Plato on True Belief and Knowledge

[kennethamy]

In one of the greatest of his dialogues, Meno, Plato poses the question, why do we (or should we) prefer knowledge to just true belief? He poses that question in the following way:

Soc. ... If a man knew the way to Larisa, or anywhere else, and went to the place and led others thither, would he not be a right and good guide?

Men. Certainly.

Soc. And a person who had a right opinion about the way, but had never been and did not know, might be a good guide also, might he not?

Men. Certainly.

Soc. And while he has true opinion about that which the other knows, he will be just as good a guide if he thinks the truth, as he who knows the truth?

Men. Exactly.

Soc. Then true opinion is as good a guide to correct action as knowledge; and that was the point which we omitted in our speculation about the nature of virtue, when we said that knowledge only is the guide of right action; whereas there is also right opinion.

Men. True.

Soc. Then right opinion is not less useful than knowledge?

Men. The difference, Socrates, is only that he who has knowledge will always be right; but he who has right opinion will sometimes be right, and sometimes not.

Soc. What do you mean? Can he be wrong who has right opinion, so long as he has right opinion?

Men. I admit the cogency of your argument, and therefore, Socrates, I wonder that knowledge should be preferred to right opinion-or why they should ever differ.

Socrates seems to be right. True belief seems to be exactly as useful as knowledge. Yet, we all seem to prefer knowledge to true belief. Why would that be so?


(Socrates presents his own answer in (as usual) the form of a kind of analogy. But we can get to that later).

[prothero]

How would you "know" if it was "true belief" or not?

[kennethamy]

Originally Posted by prothero

How would you "know" if it was "true belief" or not?

I don't see why that would matter, although I suppose that you can find that out. After all, if the guide did lead you to Larissa, then you would know he had a true belief (barring he led you to Larisa by accident). But the question is whether, and why it would be preferable for the guide to know the way to Larisa than only to have a true belief about what is the way to Larisa.

[Theaetetus]

Well, if you look deeper in the Meno (other dialogues as well)--and consult a better translation--it becomes obvious that there are four categories to which Plato refers--some more so than others. These are, in descending order of concreteness, wisdom/understanding, stable right opinion, mere right opinion, and chance right opinion. Stable right opinion is a kind of knowledge, but it is not as good as the knowledge held by the wise because it still can be prove to error.

Really, all you are digging at is an issue in translating ancient Greek to English. Knowledge is a blanket term in English, but not in Greek. Thus, to us, some meaning of the types of getting it right alluded to in the Meno do not come across very clear.

[ACB]

Originally Posted by kennethamy

Men. The difference, Socrates, is only that he who has knowledge will always be right; but he who has right opinion will sometimes be right, and sometimes not.

Soc. What do you mean? Can he be wrong who has right opinion, so long as he has right opinion?

What Meno obviously meant was that he who has right opinion on a given occasion will sometimes be right on future occasons and sometimes not. He was clearly not claiming that someone can be right and wrong at the same time!

Socrates's response looks like a cheap debating point. He must have known what Meno really meant.

[kennethamy]

Originally Posted by Theaetetus

Well, if you look deeper in the Meno (other dialogues as well)--and consult a better translation--it becomes obvious that there are four categories to which Plato refers--some more so than others. These are, in descending order of concreteness, wisdom/understanding, stable right opinion, mere right opinion, and chance right opinion. Stable right opinion is a kind of knowledge, but it is not as good as the knowledge held by the wise because it still can be prove to error.

Really, all you are digging at is an issue in translating ancient Greek to English. Knowledge is a blanket term in English, but not in Greek. Thus, to us, some meaning of the types of getting it right alluded to in the Meno do not come across very clear.

That may well be so, but I was addressing the question Socrates poses to Meno, which is why we should prefer knowledge to true belief when it appears that true belief is just as useful as is knowledge. The guide could not have done better had he known where Larisa is than he did if he had just believed correctly where Larisa is. As Socrates points out, true opinion cannot be proved to be in error, for if it could be proved to be in error, it would not be true opinion in the first place. We cannot prove what is true to be false, can we?

(I know that the Jowett translation is disparaged, but the purpose I am using it, it doesn't make any difference).

[Theaetetus]

Well, what is correct is correct. The problem with right opinion is that it can be stumbled upon by chance. Having right opinion on accident is not reliable and thus, knowledge is preferred in general. That is really the only place they can differ, but I would much prefer that someone has knowledge rather than be merely lucky to have stumbled across right opinion.

[kennethamy]

Originally Posted by ACB

What Meno obviously meant was that he who has right opinion on a given occasion will sometimes be right on future occasons and sometimes not. He was clearly not claiming that someone can be right and wrong at the same time!

Socrates's response looks like a cheap debating point. He must have known what Meno really meant.

It seems to me that what Meno said was what he meant. He said that someone who has a true belief ("right opinion") may sometimes be wrong. But, as Socrates points out, that certainly is not true. It is true, of course, that a person who has only a belief may be wrong. But, as Socrates points out, a person who has a true belief is not wrong.

(There is, however, an interesting and important modal ambiguity here, however, as between whether a true belief cannot be wrong, and whether a true belief is not wrong).

---------- Post added 11-16-2009 at 05:58 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Theaetetus

Well, what is correct is correct. The problem with right opinion is that it can be stumbled upon by chance. Having right opinion on accident is not reliable and thus, knowledge is preferred in general. That is really the only place they can differ, but I would much prefer that someone has knowledge rather than be merely lucky to have stumbled across right opinion.

I wonder why you say that when it is still true that if the guide correctly believes where Larisa is, he will guide you to Larisa as well as if he knew where Larisa is. Why should you care as long as you get to Larisa just as efficiently?

By the way, true opinion need not be just a lucky guess as you seem to be assuming. You can have a true opinion, and have good reasons for it, except that those reasons are not enough for knowledge.

[ACB]

Originally Posted by kennethamy

It seems to me that what Meno said was what he meant. He said that someone who has a true belief ("right opinion") may sometimes be wrong. But, as Socrates points out, that certainly is not true.

But it is true that a person who has a [one] true belief may sometimes be wrong. It's only untrue that he may be wrong about the thing that he truly believes. But that's obvious, isn't it?

Originally Posted by kennethamy

(There is, however, an interesting and important modal ambiguity here, however, as between whether a true belief cannot be wrong, and whether a true belief is not wrong).

"Cannot be wrong" is itself ambiguous. In one sense, a true belief cannot be wrong, because a wrong true belief is a contradiction, and a contradiction is necessarily false. In another sense, of course, a true belief can be wrong - or rather, could have been wrong - because the thing believed is a contingent truth.

---------- Post added 11-17-2009 at 12:08 AM ----------

Originally Posted by kennethamy

I wonder why you say that when it is still true that if the guide correctly believes where Larisa is, he will guide you to Larisa as well as if he knew where Larisa is. Why should you care as long as you get to Larisa just as efficiently?

As Theaetetus says, it is a question of reliability. It is useful, for future occasions, to know whether the guide is knowledgeable or whether he was just lucky.

Originally Posted by kennethamy

By the way, true opinion need not be just a lucky guess as you seem to be assuming. You can have a true opinion, and have good reasons for it, except that those reasons are not enough for knowledge.

But it could be just a lucky guess...

[kennethamy]

Originally Posted by ACB

But it is true that a person who has a [one] true belief may sometimes be wrong. It's only untrue that he may be wrong about the thing that he truly believes. But that's obvious, isn't it?



"Cannot be wrong" is itself ambiguous. In one sense, a true belief cannot be wrong, because a wrong true belief is a contradiction, and a contradiction is necessarily false. In another sense, of course, a true belief can be wrong - or rather, could have been wrong - because the thing believed is a contingent truth.

---------- Post added 11-17-2009 at 12:08 AM ----------



As Theaetetus says, it is a question of reliability. It is useful, for future occasions, to know whether the guide is knowledgeable or whether he was just lucky.



But it could be just a lucky guess...

Of course one can be wrong about other beliefs, and could be wrong even about a true belief, but he isn't wrong about any true proposition he believes is true. Any true belief (except for a necessarily true belief) could be wrong, but no true belief is wrong.

The future is not at issue. What is at issue is whether the guide who knows the way to Larisa is a better guide at this time than the guide who has a true belief about the way to Larisa.

Perhaps we should look at what Socrates says about this.