Meno

Summary

The Meno opens without any scene-setting. Meno, a rich young Thessalian from Pharsalus who has studied with the orator Gorgias, asks Socrates whether virtue comes by teaching, by practice, by nature, or in some other way. Socrates replies that he cannot say how virtue is acquired, because he does not know what virtue is, and has never met anyone who did. Meno offers three answers in turn. First he lists the virtues of a man, a woman, a child, an old man and a slave; Socrates objects that he asked for one virtue and was handed a swarm, and illustrates with bees and with definitions of shape and colour what a single account would look like. Next Meno says virtue is the power of governing men, then that it is desiring fine things and being able to get them. Each answer, Socrates shows, either leaves out justice or assumes the very thing being defined. Stung, Meno compares Socrates to the flat torpedo fish that numbs whoever touches it, and then raises a famous puzzle: how can anyone search for what he does not know, since he would not recognise it if he found it? Socrates answers with a teaching he attributes to priests, priestesses and poets such as Pindar: the soul is immortal, has seen all things, and learning is really recollection. To show this he questions one of Meno's slave boys about doubling the area of a square. The boy first guesses wrongly that the side should be doubled, then falls into perplexity, and at last, through questions alone, sees that the square drawn on the diagonal is the answer. Socrates claims he taught nothing and the boy drew true opinions out of himself. Returning to the original question, Socrates proposes a hypothesis, as geometers do: if virtue is a kind of knowledge, it can be taught. He argues that virtue is a form of wisdom, but then notes that there seem to be no teachers of it. Anytus, Meno's host and later one of Socrates' accusers, joins the talk, scorns the Sophists, and claims any Athenian gentleman can teach virtue; yet Themistocles, Aristides, Pericles and Thucydides failed to make their sons good. Anytus leaves with a warning to be careful. Socrates then distinguishes knowledge from true opinion, which guides action just as well but runs away like the statues of Daedalus unless tied down by reasoning. Good statesmen, he concludes, acted from true opinion like inspired prophets, so virtue seems to come by divine gift; but the certain answer awaits an account of what virtue itself is. The library text is Benjamin Jowett's translation (first published 1871 in The Dialogues of Plato), printed with his long introduction.

Plot or Argument

• The opening question (70a-71d)

  Meno asks how virtue is acquired; Socrates turns the question back to what virtue is, admitting he has never met anyone who knew, and asks for Gorgias's view as Meno remembers it.

• Three failed definitions (71e-79e)

  Meno lists many virtues, then defines virtue as the power to rule, then as desiring fine things and being able to get them. Socrates models good definitions with shape and colour and shows that each answer is either a list or assumes justice, a part of virtue.

• The torpedo fish and Meno's paradox (80a-81e)

  Meno complains that Socrates numbs his partners and poses the dilemma that inquiry is impossible. Socrates replies with the account of the immortal soul, citing Pindar, and concludes that learning is recollection.

• The slave boy and the doubled square (82a-86c)

  Questioned about a square of four feet, the boy guesses a doubled side, then a side of three, then admits he is at a loss; with further questions he sees that the square on the diagonal has double the area. Socrates argues the true opinions were in him all along and urges the duty of inquiry.

• Reasoning from a hypothesis (86d-89c)

  Following the geometers' method, Socrates reasons that if virtue is knowledge it can be taught, and argues that virtue is beneficial and so a kind of wisdom, since courage or temperance without wisdom can do harm.

• Anytus and the missing teachers (89d-95a)

  Anytus despises the Sophists and claims any Athenian gentleman can teach virtue, but Socrates names great men whose sons did not become good, and Anytus leaves with a warning.

• True opinion and divine gift (95b-100c)

  Poets and Sophists disagree about teaching virtue; Socrates distinguishes true opinion from knowledge tied down by reasoning, likens good statesmen to inspired soothsayers, and concludes provisionally that virtue comes by divine dispensation, while insisting the question of what virtue is remains first.

Characters

• Socrates, Athenian philosopher and questioner

  Professes not to know what virtue is, refutes Meno's definitions, and leads the slave boy by questions.

• Meno, young Thessalian aristocrat

  A pupil of Gorgias, confident in his speeches on virtue until Socrates leaves him at a loss; he poses the paradox of inquiry.

• The slave boy, one of Meno's attendants

  A Greek-speaking boy with no training in geometry who, under questioning, finds the square on the diagonal.

• Anytus, Athenian democratic politician

  Meno's host, who scorns the Sophists, defends Athenian gentlemen as teachers of virtue, and leaves with a warning; historically one of Socrates' accusers in 399 BC.

• Gorgias, absent orator from Leontini

  Meno's teacher, whose views stand behind Meno's first answers.

• Themistocles, Aristides, Pericles and Thucydides, Athenian statesmen named as examples

  Good men who gave their sons the best training in riding, wrestling and music but could not make them virtuous.

Lessons

• Define before you decide

  Meno wants to know how virtue is gained before he knows what it is, and Socrates refuses to let him skip the first question. His bees, shapes and colours show the difference between giving examples and giving an account of what all the examples share.

  • Why does Socrates reject Meno's list of the virtues of men, women and children?
  • What makes Socrates' sample definition of shape a good model?
  • Can you think of a word you use well but could not define?

• Perplexity can be a gift

  The slave boy is better off once he knows he does not know, because only then does he want to search. Meno's complaint about the torpedo fish describes the same numbing, and Socrates treats it as the doorway to learning rather than a defeat.

  • At which moment does the boy realise he does not know the answer?
  • Why does Socrates say the numbing did the boy no harm?
  • Is it harder to unlearn a confident error than to learn something new?

• The duty to inquire

  Against Meno's paradox, Socrates says he is not sure of every detail of the recollection story, but he will fight for one conclusion: we become better and braver by believing we ought to seek what we do not know. The dialogue ties intellectual effort to courage.

  • Why does Socrates call the paradox an argument for idle people?
  • Which part of his reply does Socrates admit he is unsure of, and which part does he defend?

• Knowledge and right opinion

  A person with true opinion can guide a traveller to Larisa as well as one who knows the road. But true opinions wander off unless they are tied down by working out the reason, as the statues of Daedalus had to be tied to keep them from running away.

  • If true opinion guides action as well as knowledge, why is knowledge worth more?
  • What does it mean to tie down an opinion by working out its cause?
  • How does this distinction explain why great statesmen failed to teach their sons?

Context

The dialogue is set in Athens around 402 BC, shortly after the restoration of democracy and a few years before the trial of Socrates in 399 BC. Meno of Pharsalus was a real Thessalian noble who soon afterward served among the Greek commanders of Cyrus the Younger and was put to death after the expedition of 401 BC; Xenophon's Anabasis gives an unflattering portrait of him. Anytus, his host, was a leader of the restored democracy and one of the three men who brought the charge against Socrates, which gives the warning he delivers in the dialogue its edge. Gorgias, Meno's teacher, was the most famous teacher of rhetoric of the age.

Composition

Plato probably wrote the Meno in the 380s BC, after founding the Academy; scholars place it among the transitional dialogues, close to the Gorgias and before the Phaedo and Republic, which develop recollection and the theory of Forms more fully. The dialogue runs from Stephanus page 70 to 100. Benjamin Jowett, Master of Balliol College, Oxford, published his translation in The Dialogues of Plato (1871); the library text reproduces it with his introduction and occasional cross-references to other dialogues.

Reception

Aristotle opens the Posterior Analytics by addressing the puzzle of the Meno, and the distinction between knowledge and true opinion has been central to the theory of knowledge ever since. Augustine answered the recollection argument with his account of divine illumination, and the slave-boy scene became a standard text in later debates over innate ideas, from Descartes and Leibniz to Locke's criticism of them. The dialogue remains one of the most widely assigned introductions to Plato.

Comparisons

• the-last-days-of-socrates

  Anytus, who warns Socrates to be careful in the Meno, is one of his accusers in the Apology, and the Phaedo returns to recollection as an argument for the soul's immortality.

• the-republic

  The Meno's distinction between knowledge and true opinion is developed in the Republic's divided line, and its question about statesmen who cannot teach their virtue is answered by the education of philosopher-rulers.

• phaedrus-and-letters-vii-and-viii

  The Phaedrus gives a mythic picture of the soul's vision of true being before birth, the background the Meno's recollection story only sketches.

• aristotle-posterior-analytics-and-physics

  Aristotle opens the Posterior Analytics with the Meno's puzzle about learning and answers it by distinguishing universal from particular knowledge rather than appealing to recollection.

• the-nicomachean-ethics

  Aristotle takes up the Meno's opening question and answers that moral virtue comes by habit, intellectual virtue by teaching, with nature giving the capacity.

• euclid-elements-book-i

  The slave boy's discovery that the square on the diagonal has double the area is a special case of the theorem Euclid proves at Elements I.47.

Quotes

For Students

A reading companion for classical Christian high school students. See the student guide.

Reading Guide

Watch for

• Meno's three definitions of virtue and the precise flaw Socrates finds in each.
• The moment Meno compares Socrates to the torpedo fish, and how Socrates answers the comparison.
• Each wrong answer the slave boy gives before he reaches the diagonal, and the point at which he admits he does not know.
• Socrates' admission that he is unsure of parts of the recollection story but certain about the duty to inquire.
• Anytus's anger at the Sophists and his parting warning, read with the trial of Socrates in mind.

Key terms and names

Arete (virtue)

The Greek word Jowett translates as virtue means excellence of any kind; Meno and Socrates argue over what human excellence is.

Meno's paradox

The dilemma that one cannot search for what one knows, since one has it, nor for what one does not know, since one would not recognise it.

Anamnesis (recollection)

Socrates' teaching that the immortal soul already knows all things and that learning is remembering them.

Torpedo fish

The electric ray, whose numbing shock Meno uses as an image for the perplexity Socrates causes.

Hypothesis

Borrowed from the geometers: Socrates reasons from the assumption that if virtue is knowledge it can be taught.

True opinion

A correct belief held without the reasoning that grounds it; it guides action as well as knowledge but is unstable.

Statues of Daedalus

Legendary statues so lifelike they ran away unless tied, Socrates' image for true opinions not yet fastened by reasoning.

Seminar Questions

1. Comprehension What three definitions of virtue does Meno give, and what is wrong with each, according to Socrates?
2. Comprehension What answers does the slave boy give to the doubled-square problem before he finds the right one?
3. Comprehension Why does Anytus become angry, and what examples does Socrates use to show that good men have not taught virtue to their sons?
4. Interpretation Does the slave-boy scene prove that learning is recollection, or does Socrates' questioning do the teaching?
5. Interpretation Why might Plato have placed Anytus, a future accuser of Socrates, in a dialogue about who can teach virtue?
6. Interpretation Is the conclusion that virtue comes by divine gift meant seriously, ironically, or provisionally?
7. Big Question Can goodness be taught, and if so, by whom: parents, teachers, the city, or God?

Faith Connections

• James 1:17 (Scripture)

  Every good and perfect gift comes from the Father of lights. Socrates' closing suggestion that virtue comes by divine gift meets this teaching from a very different starting point.

• Proverbs 22:6 (Scripture)

  Solomon's counsel to train a child in the way he should go sits beside the Meno's sons of Pericles and Aristides, who were trained in everything but did not turn out good, and raises the same question of what training can give.

• Augustine, De Magistro (The Teacher) (Church Fathers)

  Augustine argues that words only prompt us, and that we learn truth from Christ the inner Teacher. He keeps the Meno's insight that learning is drawn from within while replacing recollection with divine illumination.

• Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics II.1 (Great Conversation)

  Aristotle answers Meno's opening question by distinguishing virtues of thought, which grow by teaching, from virtues of character, which grow by habit.

Logic and Rhetoric

Central argument: If virtue is knowledge, it can be taught. Whatever is taught has teachers and learners. But neither Sophists nor good Athenian statesmen succeed in teaching virtue. Therefore virtue, as men now have it, is not knowledge but true opinion, which comes by divine gift; yet the question cannot be settled until we know what virtue is.

Rhetorical device: elenchus (refutation by question). In 71e-79e Socrates gets Meno to agree to small premises and then shows that each of his definitions contradicts them, ending in the perplexity Meno compares to the torpedo fish's shock.

Debate: Resolved: that virtue can be taught.

Memory Work

that we shall be better and braver and less helpless if we think that we ought to enquire, than we should have been if we indulged in the idle fancy that there was no knowing and no use in seeking to know what we do not know

And this is why knowledge is more honourable and excellent than true opinion, because fastened by a chain.

Writing Prompts

Essay: Socrates admits he is unsure about the details of recollection but certain that we ought to inquire. Argue whether his practical conclusion still stands if the recollection theory is false.

Comparison with The Last Days of Socrates: Read Anytus's warning in the Meno beside the Apology. How does the Meno's question about teaching virtue illuminate the charge that Socrates corrupted the young?

Medical Lens

The dialogue has no medical content beyond the image of the numbing torpedo fish, an electric ray later used by Roman physicians such as Scribonius Largus against headache; the Meno itself makes no medical use of it.

Creative Prompts

• Classroom

  Draw a two-foot square on the board and re-enact the slave-boy questioning with a student who has not seen the dialogue, asking only questions. Afterward, discuss whether any question smuggled in the answer.

• Dialogue

  Write the conversation Meno might have had with Anytus after Socrates leaves, trying to persuade him as Socrates asks him to.

• Essay

  Is the slave-boy scene evidence for recollection, or only for good teaching by questions? Argue from the details of 82b-85b.

• Fiction

  Tell the doubled-square lesson from the slave boy's point of view, from his confident first guess to the moment he sees the diagonal.

Further Reading

• Anabasis, Xenophon

  Book II ends with Xenophon's portrait of Meno of Pharsalus.

• Posterior Analytics, Aristotle

  Book I, chapter 1 answers the Meno's puzzle.

• A Commentary on Plato's Meno, Jacob Klein

• Plato's Meno, Dominic Scott

• The Teacher (De Magistro), Augustine of Hippo

  A Christian dialogue on whether one person can teach another.