On the question of Aristotle’s relation to Plato: a problem of knowledge

Abstract

The purpose of this essay is to examine Aristotle’s relation to Plato in terms of their understanding of knowledge. Evolution of the philosophical system of Aristotle is interpreted as a transition from technique of polysubjective speech activity (“Topica”) to monosubjective conception of knowledge as a state of existential plenitude (“Analytics”, “De anima”, “Metaphysics”). The essay notes that the second half of the XX century updated interest to the Aristotle’s “Topica”. This interest, in turn, has allowed to reveal new aspects of Aristotle’s philosophical development, which to some extent was caused by discussions of the late Academy and by the peculiarities of the discourse of Plato’s school, where a problem of construction of definition took up one of the central places. Problem of definition was included in the problem of completeness of knowledge, and that, in turn, was conjugated with the existential and metaphysical issues. A study of Aristotle’s interpretations of knowledge set critical rethinking about the possibility to translate the concept of “ἐπιστήμη” as “science”. The concept of science refers primarily to the category of activity or field of objective information, while Aristotle supposed, probably, essential-existential context for the concept of “ἐπιστήμη”. This brings Aristotle and Plato together, at least in that aspect, how the problem of knowledge is considered in the dialogue “Theaetetus”, where the knowledge is regarded as a transformative moment. It is transformativeness, its means and methods, provides the basis for specific field of historical and philosophical reconstruction. This essay is based on general works (B. Jaeger, P. Hadot, S. S. Avernitsev, V. V. Bibikhin, Yu.A. Shichalin et al.) and special monographs and comparative studies (V. S. Sementsov, J. Taber, O. Primavesi, P. Slomkovski, A. Bradshaw et al.). Refs. 24.