The Unique World of the Timaeus

Richard D. Parry

Journal of the History of Philosophy, Volume 17, Number 1, January1979, pp. 1-10 (Article)

Published by Johns Hopkins University PressDOI: 10.1353/hph.2008.0257

For additional information about this article

Access provided by Universidad Complutense de Madrid (2 Sep 2015 13:21 GMT)

http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/hph/summary/v017/17.1parry.html

The Unique World of the Timaeus

RICHARD D. PARRY

AT 30cl TO 31b3 o r TI~E Timaeus, Timaeus in t roduces the Mode l F o r m that the Demi- urge will use in mak ing the wor ld and argues that the M o d e l and the wor ld copied af- ter it will be un ique . ' There has been mi sunde r s t and ing o f this passage f rom many sides. In this pape r I will begin by reviewing one o f the recent in te rp re ta t ions , made by David Keyt , and then by giving the in te rp re ta t ion I believe to be the correct one. A number o f consequences o f this in te rpre ta t ion will then be d r a w n tha t effect F. M. Corn fo rd ' s c o m m e n t a r y on this poin t and H. Chern i s s ' s read ing o f this a rgumen t .

I . In an ar t ic le ent i t led " T h e M a d Cra f t sman of the Timaeus" David Keyt says that the a r g u m e n t at 31a2-5 commi t s the c r a f t sman ' s vers ion o f the fal lacy of divi- sion." When someone is mak ing , for example , a table f rom di rec t ions , if he made the table out o f pape r because the d i rec t ions are on pape r , he would be commi t t ing this fal lacy. Just so, while the a im of P l a t o ' s a rgumen t is to show tha t our wor ld is unique, accord ing to Keyt , P l a to tries to prove this c la im by appea l ing to the unique- ness o f the F o r m on which the Demiurge fashions ou r world . But uniqueness is a p rope r ty tha t belongs to the Fo rm because it is a F o r m , no t because it is a p a r a d i g m . The fallacy here is in a t t r ibu t ing to the copy a p r o p e r t y tha t be longs to the F o r m qua F o r m ; such a p r o p e r t y is cal led by Keyt a formal p roper ty .3 He i l lus t ra tes the fal lacy:

Plato's argument is this: the cosmos was made according to its model; its model is unique; therefore, the cosmos is unique. If Plato accepts this argument, he should also be prepared to accept the following one, which within his system has true premises and a false conclusion: the planet Mercury was made according to its model (the Form of heavenly god); its model is unique; therefore, Mercury is the only heavenly god (that is, the only celestial body). '

Before we can assess Key t ' s cr i t icism we must ana lyze the a rgumen t whereby P la to arr ives at the uniqueness o f the Model F o r m . This is re levant for it will a l low us to see the kind o f uniqueness the Model Fo rm has. W h e n we come to see the kind o f uniqueness this F o r m has, we will see that it is not , as Keyt charged , a formal p roper - ty of the F o r m at all . In fact, we shall see that the uniqueness o f the Fo rm is not a

1 would like to express my gratitude to Professor David T. Furley, who discussed this paper with me and made a number of helpful suggestions.

' Internal references to the Timaeus and the Gorgias in this paper are taken from volumes 3 and 4 of Platonis Opera, J. Burnet, ed. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1902).

2 Philosophical Review 80 (1971) : 230-35. ' Ibid., p. 230. ' Ibid., pp. 232-33. A similar point is made by I. M. Crombie in An Examination of Plato's Philo-

sophical Doctrines, 2 vols. (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1963), 2:200. Keyt goes on to argue that Plato is guilty of the same kind of fallacy in two other places in the Timaeus; in this paper I shall concen- trate on this argument at 31a2.

[l]

2 H I S T O R Y O F P H I L O S O P H Y

formal but a ma te r i a l p rope r ty ; that is, it is a p r o p e r t y the F o r m has, not because it is a F o r m , but because o f the k ind of Fo rm it is. A n y o n e reading Key t ' s ar t ic le would fail to see this i m p o r t a n t fea ture o f the a rgumen t for the uniqueness o f the F o r m because the ar t ic le does not include this po r t i on o f the overal l a r g u m e n t for the uniqueness o f o u r wor ld .

!1. In fact , the bu lk of the a rgument at 31a-b is devoted to the F o r m called (in the C o r n f o r d t r a n s l a t i o n used in this paper ) the Living Crea tu re . The aim of the a r g u m e n t is to p r o v e tha t this F o r m has a un ique p r o p e r t y in v i r tue o f the k ind of F o r m it i s . ' Once P l a t o has es tabl ished the un ique p r o p e r t y o f the F o r m he will be ab le to a rgue tha t wha tever is fashioned after this F o r m will have the percept ib le equiva len t o f this p rope r ty . This , in turn , will mean tha t whatever is fashioned on this F o r m will be un ique in the percept ib le wor ld .

Acco rd ing ly , in the fol lowing I will out l ine the whole a rgumen t for the uniqueness o f our wor ld . The a rgumen t will be a t t acked in two par t s . The first will dea l with the uniqueness o f the F o r m ; the second with the app l i ca t i on o f this p rev ious a rgument to the issue o f the uniqueness o f our world .

The po in t o f the a rgumen t f rom 31a4-8 is to es tabl ish the uniqueness o f the F o r m Living Crea tu re . In the Corn fo rd t r ans la t ion , 31a4-8 reads:

For that which embraces all the intelligible living creatures that there are, cannot be one of a pair; for then there would have to be yet another Living Creature embracing those two, and they would be parts of it; and thus our world would be more truly described as a likeness, not of them, but of that other which would embrace them. s

P l a t o ' s s t r a t e g y h e r e is to show that the F o r m is un ique not just because it is a F o r m but because o f the k ind o f F o r m it is. That is, it is unique because o f some p rope r ty it has as the k ind o f F o r m it is ra ther than because o f a p rope r ty it has because it is a F o r m .

By type it is a reductio a rgumen t . Ac tua l ly , the reductio does not lead to an ab- surd i ty so much as to a conclus ion that is o d d enough tha t P l a to obv ious ly th inks it wou ld de ter his l is teners . We shall see what this o d d i t y is la ter . W h a t e v e r the sort o f reductio, the conc lus ion to be der ived in the last s tep is: the F o r m tha t embraces all the intel l igible l iving crea tures tha t there are canno t be one of a pa i r . So we can begin the ou t l ine by a suming the oppos i t e of this conc lus ion :

(1) The F o r m tha t embraces all the intel l igible l iving crea tures tha t there are is one o f a pa i r .

' The main point of this argument is correctly given by Archer-Hind, in one succinct sentence (The Timaeus of Plato [New York: Arno Press, 1973], p. 94, n. 10). However, he does not analyze the argu- ment. Perhaps it is for this reason that he does not see the full thrust of the argument (and its main point) and is therefore open to the criticism Keyt levels at him. Keyt takes the Model Form to be a genus and points out that Archer-Hind's interpretation conflicts with such a position (p. 233). Since Archer-Hind does seem to take the Model Form to be a genus (p. 94, n. 2), he is made, in effect, to call into question his own reading. However, my analysis of the argument shows that the Model Form is not a genus.

6 F. M. Cornford, Plato's Cosmology (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1975), pp. 41-42. I can note the dif- ficulties of translating Z6on as Jiving creature; but since it is Cornford's choice I shall use it throughout this paper.

PLATO'S T I M A E U S 3

(2) Then there would have to be another Living Creature embracing those two, and they would be parts of it.

(3) Thus our world would be more truly described as a likeness, not of them, but of that other that would embrace them.

There are, obviously, suppressed premises between steps (1) and (2). l shall first give the premises and then argue that these premises are the ones Plato meant. The two premises needed are:

(la) Each of the pair of Forms which embrace all intelligible living creatures is itself an intelligible living creature.

(lb) There is a Form which embraces, in a system, all the intelligible living creatures there are.

With these assumptions we can move from step (1) to step (2) in the following way. The original pair fails to embrace all intelligible living creatures because they fail to embrace one another. They are distinct systems: that is what their being a pair means. And they are each intelligible living creatures; so if there is a Form that em- braces all intelligible living creatures, there will have to be a third Form, embracing this pair into a system. Since the embracing Form is a Living Creature, this third Form will itself be a Living Creature.

The incipient infinite regress threatened by this argument already shows the futili- ty of multiplying the Form that embraces all intelligible living creatures. But Plato does not stop here; he draws the further consequence for the role of these Forms as Models for our world, that is, step (3).

Let us turn to step (3), then. Step (3) follows from (I), (la), (lb), and (2) if we add another assumption between (2) and (3). We must assume:

(2a) The exemplar for our world will be the most complete Living Creature.

Then we can conclude that our world will be a copy of the third Living Creature rather than one of the original pair because the third Living Creature contains all the intelligible living creatures that there are. The other two fail to contain each other, thereby being incomplete.

Now we can offer justification for the added premises. This justification will all be taken from the immediate context of the argument and therefore makes no appeal to claims about the relation of the Timaeus to other dialogues. We can start with (la), which says that each of the pair of Forms that embrace all intelligible living creatures is itself an intelligible living creature. The chief reason for making (la) a premise is that the notion of the pair of intelligible living creatures is arrived at by doubling the notion of the Form that embraces all intelligible living creatures (31a4). This Form, in turn, is itself called an intelligible living creature three times by Plato (30c3, 31a6, 31bl). By doubling this Form, then, we get a pair of intelligible living creatures.

It is necessary to insist that these two Forms be intelligible living creatures and not just systems of intelligible living creatures. If they were just systems of living crea- tures that were not themselves living creatures, there would be no need for the third

4 HISTORY OF P H I L O S O P H Y

Form to embrace them. First of all, two systems of intelligible living creatures need not contain different living creatures; they could each contain all the intelligible liv- ing creatures and be distinct from one another. In somewhat the same way, two dis- tinct political entities can contain the same people but have different functions. If the two Forms both contained all the intelligible living creatures but were not themselves intelligible living creatures, there would be no need for a third Form to embrace all the intelligible living creatures. If anything, the intelligible living creatures would be overcontained. Further, even if we suppose the two Forms to contain somewhat different members , while still not being themselves intelligible living creatures, the third Form would be needed, not to contain the two Fo rms- - a s Plato says it i s - b u t only to comprehend their members. The third Form embraces all intelligible living creatures, not all systems of intelligible living creatures.

Premise (lb) says that there is a Form that embraces, in a system, all the intelligi- ble living creatures that there are. Strictly speaking, this is not a suppressed premise but an import from the earlier part of the passage: "Le t us rather say that the world is like, above all things, to that Living Creature of which all other living creatures, severally and in their families, are parts. ' '7 Plato has asserted that there is such a thing; now he is trying to prove something about it.

Finally, (2a) says that the exemplar of our world will be the most complete Living Creature. This means that it will contain all, and not just a part of, intelligible living creatures. Again, this premise is imported from the earlier part of this passage where Plato is talking about the Model for our world. At 30c5, Cornford 's translation reads, " W e must not suppose that it was any creature that ranks only as a species; for no copy of that which is incomplete can ever be good. ' 'a We will have grounds for taking exception to the translation of en merous eidei as species; but the present point will remain the same. Here Plato is recalling his earlier claim about this world, that is, that "this world is the best of things that have become. ' '9 And in this pre- vious passage (29a-b), Plato has argued that if this world is the best of the things that have become, it must be copied after an eternal Form (29a2-5). In the present passage, he is claiming that if the world is to be good, the Model must also be the most complete. The completeness means that it will not contain just a part of the in- telligible living creatures that there are.

Now, if we have been successful so far in completing Pla to ' s argument, we can ask the question as to why the conclusion, step (3), is so unacceptable that everyone is expected to prefer the opposite of the first premise, viz., that the Form that embraces all intelligible living creatures is not one of a pair, that is, is unique. The conclusion simply says that the nonunique Form embracing all intelligible living creatures would lose its status as an exemplar for our world. That consequence is not absurd, of course. But that Plato makes it the last step of an obvious reductio argument shows that the only reason for supposing there to be such a Form is that it is to be used as a Model. That it is to be so used isneither a formal nor a material property of the Form; but it is a feature of the reason for which Plato is entertaining its existence. He is saying, then, that any Form embracing all intelligible living creatures that was

' Ibid., p. 40; 30c5-7. ' Ibid., p. 40. ' Ibid., p. 23; 29a5.

P L A T O ' S TIMAEUS 5

not unique, and therefore not complete, would lose interest for us as a Model, and we would need to look for another one.

This role of the Form, which embraces all intelligible living creatures, as Model can be seen from another point of view. If the premises attributed to Plato in this paper are correctly attributed, then it will be seen that Plato could have gotten to the conclusion of his reductio argument without going through step (2) and step (3). It is enough to suppose (1), (la), and (lb) because they imply the contradiction that there are two distinct Forms, themselves living creatures, that contain all intelligible living creatures. This is a contradiction because, failing to contain one another, the Forms, which are supposed to contain all intelligible living creatures, cannot contain all in- telligible living creatures. That Plato did not stop here but went through steps (2) and (3) shows that he is interested in this Form that embraces all living creatures not just as a peculiar kind of Form but as a Model for our world. And the important property it has as a Model is its completeness.

A reductio argument that stopped at the contradictory result just outlined would not make this point; it would not be complete enough for Plato 's purposes. After all, a contradictory result leaves a fork: either the Form that embraces all intelligible liv- ing creatures is not one of a pair or the pair does not embrace all intelligible living creatures. Plato can be seen as following the second prong, that is, the harder case for his position. His motivation for doing this is to illustrate how the Model for our world must be complete. For given that there is a Form that embraces all intelligible living creatures, it will embrace these two (incomplete) intelligible living creatures. This third Form, then, becomes the exemplar for our world because of that property most important for our world, completeness. A secondary motivation here could be his precluding anyone 's taking the second prong, thinking thereby to have escaped altogether from the notion of an all-embracing Form. Plato is able to remind us that this alternative is not open.

111. Having arrived at the conclusion that the Living Creature is unique, we can see that the Living Creature has a unique property that belongs to it in virtue of the kind of Form it is. The property is the one of embracing all intelligible living crea- tures. This is a property that only one Form can have. Any Form that has this property cannot be one of a pair.

After establishing this conclusion, Plato turns in the next sentence to what effect this has on our world. Here we are to assume that our world is a copy of the Living Creature, of course. This Form is unique because it embraces all intelligible living creatures. Its copy will have the corresponding property in the perceptible world. So our world will embrace all perceptible living creatures. Having this property, it is unique. If there were any perceptible living creatures outside it, it would fail to be a copy of the Living Creature just by lacking the perceptible counterpart to that unique property of the Living C r e a t u r e - that very proper ty in virtue of which the Living Creature was chosen to be the exemplar for our world.

I can explicate this claim, perhaps, by giving an argument reminiscent of the argu- ment given for the uniqueness of the Living Creature:

(1) There are two worlds that embody as far as possible the properties of the Living Creature, that is, each is a system of perceptible living creatures.

HI S TORY OF P H I L O S O P H Y

(2) Each is a system distinct from the other. (3) Each is a perceptible living creature. (4) Each fails to contain the other in its system. (5) Thus, each of these worlds is a bad copy of the Living Creature because it

fails to contain all the perceptible living creatures, that is, it fails to em- body the unique characteristic of the Living Creatures.

IV. 1 now turn to some of the consequences of this interpretation. It will be noted that step (la) of the argument for the uniqueness of the Form that embraces all intelligible living creatures involves self-predication. Since the Form that embraces all intelligible living creatures is called an intelligible living creature, the predicate "intelligible living creature" is applied to the products o f the hypothetical doubling of the original Form because it was applied to the original Form. There are a few consequences of this instance of self-predication that need to be looked into. First is the effect it has on Cornford 's position that the Form that embraces all intelligible living creatures is a genus of a special sort. '~ Second is Cherniss 's interpretation of the argument at 31a4-8, that is, the argument that the Model Form is unique. Cher- niss maintains that this argument not only proves the uniqueness of the Form but ac- tually contains an answer to the self-predication problems posed in the Par- menides ." So, if Cherniss is correct in his interpretation, not only does this argu- ment not contain self-predication, it actually shows a way out of the problems posed for Pla to ' s theory of Forms by self-predication. I will deal with Cornford ' s inter- pretat ion of the Living Creature first.

Throughout this paper I have referred to the Form that embraces all intelligible living creatures as a system of intelligible living creatures. The notion implicit in so calling the Model Form is that it is the paradigmatic system that connects all its con- stituents in such a way that the system so connected can itself be called living. The copy of this paradigm is a perceptible system of living creatures that itself can be called living. Consequently, our world is something like an organic entity where the constituents contribute to something that can be called the life of the whole. This interpretation shows that Plato meant , in the Timaeus, to put forth a strongly teleo- logical theory about our world. A living creature is a prime instance of teleology since the parts function for the good of the whole as well as for their own good. The best Platonic illustration of such an organic system is the city-soul of Books 2-4 of the Republic.

Now this interpretation of the Model Form as a system of intelligible living crea- tures is incompatible with Cornford 's interpretation of the Model Form as a genus-- even a genus of a rich sort. In order to defend the interpretatiofi offered here, I wish to show the incompatibility of Cornford 's interpretation with the text. But first, let us outline his interpretation:

The visible world, being "in very truth" a living creature with soul and body, has for its original a complex Form, or system of Forms, called "the intelligible Living Creature." This is

,0 Ibid., p. 40; cf. Cornford, Plato's Theory of Knowledge (New York: The Liberal Arts Press, 1957), pp. 268ff.

" Harold Cherniss, Aristotle's Criticism of Plato and the Academy (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1944), pp. 295-97.

P L A T O ' S TIMAEUS 7

a generic Form containing within itself the Forms of all the subordinate species, members of which inhabit the visible world. '2

Cornford is correct in saying that the Model Form is a complex, or system of Forms. But he is not correct in saying that the relation of part to whole within the complex is that of genus to species. Even if he changes, as he at tempts to do, the ordinary meaning of that relation, he cannot avoid difficulties. Here is his altered version of the genus-species relation: "The generic Form must be conceived, not as a bare abstraction obtained by leaving out all the specific differences determining the subordinate species, but as a whole, richer in content than any of the parts it con- tains and embraces. ' ' '~ Aside from whatever inherent conceptual difficulties such a notion of genus has, it will not answer to Plato 's notion of the Model Form. Even the "richer in content" genus does not find itself instantiated as another animal em- bracing the instances of its species. But Plato 's Model Form is instantiated as another animal embracing all other perceptible living creatures. " F o r the god . : . fashioned it [our world] as a single visible living creature, containing within itself all living things whose nature is of the same o r d e r . ' " ' It should be noted that this argu- ment does not depend on self-predication for the Form Living Creature, though it does depend on calling our world a living creature.

Finally, we can turn to Cherniss 's interpretation of the argument at 31a4-8. Cher- hiss maintains that this argument is designed to defeat the third-man argument of the Parmenides. It shows the uniqueness of the Model Form with regard to the property F, of which the Model is the Form, that is, that the Model Form is F in a way no other thing is. This move stops the third-man argument in its tracks because the Model and copy are not F i n the same way and are not, therefore, similar with regard to F. 'S Cherniss maintains that any Form is unique with regard to its property F because it and only it is ho esti F. This means that it and only it is identical with F. Thus Cherniss is maintaining the uniqueness of the Model Form on the basis of a formal property since being ho esti F belongs to the Model Form in virtue of its being a Form. '

Now if Plato were making such an agument here, he would be denying self-predi- cation of the Form. The difference between saying some x (which is not the Form) is F a n d saying the Form is Fwou ld be th.at the former is predication but the latter is an identity statement. But in fact Plato is not making such an argument here, even if he is in the tenth book of the Republic (597c). Cherniss's attempt to maintain the simi- larity between the argument at 31a4-8 in the Timaeus and the argument at 597c of the Republic depends on whether in the Timaeus Plato is implicitly using as a part of his argument the notion ho esti F. It can be seen that he is not.

'~ Plato's Cosmology, p. 40. 'J Ibid. ,4 Ibid.; 30dl-31al. '5 Cherniss, p. 295. " If Cherniss 's interpretation is correct, then the uniqueness o f the Form Z6on is a formal and not a

material property. Thus, in arguing for the uniqueness of our world on the basis of the uniqueness of its Model, Plato would be guilty of the charge leveled by Keyt. Cherniss 's interpretation, then, has the imme- diate disadvantage that it commits Plato to this fallacy. But there are other disadvantages, as we shall see in the sequel.

HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY

First, let us see Cherniss's interpretation of the argument at 31a4-8 in the Timaeus:

In the Timaeus he contends that two (or more ) ideas of ~t~v would necessarily imply a third which would "include" them and these two would then not be the ideas of ~t~v at all; in the language of the Republic they would have the idea but would not be 6/~oxt ~ o v . '~

In interpreting the argument in this way, Cherniss does not say why there is a need for a third Form. But what he says about the pair of Forms gives us a clue. Both of the pair of Forms have a common characteristic-z6on, being living creatures. Moreover, their being a pair of Forms sharing a common characteristic implies that neither can be identical with the Form corresponding to that characteristic. There- fore, to this common characteristic there must correspond a third Form, the Form ZCJon, in virtue of which they have the characteristic. It is from this Form that our world is copied because it, and not the original pair, is the Form that is identical with the characteristic zt~on.

In this interpretation Cherniss is attributing to Plato the following assumptions: (A) the pair of Forms are each living creatures. To this assumption we have already agreed; it is equivalent to (la) of the interpretation offered in this paper. (B) when there are two or more Forms with a common characteristic, there must be a third Form, corresponding to that characteristic, in which they participate. Presumably, this is a version of the principle from Book 10 of the Republic, adapted for Forms (596a). (C) when two or more Forms share a characteristic, neither can be that characteristic. From this and (A) and (B) it follows that (C') the two intelligible living creatures that embrace all intelligible living creatures are not the Form Zt~on because they share that characteristic, instead of being it. Finally, from (1)--the hypothesis that the Form that embraces all living creatures is one of a pai r - -and (A), (B), (C), and (C'), one can conclude (2') that there must be a third Form, the Form Z6on, in which the pair participate. But these do not lead to Plato's conclusion that (2) " there would have to be yet another Living Creature embracing these two, and they would be parts o f it.'" ,a Even if Cherniss has shown that the two living creatures participate in the Form Zt~on, he has not shown that they are parts of Zi~on. The relation of par- ticipating is different from the relation of being contained. Plato would never have said that all the beautiful things are embraced by and are parts of the beautiful itself, for example.

Of course, one might counter that when a species Form is said to participate in a genus Form the relation can be easily characterized as one on which the genus Form contains the species Form.'9 Consequently, if one is dealing with a genus Form and a species Form in this passage, there would be room for maintaining that (1), (A), (B), (C), and (C') prove ( 2 ) - a s long as we added a further premise (to be called (D)) equating the relations of "part icipat ing" and "being contained" among genus and species Forms. First of all, such an interpretation is more complex than the one being urged in this paper. Second, the key assumptions (C) and (D) are not from the immediate text the way (la), (lb), and (2a) are. Finally, I have already pointed out

" Cherniss, p. 296; notice the author 's use of quotation marks around "include." " Cornford, Plato's Cosmology, pp. 41--42 (emphasis added). " Cornford, Plato's Theory of Knowledge, p. 269.

P L A T O ' S T I M A E U S 9

the difficulty for maintaining that the Living Creature and the intelligible living crea- tures are related as genus and species.

Finally, Cherniss, in his attempt to make it an answer to the Parmenides, misses the thrust of Plato 's argument . Under his interpretation the reason our world cannot be a copy of either of the pair is that neither is the Form ZOon. But it is clear from the way in which Plato introduces this Form that the important respect in which the Form is to be the paradigm for our world is that it contains all intelligible living crea- tures. By having this characteristic, it can be a paradigm for a world that will contain all perceptible living creatures. That this Form is also a living creature is just a further way of characterizing it. If Cherniss had seen this point, he should have argued that the Form Z6on is also uniquely that which embraces all intelligible living creatures, that is, is ho esti that which embraces all intelligible living creatures.

However, if Cherniss had argued that way, he would have been forced to maintain that the Form Zaon and our world are not similar in respect of the property of em- bracing living c r e a t u r e s - o n e at the level of Forms, the other at the perceptible level. The Form ZOon might be the embracingness of living creatures. But this item does not contain all intelligible living creatures. According to Cherniss, to be the property is not to have the property. One cannot maintain that the property instantiates itself in some Pickwickian way without giving up the distinction between being and having the property.

However, if they were not similar in thisrespect , the Form Z6on could not be a paradigm for our world. But it was as containing intelligible living creatures that the Form ZOon was to be the paradigm for our world, which was, in turn, to contain all perceptible living creatures. The whole point of the Form is to serve as a paradigm for embracing living creatures:

Let us rather say that the world is like, above all things, to that Living Creature of which all other living creatures, severally and in their families, are parts. For that embraces and contains within itself all the intelligible living creatures, just as this world contains ourselves and all other creatures that have been formed as things visible.2~

The parallel in the last sentence will not sustain the Cherniss interpretation. One can- not say that the Form ZOon is the embracingness of all intelligible living creatures just as (kathaper) this world contains all perceptible living creatures. No more can one say that the author of Waverly is Sir Walter Scott just as the author of Gone With the Wind is Georgian.

V. There emerges from this reading a notion of Form that is different from that in the other dialogues. As I have pointed out, the intelligible Living Creature that comprehends the four lower orders of intelligible living creatures is the paradigm of a self-contained organic system. The intelligible Living Creature contains entities that are so related that the whole is itself an intelligible Living Creature, and the only intelligible Living Creature of its magnitude of comprehension. This contrasts with the notion of a Form as a genus in some important ways, of course; I can point out some of them by way of a conclusion. First, the most important difference is that between the kinds of internal relations of the two types of Form. A genus may show

2o Cornford, Plato's Cosmology, p. 40; 30c7-dl (emphasis added). "For" is the translation of gar; "just as," for kathaper.

10 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY

the differential relations among its species or the similarities among its members; but it does not show how the species or members are related so as to form another living being. Of course, Plato does not give any details about how the constituent living creatures form another Living Creature; he merely says that they do.

There is a close relation between the Living Creature's being this kind of Form and its being a model for our world. We can begin to see this close relation by first taking a cursory look at Plato's notion of the craftsman in the Gorgias. All craftsmen are said to seek to bring order and harmony into their work (503el- 504a5). This order seems to be a mental paradigm or an envisioned goal. It is obviously motivating. This order is also the excellence (arete) of each object (506el- 507al) and makes it good. The good Plato talks about in the examples is a functional o n e - t h e good of a house or the good of a ship (504a7-b5). The craftsman, however, is drawn not so much by the function of the objects as by their order and harmony. Not only is it explicitly said that the craftsman seeks to bring these qualities into exis- tence; but the language used in this passage shows the attitude toward order that Plato is attributing to the craftsman. The multiplication of words and phrases for order, coupled with the address to Callicles on the value of order (507e6-508a8), shows something approaching enthusiasm.

In the light of these passages, we can understand the Demiurge's using a paradigm of systemic and self-contained order. This paradigm would not be just a blueprint for the perceptible world nor just a chart of its generic relations; it would be a model that displayed the order by which the product would have its functional goodness. It would thereby motivate a craftsman such as the Demiurge (30a5-6), who greatly prefers order. It would be an embodiment in the intelligible world of the goal he seeks to instantiate in the perceptible world. Of course, the order cannot be perfectly instantiated; Plato always reminds us of this. But then all the more reason to have an ideal for the Demiurge to seek to instantiate.

However, such a model provides not only motivation; it is also, in a stronger sense, a determining factor for the Demiurge, who wishes his product to be the best. The Demiurge must use the best possible model (29a2-6); and one of the qualities that makes the Model Form best is that it is the most complete (30dl-31al). But it must be remarked in what way this makes the Model Form the best. Completeness does not qualify the Model Form as model--as , for example, ease of use or durabil- ity in testing would an earthly model for an oil tanker. Nor does it qualify only the copy that is fashioned on the best model. While completeness is a goodmaking quality that the copy will have in its way, the argument shows that completeness is a goodmaking quality not just in the perceptible world but in the ideal world as well. More specifically, a Form that is complete is better than one that is not; and it is better intrinsically, not just as a model for something else. In using the best Form, that is, the complete Form, as a model one is then transferring what is best in the intelligible world to the perceptible world, mutatis mutandis. So seeing what is best in the intelligible world tells one, as it were, what is best for the perceptible world to attempt to embody.

These are some of the ways, then, in which a craftsman's model differs from the epistemologist's genus. If we take seriously the former role of the intelligible Living Creature and do not mix it with the ~atter, the Demiurge does not seem mad at all.

Agnes Scott College