Plato on Knowledge
CLASPHIL 2007
Subject & Catalog Number
Course Information
Description
In this graduate seminar, we will carefully read and study Plato’s dialogue on knowledge (epistême), the Theaetetus. Plato's Theaetetus is a foundational text of epistemology, and it had enormous influence on the development of Stoicism, ancient skepticism and Platonism, as well as on 20th-century philosophers like Gettier, Sellars and Wittgenstein. Is truth relative? Is knowledge sense-perception or empirical? Is it true belief or true belief together with an account justifying what is believed? Approaching the dialogue on its own terms, we will consider these and other questions with the help of contemporary and ancient scholarship.
Recommended Prep
Students enrolled in this course as CLASPHIL 2007 should have advanced reading knowledge of ancient Greek (i.e., have taken at least one 100-level course in Greek or equivalent). For students enrolled in this course as PHIL 207th, reading knowledge of ancient Greek is not required. This is a graduate seminar. For undergraduates, some coursework in ancient philosophy or epistemology is recommended.
Available for Harvard Cross Registration
