THE SETTING

Among scholars of ancient philosophy, there is disagreement over whether the Platonic corpus exhibits thematic unity or thematic development. According to “unitarians,” Plato's dialogues present a single, consistent, synoptic philosophical system of which each dialogue gives us a partial or proleptic glimpse. According to “developmentalists,” the same dialogues can be arranged in thematic order that likely corresponds with the order in which they were written.

The main lines of argument that favor developmentalism are these. The “early” dialogues (Apology, Crito, Euthyphro, Charmides, Ion, Hippias Minor, Menexenus, Protagoras, Euthydemus, Lysis, Laches, and Republic I) hew (more or less) to the following paradigm: Socrates (always the protagonist) extracts from his interlocutor a definition or characterization of a morally significant topic (typically, one of the canonical parts of human virtue), proceeds to criticize this definition or characterization “elenctically” by pointing out that the interlocutor's beliefs on the relevant subject are logically inconsistent, and wraps up the discussion by getting the interlocutor to admit to utter confusion (aporia) and ignorance. At no point in these dialogues does Socrates propose or defend his own definition of the parts of human virtue.