democracy in Ancient Athens(Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2006), 106–109; Michael Zuckert,“Rationalism and Political Responsibility: Just
Speech and Just Deed in theCloudsand theApology of Socrates,”Polity17/2 (1984): 283–87; and Leo
Strauss,“On Plato’sApology of SocratesandCrito,”inStudies in Platonic Political Philosophy(Chicago:
University of Chicago Press), 42, 44; but see Lee Ward,“The Relation between Politics and Philosophy in
Plato’sApology of Socrates,”International Philosophical Quarterly49/4 (December, 2009): 504.
7 Barrachi,“Inconceivable Happiness,” 278 – 79.
8 Plato,Meno, G.M.A. Grube, trans. (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing), 2002. All subsequent citations will
be taken from here.
9 Plato,Republic, Allan Bloom, trans. (New York: Basic Books, 1968), 335a–336d. All subsequent citations
will be taken from here; also see Plato,Crito, G.M.A. Grube, trans. (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing,
2002), 45b–46a, 49d–e.
10 For instance, see Plato,Euthyphro, G.M.A. Grube, trans. (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 2002) 5d, and
Plato,Republic, 476a–b; also see Ann Ward,“Divine Speech and the Quest for the Ideas in Plato’s
Euthyphro,”inNatural Right and Political Philosophy: Essays in Honor of Catherine Zuckert and
Michael Zuckert, Ann Ward and Lee Ward, eds. (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2013),
41; Mary P. Nichols,Socrates and the Political Community: An Ancient Debate(Albany: SUNY Press,
1988), 112; and R.E. Allen,Plato’s Euthyphro and the Earlier Theory of Forms, (New York: Humanities
Press, 1970), 28–9, 67–9. Yet, see Crombie who argues that in theMeno, although Socrates is asking for the
idea of virtue, he is not in fact asking for the definition of virtue. I.M. Crombie,“Socratic Definition,”in
Plato’s Menoin Focus, Jane M. Day, ed. (London: Routledge, 1994), 179–80, 191–92.
11 Moravscik denies that the paradox of learning for which recollection is brought in as a resolution and calls
into question all forms of learning, including learning done through empirical inquiry. See Julius Moravscik,
“Learning as Recollection,”inPlato’s Meno in Focus,Jane M. Day, ed. (London: Routledge, 1994), 113.
Skepticism and Recollection in Socrates 55