Meno's Geometric Argument
October 1, 2013
Geometric Argument: Are Souls truly immortal and know all? In the Meno, Socrates tries to walk Meno through the discovery of if virtue can be taught. Along the way they come across the theory that if virtue can be taught then it is knowledge. If knowledge then it can be taught but the Geometric argument was brought up where a person can have the capacity to learn based on their previous life and their soul conjuring up prior knowledge to understand the topic. Socrates called upon a slave, a person who has no formal education and walked him through a geometry problem. This problem was meant to illustrate that a person’s knowledge is not based on what this person has learned in their lifetime but their capacity and ability to understand is based on what their soul has learned in previous lifetimes. Socrates uses this example show his thesis is true but what about different scenarios that aren’t math based and through different problems you can see that Socrates theory is half correct and that there are several implications that prove that souls don’t know it all. To fully understand the Geometric argument you must know that Socrates believes that souls are immortal and before they inhabit a human’s body they were exposed to everything. In order for a human to learn something, all that person has to do is experience it during their lifetime. This means that everyone has the capacity to learn, they just need to be taught. Socrates takes this example to explain to a slave how he can get a square with the area of eight with using squares with the area of four. Socrates walks the slave through the problem with just questions and diagrams to show the slave what the slave has concluded. The slave at first tries to double the sides of the square from two to four to get a square of area equal to eight. He walks into a problem and realizes himself that the area isn’t eight and actually concludes that the area of this square is 16. Socrates then questions
Geometric Argument: Are Souls truly immortal and know all? In the Meno, Socrates tries to walk Meno through the discovery of if virtue can be taught. Along the way they come across the theory that if virtue can be taught then it is knowledge. If knowledge then it can be taught but the Geometric argument was brought up where a person can have the capacity to learn based on their previous life and their soul conjuring up prior knowledge to understand the topic. Socrates called upon a slave, a person who has no formal education and walked him through a geometry problem. This problem was meant to illustrate that a person’s knowledge is not based on what this person has learned in their lifetime but their capacity and ability to understand is based on what their soul has learned in previous lifetimes. Socrates uses this example show his thesis is true but what about different scenarios that aren’t math based and through different problems you can see that Socrates theory is half correct and that there are several implications that prove that souls don’t know it all. To fully understand the Geometric argument you must know that Socrates believes that souls are immortal and before they inhabit a human’s body they were exposed to everything. In order for a human to learn something, all that person has to do is experience it during their lifetime. This means that everyone has the capacity to learn, they just need to be taught. Socrates takes this example to explain to a slave how he can get a square with the area of eight with using squares with the area of four. Socrates walks the slave through the problem with just questions and diagrams to show the slave what the slave has concluded. The slave at first tries to double the sides of the square from two to four to get a square of area equal to eight. He walks into a problem and realizes himself that the area isn’t eight and actually concludes that the area of this square is 16. Socrates then questions