Books to Read While the Algae Grow in Your Fur, December 2021

Attention conservation notice: I have no taste, and no qualifications to opine on the fountainheads of the western philosophical tradition, the history of 17th century science, political philosophy, cognitive psychology, the transmission of inequality, or even social-scientific measurement.

Plato, trans. and ed. Christopher Rowe, Theaetetus and Sophist

Theaeatetus is about knowledge, and more specifically how false belief is even possible --- say, falsely identifying someone else as Socrates, if we (supposedly) know Socrates. It's notable for Socrates propounding at least three distinct theories of knowledge, and undermining them all, ending in perplexity. There are some deeply interesting pieces here, including bits (like the analogies of the wax impressions, and of the aviary) where Plato is trying to think through how to make something knowledge-like work. Then there are the bits of metaphysics about being and not being which I frankly cannot comprehend, and have to hope sounded more plausible in Greek. (I do not think this is Rowe's fault.)

(The dialogue is also notable that early on Socrates makes a big song and dance about how he's just a "midwife" and is only going to help bring out the ideas already in young Theaetetus's mind. Then the whole rest of the dialogue is Socrates setting up and knocking down theories, with one piece of criticism from Theaetetus's teacher Theodorus [161]; the youth contributes exactly nothing, beyond the usual "just as you say, Socrates" or "I do not altogether follow, Socrates". [See also.])

Sophist is, supposedly, a sequel, where Theatetus converses with another distinguished visitor, an unnamed philosopher from Elea. (Socrates has vanished.) The goal here is to try to define the character of the sophist, by means of a series of binary distinctions. The visitor propounds a series of very distinct-looking definitions, all unflattering, which are held to be equivalent. To give something of the flavor, one definition (223) is

Then according to what we are saying now, Theaetetus, it seems that if we take expertise in appropriation, in hunting, in animal-hunting, in land-animal-hunting, in the hunting of humans, by persuasion, in private, involving selling for hard cash, offering a seeming education, the part of it that hunts rich and reputable young men is --- to go by what we are saying now --- what we should call the expertise of the sophist.

while another (268) is

The expert in imitation, then, belonging to the contradiction-producing half of the dissembling part of belief-based expertise, the word-conjuring part of the apparition-making kind from image-making, a human sort of production marked off from its divine counterpart --- if someone says that the one who is 'of this family kind, of this blood' is the real sophist, it seems his account will be the truest.

In between, there is a lot of discussion of, essentially, how multiple statements can all be true of the same object.

(Theaetetus opens with a frame-story about someone having witnessed, and taken notes on, the original conversation between Theaetetus, Socrates and Theodorus, and ordering his slave to read the dialogue that follows. This conceit is forgotten in Sophist.)

I am impressed with Theaetetus (though not with Theaetetus), but both books are strange, and left me feeling I'd missed the point. §

Mary Sisson, Tribulations

Mind candy science fiction, sequel to Trang and Trust. It's deeply enjoyable and I hope we don't have to wait another seven years for more. §

Lois McMaster Bujold, Penric and the Shaman, Penric's Mission, Mira's Last Dance, The Prisoner of Limnos, The Orphans of Raspay, The Physicians of Vilnoc, The Assassins of Thasalon, Knot of Shadows

Mind candy fantasy, following on from Penric's Demon but all, I think, self-contained. These are short, minor Bujolds (except for Assassins, which is a full-length novel), but even minor Bujold is a treat. (No purchase link since these only seem available electronically.) §

Domenico Bertoloni Meli, Mechanism: A Visual, Lexical, and Conceptual History

This is a brief but deeply erudite historical study of what "mechanism", "the mechanical philosophy" and mechanical explanations meant during the long 17th century that gave