Plato 's The Meno, A Greek Philosopher And The Wisest Of All People

1216 Words5 Pages
Alexis Evans
Midterm Paper
11/4/14
Topic 1 In Plato’s The Meno, Socrates, who was a Greek philosopher and considered one of the wisest of all people expresses his views on the relationship between knowledge and virtue. In todays era, virtue is defined as having good morals as a human being. Knowledge is defined as factual information and skills that are acquired by a person through experience or education. Together Socrates makes a statement and or beliefs, that virtue is knowledge because if you know what is right, you will in fact do what is right. While in a conversation with Socrates, Meno then asks if virtue can ever be taught. Socrates answers his question in that they both have to discuss at that point if virtue can be taught because he is uncertain. They must first define clearly what virtue is to even answer Meno’s question of if virtue can even be taught or not. At the end of the debate, the final conclusion Socrates makes is that virtue is not something natural or can never be taught. Socrates then believes that it is just simply a “gift from god” that we all receive it without ever realizing. Through the process, Meno and Socrates go at it, Meno thinking he is getting close to the correct answer just to have Socrates shot it down. After a few times of Meno guessing, he doesn 't have anything else to say and gives up. Socrates main argument responds with that learning is not discovering anything new but rather remembering something the soul knew before your
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