Thread 24662296

>Socrates: Do you call something "the end?" I mean such a thing as a limit or boundary?
>Meno: I do, and I think I understand what you mean.
>Socrates: Further, you call something a plane, and something else a solid, as in geometry?
>Meno: I do.
>Socrates: From this you may understand what I mean by shape, for I say this over every shape, that a shape is that which limits a solid; in a word, a shape is the limit of a solid.
>Meno: I think I understand now Socrates. Let me ask you a few questions to see if I really do.
>Socrates: Please go on Meno, as I am eager to learn from someone so wise as yourself.
>Meno: Very well. Does something act in accordance with itself, or something else?
>Socrates: With itself, of course.
>Meno: Meaning a stone will always act as a stone, or a fish will always exemplify that which is becoming of a fish, to say fishiness?
>Socrates: This is clearly the case.
>Meno: And will a stone ever exemplify fishiness, or a fish take on characteristics of a stone?
>Socrates: Hardly, by Zeus.
>Meno: What about the gods? Will they always act in accordance with their nature?
>Socrates: Based on what we have said it must be so.
>Meno: But each god takes on some different role, and so they are many and varied and different from one another in so far as they are gods, Athena will act according to her nature, and Apollo according to his and so on, but the way in which they are all the same and do not differ from each other is in godliness?
>Socrates: Yes that's quite right.
>Meno: And this godliness is simply what is fitting and just for the gods to represent.
>Socrates: Of course.
>Meno: Now the gods, being immortal, do they change?
>Socrates: Why if they could they would no longer be immortal.
>Meno: But humans being mortal do change?
>Socrates: By necessity they must.
>Meno: So the gods must always remain exemplifying godliness considering that they do not change, whereas humans who change do not always represent that which is fitting and right for humans, that being virtue?
>Socrates: I see what you mean.
>Meno: And humans strive for virtue, whereas the gods, already having godliness do not need to strive for it.
>Socrates: Yes.
>Meno: Then by this we can see that virtue is that which limits godliness, being defined as the limit of godliness.

How would Socrates respond to this? Other than explain geometry to a slave boy

>>24662296 (OP)
I accuse Socrates of violating and desecrating the herms.

>>24662307
I accuse myself of (consensually) violating and (tenderly) desecrating your mother.

>>24662356
You can't rape the willing.

>>24662296 (OP)
>>Meno: So the gods must always remain exemplifying godliness considering that they do not change, whereas humans who change do not always represent that which is fitting and right for humans, that being virtue?
>>Socrates: I see what you mean.
>>Meno: And humans strive for virtue, whereas the gods, already having godliness do not need to strive for it.
>>Socrates: Yes.
>>Meno: Then by this we can see that virtue is that which limits godliness, being defined as the limit of godliness.
Interesting, but I think this is unclear. With the shape-solid example (original to the Meno), the appeal is to our experience that in encountering a solid, it's encountered with a determinate shapeliness that accompanies the solid. With virtue-godliness, it's just been asserted in the above that virtue is what is fitting and right for humans, godliness is what's fitting and right for gods. But then how does human striving for virtue, in contrast to the gods always having godliness, result in virtue being a limit of godliness?

>>24662372
>But then how does human striving for virtue, in contrast to the gods always having godliness, result in virtue being a limit of godliness?
As I was reading his definition of shape being defined in relation to something outside it, a plane that is infinite, it made me realize they were just going around in circles trying to define virtue by what it's made up of, courage, justice, temperance, etc. It's definitely doesn't follow perfectly, but I think a definition of virtue Socrates would be content with has to be based on what's above it

>>24662307
>violating and desecrating
He was just trying to fit in...
I mean fit it in

>>24662296 (OP)
Why does Socrates say if the gods could change they would no longer be immortal? I need this information for my next argument with my wife.

>>24664259
Anything immortal exists outside of time and therefore cannot be impacted by time

>>24664834
Holy hell absolutely obliterated

>>24664811
Their minds can be impacted by events in time.They can learn new information and be deceived. Conceivably, they can forget things as a result of time. In fact, their minds seem identical to human minds. And since they are eternal, their minds are certainly eternal, since to be a sentient being requires having have a mind. So how can this immortal mind be subject to the influence of time if immortal things cannot be impacted by time?

>>24665349
>Their minds can be impacted by events in time
No they can't. Can an immortal being learn?

>>24662981
Hm, I took it that the definition of shape was guided by looking for what it seems to always accompany. There's an alternative answer to shape right before the excerpt that the hypothetical conversation in OP builds on,

>See then whether you can accept it to be the following: for us, indeed, let this be shape: it is that which alone, of all the things that are, which always happens to accompany color.

So both examples of the offered definitions of shape seem to define in with respect to what shape is "near to" in experience. Now, virtue and godliness might have the relation spelled out in OP, but it seems to me less clear, so maybe that just needs more spelling out.

To throw an idea out, if we take the gods to all share the nature "godliness", and IF that nature involves what we take to be virtues (i.e., being wise, being just, being moderate, etc.), then maybe one could work something out from that. Though I could also see an objection that goes, "but the gods are not all equal in being wise, Zeus is wiser than Ares, and Athena wiser than Hera, and Ares is more courageous than Aphrodite, and etc.", which would seem to make what it is to be a god to be different from what it is to be virtuous. Though perhaps then one could reject that view of the gods in favor of something from natural theology, and see a connection that way. But I'm unsure. What would do you think?

>>24666409
>"but the gods are not all equal in being wise, Zeus is wiser than Ares, and Athena wiser than Hera, and Ares is more courageous than Aphrodite, and etc."
I think that is covered by
>>Meno: But each god takes on some different role, and so they are many and varied and different from one another in so far as they are gods, Athena will act according to her nature, and Apollo according to his and so on, but the way in which they are all the same and do not differ from each other is in godliness?
>Socrates: Yes that's quite right.
>Meno: And this godliness is simply what is fitting and just for the gods to represent.

>>24666375
>They can learn new information and be deceived. Conceivably, they can forget things as a result of time. In fact, their minds seem identical to human minds.
did you read my post? Have you read greek mythology?

>>24667038
Ah, okay, I didn't take those differences in nature to necessarily mean with respect to virtue. So, for further clarification, how do you take "virtue is that which limits godliness"? Would you mean something like, "the gods all have godliness, making them gods, and virtue is what gives them their peculiar natures as the kind of gods they are"?

>>24665349
Book 2 of Republic talks about how if the gods are good then they can't change

>>24668171
It's a counterexample to the claim that eternal things are never subject to change

The immortal greek gods have human-like minds, as evidenced by their behavior and dialogue in all the myths, and human minds change all the time. But how can an eternal mind (which must accompany an immortal sentient being) be subject to change if nothing eternal can change? It's inconsistent.

Platonic ideals don't exist in the real world.