PERL, Eric D., Sense-Perception and Intellect in Plato

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SENSE-PERCEPTION AND INTELLECT IN PLATO

Author(s): Eric D. Perl
Source: Revue de Philosophie Ancienne, Vol. 15, No. 1 (1997), pp. 15-34
Published by: EURORGAN s.p.r.l. - Éditions OUSIA
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SENSE-PERCEPTION AND INTELLECT IN PLATO
Beginning with Aristotle, and continuing to this day, there

has been a widespread tradition of presenting Plato's philosophy
as a form of metaphysical and epistemological dualism. According
to this conventional reading, Plato teaches, at least in the so
called "middle dialogues", that there are two différent kinds of
beings, two sets of objects, or two "worlds", one consisting of
sensible particulars and the other of intelligible forms. Corres
ponding to these two worlds are two différent cognitive func
tions, sense-perception and intellection, by which we have access
to the sensible and the intelligible respectively. This interprét
tion, however, fundamentally misrepresents what Plato is saying
in these dialogues The very notion of a dualism between the
real and something other than the real makes no sense, for what
is other than the real ipso facto cannot constitute a second rea
lity. If, as Plato insists, the forms alone are το δν, that which is
then there cannot be δντα, beings, other than the forms. Sensi
bles, therefore, are not other things besides the forms, but are
appearances of the forms ; and the distinction of appearanc
from reality is not a distinction of one reality from another2
1. This issue is of immédiate concern to contemporary thought. Post

modern philosophers have claimed that the "Platonic dualism" of sen
sible/intelligible, and its parallel dual oppositions of signifier/signified
image/archetype, writing/speech, world/God, etc. are the foundational
structure of ail western thought. If it can be shown that Plato himself, and
the tradition which stems ffom him, does not interpret these distinctions
in terms of dualistic opposition, the recent critique of western though
will have to be fundamentally re-assessed.
2. Cf. J.N. Findlay, Plato: The Written and Unwritten Doctrines
REVUE DE PHILOSOPHIE ANCIENNE, XIV, I, 1997
16 Eric PERL
Sense-perception, corres
of apprehending sensibl
must be the appréhens
Hence, a careful readin
ception in relation to in
listic opposition, but rat
des of Cognition, from s
being, that is, of form.
less adequately, as it app
more adequately, as it is
of that which is, and a
higher and lower modes, o
Plato's clearest and most succinct statement of the relation
between sense and intellect occurs in the Phaedrus, where he is
explaining why only a soul which has direct experience of the
forms can be a human soul : "For it is necessary that man under
stand what is said according to form, going from many sense
perceptions to a one gathered together by reasoning ; and this is
recollection..." (249bc). This plainly indicates that what Plato
means by "recollection" is not a Substitute for our rational facul
ty, but rather the act of reasoning itself. Recollection or reason
ing, the process by which we corne to know the forms, consists
in recognizing what is one and the same in sense-experiences
which are many and différent. Β y observing the sameness in
différent expériences, reason recognizes what they are expérien
ces of. Reason understands the content of sense-perception by
(New York, 1974), pp. xi-xii : "[I]t is incredibly wrong to treat Platonism
as a form of dualism, as involving the postulation of a second world of
detached meanings over against the solid world of particular things. If
Plato believed or disbelieved anything, he disbelieved in the genuine
being of particular things : eternal Natures may for hlm be changeably
and inadequately instantiated, but there is nothing substantial, nothing
ontically ontic, in such instantiations". The présent study is to a large
extent an élaboration and justification of this central thesis of Findlay's
reading of Plato.
SENSE-PERCEPTION AND INTELLECT IN PLATO 17
seeing the patteras, the structures of sameness and différen

the intelligible natures, which appear in it. Intellection, the
does not simply leave sense-perception behind, but gathers a
articulâtes it. The différence between sense-perception and in
lection, therefore, lies not in their being directed toward tw
différent kinds of objects, but rather in the mode in which t
object is apprehended : the intelligible nature which sense pe
ceives in differentiated multiplicity, intellect grasps in unity.
Plato describes this relation from the opposite side, proce
ing from the one to the many, in the passage of the Republ
where, for the first time in that dialogue, he explicitly introduce
the theory of forms : "Each [form] is itself one, but, as the
appear everywhere by communion with actions and bodies an
each other, each appears as many (πολλά φαίνεσθαι)" (476a)3
Here it becomes clear that the instances of the forms which
occur in sense-experience, such as the beauty of this woman, the
justice of this man, and so on, are multiple appearances of the
unitary forms. Hence it is not the case that a form is and its
many instances also are, constituting two différent "worlds" or
sets of objects, accessible to intellection and sense-perception
respectively. Rather, there is in each case a single reality, the
intelligible nature or form. We may apprehend it as one, when
we are operating intellectually, understanding the nature itself
which is the same in ail the différent occurrences ; or we may
apprehend it as it appears, as many, when we are operating
according to sense-perception alone and thus failing to under
stand the one same nature of which we have many différent
3. It would be a mistake to interpret the "actions and bodies" as the

causes of the multiple appearances of the form, which would imply that
they exist independently of the forms themselves, and have an effect on
them. This is contrary to Plato's statements that sensibles are not δντα,
that they have no reality save as shadows, images, or appearances of the
forms. Plato is here describing the fact of instantiation, not the cause of it.
The "actions and bodies", then, are not the cause of, but are constituted
in, the forms' appearing multiply.
18 Eric PERL
expériences. The distinc

is not a distinction be
between apprehending
This is why Plato here
and sounds embrace be
their understanding is
the beautiful" (476b). T
which they embrace, a
itself, but are appearan
the beautiful as it appe
their consciousness is
appearances and so can
which is appearing in t
The same understandi
discussion of intellecti
Here, after mentioning
the good, he says,
I am speaking about ail

and in a word, the subs
each being is. Is what
through the body ?...H
ail goes toward each by
his understanding any
ception along with rea
itself by itself, tries to
itself..,(65d-66a).
At first glance this lo

between sense and intellect4. But a closer considération reveals
the continuity that Plato is describing here. The activity of the

mind is to "hunt down" the substance, the reality, of the natures
4. See e.g. David Gallop, in Plato, Phaedo, Translated with Notes

(Oxford, 1975), pp. 94-95, for a dualistic reading of this passage.
SENSE-PERCEPTION AND INTELLECT IN PL ΑΤΟ 19
which appear in sense-perception, to understand what is t

very reality which the senses are perceiving. Strength, h
beauty, and so on, are intelligible natures which "show up
instances in our experience of strong, healthy, or beautif
dies. The mind seeks to understand what we are experiencin
identify the content that is given in sense-experience.
again, therefore, sense and intellect do not have two separat
of objects, but are rather lower and higher ways of apprehe
the intelligible natures which make up reality.
In sense-perception, forms are always seen not simpl
themselves, as what they are, but as instances or appearan
bound up with particularizing conditions extraneous to th
tures themselves. Consider, for example, the "equal sticks
Phaedo 74b. The equality we become aware of in percei
these sticks is, necessarily, the equality of the sticks, equalit
belonging to these sticks, in this experience, recognized on
connection with the sticks and conditioned by the respect
which they are equal, e.g. length or weight. But the intelli
nature equality itself, what-it-is-to-be-equal, is not so conf
or conditioned. The purpose of the passage is to establish
distinction between a form and its instance, not to indicate
the sticks are not truly or precisely equal5. However we inte
5. Such a suggestion would be irrelevant and indeed destructiv

Plato's argument, for he is trying to show that our knowledge o
forms cannot be merely derived from sensible instances. If this were
because of the latter's imperfect instantiation of the forms, the exam
the sticks would not be universalizable, for perfect instances, of equ
and of other forms, are in fact possible. Cf. Gallop, Phaedo, pp. 128-
"The sticks 'fall short' of [the Equal], not in failing to be exactly equ
claim for which the présent passsage has provided no argument wha
but rather in that they are non-identical with it... On this view, t
gement that sensible equals 'fall short' of the Form Equal will not be
of a piain man confronted with logs that he regards as not quite equ
will be the judgement of a philosopher, who has recognized that the
is distinct from its sensible instances..." See also Kenneth Dorter,
20 Eric PERL
the vexed passage at

draw from it is not that
that, although they are
equals, and the equal it
he indicates that the in
form (74d), its deficien
simply in its being an
itself. Even a perfect i
form itself, and in thi
such, exhibits an inte
particularizing conditi
In seeing the sticks we
rentiating features oth
through sense-percep
equality itself, but only
nature. It is indeed th
apprehend it only as it
lity, Recollection, and Pu

and Richard Patterson, Im
napolis, 1985), pp. 165-16
instantiation" reading of t
6. That the sticks appear
"equal to one thing but n
tations, for they show th
equality in itself
is not. T
but not to another", or "
relevant, for they say noth
one time. The "deficiency"
it would have no metaph
fers the latter interprétat
equal in some respect, we
But Plato's point is that th
equal if we do not already
cannot "abstract" this con
made such a judgment.
This explains Plato's insistence that the function of inte

is to grasp a form "itself by itself ' (αυτό καθ' αΰτό), to
stand what are the various characters which appear in an
the very content of our experience : to know, for example
is equality, which appears both in these sticks and in many
expériences. Thus, in the Symposium, Plato describes the in
tual vision of the Beautiful in the same terms he uses to refer to
the knowledge of any form as distinct from its instances or
appearances : "It is not beautiful in one respect but ugly in
another, nor beautiful at one rime but not at another, nor beauti
ful in relation to one thing and ugly in relation to another... Nor
will it appear...anywhere as being in something other, as in an
animal or in earth or in heaven or in anything eise, but itself by
itself with itself..." (21 lab). The vital point is that in this vision
beauty does not appear to the mind "in something other", i.e. as
the beauty of something, differentiated by limiting conditions
which do not belong to beauty itself, and hence is perfectly
understood for what it itself is, αύτό.,.ό εστι καλόν (211cd)7.
This is not an appearance but the content of ail expériences of
beauty, what is truly delightful and attractive in ail the instances.
Here again, therefore, intellection is the faculty of grasping the
very natures which appear in sense-experience.
The same conclusion emerges from Plato's example of the
finger in the Republic. In perceiving a finger we find it to be
both hard and soft, both large and small, in différent respects and
7. This should not be taken to imply the réduction of the ecstatic

communion described by Plato to a mere conceptual grasp of what-it-is
to-be-beautiful. The appréhension of any form transcends our ordinary,
instantial consciousness, which is always focusing on this or that instance
of a nature rather than the nature itself in its unconditioned absoluteness.
But if, as Plato suggests, the Beautiful or the Good is the "form of forms",
the suprême principle of which the forms themselves are spécifications or
instances, then only the Beautiful is absolutely not-an-instance, and in the
vision of the Beautiful thought transcends ail limitation whatsoever.
Hence it is right to présent this vision as a mystical ecstasy.
22 Eric PERL
relations. We are thus

intelligible natures, of t
ness, and so on. "Sight
somewhat commingle
soul is at a loss as to w
it says the same thing
understand its expérie
by forcing the mind t
small, "to see large and
guished", and thus "t
small" (524d). In orde
mind must distinguish
ing in sense-perception
rizing features of each
long to those natures t
then, is to disentangle
tion, to understand wh
the finger shows most
not différent from th
intellection
is the unde
themselves are the nat
ted ways, to sense-pe
acknowledges the beau
acknowledges beauty
leads him to the knowl
in waking reality" (Re
of sense-perception wit
the forms, but he does
cannot think the form
conditions, and therefo
is living in a dream, n
because he is looking at
(there can be no objects
his consciousness consi
which he knows as wh
joined with conditions extraneous to itself and not recogn

the same in other instances. If Plato, in so many familia
ges, sounds like a dualist, this is not because he is describin
classes of objects, sensible and intelligible, but because
describing two modes of cognizing and living in the world
Plato uses the fïnger example to illustrate the educatio
progression which he depicts graphically by means of th
ded line and the parable of the cave. This ascent, and
"ascents of the soûl" which we find in Plato (such as the
do's discussions of the soul's separating itself from the bod
going to the forms, or the soul's chariot-ride in the Phaed
represent nothing other than the mind's ascending mode
Cognition. In spite of Plato's wamings about myth, we (te
to be lovers of sights and sounds), are often seduced b
spatial metaphor, the image of the soul traveling to the re
the forms, into thinking of the ascent as a joumey from
world, one set of objects, to another, from sensibles to for
moment's reflection, however, shows us that this interpré
cannot be correct. The "place" of the forms "above the he
(Phaedrus 247c) obviously cannot be taken literally, f
forms are not spatial entities. This may seem so obvious a
unworthy of mention, but its broader implication, that th
ney to the forms is a change in our mode of cognizing r
rather than a transition of the mind from one set of obje
another, is less widely recognized. A more careful readin
considération will show that the "ascent of the soul" is not a
movement from one world to another, but is rather the changing
attitude of the mind in the face of reality, as it rises from mere
sense-perception to intellectual understanding.
In his account of the divided line, Plato expressly tells us that
the four levels correspond, not to différent classes of objects, but
to différent modes of Cognition : "For the four divisions, take
these for expériences (παθήματα) in the soul : intellection for the
highest, understanding for the second...belief for the third, and
imagination for the last..." (Republic 511de). In the Phaedrus, it
24 Eric PERL
is clear that the "place

found represents the
"Substance which reall
intangible, visible to th
this place". (247c). An
soul from the body"
(since the soul, like the
the merely biological
body, for it "travels" to
purification not turn ou
the soul from the body
itself together complet
far as possible, both in
itself, released, as it w
Later in the Phaedo, P
ing in purely epistemo
the body to investigat
through hearing or thr
"investigating itself by
pure and ever-existin
there is no reference t
metaphor simply to de
ty. The death which ph
soul, then, is not biolo
and living in reality. T
forms is not a passage
understanding of realit
intelligible structures a
fïed in sense-experienc
If the divided line, th
the soul from the body
ascending modes of Co
Phaedrus represents t
here says that the soû
which is, go away and
ξαστή)" (248b). That is to say, they live at the level of

opinion, the mode of Cognition associated with sense-perc
as distinct from intellection (e.g. Republic 477a-480a ;
maeus 51d-52a). This description of the fall as a failure fu
"see" the forms, and a turn to sense-perception and opin
stead, implies that sense-perception is itself a weaker mo
of intellection, an imperfect grasp or dim vision of intell
form, a less adéquate way of apprehending reality. The d
of the soul, then, is not the fall of a pre-existing disemb
soul "into" a body, but rather the acceptance of a lower
experiencing reality, operating at the level of mere sense-
tion, collecting sense-experiences without understanding
short, being a "lover of sights and sounds". Indeed, on
have understood the "ascent to the forms" as the intellectual
appréhension of reality, it becomes clear that Plato's doctrine of
learning as recollection, and of the "pre-existence" of the soul
outside the body, is no less mythic than the spatial placement of
the forms "above the heavens"8. Time, no less than space, is a
condition of the body, of becoming, of sense-perception. The
argument in the Phaedo for the theory of recollection, using the
example of the equal sticks, does not in fact justify the conclu
sion that the soul knew the form of equality before (temporally)
it entered the body. What it does succeed in demonstrating is that
the knowlege of the equal is prior to sense-experience, not chro
nologically, but in the sense that it cannot be derived from it and
is a necessary condition for our récognition of the sticks as
equal. The knowledge of the forms has a logical and epistemic,
not a temporal priority, to the interprétation of sense-experience.
Indeed, as Plato knows well, the forms are not in time at ail,
8. Dorter, art. cit., pp. 210-218, has clearly demonstrated that the
theory of pre-existence and recollection is a metaphor for the non-empi
rical aspect of human knowledge and the communion of the soul, qua
rational, with eternal truth. This obviously correct reading deserves to be
universally known and accepted.
26 Eric PERL
any more than they ar

explains in the Timaeus
a timeless présent: "'W
have come to be, which
it, to eternal being. For
speech only 'is' is appr
Atting to be said of b
The mind, in knowing
reality and so transcen
time, and not the mem
what Plato calls "recol
pre-existence is a myth
human soul, as ration
principles9. In short, w
temporal dimension of
sical dimension. Then
rational soul which is
experience, and "reco
intellectual knowledge o
very first passage we
that recollection is the
city of sense-perceptio
"fall" or to "forget" m
alone. The myth of pre-
différent ways of livi
différent stages in the l
In fact, a more prosai
really is may be found
Republic, dialectic is t
9. Ibid., pp. 217-18 : "By

terms of temporal priorit
literal metaphor of the pr
séquence that, since we are
measure of immortality at
ce which passes through mathematics, astronomy, and har

nies, whose entire purpose is to train the mind in graspin
versal principles, such as the laws of number, motion, and
mony, which are merely exemplified in the measurement
bodies, the movements of the heavens, and the sounds of m
Ail these studies are a préparation for dialectic, which Plat
sents in precisely the same terms as the soul's "going t
forms" in the Phaedo : the dialectician "tries, without ail
perceptions, by reason, to set out after what each thing fi.e
nature or thought-content] itself is" (532a). He does this, as
explains in the Phaedrus (and later, in more detail, in the Sophi
by the method of collection and division. We may underst
this by once again referring to Phaedrus 249bc : we go fr
sense-perception to a knowledge of the forms by "gatheri
i.e. by collection, recognizing the sameness in many diffé
sense-experiences, and by division, the corresponding réco
tion of what distinguishes these instances from ail others. E
form is a species of sameness and of différence, a distinguis
nature or identity, a way of being the same as some things
différent from others. The method of collection and division is
"to draw what is variously dispersed into one idea, seeing it ail
together (συνορώντα)" and "to divide according to forms, at the
natural joints" (Phaedrus 265de), i.e. to grasp the objective same
nesses and différences which appear in sense-experience, in their
relation to each other. Dialectic, then, is a vision of the structure
of reality as a system of interrelated forms. As Plato says in the
Republic, the dialectician is "synoptic" in his appréhension of ail
that he has learned (537c). This dialectical grasp of the structure
of reality which appears in sense-experience is the contemplative
vision of the forms. Hence it is not a "disembodied" or "other
worldly" State, not an escape from, but rather a pénétration into,
the intelligible content which is given in sense-perception.
What we find in the middle dialogues, then, is not "two worlds",
the sensible and the intelligible, and two différent faculties for
approaching them, but rather one world, consisting of intelligible
28 Eric PERL
form, which may be ap

plation, or intellection,
ne. This interprétation is
part of the Parmenides,
forms as it appears in th
of these arguments shows
force on the false presu
parallel ontological statu
instance another thing, or
worlds. Thus when Socra
must be présent in each
one and the same will, a
parate, and thus it woul
the case only if we imag
same sense that the form
itself, which is one and
Helen and the beauty of
ties, for these are multi
Penelope's beauty are sim
unique Beautiful, then e
or by itself but "in com
tors. Thus, if we think o
other than and additiona
one form, the difficulty
or be seen as many, in d
out its unity and self-id
factors which distinguis
do not divide the reality
man" arguments (132ab,
ke, regarding the form an
kind, co-ordinate, co-nu
ing a common anterior f
kingly, tums on the adm
among us" (133c, repeat
norcan they be with us"
re theory, which insists precisely that the forms are "amo

shining oui at us on all sides in the instances which partici
them, and that our minds, being rational, do have access to
If they were not "among us", "we", our world, would ha
being at ail. The admission makes sense only if we interpr
"séparation" of the forms in a crudely dualistic manner, th
separating the "sensible world" from the forms, and fail
see that the sensible, thus eut off from the intelligible,
have no reality whatsoever. Indeed, we may even suggest
Plato wrote the fïrst part of the Parmenid.es precisely to do a
with the dualistic misinterpretation of the middle dialogu
demonstrating its incohérence, rather than to reject the theor
forms itself10. Hence he stocks it with arguments which
powerful against the "two-world" view, but have no force
his actual position.
In any case, the notion of a form as one being and an in
as another being, or of forms and instances as constitutin
worlds, is contrary to Plato's express and repeated statem
that only the forms are being s (οντα, things that are)". T
10. For this interprétation of the Parmenides, cf. Patterson,

and Reality, p. 51 : "[T]he regress of similarities of the Parmenides.
viewed, like the other arguments given there, as bringing out t
trous conséquences of one possible...misinterpretation of particip
On the nature of this misinterpretation, see Findlay, Plato, pp. 235
"[A]ll [the arguments]...are vitiated by an instantial ontology [
assumption that instances are real beings] of which Platonism is
gation...The error of the argument set forth in the First Part of th
nides does not therefore consist in supposing that the characters of
have the genuine reality of the things they characterize...but rathe
so-called things have genuine reality and that characters are not
cause they do not behave as these things do".
11. A rare exception occurs at Phaedo 79a, where Plato says
sensibles and intelligibles are δύο είδη των όντων. But since thi
trary to his usual practice of reserving the term όντα for intelligib
must assume that he is simply speaking loosely here and not us
term in its strict and proper sense.
30 Eric PERL
not to say, of course,

sheer illusion. They ar
which in no way is" (R
of the forms and thus
being l2. But reality c
natures or forms 13. Hence forms and instances are not ontolo
gically commensurable ; we cannot add together the Beautiful
and a beautiful woman, or the Large and a large man, to get two
beautiful or two large things. All the beauty or largeness there
can ever be is already contained in the form, and the instance
12. It is commonly objected to this interprétation of Plato that it ren

tiers our sense-experience illusoty. This objection, however, fails to distin
guish between appearance and illusion. There is a différence between
seeing an object in a mirror and having a hallucination ; and it is to the
former that Plato usually compares sense-perception. The sensible, then,
is not illusion, but the manifestation in differentiated multiplicity of an
intelligible form. Hence sense-experience is deceptive only if it is mista
ken for an adéquate appréhension of reality. To do this is to mistake the
image for the original, the cardinal sin, indeed the very essence of ail
error, for Platonism. Recognized as appearance, however, sense-experi
ence need not be dismissed as illusion, but rather serves as a preliminary
encounter with reality, a "reminder" (as Plato says), pointing beyond
itself and leading us toward intellection.
13. C.J. de Vogel, Rethinking Plato and Platonism (Leiden, 1986),
p. 68, castigates Findlay for making Statements to this effect and thereby
suggesting "that Plato regarded the visible world as 'non-being', i.e.as
some kind of non-reality, of 'maya', of unreal appearance". (Cf. note 12
above). But, as de Vogel herself indicates (p. 69), this is not what Findlay
means. His point is simply that sensible instances have no reality at ail
apart from or additional to the forms, and that Plato therefore cannot be
regarded as in any sense a dualist. The disagreement between Findlay and
de Vogel is thus less sharp than it may appear. But it is not sufficient to
mitigate Plato's "dualism" by pointing out, as de Vogel does (pp. 69, 162,
165), that instances are radically subordinate to and dépendent on the
forms. We must also, and more fundamentally, recognize with Findlay
(e.g. p. 34) that they are not anything additional to the forms, which thus
constitute the whole of reality.
can add nothing to it, but is only an appearance of it. Nor

add together a form and an instance to get two beings, for ail
is, is form, and instances are only differentiated appearan
that which is. The différence between form and instance is not
the différence between one being and another being. The famous
χωρισμός, the "séparation" of the forms, does not mean positing
them as another world on top of the sensible world. This leads to
nonsense, as not only Aristotle but Plato himself clearly demons
trates. The "séparation" refers rather to the distinction of a form
or intelligible nature as it is and is understood in itself (αυτό καθ'
αυτό) from the differentiated appearance of it given to sense
perception. In this sense the form is as "separate", as transcen
dent, as the staunchest dualist could wish : it is absolutely other
than each and ail of its instances. Beauty itself, for example, is
not either the beautiful maiden, or the beautiful horse, or the
beautiful pot (Greater Hippias 287e-289c). The form is "separa
te" from its instances in the sense that it cannot be identified
with or reduced to any or all of them, and does not dépend on
them. The rejection of the dualist interprétation of Plato, then,
does not in the least diminish the radical separateness or trans
cendence of the forms. But this separateness of the form from its
instances does not mean that the form and the instance are two
things, that the instance is another thing besides the form, for
insofar as it is not the form it is not really a thing (όντως öv) at
all, but an appearance.
When Plato speaks of sensibles as "images" of the forms, we
must be careful not to confuse an image with a copy, as though
the instance were an (imperfect) replica of the form, another
thing of the same kind, although inferior. An image cannot be
another thing of the same kind as its original, or it would not be
an image ; and an image of being, therefore, cannot be another
being. Plotinus, unlike the dualistic Interpreters of Plato, under
stood this well : "But we must not think [being and becoming],
which are distinct from each other, as though there were a genus
of 'something' divided into these, nor think that Plato did this.
32 Eric PERL
For it is absurd to plac

non-being, as if one sh
the same [genus]" (VI.2.
can be added together,
Socrates, but as two ph
the portrait is not only
right, apart from Socr
wood and paint. It can
tes not qua image, but
speaks of particulars as
some underlying substa
images of the forms, bu
thing but being images
commensurable with its
is not another Socrates,
be another being. Instan
but must be understood
the forms. Only this inte
so that it is distinct from the form but not additional to it as
another thing, allows us to make sense of Plato's thought and
accords with what he actually says in ail the passages we have
considered.
Thus, even in the middle dialogues, where Plato may seem to
advance the "two-world" theory most strongly, he in fact sees
not a dualistic opposition, but, on the contrary, a continuity
14. It is this point that Patterson, in his insightful study of Plato's idea
of sensibles as images, fails to appreciate. Although he rightly insists that
an image of an F is not an F at ail (Image and Reality, pp. 3-4, 20-22), he
nëvertheless continues to speak of both sensibles and forms as real things
(e.g. pp. 144, 149) and to refer to Plato's "two-world ontology" (pp. 76,
144), evidently not realizing that, by his own argument, an image of a
world is not a(nother) world at ail. Thus, while he understands Plato's
doctrine that sensibles are images, he does not recognize the füll impli
cations of the claim that they are nothing but images.
between sense-perception and intellection. To quote Plotin

once more, as he correctly sets out Plato's position, "Sen
perceptions are dim intellections, and intellections...are cl
sense-perceptions" (VI.7.7). This is because all Cognition,
every level, is the appréhension, stronger or weaker, of reality, o
form. For thought is intrinsically directed toward being, and
being is form, the object and content of intellect. But to th
extent that we fail to be fully intellectual, we do not recogni
being as it really is. Sense-perception, then, is a weak version
intellection, offering hints and glimpses of the same intelligi
content that is fully grasped by intellection ; and intellection
strong version of sense-perception, providing the füll appréh
sion of what we experience with the senses. Thus, in the para
of the cave, the shadows are not merely other than, and oppos
to, the realities outside. Rather, they bear the same shape, ho
ever blurred, because they are shadows of puppets of those re
ties. Indeed, the whole point of Plato's discussion of "shadow
and "puppets" is to stress this continuity. The cave-dwellers,
those who remain at the level of sense-perception only, are n
looking at some object other than reality. For as the historic
Parmenides pointed out, there can be nothing other than reali
which for Plato means that there can be nothing other than t
forms. These people have, rather, a shadowy, dreamlike view
reality itself. The continuity is no less clear in the correspondi
myth at the end of the Phaedo, according to which we, as m
of the senses, are living in hollows beneath the surface of th
earth, while the true surface represents the "place" of the form
(109b-e), or contemplative experience. The true earth is
variegated, marked out with colors, of which the ones here,

which they use in painting, are samples. But there ail the eart
is of these, and of ones even much brighter and purer than
these...Precious stones here are fragments of [the stones there],
carnelians and jaspers and emeralds and all such ; but ther
there is none that is not such and even more beautiful. The
34 Eric PERL
cause of this is that tho

corrupted like those he
In other words, whatev

us and can be grasped
not left behind but e
intellectual contempl
argues in the Republic
ing (581c-586b). We m
given in sense-experie
or we may be philosop
are a fleeting glimpse.
Eric D. Perl
The Catholic University of America

PERL, Eric D., Sense-Perception and Intellect in Plato

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EURORGAN s.p.r.l.

SENSE-PERCEPTION AND INTELLECT IN PLATO

Beginning with Aristotle, and continuing to this day, there

1. This issue is of immédiate concern to contemporary thought. Post

REVUE DE PHILOSOPHIE ANCIENNE, XIV, I, 1997

seeing the patteras, the structures of sameness and différen

3. It would be a mistake to interpret the "actions and bodies" as the

expériences. The distinc

I am speaking about ail

At first glance this lo

the continuity that Plato is describing here. The activity of the

4. See e.g. David Gallop, in Plato, Phaedo, Translated with Notes

which appear in sense-perception, to understand what is t

5. Such a suggestion would be irrelevant and indeed destructiv

the vexed passage at

lity, Recollection, and Pu

This explains Plato's insistence that the function of inte

7. This should not be taken to imply the réduction of the ecstatic

relations. We are thus

joined with conditions extraneous to itself and not recogn

is clear that the "place

ξαστή)" (248b). That is to say, they live at the level of

any more than they ar

9. Ibid., pp. 217-18 : "By

ce which passes through mathematics, astronomy, and har

form, which may be ap

re theory, which insists precisely that the forms are "amo

10. For this interprétation of the Parmenides, cf. Patterson,

not to say, of course,

12. It is commonly objected to this interprétation of Plato that it ren

can add nothing to it, but is only an appearance of it. Nor

For it is absurd to plac

between sense-perception and intellection. To quote Plotin

variegated, marked out with colors, of which the ones here,

cause of this is that tho

In other words, whatev

The Catholic University of America

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