Talk:Plato's problem

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Untitled[edit]

The creation of this page is a group project of Dr. Kent Norman's Spring semester 2006 course, Thinking and Problem Solving, at the University of Maryland, College Park.

Comments[edit]

Way to wordy, reads like an essay. The intention of an encyclopaedia is to give an overview of each subject. Extended rhetoric examinations rarely pass muster. I am saying this all due respect to the author, who obviously is an accomplished wordsmith. -- Cimon avaro; on a pogostick. 02:26, 18 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I have to agree that on reading this article it could in fact be much shorter. It is good and well written and I will give you credit for that. But it covers material that should be or is in other articles in philosophy and psychology. Probably what you should do, is either peel off material to start other articles that you will refer to or at the end of the semester reduce the article to a brief overview. Your full contribution will be in history of the article --User:Klnorman

Also, I think that you need to explain the problem or the definition a little more at the beginning. It is too vague. I don't think that anyone will get on the first reading. For the References, use italics rather than underlining. --User:Klnorman

Final Comments 10 May 2006[edit]

Well done. The article reads well and is well organized and documented. Now it just remains to be seen whether it stays or is divided up, etc. Total points for the Group portion = 48/50. --User:Klnorman

Ear picture[edit]

The ear picture at the somewhat end of the article seems somewhat out of context in this article, even though considering the fact that the article involves auditory perception. I suggest it should be removed, feel free to revert if you see appropriate so :) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.130.45.99 (talk) 16:09, 16 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Excessive redirect from Meno's Paradox[edit]

With all due respect to this article about Chomsky, the simplistic redirect from Meno's Paradox should not be allowed to eclipse Plato's great Socratic work. Chomsky developed his treatment of the Problem on a special case in linguistics.

Please could we have a proper encyclopaedic article on Meno (someone might start with an abstract from this article), and then by all means cross-reference Chomsky's work 2000 years later, with other related developments and issues (eg on knowlege and belief)? Jezza (talk) 17:15, 9 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Chomsky is the one who coined the phrase "Plato's Problem" in one of his books where he contrasted it with "Orwell's problem". Plato's problem is how can we know as much as we do where as Orwell's problem was given we know so much about the universe and science how can we be so deluded about facts that according to Chomsky should be obvious to anyone with basic education and a capability for minimal critical thinking. Its true that he coined the phrase in a book on Linguistics but he absolutely did NOT talk about "Plato's problem" as being specifically about language or linguistics. Rather what he said is that he thinks that one way to start to make progress on Plato's problem is to have a scientific theory of language because compared to other areas of psychology it is one where the scientific method may be able to lead to some actual tangible results. Then, hopefully we can apply the things we learn about language to other areas of psychology (which is essentially what he defines as Plato's problem). See the preface to Chomsky's Knowledge of Language: Its nature origins and use. --MadScientistX11 (talk) 23:28, 25 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Request for Deletion[edit]

This article is complete gibberish and should be deleted ASAP. It represents a deliberate misrepresentation of Plato's text to serve the editor's own purposes. Modern psychological research is nothing like what the ancient Greeks philosophized. Chomsky's theories should be correctly described and placed under his own name. BlueMist (talk) 14:53, 8 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I completely, well almost completely, disagree. This article is hardly complete gibberish. You know as an editor who got sick of editing for a while I'm going to just vent a little here. I get so sick of people leaving comments like that. If you think an article is bad then fix it or give specific suggestions for where to change it or tag things that need citations... but leaving insulting comments like "this article is complete gibberish" does no-one any good and can be kind of discouraging to people who -- unlike you -- have actually spent some time trying to contribute something. There are plenty of places on the Internet you can go to trade insults with people. Sorry, rant over. "Plato's problem" is a specific phrase that Chomsky coined and that I've seen others use in the way that Chomsky uses it. It is absolutely notable and this article should not be deleted, and it should make reference to not just Plato but Chomsky since he coined the phrase. However, I do think this article needs a lot of improvement. It reads too much like an essay, like wp:Original research and not like an encyclopedia article. --MadScientistX11 (talk) 23:37, 25 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Removed Extra Reading citation to Harry Binswanger[edit]

Someone just added an extra reading reference to a book by Harry Binswanger called How We Know. Binswanger seems to be a follower of Ayn Rand and his book from what I could gather in the various overviews I found on the Internet says nothing specific about Chomsky. It's rather a critique of mysticism in general which would not (as the editor who added the additional reading claimed) be a critique of Chomsky because Chomsky is not a mystic. He defies traditional philosophical categories but if we had to pick one tradition Rationalist (as opposed to empiricist) would be the best one and he's said as much himself. But he's not a mystic. Extra reading spaces on pages inevitably get filled with everyone's favorite writer but that isn't what they are there for. Famous critics of Chomsky include people like John Searle, Nagel (in philosophy), Sam Harris (politics), and Georg Lakoff and Terrance Deacon (Linguistics). Even if (which I doubt) Binswanger does specifically mention Chomsky in his book at any length he is nowhere near the stature of these and other Chomsky critics. I've read hundreds of books and papers by Chomsky and his critics and Binswanger's name has never come up in anything that I've read. --MadScientistX11 (talk) 15:27, 6 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Irrelevant Information[edit]

The section titled Plato (427 B.C.-347 B.C.) includes a lot of unnecessary information about Plato's early work, Socrates, and parts of Meno that are not relevant to the subject of this article. I think this information should be removed or moved to other articles where it will be more relevant. You don't need to explain Plato's other works or how the Socratic method works in an article that is just about one particular problem that is brought up in one of Plato's works. 2600:1702:3190:38A0:316F:7035:B31A:2121 (talk) 16:13, 12 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

True, introductions to the life and work of Plato and Socrates do not belong here. Does the whole concept of "Plato's problem" really come from Chomsky? I think the idea is per se from Plato, so maybe the title is actually good. But Chomsky's efforts to substantiate his claim of continuing the great tradition of humanistic thinking have been questioned by many (linguistics historians Koerner and Seuren have criticized his claim, for example). In this WP article we see how his thinking has begun to have a life of its own, so e.g. Plato and Socrates have come to be presented as elements of Chomskyan philosophy. My preliminary thoughts are that most of the content should probably be removed, and then we should focus on the actual Plato's problem which appears to be a proper one, having been discussed by Chomsky among others. Weidorje (talk) 07:48, 13 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]