Advanced search
Start date
Betweenand


The unity of the virtues in the Socratic dialogues: a question of method

Full text
Author(s):
Jose Wilson da Silva
Total Authors: 1
Document type: Master's Dissertation
Press: São Paulo.
Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH/SBD)
Defense date:
Examining board members:
Marco Antonio de Avila Zingano; Lucas Angioni; Roberto Bolzani Filho
Advisor: Marco Antonio de Avila Zingano
Abstract

Among the Socrates\' theses found in the first Dialogues of Plato, there is one, about the unity of the virtues, which will concern us in our present research. More specifically, we will be interested in examining two ways of explaining the unity of virtues: the bicondicionality thesis and the identity thesis. We have found shortcomings in both theses. To avoid these shortcomings we propose as an interpretative hypothesis: the unity of the virtues thesis, in the Socratic Dialogues, is explained by the dialectical Platonic method. However, this affirmation has to deal with an alleged incompatibility between the Socratic elenctic method and the properly dialectical method, as it is developed in later Dialogues. So, we present two solutions to have a satisfactory final result for this research: 1) the two classic ways of explaining the unity of the virtues are part of a distinct thesis, the one based on dialectic, for dialectic implies the identity of virtues, which implies their inseparability and the difference of their parts; and 2) the elenctic method, a negative thesis, points to a positive one, that is, to the dialectical method. (AU)