Knowing, speaking, and naming according to Plato: a comparative reading of the Phaedrus and the Cratylus

Abstract

The current paper contains a comparative reading of the Phaedrus and the Cratylus. Some of their central topics are here contrasted in order to highlight the characteristic traits of Platonic thought present in both dialogues. The description of dialectic in the Phaedrus fits well with a Socratic definition in the Cratylus which clearly specifies that names are tools at the service of the dialectician. This evidence leads us to the conclusion that —besides being the main mechanism to control and judge rhetoric— dialectical technic appears in the dialogues as the only correcting procedure that makes it possible to verify any sort of proposition and bring speeches and depictions of reality closer to the truth.