Banca de DEFESA: AYRONNE SANTOS SOUZA

PLATO'S MENON: VIRTUE FROM A HYPOTHESIS

This dissertation does not aim to define virtue (areté), but to examine how Plato understands an investigation that has as its starting point a hypóthesis similar to those used by geometers. Although virtue is a problematized theme - even if indirectly - in practically the entire Corpus Platonicum, it will be thematized, in this research, having as its primary basis the dialogue Meno, more precisely, from the excerpt 86c - when the homonymous character to the dialogue gives up trying to define virtue and returns to its first question - namely, whether virtue can be taught. As the investigation into virtue now has a hypóthesis as its starting point, we will, beforehand, seek to understand what Plato thinks about the term hypótheses. Furthermore, considering that the dialogue, based on the assumption that virtue can be encompassed by episteme, provisionally concludes that phrónesis is virtue, we will examine the relationship between the terms epistéme and phrónesis. In a second moment, as there is an unfolding in the conclusion of the Meno, since virtue starts to be investigated from the empirical question and is considered as orthè dóxa, we will analyze the similarity between orthè dóxa and hypóthesis. In this way, we will see to what extent the investigation of virtue from a hypóthesis influences the outcome of the Meno.