First distinction and delimitation of two crucial genera

First, then, in my opinion at least, one should make the following division. (27d5)

First explanation of the text: 223.5–224.17

Timaeus is a Pythagorean and right from his opening words he reveals himself as preserving the characteristic manner of Pythagorean accounts. Socrates did not expound his own opinions to others in an affirmative fashion but rather purified the conceptions of those others and so brought the truth to light in a dialectical fashion. Indeed he said to them that he knew nothing except how to offer and receive an account. Timaeus, however, because he is producing his accounts for knowledgeable men, says he is expounding his own doctrine, not bothering with the opinions of others, but pursuing the single path of knowledge. Moreover the use of [the term] opinion (27d5) is very much to the point here and consistent with what was said before. For of the rational soul in its entirety one part is intellect (nous), another is discursive reason (dianoia) and another is opinion (doxa), and of these the first is connected to the gods, the second projects the sciences, while the third provides these to others. This man, then, shows his awareness of these matters by harmonizing his own intellect with that of the gods through his prayers. This was in fact made clear by the [words] everything in conformity above all with the intellect of the gods, but also consequently with ours (27c7–d1). Through his invocations he has roused the discursive part of the soul. This is in fact shown by the [words] how I think (27d3). What remains is the opinative part [of the soul], which receives the scientific distinction (cf. 27d5) from the understanding and channels it towards others. This part (doxa) is neither ambiguous nor parcelled out over the sense-perceptible objects, nor is its form of cognition limited to mere assumptions only, but it has been filled [with information] from the intellect and the understanding, examines the demiurgic plan (logos), and distinguishes the nature of the realities.

Moreover these three aspects adequately resemble the paradigm that the speaker [Timaeus] has before him.