DIALECTIC WITH AND WITHOUT SOCRATES:

ON THE TWO PLATONIC DEFINITIONS

OF DIALECTIC*
Michel NARCY

Callias to Socrates (Prot. 335d2-3): If you go, well not discuss in

the same way (ej a ; n ga; r su; ej x ev l qh/ ~, ouj c oJ m oiv w~ hJ m i` n e[ s ontai oiJ
diavlogoi).
How then is a discussion with Socrates? Socrates answer to this
question is the sine qua non condition he exacts in order to continue the
debate: one has to give short answers and keep to the point (dia; bracevwn
te kai; aujta; ta; ejrwtwvmena ... ajpokrivnesqai, ibid. 336a7). That is,
he adds, what makes the whole difference between dialogical discussion
(to; sunei`nai ajllhloi`~ dialegomevnou~) and oratorical performance (to;
dhmhgorei`n). Leaving aside the actual practice of Platos Socrates who is
far from averse to embarking upon long speeches let us concentrate on
the fact that when theorizing dialogue, Socrates defines it by brachylogy.
In the Republic, Book VI, the same Socrates presents as the crowning
achievement of philosophical education the power (duvnami~) or science
(ej p isthv m h) of discussing 1. Here again, rather than showing ones
rhetorical skill, discussion seems to consist in exchanging questions and
answers: we will learn in Book VII that the power or science of discussion
is nothing else than the power or science of giving and taking an
argument 2, of questioning and answering, as the Cratylus will also say,
albeit with less sophistication 3. Now, when at last the word dialectic
(dialektikhv [scil. tevcnh]) appears 4, it seems to be the reminder or the
summary of the earlier phrases duvnami~ or ejpisthvmh tou` dialevgesqai.
* A slightly different version of this paper was published under the title Y a-t-il une
dialectique aprs Socrate? in F. Cossutta & M. Narcy (ed.), La Forme dialogue: volution et
rceptions, Grenoble, 2001.
1. Republic, VI, 511b4, c5.
2. Being not dialecticians is being not dunatoi;... dou`naiv te kai; ajpodevxasqai lovgon
(Republic, VII, 531e4-5).
3. To;n... ejrwta`n kai; ajpokrivnesqai ejpistavmenon... kalei`~ ... dialektikovn (Cratylus,
390c10-11).
4. Republic, VII, 534e3, 536b6.

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Thus, the translators are probably right when they translate, right from
the end of Book VI, to; dialevgesqai (literally discussing) as dialectic.
To sum up, when we read the Republic, Plato appears to make it clear
that there is no dialectic outside Socratic dialogue.
Yet at least on one occasion, Plato denied this identity of dialogue and
dialectic. It happens in that passage from the Sophist where the Eleatic
Stranger wonders if while we were in search of the sophist, we are
likely to have found the philosopher first5 . Why this doubt? Because it
has just transpired that, in order to show which kinds (gevnh) are mutually
consonant and which are mutually exclusive (Soph. 253b11-c1), a science
is needed, analogous to grammatic, the science of letters and of their
combinations. Now, continues the Stranger, which name are we to give
this science? Dividing by kinds (to; kata; gevnh diairei`sqai) without
taking the same form or species (ei\do~) for different nor a different one
for the same, is it not the task of the dialectical science (th` ~
dialektikh` ~ ejpisthvmh~)? (Soph. 253d1-3.) As in Republic VI-VII,
here again, therefore, dialectic is that science specific to the philosopher.
However, as we have just seen, in the Republic this science was first
denoted as the science of discussing: here dialectic was introduced as
the science that needs this one who proceeds in the path of argument in
order to show correctly which kinds are mutually consonant and which
are mutually exclusive6 .
In spite of the different phrasing, some scholars do not hesitate to
recognize in the dialectical science of the Stranger the science of
discussing of Socrates in Republic VI-VII. William S. Cobb, for instance,
writes that the dialectical knowledge (such is his translation of
dialektikh; ejpisthvmh at Soph. 253d2-3) is the knowledge connected
with the art of discourse or dialogue, dialektike7 . But that would appear
to beg the following question. Are we to hold that discussing on the
one hand and proceeding in the path of argument on the other are one
and the same? And if they are, on what grounds is this so? Most translators,
including the first two modern translators of Platos Sophist, do seem to
be careful not to prejudge the answer. Dia; tw`n lovgwn poreuvesqai is
translated by Schleiermacher as seine Reden durchfhren8 , and by Victor
Cousin, conduire son raisonnement9 . Their only disagreement concerns
the meaning of logos in this passage: Schleiermacher opts for a quite
5. Kinduneuvomen, zhtou`nte~ to;n sofisth;n, provteron ajnhurhkevnai to;n filovsofon
(Sophist, 253c8-9).
6. \Ar ouj met ejpisthvmh~ tino;~ ajnagkai`on dia; tw`n lovgwn poreuvesqai to;n ojrqw`~
mevllonta deivxein poi`a poivoi~ sumfwnei` tw`n genw`n kai; poi`a a[llhla ouj devcetai To
proceed in the path of argument is Jowetts translation for dia; tw` n lov g wn poreuv e sqai
(Soph. 253b9-c1).
7. W.S. Cobb 1990, n. 59 ad 253d2-3.
8. F. Schleiermacher 21824. Ficino had already translated: sermones peragere.
9. V. Cousin 1837.

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general meaning of the word, discourse, while Cousin adheres to the

more restricted reasoning. All subsequent translations understandably
opt for one of these two, but hardly any offer a hint of a dialogical mode
of discoursing or reasoning 10.
Admittedly, the interlocutory, or at least al-locutory aspect is not
missing from the indications we are given about this dialectical science:
making his way through the logoi, the dialectician, who the Stranger will
soon after call philosopher, is going to show and consequently, we can
suppose, show to someone. But unlike the Republic, nothing here tells us
that this figure has to answer or that the philosopher has any need of his
answer, that he has to receive it and to know how to receive it, to have
a knowledge of questioning: nothing here suggests that, under the name
of philosopher, it is Socrates who is spoken of Socrates who in Plato,
we should remember, claims no science except this very one, the
knowledge of questioning. Let us dwell on this dialectical science, or
rather on what the Stranger tells us about it. It is the knowledge necessary,
he says, for making ones way through the logoi, if one is to show which
kinds are likely to combine and which are mutually exclusive. On what
grounds are we to acknowledge the necessity of such a science? Because
it has just been discovered that, from the three kinds that were examined
up to now being, motion and rest the second and third necessarily
combine with the first but are themselves mutually exclusive. Thus, kinds
are like letters or articulated sounds: consonants need vowels to be
articulated, some consonants combine, meaning that they are
pronounceable in combination with certain consonants but incompatible
with others. There is a science of these compatibilities and incompatibilities
that our modern would probably call phonetics but that the Greeks called
grammatic; at any rate it is the science of what linguists call the first
articulation of language. How far can we adhere to the alleged analogy
between grammatic and dialectic? If, like grammatic, dialectic is named
after its object, it should be the science of the logoi, just as grammatic is
the science of the grammata. But this is not the case.
The subject-matter of grammatic is what we usually do when we are
speaking or writing: it is the way we combine sounds or the letters which
represent these. There is nothing alike in the case of dialectic. Either it
10. One recent exception : Nicholas P. White 1993, who translates dia; tw` n lov g wn
poreuvesqai by to proceed through the discussion; it is the Jowetts translation, modified
by supposing a dialectical or dialogical content of argument. But this supposition did not
convince ulterior translators such as Eva Brann, Peter Kalkavage and Eric Salem 1996
who, though they list Whites translation among those they have most frequently consulted, go back to the quite literal translation to make his way through accounts (cf.
A. Dis 1925: se guider travers les discours). No more trace of dialectic is to be found in
translations like those of L. Robin 1950: dans la route quil suit travers ses propos),
R. Wiehl 1985: [das] Durchgehen der Rede) or N.L. Cordero 1993: avancer le long des
raisonnements).

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refers to dialevgesqai or to dia; lovgwn, the name dialectic does refer to

speech. But what the dialectician referred to by the Stranger intends to
describe is not the articulation of speech, which is something like a second
articulation of language; instead, he intends to describe the articulation
of kinds. Let us go so far as to acknowledge that making his way through
accounts is the means of describing or showing this articulation; in
other words, let us acknowledge that, in the Sophist as in the Republic,
dialectic is inseparable from speech. Nonetheless, the case is not the
same as it is for grammatic because, unlike the articulation of sounds,
the articulation which dialectic teaches the rules of is not due to us. We
articulate the sounds of language, we write the letters but we do not
articulate kinds. Kinds are articulated by themselves and the articulation
of kinds is not the articulation of speech but of being: being is articulated,
but not by us. Once we are taught by the grammatist, we are able to put
into practice his teaching, to do what we learned, but this is not the case
with the dialectician: what dialectic is about, which is namely being, is
not itself dialectical; one thing is the ability that dialectic gives us to make
our way through accounts; but the science it provides us with that
knowledge of the articulation of kinds is quite another matter. Unlike
Socrates in the Republic, the Stranger would probably consider the phrase
power of discussing (duvnami~ tou` dialevgesqai) to be inappropriate
and inadequate for referring to dialectic.
A dialectic without dialogue: that is what the Sophist speaks of and,
indeed, more than simply speaks of; what comes after our passage, the
examination of the five most important kinds (being, motion, rest,
sameness, otherness) should probably be considered as a specimen of
this dialectic. Of course strictly speaking, this dialectic is not deprived of
speech, since its name is derived from proceeding through speech;
nor does it exclude dialogue, since the specimen displayed by the Stranger
assumes the shape of a dialogue with Theaetetus. But should Theaetetus
withdraw, the Stranger would not be stopped from making his way,
whereas in the Gorgias Socrates is scarcely able to overcome the trouble
caused by Callicles withdrawal.
So, what about Socrates in the Sophist? About Socrates, who Plato
used to portray as the philosopher and according to whom dialectic
consists of a dialogue?
As we know, from the moment when he handed over to the Stranger,
Socrates becomes a silent witness to the discussion a discussion in
which, as we have just seen, his own concept of dialectic is superseded
by another. Do we witness, in the Sophist, a total eclipse of the Socratic
dialogue? Not total, if it is correct to recognize the Socratic method in
the fifth definition of the sophist given by the Stranger (230b4-d4): a
purely negative method, proceeding by way of interrogation in order to
show the inconsistencies in the respondents answers and so to stop him
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from believing that he knows what he doesnt know; thanks to this

treatment a katharsis the latter gets rid of the opinions that inside him
are an obstacle to knowledge. An outstanding summary of the method
of critical examination (self-knowledge) brought into play in the earlier
dialogues, and still in the Theaetetus, according to L. Robin11. Indeed,
one cannot but be struck by the fact that the Stranger is describing for
Theaetetus the very method the young man was subjected to on the very
previous day. It is difficult to believe that Theaetetus does not recognize
it; and it becomes all the more so when in order to describe the beneficial
effects of this cathartic method, the Stranger uses the same words
Socrates used when describing his own method of midwifery and when
bringing the dialogue to an end by underlining how much having been
refuted was beneficial for Theaetetus: those who are so confronted with
their own contradictions, says the Stranger, are angry with themselves
and grow gentle towards others12.
Indeed, the passage reveals not only the judgement passed by the
Stranger on the Socratic method but the way in which this method was
perceived by its latest beneficiary. Actually, it is on the insistence of
Theaetetus rather than the Stranger that the practitioners of the latest
method the Stranger describes will be called sophists. Too odd a trick
for it to be unintentional on Platos behalf. Like all the previous divisions,
the fifth is undertaken on the Strangers initiative (226b): even though he
has given four definitions of the sophist, he goes back over the difficulty
of grasping sophists nature because of this figures poikiliva, the variety
of his shapes. Once the division is achieved, Theaetetus is asked to name
the kind just obtained, as he was previously asked to do three times out
of four 13. But this time the Strangers question is not purely rhetorical:
those who make use of this art, what name shall we give them? For I
am afraid of saying they are sophists 14 . Why?, asks Theaetetus,
surprised, and the Stranger answers: For fear of bestowing upon them
too high a dignity15. So it is up to Theaetetus to argue: And yet there is
a resemblance between what has just been told and that sort of people 16.
11. Op. cit. (supra n. 10), t. II, p. 1456 (n. 1 of p. 278).
12. JEautoi`~ me;n calepaivnousi, pro;~ de; tou;~ a[llou~ hJmerou`ntai (Soph. 230b9-c1,
transl. Jowett). For the first member of the sentence, compare Theaet. 151c2-4: eja;n... ti w|n
a]n levgh ~... uJpexairw`mai kai; ajpobavllw, mh; ajgrivaine. For the second, compare Theaet.
210c3: hJmerwvtero~ (scil. e[sh/) swfrovnw~ oujk oijovmeno~ eijdevnai a} mh; oi\sqa.
13. Cf. 223a7, 224c5, 225e2.
14. Tou;~ tauvth/ crwmevnou~ th` tevcnh/ tivna~ fhvsomen ejgw; me;n ga;r fobou`mai sofista; ~ favnai (230e5-231a1).
15. Mh; mei` z on auj t oi`~ prosav p twmen gev r a~ (231a3). Cornfords construction of the
sentence is the only one possible from a grammatical point of view : aujtoi` ~ refers to tou;~
tauvth/ crwmevnou~ th`/ tevcnh, and not to sofista;`. The reason alleged by Cornford for the
Strangers fear (echoing the Socratic disavowal of knowledge) seems to me less sure.
16. jAlla; mh;n prosevoikev ge toiouvtw/ tini; ta; nu`n eijrhmevna (231a4-5).

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And, at the cost of the nuance introduced by the analogy with the
resemblance between wolf and dog 17 , the Stranger lets himself be
persuaded to call sophists people like Socrates. But in Platos work, nobody
is like Socrates, and Socrates is the only one who uses the method in
question: under the plural used by the Stranger, Plato does not allow us
to recognize anyone but Socrates.
This exchange between the Stranger and Theaetetus reluctance on
Strangers part, resolve on Theaetetus can be read as a discussion of
the real nature of the Platonic dialogue as it had appeared up to then, with
Plato having cast Socrates in the role of leading actor. With the fifth
division, as with the previous four, the Stranger intended to catch the
sophist, this many-sided animal (226a6-7): the more unexpected we
will then find his reluctance, once this division is achieved, to put the
name sophistics upon the art he has just described; yet for Platos
readers, who are likely to have recognized in this art the Socratic method,
this reluctance is comprehensible and maybe even comforting. But they
cannot but be upset when Theaetetus, who also is likely to have recognized
the method he was subjected to on the day before, insists that they call
sophists the practitioners of this: fresh as his memory is of having been
convinced by Socrates of not knowing what he believed to know,
nonetheless he appears not to be in the least embarrassed to explain
even in the presence of Socrates himself that he saw nothing in his
questioning but sophistics or at least something very similar to sophistics.
Now, as we learned in the Theaetetus, Theaetetus has read Protagoras 18
and is far from inexperienced (ouj k a[ p eiro~) as regards sophistical
discussions19: we are thus allowed to think that he passes an informed
judgement when he maintains that Socratic midwifery resembles
sophistics.
The dialogue form, at least in the form in which it was thought of and
subject to theorizing up to the Theaetetus, is thus subsumed under
sophistics: in order to maintain the opposition of philosophy to sophistics,
17. This analogy is far from clear. Most readers understand it as meaning that Socrates is
to a sophist as a dog is to a wolf the tamest of animals contrasted with the fiercest. But
construing the analogy in this way is not faithful to Platos phrasing. Let us look at the Greek
sentences: THEAETETUS: prosevoikev ge toiouvtw/ tini; ta; nu`n eijrhmevna. STRANGER: Kai; ga;r
[scil. prosevoike] kuni; luvko~, ajgriwvtaton hJmerwtavtw/. If we adhere to the distribution of
grammatical cases, we must understand that kuni; and hJ m erwtav t w/ correspond to toiouvtw/
tini; that is, the sophist, luvko~ and ajgriwvtaton to ta; nu`n eijrhmevna that is, the description of a method in which the Stranger is reluctant to recognize sophistics, and which seems
to be the Socratic method of elenchus. So, while we could expect that he who makes his
adressee hJmerou`sqai (cf. 230c1) should himself be compared to the tamest (hJmerwvtato~) of
animals, Plato seems to change the roles unexpectedly : yet let us remember that in the
Apology Socrates compares himself to a gadfly (30e5), an animal which, though small, is
hardly tame!
18. Theaet. 152a5.
19. Theaet. 155c6; cf. 158 b5-c7, where Socrates reminds Theaetetus that he has already
heard discussions about the indiscernibility of waking from dreaming.

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one has now to dissociate philosophy from dialogue. On the other hand,
if Plato wants to maintain the link between philosophy and dialectic20, he
has to coin a new definition of dialectic: the one he puts into the mouth of
the Stranger in the passage commented upon at the beginning of this
essay. According to this definition, as we have seen, dialectic consists
no longer in discussion, but in the science which makes the philosopher
able not to discuss but to make his way through the accounts a phrase
that is vague enough not to exclude discussion but does not make it the
core of the business, either; indeed, this phrase is the proposal of a new
etymology for dialektikhv: dia; lovgwn instead of the previous and much
more plausible dialev g esqai. So dialectic is now distinguished and
independent from dialogue. Whereas Socrates used to mark out the frontier
between dialectic and eristics by differentiating two modes of discussion 21,
this frontier is now drawn between dialectic and dialogue. More exactly,
between dialectic and Socratic dialogue, or elenchus.
Indeed, whatever Socrates says, the Sophist classifies his practice of
dialectic as a species of the genus eristics: before giving the new definition
of dialectic, it is what the Stranger has achieved through the fourth
division. The fourth definition of the sophist (money-maker, 226a1) is
obtained by a distinction between a certain kind of eristics through which
one makes money, and another through which one wastes money instead.
If the proper name of the former is sophistics, for the latter the Stranger
has no name to suggest but ajdolescikovn (225d10), which is usually
translated by babbling. Let us notice that we would have the same
translation if the text read ajdolescei`n ; that is, we miss in the translation
the nuance brought by the ikov~ desinence. Words with this desinence
usually refer to technical expertise (tevcnai), and Plato coins many words
of this form to put them into the mouth of the Stranger during his
divisions. Some of these neologisms may aim at a comic effect, but none
of them so conspicuously as aj d olescikov n, which raises to a tev c nh
such a childish (or senile) mode of speaking as babbling.
Yet we cannot be sure that it is a real witticism. As G.J. De Vries has
rightly pointed out, wheresoever ajdolevsch~ and its cognates occur in
Platos works, they are terms of abuse22. We may add that every time
20. Why doesnt Plato drop dialectic? One may wonder. The plausible answer is psychological rather than theoretical: like many philosophers, and not only philosophers, Plato is
not prepared to acknowledge his change of mind. Cf. D. Sedley 2004, ch. 1, 5: Platos
Unitarianism.
21. Cf. Meno, 75c8-d7.
22. Cf. G.J. De Vries 1975, 15. As De Vries remarks, the point seems to have escaped
the lexicographers: from ten dictionaries he checked, only one (Passow-Crnert, 1912)
abstains from giving the word a favourable sense; thirty years later, nothing has changed.
Now, for the supposed favourable meaning of aj d olev s ch~, aj d olesciv a and cognates, the
dictionaries can only allege occurrences in Plato: so to decide when Plato uses the term
favourably or not is only a matter of interpretation.

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these words are put into Socrates mouth 23, they clearly hint at the way
in which he was represented by the comic poets24, who, Plato has him
saying in the Apology, were his first accusers25. The same certainly holds
for Parm. 135d5 and for Polit. 299b8, the latter being a strong implicit
allusion to Socrates as characterised by his accusers 26, and the former,
a clear retort to those accusers. On at least two occasions (Phaedr. 269e4270a1 and Crat. 401b8-9), one can hypothesize that Socrates uses
ajdolevsch~ or ajdolesciva ironically 27 . But what about our ajdolescikovn ?
At best it is ironical, at least ambiguous. According to Proclus, it is the
rubric under which the Stranger puts dialectic 28; his argument for thinking
this is that in Platos homonymous dialogue, Parmenides calls ajdolesciva
the method with which he wants Socrates to train29 . But as Proclus himself
remarks, Parmenides does not simply call his method babbling but
adds what the many call babbling 30. As for the Stranger, he abstains
from making this point so that it is not clear whether he gives ajdolescikovn
the Parmenidean meaning or its literal sense whether he speaks like
the many or not.
Now, why should we think he does not speak like the many? From
him we read no reservation about the common meaning of the word no
more than Socrates offers us when, in the Theaetetus, he happens to call
himself a babbler 31. I do not know of any scholar who has observed a
reminder of the Theaetetus in the fourth division of the Sophist. And yet
it is should be noted that the second to last stage of the division (the very
last being the definition of the sophist as distinct from the babbler) opposes
two kinds of disputation (ajntilogikovn, 225b13-c9): one about contracts
(peri; ta; sumbovlaia), which is carried out at random and without
23. Phaed. 70c1-2, Phaedr. 269e4-270a1, Crat. 401b8-9, Resp. VI, 489a1, Theaet.
190b10-c2.
24. Cf. Eupolis, fr. 352 Kock = SSR IA 12: misw` de; kai; to;n Swkravthn, to;n ptwco;n
ajdolevschn. At the end of Aristophanes Clouds, as he is going to set Socrates house on fire,
Strepsiades calls it the babblers house (th; n oij k iv a n tw` n aj d olescw` n) (Aristoph. Nub.
1484-1485).
25. Plato, Ap. 18a7 ff.
26. D. Sedley 2003, 100 n. 1.
27. It must be said that certain scholars and prestigious ones at that think that the
Phaedrus passage must be taken as serious (cf. C.J. Rowe 1986, n. ad 269e1-270a8, p. 204205; Rowe himself defends the ironic interpretation). According to D. Sedley 2003, 100, in
the Phaedrus passage we encounter a mixture of irony and earnestness, and the like in the
Cratylus.
28. Proclus, Commentarium in Platonis Parmenidem, col. 657, 25-26 Cousin.
29. Cf. Plato, Parm. 135d4-5: Guvmnasai ma`llon dia; th` ~ dokouvsh~ ajcrhvstou ei\nai
kai; kaloumevnh~ uJpo; tw`n pollw`n ajdolesciva ~.
30. Proclus, ibid. col. 656, 27-30 Cousin.
31. Plato, Theaet. 195b10-c2. Contrary to what Proclus (In Parm. 657, 5-15) and most
scholars after him have thought, which is that Socrates would be calling his own practice of
dialectic babbling here, he is actually blaming himself for having previously been mistaken in
his reasoning. In other words, in this passage Socrates doesnt ironically call the true dialectician babbler, but, literally, the bad dialectician he thinks he has just been.

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rules of art (eijkh` kai; ajtevcnw~) , and one which disputes by rules of
art about justice and injustice themselves (e[ntecnon kai; peri; dikaivwn
aujtw`n kai; ajdivkwn... ajmfisbhtou`n); the former is not named, but the
latter is labelled as eristic. Now, with due deference to Cornford, who
notices only the opposition without/by rules of art 32, it is difficult not to
think of the opposition raised in the middle of the Theaetetus between the
man only interested in the question What injustice have I done to you or
you to me? and the man who examines justice and injustice in themselves
(aujth`~ th` ~ dikaiosuvnh~ te kai; ajdikiva ~) 33. So the Eleatic Stranger
takes over the difference stated by Socrates in the Theaetetus between
the man trained in forensic oratory and the man trained in philosophy;
the novelty here and the surprise! is that the latter, who Socrates calls
a philosopher34, is labelled as eristic by the Eleatic Stranger, who then
obtains the definition of the sophist through a further division inside the
genus so named. As a result, we have to admit that to the Strangers
mind the sophist has the same intellectual interests and is engaged in the
same kinds of discussion as Socrates philosopher 35. Thus, the only
relevant difference between the last two species obtained through the
fourth division is either making or wasting money; and so while to the
Strangers mind the sophist appears to be as much a philosopher as the
so-called babbler 36, it seems highly plausible that Socrates himself is
alluded to through the characteristic of not making money: this was what
he used to proudly claim. So the least we can say is that here Socrates is
characterized not as a philosopher he has this characteristic in common
with the sophist but, among eristics who he otherwise resembles, as a
money-waster instead of maker: as a babbler, in a sense very near to
what comic poets and Athenian people influenced by them actually meant
when they spoke of him. Thus, to the degree that we can hypothesize
that the Stranger uses ajdolescikovn ironically, we may suspect that while
obtaining a fourth definition of the sophist, he passes the same judgement
on Socrates as his accusers and condemners. In this respect, the fourth
definition appears as an appropriate prelude to the fifth according to the
32. F.M. Cornford 1970 [ 11935], 176.
33. Theaet. 175c1-2.
34. Theaet . 175e2. This is the only occurrence in the so-called digression where
Socrates uses the word filov s ofo~ while attributing it to Theodoros: o} n dh; filov s ofon
kalei`~. Elsewhere in the same section (172c3-177c2), Socrates uses such circumlocutions as
men who spend much time in philosophical studies (173c8-9, cf. 172c5, 174b1), bred in
philosophical pursuits (172c9-d1), that most of translators abbreviate into philosopher(s).
35. This may be of no surprise: as is well known, Isocrates would also use the terms
eristic or sophist to label the Academicians as well as actual sophists or rhetors.
36. To be more precise, inquiring into justice and injustice themselves makes, at least to
the Strangers mind, no actual difference between the sophist and the philosopher: at this
stage of the dialogue, we have still to learn what this difference actually consists in, to know
which kinds or species are likely to combine and which are mutually exclusive a technical
rather than a theoretical difference.

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which, through a new division, Socrates will be regarded as a sophist even

if a noble one!
So this eleatic Stranger who will prevent Theaetetus from confusing
sophist and philosopher does not seem to be embarrassed in classifying
Socrates as a sophist twice. Moreover, once he has caught Socrates in
the net he has woven with his definitions, he stops hunting the sophist.
Are we to understand by this that the actual aim of the sophist hunting
was to catch Socrates? Perhaps this would be going too far. Nevertheless,
we must certainly observe how different the Strangers method is from
the Socratic method. Whereas the Socratic rule is to replace a rejected
definition with another in the hope of eventually obtaining the truth, the
Stranger constantly adds one definition after another and puts them side
by side, rejecting none. Thus he fails to comply with the well known
Socratic condition that there should be just one definition37. Admittedly,
he will go on to select one of the definitions previously obtained as the
best 38, but this selection will not mean rejecting the others; rather, the
definition of the sophist as a practitioner of contradiction (ajntilogikov~ )
could be understood as something that approaches the common
denominator of the whole set. It would appear that herein lies the essence
of the Strangers method, which is to attempt no refutation: each definition
is good but no single definition is exclusive, so that, as he eventually
says, the more the better!39 Here Plato confronts us with a paradox: after
the Stranger was introduced by Socrates (maybe for propitiation) as a
god of refutation40, he never practises refutation. To be precise, he
never practises refutation in the Socratic way, which would mean using
cross-examination. Later in the dialogue he will introduce the parricide
to be committed upon Parmenides as a refutation (e[legco~)41. However,
this refutation will not take the shape of the classical Socratic crossexamination : there will be no dialogue with Parmenides, no attempt to
make him contradict himself 42. The Stranger will proceed instead by
inquiring about being and by displaying the intertwining of the five most
important kinds43, in order to refute Parmenides; and then, in order to
refute the sophistic claim that it is impossible to speak falsely, he will
deliver a linguistic analysis according to which sentences, not words,
are meaningful and are therefore bearers of truth. At no point is there any
37. Cf. Men. 72a6-73c8; Theaet. 146d3-148d7.
38. Soph. 232b3-6. The definition retained by the Stranger as the best is the characterization of the sophist as aj n tilogikov ~ : it must be noted that this is not one of the six
definitions given previously, but the second to last stage of the division that ended in the
fourth definition of the sophist as eristic.
39. Cf. Soph. 231c5-6.
40. Qeo;~ w[n ti~ ejlegktikov ~ (Soph. 216b5-6).
41. Soph. 242a8, cf. 241e1, 242b1, 242b2, 242b4.
42. Cf. E. Grasso 2006.
43. Plato, Soph. 254d4: mevgista tw`n genw`n.

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manner of cross-examination: the method consists in opposing theory

with theory, in displaying the knowledge of which kinds combine and
which do not, that is the dialectic newly defined, that non-dialogical
dialectic examined earlier in this paper. So we may conclude that to the
new definition of dialectic given by Plato in the Sophist there corresponds
an equally new practice of dialectic.

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