Part 145

108. Socr. And now it has been made perfectly clear that science is something different from perception. But we did not commence this conversation with this view, that we might find out what science is not, but what it is. However, we have advanced so far as not to seek it at all in perception, but in that name, whatever it is, which the soul possesses when it employs itself about things that exist.

Theæ. But this, I think, Socrates, is called, to judge.

Socr. You think rightly, my friend. And now consider again from the beginning, having obliterated all that has been said before, if you see at all more clearly, now that you have come to this point. And tell me again what science is.

Theæ. It is impossible, Socrates, to say that it is every judgment, because there is also false judgment. But it appears that true judgment is science, and let this be my answer. For if, as we proceed, it shall not appear to be so, as it does at present, we will endeavour to say something else.

109. Socr. Thus, then, Theætetus, you must speak more promptly, and not, as at first, hesitate to answer. For if we do so, one of two things will happen; we shall either find that which we are in search of, or we shall in a less degree think that we know what we do not know at all; though this would be no despicable reward. Now, then, what do you say? Since there are two species of judgment, one true, and the other false, do you define science to be true judgment?

Theæ. I do; for this at present appears to me to be the case.

Socr. Is it, then, worth while again to resume the discussion respecting judgment?

Theæ. What do you mean?

Socr. Somehow this matter troubles me just now, and has often done so at other times, so that I have had great doubt with respect to myself and others, from not being able to say what this affection in us is, and in what way it is produced.

Theæ. What affection?

Socr. This, that any one forms false judgments; and I even now still consider and am in doubt whether we shall let this alone, or examine it in a different manner than we did just now.

Theæ. How not, Socrates? at least if it appears necessary to be done in some way or other? For you and Theodorus just now remarked, not badly, respecting leisure, that there is no urgency in matters of this kind.

110. Socr. You have reminded me very properly. For perhaps it will not be foreign to our purpose in a manner to retrace our steps. For it is better to finish a little well than much insufficiently.

Theæ. Why not?

Socr. How then? what do we say? do we not affirm that sometimes judgments are false? or that one of us forms false judgments and another true ones, as if this was naturally the case?

Theæ. We doubtless do affirm this.

Socr. Does not this happen to us with regard to things in general and each particular, that we either know it or do not know it? For learning and forgetting, as being between these, I pass by for the present, for now they have nothing to do with our discussion.

Theæ. However, Socrates, there is no other alternative with respect to each particular, except knowing or not knowing it.

Socr. Then, is it not necessary, that he who judges should judge either what he does know, or does not know?

Theæ. It is necessary.

Socr. But that a person who knows should not know the same thing, or that he who does not know it should know it, is impossible.

Theæ. How not?

Socr. Does not he, then, who forms a false judgment about what he knows, think that these are not the same, but different from what he knows, and thus while he knows both, he is at the same time ignorant of both?

Theæ. But this is impossible, Socrates.

111. Socr. Does he, then, think that things which he does not know are certain other things that he does not know, and is it possible for one who knows neither Theætetus nor Socrates, to imagine that Socrates is Theætetus, or Theætetus Socrates?

Theæ. How could that be?

Socr. Neither, surely, does any one think that the things which he knows are the same as those that he does not know, nor again that the things which he does not know, are the same as those that he does know.

Theæ. For that would be monstrous.