Explain Plato's Arguments For Recollection In The Meno

Discuss Plato's arguments for recollection in the Meno; what puzzle is recollection supposed to solve? Deliberating on knowledge according to Plato’s Phaedo and Meno, respectively, the term “knowledge” lacks the one definition that encompasses in totality what knowledge is and what it entails. Philosophers have, for a long time, been at task to find the one definition that would cover knowledge completely, but that definition is still elusive. Socrates also contradicted himself when it came to the issue of defining knowledge. In his dialogues with Meno and Phaedo respectively, Socrates tries to explain to each the meaning of knowledge and how knowledge is acquired. However, the explanations in these two dialogues seem to contradict to some
Plato, in Phaedo writes that the fact that a person can hear or see something and recognize it, and even think of something alike, is all based on anamnesis (74c). In Phaedo, Plato gives an example of knowledge through recognition by stating that a person may see a lyre that reminds them of their lover (73c-e). In this context, the person’s recognition of a lyre is independent of them being reminded about their lover. However, there is a difference between seeing just any lyre and being reminded of one’s lover, and seeing a lyre belonging to one’s lover and being reminded of them. The alter explanation deals with a truth about the lover’s lyre, while the former introduces a new concept, with an opinion about any lyre.
In Phaedo, Plato also explains what recollection is all about suing the example of the equal itself (74c-d). Here, the argument is that one person may see two stones or sticks as equal, while another sees them as unequal. The equality of these objects may vary according to one’s opinion, but the equal itself is always equal, with no variations of equality. Fundamentally, this is to say that the two people both have prior truthful knowledge of what the equal itself is; what may differ, however, are their opinions concerning the equality of the
However, a person can see something and instead of being reminded of another, they can create their own idea of something else that could be dissimilar from what they saw. This creation of an idea by a person is a new concept that does not necessarily come from a pre-existing truth. This argument, therefore, puts into doubt the idea that the pre-condition to being reminded is to have cognition of something. This is a case of having knowledge through recollection of things that are alike and similar, which is a form of associative knowledge. In Phaedo, therefore, a person’s opinion is classified as a form of knowledge; although such an opinion could be unstable, as opposed to the truth which is always stable.
In Meno, Plato writes that people answer questions correctly because they can recollect a truth about the subject in question. According to Plato in Meno, however, while there is no truth to recollect, the person cannot answer the question correctly, yet they might just give an opinion (73a). The case in point refers to the slave boy who in Meno answers a question about the theorem of a square yet he is completely ignorant of geometry (82a–f). The boy only gets assistance from Socrates who tells him the properties of a square, and then from there the boy makes an