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Course

Plato’s Theaetetus:An Inquiry into Knowledge

Chapters

Lecture 1 Is Knowledge Just Perception?

Welcome to the Course on Plato's Theaetetus
0:00
How to Read Plato When He Never Speaks
1:47
Why Plato Thought Writing Was Dangerous
3:52
The Paradox of Writing About Writing's Futility
7:24
The Prologue: Death and Character
10:15
Knowledge in Everyday Life Before Philosophy
12:14
Socrates Meets His Ugly Double
14:40
Is Wisdom the Same as Knowledge?
16:37
Examples Are Not Definitions
19:24
The Clay Analogy and Circular Definitions
20:51
Irrational Numbers and the Limits of Language
23:46
Socrates the Intellectual Midwife
26:16
Knowledge Is Perception — The First Answer
30:28
Protagoras and the Measure of All Things
34:08
Ancient Relativism Meets Quantum Mechanics
37:57
Why Perception Destroys Absolute Reality
39:11

Lecture 2 When Every Perception is True

Recap: Characters and Knowledge as Perception
0:00
Heraclitean Flux: Everything Is a River
4:08
Does Real Perception Require Study and Motion?
10:11
The Six Dice Paradox and the Nature of Being
13:16
Color Theory and Secondary Qualities
17:04
Secret Doctrine: Abolishing Being Itself
19:09
Socratic Irony and the Midwife Metaphor
23:33
Dreams, Insanity, and Misperception
29:20
Are All Perceptions True for the Perceiver?
31:27
Running Around the Hearth: Testing the Idea
35:27
Are We No Wiser Than a Pig or Baboon?
36:38
The Foreign Language Objection
39:23
Cheap Shots: Closed Eyes and Fair Dialogue
41:10
Wisdom as Improving Perceptions
44:11
Medicine, Therapy, and the Placebo Effect
48:50
The Problem of Ethical Relativism
50:33

Lecture 3 Does Relativism Refute Itself?

Recap: Knowledge as Perception and the Theory of Becoming
0:01
Can Protagoras Claim Special Wisdom?
4:04
The Peritrope: Does Relativism Refute Itself?
5:37
Experts, Emergencies, and the Power of Prediction
10:21
Politics and the Fact-Value Distinction
12:09
The Digression Begins: Philosopher vs. Lawyer
16:02
What Makes a Philosopher? Freedom, Ignorance, Nobility
18:10
Thales Falls into a Well: The Original Nerd
23:00
Is Socrates Really Describing Himself?
24:30
The Cave Allegory and Combining Two Wisdoms
30:55
Injustice as Its Own Punishment
37:34
After the Digression: Legislation and Usefulness
41:10
The Slippery Heracliteans and Deconstruction
43:55
Parmenides: Being Is and Nothing Changes
45:30
Two Kinds of Change: Motion and Alteration
50:06
Universal Flux Destroys Language Itself
53:23
Preview: Can Perception Really Be Knowledge?
57:15

Lecture 4 The Soul Behind the Senses

Recap: Four Arguments Against Relativism
0:01
The Final Argument Against Knowledge as Perception
2:14
The Psyche as Unifying Consciousness
3:01
Do the Senses Really Never Overlap?
5:23
Common Concepts Beyond Perception
9:57
Categories and the Empiricist vs Rationalist Debate
12:50
Why Separating the Senses Matters
15:25
Being: The Key Concept for Knowledge
18:41
Does Perception Share in Truth at All?
21:21
Knowledge as True Judgment
22:22
Theaetetus Disproves His Own Definitions
25:01
Anticipating True Judgment Plus Logos
26:31
Three Sophistical Arguments Against False Judgment
28:11
The Wax Block Model of Memory
31:33
How the Wax Block Explains False Judgment
35:08
Where the Wax Block Model Breaks Down
40:13
The Nature of Truth and Being
42:42
Preview: Can Knowledge Be Defined?
45:16

Lecture 5 Defeat as Philosophical Victory

Recap: True Judgment and the Wax Block Problem
0:01
The Aviary Model of Memory
1:03
Philosophy as Recollection
2:56
How False Judgment Works in the Aviary
4:21
The Circularity Trap in Explaining Error
6:18
The Jury Counter-Example
9:15
Justified True Belief and the Gettier Problem
10:33
Can Putting Judgment into Words Be Enough?
13:10
Listing Elements as an Account
15:28
The Dream Theory: Perceivable but Unknowable
18:16
The Parts and Wholes Dilemma
22:18
Self-Evidence and the Limits of Analysis
26:20
Descartes and Self-Evident Truths
29:57
Music, Memory, and Temporal Unity
31:39
Account as Distinguishing Mark
33:56
Wind Eggs and Socratic Wisdom
35:45
Snatching Victory from Defeat
41:22
Falsifiability, Learning, and AI
44:16