Protagoras

This paper argues, first, that one can render Protagoras’s view on the teach ability of political virtue coherent by distinguishing between the affect required for achieving it and the capacity for developing these affect into fully fledged virtues. Second, the paper argues that by focusing on Books II - III of the Republic one might see an affinity between between Protagoras’s suggestion that virtuous citizens might give advice, without ruling it, in the affairs of the city and Plato’s conservative practical (...) political theory. (shrink)

According to a fragment of Porphyry (410 F Smith = 80 B 2 DK), containing a dialogue on the theme of plagiarism, Plato made use of the same arguments as Protagoras’ Περὶ τοῦ ὄντος against monistic thinkers, most likely the Eleatics. My paper aims to analyse Porphyry’s testimony to assess some aspects of Protagoras’ reflection on being through a comparison with parallel sources, in particular Plato’s dialogues (Theaetetus, Euthydemus, Sophist, Parmenides). I conclude that it is plausible to suppose that, within (...) the framework of a more general reflection on ὀρθοέπεια, Protagoras viewed the notion of being in Περὶ τοῦ ὄντος from a linguistic perspective. (shrink)

This article will contrast two portrayals of Protagoras: one in the "Theaetetus," where Socrates discusses Protagorean theory and even comes to his defense by imitating the deceased sophist; and another in the "Protagoras," where Socrates recounts his encounter with the sophist. I suggest that Plato wants listeners and readers of the dialogues to hear the dissonance between the two portraits and to wonder why Socrates so distorts Protagoras in the "Theaetetus." Protagoras in the "Protagoras" behaves and speaks in ways that (...) are incompatible with the Protagorean position presented in the "Theaetetus.". (shrink)

This paper discusses two broadly logical issues related to Protagoras’ measure doctrine (M) and the self-refutation argument (SRA). First, I argue that the relevant interpretation of (M) has it that every individual human being determines all her own truths, including the truth of (M) itself. I then turn to what I take to be the most important move in the SRA: that Protagoras recognises not only that his opponents disagree with him about the truth of (M), but also that they (...) hold that (M) is false simpliciter. By recognising that his opponents do not make the relativising concession he makes for them, he is forced to accept that (M) is false. I go on to argue that several other defenders of the SRA end up with a regress which is difficult to end and might not favour anti-Protagoreans. On my reading, by recognising what his opponents believe, Protagoras is barred from adding qualifiers, and the possible regress doesn’t get off the ground. I conclude with brief discussions of how Protagoras might try to avoid the result of the SRA and the argument’s role in this part of the Theaetetus. (shrink)

The epistemic justification and nature of Protagoras of Abdera’s agnosticism continues to be subject to varying interpretations, and there remain several reconstructions for the theological and anthropological argumentation that apparently followed on from his declaration of agnosticism that apparently opened his book On the Gods. In this article, the grounds for these hypothetical reconstructions will be challenged and a “strong agnostic” interpretation of Protagoras’ theology interpreted critically in light of his epistemology will be proposed. The article will conclude with discussion (...) on a more recent argument for Protagorean atheism. (shrink)

This essay explores a curious point of intersection in the historical pairing of becoming and negation, between two thinkers and two traditions: the Sophist Protagoras of fifth-century BCE Greece and the second-century CE South Asian Buddhist thinker Nāgārjuna. I offer a speculative account of how becoming and negation are linked in Protagoras—speculative because only so much can be deduced from the extant fragments and testimony. I compare that account to the more coherent picture offered by Nāgārjuna—more coherent because a complete (...) account of the logic that links becoming and negation is carefully preserved in the works attributed to Nāgārjuna. While no specific conclusions regarding the bridge that linked India and Greece may be reached, the similarities between these thinkers and the greater coherence of the Buddhist tradition nevertheless offer hypothetical possibilities for reconstructing the larger architecture of the world of sophistic thought that is now lost to us. (shrink)

En el Gran Discurso de Protágoras, en el diálogo platónico que lleva su nombre, Platón pone en boca de Protágoras un mito acerca del origen, desarrollo y naturaleza del ser humano, que es de gran relevancia filosófica. Se expresa que los dioses crearon a los seres mortales desde dos elementos: la tierra y el fuego. A su vez, también asignaron dos titanes, Epimeteo y Prometeo, para que proveyeran a los mortales de sus facultades. ¿Acaso esto implica que la creación no (...) fue terminada por los dioses? ¿Hasta qué punto los dioses crearon enteramente al ser humano? ¿Podría afirmarse que este es un mito creacionista? El desarrollo de los seres vivientes puede dividirse en cuatro instancias. A lo largo de este artículo, se proponen distintos modelos hermenéuticos para responder los interrogantes mencionados anteriormente. (shrink)

The Great Speech of Protagoras in Plato’s dialogue is now widely seen as an expression of democratic theory, one of the earliest substantial expressions of democratic theory on record. At the same time, there have long been arguments to the contrary, the most formidable presentation of which is an article by Peter Nicholson that appeared in these pages in 1981. In this short piece, I address Nicholson’s skeptical arguments head-on and in full, in a way that has not yet been (...) done. By doing so, I hope to put skeptical arguments of this sort to rest, and to confirm Protagoras’ Great Speech once and for all as an early, and very interesting, fragment of democratic theory. (shrink)

En el presente trabajo intentaremos poner en evidencia un singular enfoque sobre la pólis ateniense ofrecido por Protágoras en el diálogo platónico que lleva su nombre. Dicho enfoque, soslayado por los intérpretes, hace hincapié en la dimensión visual de la praxis política de los ciudadanos y es coherente con los posicionamientos ontológicos que emergen de los fragmentos del sofista.

Plato's Theaetetus discusses and ultimately rejects Protagoras's famous claim that "man is the measure of all things." The most famous of Plato's arguments is the Self-Refutation Argument. But he offers a number of other arguments as well, including one that I call the 'Future Argument.' This argument, which appears at Theaetetus 178a−179b, is quite different from the earlier Self-Refutation Argument. I argue that it is directed mainly at a part of the Protagorean view not addressed before , namely, that all (...) beliefs concerning one's own future sensible qualities are true. This part of the view is found to be inconsistent with Protagoras's own conception of wisdom as expertise and with his own pretenses at expertise in teaching. (shrink)

»Πάντων χρημάτων μέτρον ἐστὶν ἄνθρωπος, τῶν μὲν ὄντων ὡς ἔστιν, τῶν δὲ οὐκ ὄντων ὡς οὐκ ἔστιν [Pántôn khrēmátôn métron éstin ánthrôpos, tôn mèn όntôn hôs éstin, tôn dè ouk όntôn hôs ouk éstin]« – »Čovjek je mjerilo svih stvari, onih koje jesu da jesu, onih koje nisu da nisu«, kaže Protagora. Onaj tko hoće razmotriti Protagorin iskaz (ili raspravljati o njemu), trebao bi najprije potražiti odgovor ne prethodno pitanje: što je čovjek? Utoliko će se u ovome prilogu našem razgovoru (...) najprije (uz pomoć Aristotela) potražiti neki odgovori na to prethodno pitanje, da bi se Protagorin iskaz pokušalo razmotriti s vidika tih odgovora te da bi ga se iskušalo u dva različita vida čovjekova života – u vidu što ga Aristotel naziva θεωρετικός βίος (theōretikόs bíos) i u vidu što ga naziva πολιτικός βίος (politikόs bíos). Napokon, ako se prihvati interpretacija Protagorina iskaza kao afirmacija relativističkog načela (kako to u svojoj kritici u Theaitētu drži Platon), pokušat će se mjesto i smisao relativizma odrediti s obzirom na ta dva vida čovjekova života te s obzirom na razliku između sofizma i filozofije (sofista i filozofa). Na kraju će biti sugerirano da je Protagorin iskaz moguće i drugačije interpretirati te da svaka od različitih interpretacija može imati valjanu težinu. (shrink)

This paper argues that Protagoras’ concept of education, unlike the Platonic ideal of complete transmission of cognitive knowledge, is not oriented towards the paradigm of axiomatic geometry, but seeks to develop virtue and judgment through processes of consideration, insight, imitation, and practice. Accordingly, his epistemology combines consciousness of moderate relativity with a preference for proliferation of theories, without giving up the claim to gradually better logoi. Protagoras’ position can thus be understood and defended against the reservations of Plato to Boghossian (...) as a systematically attractive and virtuous epistemic attitude. (shrink)

While defending the principle of non-contradiction in Metaphysics 4, Aristotle argues that the Measure Doctrine of Protagoras is equivalent to the claim that all contradictions are true; given all appearances are true (as the Protagorean maintains), anytime people disagree we get a true contradiction. This argument seems clearly invalid: nothing guarantees that actual disagreement occurs over every matter of fact. The argument in fact works perfectly, I propose, because the Protagorean view falls prey to a version of Fitch's “paradox” of (...) knowability. The proposed reading shows how Aristotle treats the Protagorean view at issue as an epistemic theory of truth distinct from the mere claim that all appearances are true (which other opponents put forward on different grounds) and reveals Aristotle's underlying concern with the modal collapse of possibility into actuality. The revised Protagorean view Aristotle confronts in a subsequent chapter is furthermore best understood as an attempt to avoid this Fitch-style result. (shrink)

La cultura occidental, con la que vivimos y entendemos, nació bajo los auspicios de un triple ente: la conjugación de lacultura arábigo-musulmana, la civilización germano-eslava y el mundo clásico-bíblico; todos éstos vendrían a encajar, en principio, los miembros articulados del hombre moderno occidental. En concreto, las lenguas modernas han resultado un vehículo habitual y pertinente de la cultura clásica, en mayor o menor proporción y la someten a su propio arbitrio, creando una nueva dinámica literaria, determinada por razones estilísticas o (...) de prestigio. Por ello, no dejan de ser preocupantes los constantes vaivenes de una sociedad ávida de informaciones y conocimientos, sin ningún rumbo a seguir ni alguna meta humanamente satisfactoria. (shrink)

Le célèbre incipit du Peri theon (80 B 4 DK = 31 D 10 Laks-Most), dans lequel Protagoras affirmait être dans l’incapacité de savoir si les dieux existent ou non, joue sans aucun doute un rôle important dans l’histoire de l’athéisme ancien dans la mesure où il permet, comme le souligne David Sedley, de reconstruire un contexte culturel dans lequel la négation de l’existence des dieux était considérée comme une thèse philosophique digne d’être discutée. La présente contribution portera sur les (...) principaux problèmes exégétiques relatifs au fragment protagoréen. Dans un premier moment, nous nous occuperons de la question de la constitution du texte. Nous considérerons ensuite l’historicité de la tradition biographique concernant la persécution judiciaire du sophiste, qui est évoquée par la plupart des sources citant le fragment. Finalement, nous essayerons d’étudier le fragment de Protagoras dans le cadre de la tradition philosophique et littéraire qui le précède et de l’analyser à la lumière de la réflexion philosophique du sophiste lui-même, afin de mieux comprendre le point de vue sur les dieux et la religion que Protagoras exprimait dans son écrit. (shrink)

Protágoras de Abdera, conhecido sofista da Grécia antiga, é compreendido em seus dizeres no decorrer da história da filosofia principalmente devido às contribuições de Platão. O ateniense não apenas dedicou uma obra com seu nome, como também apresentou sua famosa tese do homem-medida no diálogo Teeteto, contribuindo imensamente para elucidar questões importantes sobre seu relativismo. O quão seria pertinente afirmar que é possível saber na íntegra o que queria dizer Protágoras nesse fragmento quando seguimos apenas os testemunhos de Platão. No (...) presente trabalho, iremos propor algumas interpretações dos fragmentos de Protágoras de Abdera com a finalidade de percebermos se há divergências com a interpretação platônica, acima de tudo sobre o fragmento do homem-medida. Traremos, para a análise de Protágoras, o livro de Edward Schiappa, Protagoras and Logos, fazendo as devidas considerações sobre suas conclusões, para, ao final da pesquisa, nos posicionar devidamente diante do que Platão, de fato concordou e acertou sobre o homem-medida. (shrink)

Taking a cue from the interpretive difficulties faced by Socrates and his interlocutors in Plato’s Theaetetus as they struggle to determine the meaning of Protagoras’ homo-mensura doctrine (HM), I argue that Protagoras, or early Protagoreans, used HM to speak on the relativity of literary criticism. For evidence I adduce an overlooked passage of the anonymous Certamen Homeri et Hesiodi, which contains an ethical formulation of HM. This formulation of HM, compatible with the portrait of Protagoras from Theaetetus, explains the concern (...) for literary interpretation latent in two sections of the Certamen. From the evidence in the Certamen, we may infer that HM was directly related to Protagorean education in civic virtue, part of which included a study of how to read and listen to texts. (shrink)

Despite Protagoras’ infamous reputation for corrupting his students, his “Great Speech” (Plato, Protagoras 320c-328d) presents one of the most important arguments in the history of ethics. Refuting Socrates’ contention that virtue must be unteachable since even the best of men cannot raise good children, Protagoras argues that everyone is capable of learning the difference between right and wrong.

Protagoras’ Grand Speech is traditionally considered to articulate a contractualist approach to political existence and morality. There is, however, a newly emerging line of interpretation among scholars, which explores a naturalist layer in Protagoras’ ethical and political thought. This article aims to make a contribution to this new way of reading Protagoras’ speech, by discussing one of its most elaborate versions.

The famous dispute between Protagoras and Euathlus concerning Protagoras’s tuition fee reportedly owed to him by Euathlus is solved on the basis of practical argumentation concerning actions. The dispute is widely viewed as a kind of a logical paradox, and I show that such treating arises due to the double confusion in the dispute narrative. The linguistic expressions used to refer to Protagoras’s, Euathlus’s and the jurors’ actions are confused with these actions themselves. The other confusion is the collision between (...) the pairs of incompatible actions ambiguously expressed by two different pairs of sentences, one of which is a propositionally consistent pair whereas the other is an inconsistent one. The actional paradox solution aims to clear up these confusions by means of two core borderlines, propositional and expressive, drawn between the actions and the propositions. The propositional distinction says that actions are empirical facts and they lack truth values unlike propositions, which are mental entities and are often employed for referring to the actions. This distinction helps to avoid the confusion between the empirical incompatibility of actions and the truth-functional inconsistency of propositions. The expressive distinction claims that although the same linguistic sentences can be used to refer both to actions and propositions, two empirically incompatible actions can be expressed both by a pair of inconsistent propositions as well as by a pair of consistent ones. Therefore, the action of Protagoras’s being paid may be linguistically symbolized in four different ways: Protagoras gets paid due to the verdict, Protagoras gets paid due to the contract that amount to Protagoras does not get paid by the contract and Protagoras does not get paid by the verdict respectively, and likewise for Euathlus’s actions. The two distinctions are used for classifying the two groups of paradox solutions, legal and logical, proposed so far depending on which of the two confusions they purport to escape from. The actional reconstruction of the paradox suggests that there is only one single agent in the dispute, Protagoras, while the other named Euathlus is a ‘phantom,’ which most probably was invented by Protagoras himself for the sake of creating this challenging sophism. (shrink)

This article seeks to present a detailed textual analysis of Protagoras’ Great Speech in Plato's Protagoras. I will argue that the concept of ἀρετή as it appears in the Great Speech is whittled down to a vague notion of civic duty. In this respect, Protagoras is bringing himself in line with the democracy, but in doing so the ἀρετή he claims to teach loses much of its initial appeal, particularly in the eyes of his aristocratic clientele. Nevertheless, if thecontentof Protagoras’ (...) Great Speech overlooks the abilities required to rise to political prominence, theformmost assuredly does not. As one would expect from Plato's Protagoras, his speech is replete with just that oratorical prowess his students might expect to acquire from him. This, in turn, has a number of interesting and important implications in the broader context of theProtagoras, in particular regarding the contrast or conflict between long speeches and short-answer dialectic. Moreover, although it has long been noticed that Protagoras neglects rhetoric and personal pre-eminence in his account, as far as I know there has not been any serious attempt to analyse the stylistic aspects of this masterful speech. Accordingly, both this and my attempt to interpret it within the economy of the dialogue are original. (shrink)

The goal of this research was to analyze the philosophical meaning of the sentence of the fifth century sophist a.C. Protagoras de Abdera: “Man is the measure of all things: of the things that are, that they are, of the things that are not, that they are not”. That phrasing wording was criticized by philosophers of the time, especially Plato. Drawing from various sources, I intend to retrace Protagoras' ideas and its philosophical force. I intend to investigate how, in a (...) way, Protagoras contributes to Plato's philosophical reflection and to investigate, on the other hand, whether there are relevant arguments to show that the interpretation of Protagoras's sentence is different from that of Plato. (shrink)

The paper offers an analysis of Protagoras’ fr. DK 80 B 1 and rejects the traditional reading of Protagoras as relativist. By considering the ipsissima verba that Protagoras makes use of in his passage, it is argued that alternative interpretations are possible, of which epistemological reism and psychological individualism are proposed. On a more general level, it is discussed to what extent Protagoras’ fragment contains descriptive rather than normative claim.

This paper is written on the supposition that the main theme in the Protagoras is the nature of Protagoras’ teaching. This teaching, as it must have been displayed in his lessons, is, however, neither accounted for nor discussed directly in the dialogue. Instead of asking Protagoras for a trial lecture, Socrates from the start is set to challenge the underlying assumptions of his teaching; the structure of its moral underpinnings. This structure, I assume, is less formed by theoretical thinking on (...) Protagoras’ part than by social and institutional factors, factors that to a large extent determine the professional role of Protagoras as a teacher. I will discuss this structure under four headings: (1) The expectations of a potential student. (2) The ambiguities of Protagoras’ position as a teacher. (3) Protagoras’ attitude to the virtues. (4) What is it to live well? (shrink)

One of the central challenges to contemporary political philosophy is the apparent impossibility of arriving at any commonly agreed upon “truths.” As Nietzsche observed in his Will to Power, the currents of relativism that have come to characterize modern thought can be said to have been born with ancient sophistry. If we seek to understand the strengths and weaknesses of contemporary radical relativism, we must therefore look first to the sophists of antiquity—the most famous and challenging of whom is Protagoras. (...) With Sophistry and Political Philosophy, Robert C. Bartlett provides the first close reading of Plato’s two-part presentation of Protagoras. In the “Protagoras,” Plato sets out the sophist’s moral and political teachings, while the “Theaetetus,” offers a distillation of his theoretical and epistemological arguments. Taken together, the two dialogues demonstrate that Protagoras is attracted to one aspect of conventional morality—the nobility of courage, which in turn is connected to piety. This insight leads Bartlett to a consideration of the similarities and differences in the relationship of political philosophy and sophistry to pious faith. Bartlett’s superb exegesis offers a significant tool for understanding the history of philosophy, but, in tracing Socrates’s response to Protagoras’ teachings, Bartlett also builds toward a richer understanding of both ancient sophistry and what Socrates meant by “political philosophy.”. (shrink)

Protagoras est un sophiste, les sophistes sont les ennemis de Platon... De ce syllogisme, la conclusion semble evidente. Elle appelle cependant quelques nuances. Plus qu'un ennemi, Protagoras apparait en effet chez Platon comme une figure exemplaire, un interlocuteur valable qui, a travers son affirmation selon laquelle l'homme est la mesure de toutes choses, incarne la democratie, ses conditions et ses consequences.Ce livre traite le theme general, et classique, de l'opposition entre sophistique et philosophie, mais en le limitant a une seule (...) question dont il deploie les differentes facettes : l'idee de mesure. Il reconstitue une pensee protagoreenne qui replace Platon dans son contexte intellectuel et montre comment, a travers la figure de Protagoras, c'est le debat avec la democratie qui se joue, non seulement en tant que regime politique, mais aussi en tant que modele theorique aux implications multiples (epistemologiques, morales, pedagogiques, techniques).Sur quel critere fonder la mesure? Comment concevoir l'expertise et le savoir? Quel role attribuer au langage dans l'education? Que faire de l'identite du sujet dans le processus de memoire? Comment penser l'unite de la Cite? Autant de questions soulevees dans le dialogue avec le modele protagoreen. Comprendre ce que Platon doit a Protagoras, c'est ainsi chercher par quels elements cette pensee l'a mis au defi et par reaction a quoi il a elabore sa propre theorie de la mesure, de l'expertise, de l'education et de l'unite politique. (shrink)

Discussion of the many faces of relativism occupies a highly prominent place in the epistemological literature. Protagoras in ancient Greece and Nelson Goodman in the modern period are two most notable proponent of relativism. In the present article, I discuss and explain relativistic approaches of this two important relativist. I will first briefly define and review some faces of relativism. Then I will discuss and elaborate Protagorean or true-for-me relativism and Goodman’s radical relativism in turn. I will argue that there (...) are crucial difficulties in Protagorean and radical relativism, and that these difficulties, as the realist philosophers insist, make these two faces of relativism be undefensible. No doubt, these two shapes of relativism have paved the way for anti-realism. In the end, it will appear that Goodman’s radical relativism and so the theory of worldmaking, like Protagorean relativism, suffers from a fatal flaw: the flaw of self-refuting. (shrink)

We have far less evidence for Aristotle’s reception of Protagoras than we like to think, and the evidence we do have is somewhere we hardly ever look. With one exception, every reference Aristotle makes to the Measure Doctrine—Protagoras’ claim that humans are the ‘measure of all things —concerns the Doctrine as amplified in Plato’s Theaetetus, and the ‘Protagoras’ in question is Plato’s fictional character as fictional. Metaph. I 1, 1053a35–b3 provides the only exception, where Aristotle offers an anomalous reading of (...) the Doctrine incompatible with the others. The chapter interprets I 1, 1053a35–b3 and concludes that Aristotle attributes the anomalous reading to Protagoras himself. The chapter argues further that every other reference to the Doctrine derives from the Theaetetus. Aristotle formulates ‘the theory of Protagoras’ according to Plato’s self-refutation argument, and his argument that it denies the Principle of Non-contradiction includes premisses from Plato’s argument that are out of place in Aristotle’s own. He moreover attributes to ‘Protagoras’ arguments and dialectical demands that the fictional Protagoras makes in his so-called ‘apology’, so his target is specifically a Platonic invention and not the historical person. This leaves only Metaph. I 1 1053a35–b3 to join his six other references to the historical Protagoras, which makes it Aristotle’s only engagement with the Measure Doctrine as the actual view of his predecessor. (shrink)

Este artículo se propone mostrar que el significado de aisthesis para Protágoras responde al uso y significación de la filosofía jónica, esto es, aún significa indistintamente juicio, sensación, emoción, creencia, en fin, doxa. Esto tiene una consecuencia muy relevante para la comprensión del homo mensura y la tesis que afirma: aisthesis es episteme.

The presocratic philosopher Protagoras of Abdera (490–420 BC), founder of the sophistic movement, was famously agnostic towards the existence and nature of the gods, and was the proponent of the doctrine that 'man is the measure of all things'. Still relevant to contemporary society, Protagoras is in many ways a precursor of the postmodern movement. In the brief fragments that survive, he lays the foundation for relativism, agnosticism, the significance of rhetoric, a pedagogy for critical thinking and a conception of (...) the human being as a social construction. -/- This accessible introductory survey by Daniel Silvermintz covers Protagoras' life, ideas and lasting legacy. Each chapter interprets one of the surviving fragments and draws connections with related ideas forwarded by other sophists, showing its relevance to an area of knowledge: epistemology, ethics, education and sociology. (shrink)

Der Beitrag untersucht die Bedeutung des Protagoras für die Entwicklung von Platons politischer Philosophie und Ethik anhand des gleichnamigen Dialogs. Im Mittelpunkt steht zunächst die epideiktische Rede des Protagoras, die die Fragen nach dem Wesen und der Lehrbarkeit der Tugend, nach der besten Erziehung sowie der besten politischen Verfassung aufwirft. Konkret werden in diesem Kontext die Auseinandersetzung um die Bewertung der Demokratie, das Verständnis der politischen Technik, das Verhältnis von Natur und Satzung und die Antizipation der späteren Aristotelischen Differenzierung zwischen (...) ethischen und dianoetischen Tugenden im _Protagoras_ analysiert. Durch all diese Punkte läßt sich schließlich nachdrücklich belegen, wie stark Platons eigener Weg von Protagoras bestimmt worden ist, sofern dieser für ihn auf anerkanntermaßen höchstem Niveau und auf eine geradezu paradigmatische Weise all die Irrwege beschreitet, die ihn zu einem idealen Antipoden von Platons eigenen Intentionen werden lassen konnten. (shrink)

In both Metaphysics Γ 4 and 5 Aristotle argues that Protagoras is committed to the view that all contradictions are true. Yet Aristotle’s arguments are not transparent, and later, in Γ 6, he provides Protagoras with a way to escape contradictions. In this paper I try to understand Aristotle’s arguments. After examining a number of possible solutions, I conclude that the best way of explaining them is to (a) recognize that Aristotle is discussing a number of Protagorean opponents, and (b) (...) import another of Protagoras’ views, namely the claim that there are always two logoi opposed to one another. (shrink)

Protagoras of Abdera, Socrates’ older contemporary, is regarded as one of the most prominent representatives of the so-called sophistic movement. Instead of simply accepting the biased reports given by Plato and Aristotle about this sophist, the contributors to this volume review the complicated doxographical situation and make a case for Protagoras as a philosopher in his own right. Two major themes of this volume are Protagoras’ relativism and his case for a moral and political ideal, both of which are contrasted (...) with the metaphysical idealism of his future opponents in the Academy and the mundane conventionalism typically associated with the sophists. It turns out that rather than a parasitic force of intellectual subversion, Protagoras may have been a prolific and original thinker aiming at a coherent and comprehensive view of man’s place in the world. (shrink)

The character Protagoras in Plato's Protagoras holds similar views to the one in the Theaetetus, and faces similar problems. The dialogue considers issues in epistemology and moral epistemology, as a central theme. The Protagorean position is immune from Socrates' attacks, and Socrates needs Protagorean methods to make any impact.

In this contribution, I explore the treatment that Plato devotes to Protagoras’ relativism in the first section of the Theaetetus (151 E 1–186 E 12) where, among other things, the definition that knowledge is perception is put under scrutiny. What I aim to do is to understand the subtlety of Plato’s argument about Protagorean relativism and, at the same time, to assess its philosophical significance by revealing the inextric¬ability of ontological and epistemological aspects on which it is built (for this (...) latter aspect, I refer to contemporary discussions of relativism, mainly to Margolis’ robust relativism). I then turn to Aristotle’s treatment of Protagoras’ relativism in Metaphysics Γ, sections 5 and 6, in order to show that Plato and Aristotle surprisingly share the same view as regards the philosophical content of Protagoras’ relativism (in doing so, I take position against the standard opinion among scholars that Plato and Aristotle understand Protagoras’ relativism in different, even incompatible, ways). What I ultimately aim to demonstrate is that Protagoras’ relativism, as understood by both Plato and Aristotle, is a coherent, even attractive, philosophical position. (shrink)

Dans cet article, je me propose de reconstruire le cadre général de la pensée politique protagoréenne et de dégager ses conditions de possibilité à partir d’une analyse du mythe et des déclarations exposées dans le Protagoras. J’essaierai de montrer que la conception protagoréenne est axée sur les notions de loi et de citoyen d’une part, et sur la relation que le sophiste d’Abdère établit entre loi et nature de l’autre. Protagoras est le premier penseur dans l’histoire de la philosophie grecque (...) qui est en mesure de distinguer le niveau du social (marquant la deuxième phase du développement de la vie humaine) et le niveau du politique (marquant la troisième phase, représentée par la fondation de la cité). Dans ce cadre, j’établirai un parallélisme entre la conception protagoréenne et le concept kantien d’« insociable sociabilité ». J’articulerai enfin cette conception à la définition du sophiste qu’offre Protagoras dans le Théétète, en vue de mettre en évidence le rôle directif du sophiste par rapport au dèmos et son intervention active dans le processus de constitution de la loi, et d’éclaircir ainsi son rapport à la démocratie athénienne. (shrink)

Os comentários a respeito do Crátilo platônico costumam concordar que, em tal diálogo, Platão possui adversários implícitos, cujos pensamentos pretende refutar quando põe em cena Sócrates a dialogar com os jovens Crátilo e Hermógenes. Este artigo pretende dar uma pequena contribuição para tal debate, mostrando em que medida e por que razões Protágoras e Heráclito podem ser vistos como candidatos ao posto de adversários platônicos no referido contexto.

Das Buch des emeritierten Salzburger Gräzisten enthält eine Auswahl seiner in den Jahren seit 1971 entstandenen Aufsätze sowie einen umfangreichen, noch nicht publizierten Beitrag zum sokratisch-platonischen ethischen Intellektualismus. Ausgehend vom Zusammenhang zwischen der areté, dem Wissen vom Guten und dem richtigen Handeln, gelangt Platon zur Konzeption der anámnesis und zur Ideenlehre - ein bisher in der Forschung wenig beachteter Komplex. Weitere Themen der ueber zwanzig Aufsätze sind u.a. die Ontologie des Parmenides, der homo-mensura-Satz des Protagoras und Platons Auseinandersetzung mit ihm, (...) Platons literarische Techniken, die Sozialphilosophie und Sozialpolitik Marc Aurels. Unter dem Aspekt "Lohnt es sich, fuer die Menschen zu leiden?" wird der Prometheusmythos interpretiert. Ausserdem behandelt Dalfen den Wissenschaftsbegriff der griechischen Medizin, die Präsens der Griechen im Denken der modernen Naturwissenschaft, die Wurzeln des europäischen Kulturbegriffs, Politik und Utopie in einer Komödie des Aristophanes, und aus dem Bereich der Religion das Gebet des Kleanthes an Zeus und das Schicksal sowie Deutungen menschlicher Existenz in der fruehen griechischen Dichtung. (shrink)

In his theory of society Protagoras, one of the most influential sophists thinkers, applies a contractarian approach, similar in many respects to those of Locke, Hobbes and Rousseau. Protagoras, unlike Aristotle or Plato, was convinced that individual perceptions and beliefs as well as those of the body political are relative, because there is no uniform ground on which things could be perceived or experienced. He offers an evolutionary account of the development of human species, arguing that society is a result (...) of a contract among its members, based on commonly shared and taught social virtues. On the other hand, Protagoras is not a nihilist: In his account there is still a possibility of an expertise within the polis, related to the good of the particular community. (shrink)

This is the translation of Protagoras' life from Diogenes Laertius' "Lives of eminent Philosophers" (IX, 8).

This paper aims to define the position of Protagoras on poetry, taking some crucial passages of Platonic Protagoras as texts that express the positions of the historical Protagoras. These passages, strictly incompatible with some essential theses of Plato’s thought, are the Great Speech (320c8-328d2), the intervention on the variety and variability of the good (334a3-c6) and the comment on the poem by Simonides (338e6-339d9). From these passages we can infer the position of the sophist towards poetry which could be summarized (...) in the following theses: 1. Poetry is an essential part of education. Epic poetry provides models for the education. Lyric poetry in turn helps to internalize in the souls of children the rhythm and the harmony that its verses contain. 2. However, an educated person should know how to evaluate what is right or wrong in the words of the poets. Criticism of Simonides’ poem is an example. From this perspective, the myth of Prometheus contained in the Protagoras Great Speech, which amends the versions of Hesiod and Aeschylus, can be considered as an model of poetic orthoepeia. (shrink)