Topics Philosophers

Question In the Platonic theory of forms, one could imagine a thing participating in many different forms at once. E.g. a large oak tree could participate in tree-ness, oak-tree-ness, bark-ness, leaven-ness, green-ness, brown-ness, large-ness, beauty, etc. One could imagine this could go on ad infinitum (i.e. ever more specification leading to ever more forms). Where is the limit? Or is there no limit? Or in reality, is there really only one form? (The Good?) or to put it another way the Form of "being." It might remind one of Parmenides....it is or it is not.... It seems to me that sensible things either participate in infinite forms or one form. Thoughts? Lou, New York

Accepted:
October 14, 2010

Comments

I think the only really honest answer to your question is that Plato is never quite as clear about this issue as we wish he were. On the one hand, as you say, there seems to be no obvious limit on how many Forms a given particular might participate in--after all, something can be not just a good image of F-ness, but also a bad image (and hence participant in) G-ness.

But maybe it helps that nothing in the theory of Forms (such as it is as a "theory," as opposed to something more like a hypothesis) allows participation that would create category mistakes (e.g. "The lion sleeps greenly" or "Putting the number 2 on a diet"), so there is presumably some limit on how many Forms can apply to a given thing.

Anyway (back to the really honest answer), your question shows one of many reasons why few today find the "theory of Forms" adequate as a metaphysical theory.