In the so-called ‘dialogues of definition,’ Socrates appears to endorse the ‘priority of definition.’ This principle states that an agent cannot know anything about F-ness (its instances, examples, properties, etc.) without knowing what F-ness is (the definition of F-ness). Not only is this principle implausible, it is also difficult to square with Socrates’ method. In employing his method, Socrates appeals to truths about the instances and properties of F-ness, even while pursuing definitional knowledge; meanwhile, he holds that one cannot know (...) those truths without already knowing the definition. Thus, there is a tension between Socrates’ principle and his method. Commentators have tried to resolve this problem in various ways, though typically without a careful examination of his ‘What is F-ness?’ question. I argue that Socrates employs the ‘What is F-ness?’ question as a way of introducing two distinct types of investigation into F-ness (conceptual and causal). With this established, the relationship between Socrates’ principle and his method comes to light, and the tension is resolved. (shrink)

Toward the end of the Charmides, Socrates declares the search for temperance a ‘complete failure’ (175b2‐3). Despite this, commentators have suspected that the dialogue might contain an implicit answer about temperance. I propose a new interpretation: the dialogue implies that temperance is the knowledge of good and bad, when this knowledge is applied specifically to certain operations of the soul. This amounts to a kind of self‐knowledge; it also involves a kind of reflexivity, for it involves knowing about the value (...) of one's knowledge. This positive reading, more than any other, makes sense of the dialogue's dramatic and dialectic features. (shrink)

Intellectualism about human virtue is the thesis that virtue is knowledge. Virtue intellectualists may be eliminative or reductive. If eliminative, they will eliminate our conventional vocabulary of virtue words-'virtue', 'piety', 'courage', etc.-and speak only of knowledge or wisdom. If reductive, they will continue to use the conventional virtue words but understand each of them as denoting nothing but a kind of knowledge (as opposed to, say, a capacity of some other part of the soul than the intellect, such as the (...) will or the appetites). Virtue intellectualists may be pluralists or monists. If pluralist, they identify the virtues with distinct kinds of knowledge. If monist, they identify all the virtues with one and the same kind of knowledge. In a number of dialogues-including the Euthyphro, Apology, Charmides, Euthydemus, Laches, Lysis, Protagoras, and Republic I-Socrates gives arguments that support Reductive Monist Intellectualism (RMI) about human virtue. I disarm an influential objection to RMI as the correct interpretation of Socrates. (shrink)