Souls, Forms, and False Statements in the Sophist

Author(s): Edith Watson Schipper

Source: The Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. 15, No. 60 (Jul., 1965), pp. 240-242
Published by: Wiley for The Philosophical Quarterly
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240

DISCUSSIONS

SOULS, FORMS, AND FALSE STATEMENTS IN THE SOPHIST

In a provocative and ingeniously worked out article, Robert Turnbull

has presented his view of the Sophist's account of false statements.1 I
should like to bring out some passages which raise questions about his
position, and briefly suggest an alternative view to which I think they point.
The argument, as I understand it, rests upon Mr. Turnbull's interpreta-
tion of the Platonic ontology as consisting of " forms, souls, and immanent
characters ".2 Immanent characters or actions, " the stuff of Becoming ",
exist in the souls, and participate in the forms for which the souls strive.
A false statement about a soul ascribes to it a possible action participating
in a form which is not (is different from or contrary to) the form for which
the soul strives. For " the contrariety of forms is reflected in references to
actions ".3 Thus, a false statement rests on the difference of some forms from
others, though it is about the possible actions which illustrate the contrary
forms and are somehow in the souls.
This argument makes the fundamental and often neglected point that
the oavTroKyi EiSdvis for the sake of Xoyos about the changing things,
actions, and events of the world, here called " immanent characters ". Yet
several questions arise. The first is whether, as is claimed, souls even can
be "named " or referred to by logos. Now it is true that souls as agents
exist, from the Phaedo on. The Stranger says (Sophist 248e-249c) that
" motion, life, soul and mind " (pp6vriols,later vous) must exist, and are
necessary for knowledge. As here, souls are linked with nous; they are
knowers. As Plato reiterates (i.e. Timaeus 30b, 37c, Philebus 30c), souls
must always contain nous. Such reasoning and knowing souls are pre-
supposed by the forms, the objects of knowledge, which are known by them.
Yet these souls, not being themselves the forms they discern through dialectic
and logos, are not known in the same way as forms. Rather, souls, being
Buvv&Eis,are defined by what they effect and know. In the Republic (477c),
Plato had said that a power such as 'Trrioa-r1ior 866a is not discriminated
by " a colour or figure or any such mark" by which other things are dis-
tinguished. Knowing souls are not directly known; they are presupposed
by what is known in dialectic or logos.
In the examples of true and false logoi (Sophist, 262a-263d) the referent
of the logoi or what they are about would not seem to be the soul of Theae-
1"4The Argument of the Sophist ", The Philosophical Quarterly, vol. 14, Jan. 1964,
pp. 23-34.
20p. cit., p. 24.
80p. cit., p. 34.

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 SOULS, FORMS, AND FALSE STATEMENTS IN THE SOPHIST 241

tetus, which is neither sitting nor flying. Theaetetus, as what the statements
are about, is the apparent, perceived, and heard "answerer ", whom the
Stranger is questioning. It is true that his discriminating responses pre-
suppose a very intelligent soul. But, in the context, he figures as an appear-
ance to be described, an example of "an action or inaction or nature of
what is or is not ", or of any " existing thing in generation " which logos
is about (262c3).
It might be countered in defence of Mr. Turnbull's position that these
actions and existing things are "immanent characters " existing in souls,
which are the ultimate referents. Yet this defence would not seem to me
to do. For, since a soul for Plato always contains nous, not all of the gener-
ated things of experience could have souls, or even share in the rational
world-soul of the Timaeus. Moreover, Plato rejects a view that " all things
think " as "having no 76yov " (Parmenides 132c). Hence, he would not
consider that all the experienced things and actions of the world inhere
in souls.
A second question concerns Mr. Turnbull's claim, based on Phaedo 74-5,
that souls, though they do not participate in forms, "aspire to " them.4
Yet, in the Phaedo passage, Plato is explaining how, not souls, but sensed
things, illustrated by his favourite "sticks and stones ", "aim at " the
ideal standards not given in sensation of them. The apparently equal stick
"aims " (poAE-rTal) to be like something else (olov aA&oTi) of which it is
an approximation (74d-e). This "aiming at" is later replaced by the
language of " participating " in forms. And, as Mr. Turnbull says, souls do
not participate in forms.
Rather, the many things of experience, sensed, and in generation, are
what are related to forms by an enigmatic "participation ". They are
often (Parm. 129d, Theaet. 156e, Soph. 346a) illustrated by "sticks and
stones ". Their relation to the forms, a relation which Socrates confesses
not to understand (Phaedo lOOd),is a problem left unsolved in the earlier
dialogues. This problem of the relation of sensed things to forms is dealt
with most explicitly, though fragmentarily, in the Sophist's treatment of
true and false logos and how it can apply to sensed and changing things
and events.
The last question I should like to raise concerns the status of belief
(Plato's 866a) and its objects. Mr. Turnbull distinguishes belief, the thought
(Si&voia)which is an inner and silent logos, from knowledge. Belief not
only may be false, but is not ' apprehension of forms '; whereas knowledge
is of the forms and is infallible. Rather, belief, which may arise from per-
ception, is about actions or " immanent characters ", which may be directly
perceived.5 Hence, certain characters other than forms may be perceived
as the referents of logos and doxa. Nevertheless, false logos (or doxa), ascribes
to an actor a possible action which is different from the truly ascribable
action, though that possible action can be different only by virtue of par-
40p. cit., p. 24.
60p. cit., p. 25.

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242 EDITH WATSON SCHIPPER

ticipating in a form which is different from the one participated in by the

truly ascribable action. Thus, false logos can only ascribe to actions forms
contrary to other forms. As Mr. Turnbull says,6 " talk of possible actions
is simply talk of forms qua strivable for ". So false logos (and doxa) turns
out to be about forms, in spite of its definition as apprehension not of forms,
but of actions.
Now this definition of belief as what is apprehension not of forms but
of actions and things comports with Plato's earlier use of doxa, in the
Republic. For there (i.e., 478a-e, 533e), doxa is contrasted with dianoia and
epistemeas being about sensible things apart from forms. But, in the Sophist
(263e), doxa is redefined as an inner, silent logos; and is dianoia, which the
divided line analogy has said to be concerned with forms as illustrated by
things, and has contrasted with the earlierdoxa. Since the later doxa is a silent
logos, and since logos, all through the dialogues, has defined the forms, it,
too, should be about forms.7
That logos (and doxa) in the Sophist are about the forms is indicated in
its treatment of the interweaving of forms, leading up to the discussion of
false statement. Dialectic is said to be the science of connecting and differ-
entiating the forms aright (OpOeCs; 253b-d). The passage about the inter-
weaving of forms ends with saying that logos depends on or arises from
(li& .... y?yovEv) the interweaving of forms (259e). The discussion of not-
being and the interrelating of forms is said to be for the sake of explaining
false statements and beliefs.
The examples of the simplest kind of logos, true or false statements,
interconnect the forms rightly or wrongly in saying something about the
apparent, perceived Theaetetus. The long discussion about not-being and
the interconnecting of forms has shown that both what is and what is not
(other than) something else, (where elvai is used in the attributive or rela-
tional sense) exists (in the existential sense), and so can be spoken of.8 State-
ments would interconnect rightly or wrongly the forms applicable to Theae-
tetus. True ones state about him " what are as they are " (T&OVTa C&s ETriv);
and false ones " what are as other than they are " (OVTCOV 8E yE 6v-Tca?rEpa;
263b). The example of false statements connects flying, a form different
from what can be connected with other forms applicable to the experienced
situation, such as those of a young man named Theaetetus,a brilliant student,
one who is seated, and one who is respondingto the questionsabout thoseforms.
True statements interconnect the forms to characterize and interrelate the
apparent Theaetetus as a member of the discussion. Only in this way,
through interrelating the relevant forms, can logos state things about the
experienced world.
EDITH WATSON SCHIPPER
University of Miami.
O0p.cit., p. 34.
7That logos is about the forms is alike affirmed in the differing views of R. C. Cross,
"Logos and the Forms in Plato ", Mind, vol. 63, 1954; and R. S. Bluck, "Logos and the
Forms in Plato ", Mind, vol. 65, 1956.
81 try to justify this in " The Meaning of Existence in Plato's Sophist ", Phronesis,
Vol. IX, No. 1 (1964).

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