History of Philosophy Meno's Paradox

1. A Puzzle about Definitions Socrates has told us he knows how to reject faulty definitions. But how does he know when he has succeeded in finding the right definition? Meno raises an objection to the entire definitional search in the form of (what has been called) "Meno's Paradox," or "The Paradox of Inquiry" (Meno 80d-e). 2. An Objection to Inquiry 1. The argument reformulated: 1. If you know what you're looking for, inquiry is unnecessary. 2. If you don't …showed first 75 words of 1108 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1108 total…e argument from imperfection, which purports to show that the imperfection of the physical world proves that we must have a priori concepts that cannot be derived from experience. Rather, the very possibility of our having experience at all requires that we already have these concepts. So even if "recollection" is only inference misdescribed, there is still room for Plato to argue that inference requires the use of concepts that cannot themselves be acquired empirically.