Recollection In Meno

Charles Miller
Philosophy Introduction to Knowledge
Prof. Polger
23 February 2015
Paper #1 In Meno, Plato believed that learning is recollection, as previously voiced by Socrates. Plato also believed that this argument was valid argument that because perception can deceive us, it can be wrong, so our knowledge must come from recollection. Setting this up as a deductive argument is simple. Stated by the IEP (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy) “A deductive argument is an argument that is intended by the arguer to be (deductively) valid, that is, to provide a guarantee of the truth of the conclusion provided that the argument 's premises (assumptions) are true.” So according to Plato’s believes that knowledge is recollection we can set up
He uses the example of the cave and how ones reality is shaped by perception but their knowledge is based on recollection. In the cave allegory the man is tied up and only sees puppets of real things but the things he is seeing are not the real things. They are just forms of the objects that are someplace else, Plato calls this “the realm of the forms” and he also says, “We do not learn, and that what we call learning is only a process of recollection.” (Plato). This implies that we don’t in fact learn anything true at all because the forms are somewhere else. But what we can do is recall information taught to us and because perception can lead us to false truths we get to this information by remembering rather than looking at it. Going back to the cave allegory Plato gives the example if the man escaped the cave his reality would be crushed because he could only recall on the images he saw in the cave of these real things. It just wouldn’t be right to him even though outside the cave is where the real things are. Whether this is just a comment on society and telling us that we are stuck in the cave and not able to find true knowledge or it is just a reinforcement on his theory that knowledge is recollection this story has a lot of flaws in the story and his ideas of what knowledge
Like where is the Realm of the forms and how do I gain true knowledge if all I see is false things. If we know what we know then what we know is true. Each person doesn’t think the same so no one’s reality is the same which means that there is no one true reality. We are all different and have different minds and things we can perceive to be true. But if someone doesn’t believe your view then does that mean it is false. Absolutely not, it is true to you so each person’s truths and morals are different therefore the way we come to these truths are all unique. Plato didn’t believe this, he implied in the Meno that all of our truths are false and there is no way to get to absolute truth but through our own truths we can get a generalization of what things are. “One ever feels twoness, an American, a Negro, two souls, two thoughts” (W.E.B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk). Many other great minds back then have since disproven Plato but to give the man some credit, he was a brilliant mind that had a lot of tremendous ideas about the way we