Plato's Semantics and Plato's "Cratylus"

Plato's Semantics and Plato's "Cratylus"Author(s): Thomas Wheaton BestorSource: Phronesis, Vol. 25, No. 3 (1980), pp. 306-330Published by: BRILLStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4182100 .

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Plato's Semantics and Plato's "Cratylus"

THOMAS WHEATON BESTOR

Plato tells us that the Cratylus concerns the "correctness of onomata" (words, names, expressions). It is such an eccentric piece of work, however, with no obvious organization and bizarre digressions over half its length, that it is very difficult to decide what the discussion really amounts to. I believe I know.

I. What Is at Issue?

We have to start much much further back than the beginning. Over and over again, before as well as after the Cratylus, Plato takes up various problems of Words and the World, questions we would now dub "semantic". What type of hook is the hook between an individual term like "Socrates" and the person it refers to? Between a general word like "just" and each of the many sensibles it refers to? Between "just" and the single Form it refers to? Between a sentence like "Socrates is just"' and the state of affairs it refers to? The announced topic, "Wherein lies the correctness of onomata?", whatever it is, is plainly some problem of Words and the World like these, a semantic question. But what exactly are the semantic stakes? At stake, I think, is deciding what to count as the most basic, the most primitive, the most fundamental type of Words-to-World hook. Both candidates canvassed in the dialogue give answers to this question. On the one hand, the correctness of onomata being a matter of "nature" (q<p'as), the most basic hook will be a capsule description or potted definition, a spelling-out of the special properties of some object by the special properties of the onoma which refers to it. On the other hand, the correctness of onomata being a matter of "convention" (vo'ps), the most basic hook will be a logically proper name which by simple agreement is used as a stand-in or proxy in place of its referent for purposes of bartering by mouth and pen.

It is in the context of words for Forms that the question of "most basic hook" takes on urgency. Scattered among the rest, Plato gives (at least) four distinctly semantic sorts of arguments for Forms in the dialogues.1 He argues, for instance, that the referent of a linguistic item must be an entity

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which actually does exist - but since sensible beauties, say, always pass away eventually, the real referent of the word "beauty" must be that Form of Beauty which abides unchanging behind such transience (e.g. Crat. 439-440b). He argues that a term must refer to its referent each and every time it is used - but since no individual beautiful thing is so referred to, the real referent of "beauty" must be that Form of Beauty present to each and every one of them (e.g. Hip. Maj. 287e-288e). He argues that there must be just one referent per term - but since beautiful things ipso facto constitute a plurality, the real referent of "beauty" must be that Form of Beauty which is the One over that Many (e.g. Phd. 100b-e). He argues that the reference of a term must be unambiguous - but since every sensible which is beautiful is simultaneously not-beautiful (to some degree, in other respects, by comparison with something else), the real referent of "beauty" must be that Form of Beauty which is beauty absolutely and unqualifiedly (e.g. Rep. 479a-e). All of these arguments for Forms begin by laying down restrictions on what is necessary in order for bits and pieces of our language (the Words) to hook up to bits and pieces of the universe (the World). Not so long ago in this journal, I claimed these restrictions proved conclusively that Plato was thinking of the semantic relation between a general word ("beauty" or "beautiful") and the Form it refers to (Beauty) as essentially the relation of a proxy proper name to its single proper bearer, for these restrictions seemed to be binding especially on proper names. Reconsid- ering, though, I'm not sure they decide at all between the two Cratylus candidates, proper names and capsule descriptions. After all, capsule descriptions seem to be bound by exactly the same constraints. If the proper name "Plato", for instance, needs an existent / ubiquitous / single / unambiguous referent in order to have a clear meaning, so too does the capsule description "the teacher of Aristotle". And for exactly the same reasons.

Now, however, things begin to hurt. Plato's most important semantic arguments for Forms leave us with no answer to the most important semantic question about them: "How are we to think general words basically hook up to their Forms - as proper names or as capsule descriptions?" For various reasons, in various dialogues, Plato was sympathetic to both alternatives. On some occasions, he seems to want the Big Words to pick out their Forms descriptively, so that "f' applied to the Form F tells us something about the nature of that Form (e.g. Symp. 21 la-e). On the other occasions, he seems to want the Big Words to be the same kind of beast as people's personal names; applied to the Form F, then, "f" tells us nothing about F but merely points it out amidst the

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citizenry of heaven (e.g. Meno 71a). I believe that by the time of the Cratylus Plato realized he couldn't have his cake and eat it too. The most basic "f"-to-F hook could be a stand-in hook, or it could be a spelling-out hook, but it couldn't be both. Moreover, I believe that the purpose of the Cratylus in Plato's scheme of things is to decide precisely this question. The so-called "Critical Period" was ushered in partly by Plato's realization that semantic problems couldn't really be put off any longer. In the Cratylus, the first of the "Critical" dialogues, he tackled the first of them.

This is, as it happen, a rather peculiar opinion to have about the content and the purpose of this work.2 I think I can make some sort of case for it though.

II. The Key Move

The most important thing is to realize right at the start that Plato takes a certain analogy much more seriously than it might seem at first, or second, glance. On this analogy, presented at 387d-390d, ONOMATA ARE TOOLS

(6py&va) FOR THE PERFORMANCE OF A FUNCTION (Q'pyov). Just as we use our bodies to carry around our souls (Alc. I 129b-130c); just as we use a butcher's chopper to cut meat at the joints (Pol. 287c, Phdr. 265e); just as we use a borer to drill holes in things (Crat. 387e); just as we use ships to transport grain (Hip. Maj. 295d); just as we use a flute to make music (Laws 669e, 700e) - so in the Cratylus (383a, 388b) we use "a piece of a man's voice" (qpwvins FOplOv) to "accomplish certain tasks" (TL 1TOLov-.LEV).

In particular, Plato's talk of the "task" of onomata in the Cratylus parallels exactly his talk of "function" in the Republic. Compare a couple of passages. First from the Republic:

Some things have a function; a horse, for instance, is useful for certain kinds of work. Would you agree to define a thing's function ('pyov) in general as the work for which that thing is the only instrument or the best one? I don't understand. Take an example. We can see only with the eyes, hear only with the ears; and seeing and hearing might be called the functions of those organs. Yes. Or again, you might cut vine-shoots with a carving-knife or a chisel or many other tools, but with none so well as with a pruning-knife made for the purpose; and we may call that its function. True. Now, I expect, you see better what I meant by suggesting that a thing's function is the work that it alone can do, or can do better than anything else. Yes, I will accept that definition. (352e-353a, Cornford translation)

Next from the Cratylus:

In cutting we do not cut as we please, and with any chance instrument, but we cut with the proper instrument only, and according to the natural process of cutting, and

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the natural process is right and will succeed, but any other will fail and be of no use at all ... And this holds good of actions? Yes. And speech is a kind of action? True. And will . .. not the successful speaker be he who speaks in the natural way of speaking, and as things ought to be spoken and with the natural instrument? Any other mode of speaking will result in error and failure. I quite agree with you. And is not giving onomata a part of speaking?. . . Then the argument would lead us to infer that onomata ought to be given according to a natural process and with a proper instrument (T& 'TpVPyRY1TT OVVOic&ELV w 1TiPuVXE) ... I agree. (387a-c, d, Jowett translation)

In both texts the point is the same. The function of some instrument is that which only it can do or at least that which it can do better than anything else. This is a pervasive assumption of Greek thought generally, in Aristotle for instance (Nico. Eth. 1097b29-1098al8) and everywhere in the Cratylus (e.g. 388a-c, 428e, 435d-e). So, to return to the Republic examples, the function of seeing is something which only the instrument an eye can do; that instrument is necessary in order for that function to be performed at all - we can't possibly see with any other organ. And the function of cutting vines is something which the instrument a pruning-knife can do best of all; that instrument is necessary in order for that function to be performed in the best way - we can cut vines with other tools (bulldozers, say, or sheep) but not as efficiently or as tidily.

Perhaps we might distinguish a "strong sense" of "function" from a "weak sense" here, but the point for my purposes is clear enough without such niceties. Socrates suggests we are to think of our ONOMATA as just such instruments with just such functions. It is only insofar as they too succeed in getting some job done well (or even done at all) that onomata really deserve the title. This is Plato's Tool Analogy (a recurring analogy in the history). It lays out in detail what needs doing next in any proper theory of language: (i) It tells us we must clarify how to individuate the entities which are to count as onomata. (ii) It requires that we go on to specify exactly what the function is which genuine onomata perform. (iii) It gives us a definition of the concept of "correctness" as it applies to onomata. (iv) It demands we decide what prerequisites must be met in order for that function to be performed with that correctness by those units. These four are precisely what Plato now proceeds to give. As written prose or spoken dialogue the Cratylus is admittedly a rambling shambling affair. But as pioneer philosophy of language it is trim and spot on.

FIRST TASK FOR ANY THEORY OF ONOMATA. Plato starts the real business of the dialogue with the question we expect to be cleared up first: " What is an onoma?" This not in the sense "What does an onoma do?" but in the preliminary sense "What tells us when we have the right thing to be an

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onoma, one onoma or two, same or different onomata?" The problem is especially acute for Plato since his semantic arguments generally require some One whenever we have something which is multiple or sensible or transient or ambiguous. Now "pieces of a man's voice" seem to fit that bill perfectly. So what exactly is the One which is to reach out to some referent in the world? With wisdom, for instance, is it the one Form-of-the- Onoma-"Wise"'? Or my solitary utterance of the noise wiz just a second ago? Or the single word "wise" which we find spelled so many ways in the Oxford English Dictionary? Or the English "wise" and the Greek aowoqs and the French "sage" and the German "weise" taken as a unitary class of synonyms? Surely we can't make any progress with the puzzle of semantic functioning until we have mastered the puzzle of a syntactic unit.

Plato agreed. His choice of unit comes early on:

If different lawgivers do not embody [the onoma which is fitted by nature for some object] in the same syllables, we must not forget it on that account. For different smiths do not embody the form in the same iron, though making the same instrument for the same purpose (ToV OtxVTO' gVExa 'TrotV TO avTb opyavov). (389d-390a, Fowler translation, as for all unattributed passages following)

Variety in the syllables is admissible so that onomata which are the same appear different to the uninitiated, just as the physician's drugs, when prepared with various colors and perfumes, seem different to us though they are the same. To the physician, who considers only their medicinal value (Tiv UvcqLLV TrOv 7QVxpAiXxV),

they seem the same, and he is not confused by the addition. In like manner, the man who knows about onomata considers their value (TiV UV%tILV QvTj;V) and is not confused if some letter is added, transposed or subtracted, or even if the force (

wvcxau.) of the onoma is expressed in entirely different letters. (394a-b)

The story we are getting here is a kind of story we know well from Charles Sanders Peirce - the now standard distinction between a linguistic "token" and a linguistic "type".3 A token, according to Peirce, is "an actual existing thing or event which is a sign". It is a particular one-time-only unit con- sisting of a string of wntten marks or a sequence of spoken noises (a unit we can speak of as, say, illegible or mispronounced). Thus the following item in quotation marks is a token: "wise"; and the preceding token is a different token from the following one: "wise". By contrast, a type, according to Peirce, is "a law that is a sign" (a unit we can speak of as, say, derived from Latin or in the dictionary). Tokens are of the same type when they have the same meaning, i.e. when they can be used to perform the same function in communication. Thus "wise" and "WISE"', though two different tokens (for they are different occurrences of marks or noises), are of one and the same type, since no matter what meaning the first token ("wise") has, the second token ("WISE") has the same. By extension, "wise",

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"uoGp6' , "sage" and "weise" are all really tokens of the same type too; whatever function one of them can be used to perform, they can all be used to perform (on a different occasion in foreign climes, and so on).

In the Cratylus passages above, I believe, Plato is giving criteria for sameness and difference with regard to both a classical analogue of token and a classical analogue of type. Two objects hammered out by a smith are the same tool if and only if they have "the same purpose" (they can do the same jobs), no matter how different in shape or material they may be. Two potions mixed up by a physician are the same drug if and only if they have "the same medicinal value" (they can effect the same cures), no matter how different in colour or perfume they may be. Likewise, two strings of marks or sequences of noises are the same onoma if and only if they have "the same force" (they can perform the same duties), no matter how different in letters or loudness they may be. Just what we would expect from the Tool Analogy. What is important for a certain tool's being the exact tool it is, is that it can be used to perform this or that particular function. Of course, then, differently shaped tools, or tools made of different materials, or numerically distinct tools are really the same tool just to the extent that the function they can be used to perform (whatever it is) is the same function. From such considerations we get two criteria. The criterion for sameness and difference of tool tokens is a matter of their shape or arrangement or number. The criterion for sameness and difference of tool types is a matter of their BvvaXLLs, what they can do. Onomata being tools, there is no special problem determining when we have one or two, same or different.

SECOND TASK FOR ANY THEORY OF ONOMATA. Putting it like that, I have deliberately left in the air what exactly thefunction orfunctions of an onoma are - what duties must get performed in order for a noise or a mark to become an onoma at all.

Can you say something of the same kind about an onoma? The onoma being an instrument, what do we do with it when we give onomata (op-y&v 6V'rtrC &v6ouart 6voViatovies ;r moLo4LIEv)? (388b)

In Plato's hands the answer is composite. Ahead of all the rest, we are told that the function of onomata is to teach

others, to give instruction: [When we give an onoma], do we not teach one another something (8&banxopv n

&XVIXous) ...? Certainly. An onoma is, then, an instrument of teaching (xMaa- XaXLXoV Tr 'op-yavov) . . . Yes. (388b-c)

The weaver will use the shuttle well, and "well" means "like a weaver"; and a teacher (&t&aaxcXLx6s) will use an onoma well, and "well" means "like a teacher" (xaxXCs W'io' 8L8aGXaXLX,S). (388c; cf. 388d)

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Onomata, then, are uttered (XiyETQL) with a view to instruction (8OLaxxXu(s)? Certainly. This instruction is an art and has its artisans? Certainly. (428e; Kretzman translation, "Plato on the Correctness of Names," p. 137 fn. 30)

What is the function of onomata and what good do they accomplish? I think, Socrates, their function is to instruct (8LUMaxeLv). (435d)

Now let us see what this manner of giving instruction (& axaMKas) is to which you refer [when you say the function of onomata is to instruct], and whether there is another method but inferior to this, or there is no other at all. (435e)

In almost the same breath, Plato has Socrates insist that the basic onoma function is to discriminate one thing from other things, to distinguish what is the subject at hand from the zillions of things that are not the subjects at hand. The existence of the onoma "table", for instance, enables us to mark off the kitchen table from the chairs around it. Likewise, the existence of onomata in general enables men to classify and mark off the manifold bits of the universe one from another:

[When we give an onomal do we not. . . separate things according to their kinds (T&

sp&ypa.rot &axpivo,ev)? Certainly. An onoma is, then, an instrument ... of separating reality (8&axpvrLXOV riS oVaaos), as a shuttle is an instrument of separating the web. (388c, my translation; cf. 423e)

The man who knows how to ask and to answer (&'rroxpPviCdL) questions [about discriminating kinds] you call a dialectician? Yes ... [Then] the work of the lawgiver, as it seems, is to make an onoma, with the dialectician as his supervisor, if onomata are to be well given. True. (390c,d)

Examples of such separating or discriminating duties occur at several places in the dialogues (e.g. Phdr. 265d-e, Soph. 224c-d, Pol. 287c, Tim. 83c, Phil. 18b-d). It is in this sort of context that the so-called "Method of Collection and Division" has its proper home (cf. Charm. 175a-b, Gorg. 504c-e, Pol. 275d).

Plato also says, explicitly and implicitly, that onomata are essentially tools for effecting a communication. They are what we use to get our thoughts and intentions over to one another. They are what we use to get hold of another's thoughts and intentions. Accordingly, to be an onoma a noise or a mark must get the hearer to recognize what the speaker has in mind when he opens his mouth or wiggles his pen. The dumb, for example, can succeed in doing what onomata do with entirely non-vocal bodily gestures. Not how but what they are doing is the crucial point:

If we had no voice or tongue, but still wished to communicate things to each other (8iqXODV &XXAXOLS T1 x rp&ypaxTU), would we not, like the dumb, try to make signs

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(aluaivvELv) with our hands and our heads and the whole body? Yes ... In this way, I think, a communication would be achieved (6BlX\Wc kyi-yvEro). (422e, 423b, Nehring translation, "Plato and the Theory of Language", p. 20 fn. 43)

The only difference between the dumb and the rest of us is that our signs we make not with hands and body but with pieces of our voice. Still, so long as we can "understand one another's meaning" when we broadcast such signs, we have enough to guarantee their genuineness as onomata:

Isn't it true that the onoma as it stands right now is perfectly intelligible to both of us (vVV v X'yo%Ev oVSiv pcvOavop.ev &XX\Xwv)? When I say skieron (0XXqp6v) you do in fact know what I am saying, don't you (oV6E oto0La ovi vivv 8 rt iyQ Xyw)? Yes. So it suffices that when I speak I have a definite meaning and you recognize that I have that meaning (eyw oTai'v rOVTO qOE-yyY.RLcL &VoOt4LcKt bEXEIVO, OV 8? ytlyVWiXELS O'TL ExEivo 8&avooVaccL). Isn't that what you are saying? Yes. So if you recognize my meaning when I speak (oixowvX~ EyLyVCaXELS ?Vxo 0Ocyyo[tivov), then a communication has indeed been effected from me to you (AXR& OOL yiyVe'TL saLp'

4toi). Yes. And a communication still comes from me to you even through something unlike [the normal spelling]. Yes. (434e-435a, my translation)4

These functions were almost certainly never distinct or independent in Plato's own mind. The triple clusters together naturally and impressively. What function can be performed only with a piece of a man's voice, or at least best with it? .The function of communicating with one another, of getting information out of one head and into another head. What information? Information that enables us to discriminate among things in the world. Transferring such information, passing our discriminations on to others, just is giving instruction. It is this composite function of teaching- separating-communicating which onomata as onomata do par excellence.

THIRD TASK FOR ANY THEORY OF ONOMATA. So we come to another crucial question: " What does 'correctness'mean when applied to an onoma?" The answer is easy but, again, the most arresting fact is that Plato even asked it. Asking it in the light of the Tool Analogy puts the whole matter of correctness in a special light. The topic has become correctness in a tooL Quite deliberately, then, the relevant concept of "correctness" is to be defined in terms of the onoma tool's adequacy or serviceability in performing its proper functions. Here is an absolutely vital move for a philo- sopher to make and it goes much to Plato's credit to have made it. Just as it goes to the credit of contemporary philosophers to remake it:

"What conditions are necessary for the utterance of [a singular referring expression] to constitute a successfully performed referznce?" As a necessary preliminary to answering this question ask the prior question: "What is the point of a definite reference, what function does the propositional act of referring serve in the illo- cutionary act?" (John Searle, Speech Acts (Cambridge, 1969), p. 81)

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To get down to specifics, a tool is "correct" for some purpose if and only if it is especially fit or efficient or successful at accomplishing that purpose. The "correct" knife for cutting a vine, for instance, is the knife that does it well or better than any other knife. Following this up, we can generate a whole series of definitions of "'correctness". Correctness in a knife is success at cutting (387a). Correctness in a borer in success at making holes (387e). Correctness in a shuttle is success at separating warp from woof (388b-c). In general:

correctness in a tool = df success at performing the function proper to that tool.

Here is no "theory of correctness", of course, but a simple tautology: being a correct tool X just is being successful at performing the function proper to X-es. The significance comes, again, when we turn to teaching-discriminating-communicating and its onoma tools. Then a particular candidate for onoma-hood will be "correct" only to the extent that it too performs its proper functions successfully:

correctness in an onoma = df success at performing the functions of picking out a thing and getting that thing across to others.

(So, for example, at 388c an onoma will be used "well", i.e. correctly, when it is used "as a good teacher uses it", i.e. successfully.) Again, what we are given here is no "theory of correctness"' but a simple definition, indeed, an elegantly simple definition.

Since correctness is the same as success, the question "What makes for correctness in this tool?" is everywhere the question "What makes for success with this tool?" Nothing more and nothing less. This means that the only questions we can intelligibly entertain about what makes a tool "correct" are everywhere to be answered, for Plato, by finding the prerequisites to be met by a particular tool if it is to be actually successful in performing a certain function:

In each of the instruments he makes, the shuttlemaker must embody the nature which is most serviceable for each kind of work it will be put to. And the same applies to all other instruments. The toolmaker must discover the instrument best fitted for each purpose and must embody its qualities in the material of which he makes the instruments. (389b-c, my translation)

In the case of onomata, any question about what makes an onoma "correct" is only to be answered by finding the prerequisites which must be met if it is to be successful in picking out and getting across a thing.

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FOURTH TASK FOR ANY THEORY OF ONOMATA. This takes us to the question Plato spends most of the dialogue exploring and illustrating: "What are the conditions for success at the onoma function?"

Our next task is to try to find out, if you care to know about it, what kind of correctness that is which belongs to onomata. (39 lb)

After all, not everything manages to become an onoma. So what are the minimum conditions which must have been satisfied by those things which do? The matter is, again, just the same as with more pedestrian tools. "What properties must a knife possess in order for it to be successful at cutting this material?" "What properties or relations to thing T must onoma 0 possess in order for it to be successful at picking T out and communicating it to others?" Answers to these sorts of questions do constitute "Theories of Correctness" (spelled with capitals). Suppose a knife- maker tells me that sharpness is actually what makes a knife a success at cutting. The old "The correct knife is the one which performs its function well" is a tautology and not a Theory. The new "The correct knife is the one which is sharp" is a Theory and not a tautology. So too for onomata.5

What makes the Cratylus worth all the aggravation in the end is that it carefully examines two answers to this prerequisites question. These are the two theories put in the mouths of Cratylus and Hermogenes in the first few pages of the dialogue and developed again towards the end. It is exactly as if we had two opposing stories about what enables a knife to cut: sharpness versus, say, shape of the blade.

III. The Two Theories of Correctness

The opposing stories about onomata come to something like this I think. First is the story of

Cratylus: in order to pick out and get across a thing T successfully, it is necessary and sufficient that a noise or mark 0 "display" the essence of T.

Next is the story of Hermnogenes: to perform those duties it is necessary and sufficient merely that 0 be agreed upon to stand as proxy for T.

Neither of the Theories is expressed in so many words, however, so we must dig a bit deeper.

THE DESCRIPTFION THEORY. At the beginning Cratylus affirms a "nature" theory, that there is some sort of "natural rightness" (o5pOo&TrTa qwcEL) to

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genuine onomata. What Cratylus means by "natural" rightness is that there are non-man-made requirements which must be met before a piece of a man's voice can succeed in doing an onoma's job.

Cratylus, whom you see here, Socrates, says that everything has a right onoma of its own, which comes by nature, and . . . that there is a kind of inherent correctness in onomata, which is the same for all men, both Greeks and barbarians. So I ask him whether his onoma is in truth "Cratylus", and he agrees that it is. "And what is Socrates' onoma?" I said. "Socrates", said he. "Then that applies to all men, and the particular onoma by which we call each person is his onoma?" And he said, "Well, your onoma is not 'Hermogenes' ['son of Hermes', the god of banker and traders], even if all mankind call you so." (383a-b)

Such a story I shall call a "Description Theory" and in Cratylus' hands it consists of four theses:

(A) The sign-relation between some onoma 0 and some thing T is one whose existence is "determined by nature" (TCv OVT(TV WUGEL ExvXV)

and is "inherent in" the very constitution of 0 itself (TG;v ovo,uITav

iwxpvxhva). (383a5-6, 384d7, 389d4-5, 390d9-eI) (B) Only certain 0's therefore can be sign-related to certain T's. The ones which aren't correct by nature aren't really onomata at all. (384b7-8, 433c 10, 438c9, d7-8) (C) Naturally enough, 0 never becomes "naturally" sign-related to T as a result of mere agreement to call T by 0 - even agreement by the majority of men. (383a7, b8-9, 390e1-2) (D) O's being (naturally) sign-related to T is something which, when it obtains at all, obtains for everyone alike and everywhere. (383a8-b2)6

With the Tool Analogy firmly in mind, it is easy to see that Cratylus' view is not merely the view that there is such a thing as correctness to onomata - of course there is, success in performance. Rather, it is the view that the condition for success here is the existence of a natural relation of depicting (or "representing" or "disclosing" or "making manifest") between a noise or mark 0 and its referent T. An onoma must tell us in its special properties what the thing's special properties are, by displaying or reproducing them.

The underlying principle here is one we find in many classical civili- zations. It is the view that words must give us information about the things they single out. Words, at their best, "fit" their things. Things, at their best, "live up to" their words. This is the core of a wide range of so-called "aetiological sagas" in the Hebrew Old Testament, for instance:

[A] good place saga is to be found in Judg. XV. 9-19. Samson, arrested by the Judeans under Philistine pressure, freed himself at the moment when he was about

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to be handed over to the Philistines at Lehi, and killed a thousand Philistines with the jaw-bone of an ass which was lying there. He then threw away the jaw-bone and since then the place bears the name Ramath-lehi, "hill of the jaw bone". But the story does not end with this etymology, clearly linked to the existence of a mound shaped like a jaw-bone. Samson is now in danger of dying of thirst since there is no water in the place. In answer to his prayer, Yahweh causes water to flow out of the cavity of the tooth in the jaw-bone, and the spring which thus came into being was called "the spring of the caller" (Enhakkore) because it arose from Samson's call in prayer. (Otto Eissfeldt, The Old Testament (Harper, 1965), pp. 38-9)

Ancient Greece had no systematic tradition of aetiological sagas. Instead it had an equally systematic distinction between a "lie-name" (o5vo,ua 4ei83s) and a "truth-name" (Qvoca XNq1t3s). A personal name predicates a property or tells a story or predicts a destiny for its bearer. If its report matches the person or thing, then we have a good or true or correct onoma. If its report doesn't match, then we have a bad or false or incorrect onoma. This is the traditional principle which Socrates puts to work in the massive etymologies section of the Cratylus. Many of these onomata are portmanteau words, openly "little sentences", "abbreviated phrases" (399b, 409c, 415d, 416b, 421a; cf. Democritus, frags. 12, 142; Aristotle, De Caelo, 270b16-24). Thus the onoma of the hero Agamemnon compresses "admirable for endurance" (aycxoT6s XavT rrv Ep.toviiv), which he truly was (395a-b). Onoma itself is "the reality yearned for" (ov ovU pAa&Ra), which it certainly is in this interminable dialogue (421a). Single unit onomata too are inter- preted as equivalent to predicate terms characterizing their referents. The onoma of the goddess Hestia is equivalent to "reality" or "essence" (oVUiua, which in olden times was ?ooiaa), a fitting onoma, for she is the first of the divinities (401c-d). rvvil or "woman" is derived from "birth" (yov'), exactly right (414a). Even the so-called "primary" or "atomic" onomata work to this rule. In pronouncing the letter rho, for instance, the tongue is most agitated, thus making the onomata which that letter is present in singularly truth-telling of motion - as in "flow" (p?lv - rhein), "trembling" (rpO'ios - tromos), "whirl" (Ov[?loEv - rhumbein) and the like (426d-e).

Against this background, the tale Cratylus tells makes a mad sort of sense. If onomata are tools for communication and must satisfy certain conditions in order to fulfill that function, what is more obvious than to assume they communicate only to the extent that they accurately depict the essential nature of their referents? The thing T's essence, after all, is what we want to know about. So a noise or mark 0 doesn't really do us any good in communication unless it has that relation to its T. Inventing an onoma is a bit like creating a philosophical dictionary on taxonomic lines. Any new entry will require us to have analyzed the nature of the thing referred to

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and to be rendering that nature verbally in the entry's own nature. This seems a bizarre obligation for chairs and "chair", pots and "pot" and so on. But it seems bizarre only because such words and things are so familiar to us. Consider what happens, however, if I come across something unfamiliar to my listener and not readily to hand. How can I pick out and get it across? Now there seems only one useful mechanism. I must describe the thing and describe it in terms of properties with which my listener is already familiar and can use to pick out what I mean. Accordingly, if a new onoma is required, the describing must somehow be embodied in that very onoma itself. This happens frequently with new words coined in English: "Sautomobile", "loudspeaker", "coffee pot", "television", "ice-box", etc. Hence it is natural enough to suppose that if we want to demonstrate the real underlying character of our ability to communicate verbally, then descriptive onoma-creation and descriptive onoma-use must be a basic part of the account right from the beginning. This is Cratylus: it is the descriptive element in onomata which guarantees their general intel- ligibility and usefulness.7 Nothing else can:

The correctness of all the onomata we have discussed was based upon the intention of showing the nature of the things (o';a 6ikXoE3v o'ov Exaco'v ecOTL T iV OVT.V). Yes, of course. And this principle of correctness must be present in all onomata, the earliest as well as the later ones, if they are really to be onomata. Certainly. . . How then can the earliest onomata, which are not as yet based upon any others, make clear to us the nature of things (qxavEp& ,1LtV 1TOL8OEL T& 6vra), so far as that is possible, which they must do if they are to be onomata at all? (422d-e)

Don't worry about the plight of the earliest onoma-giver hinted at here. The key point is rather the parade of variations on the expression "make clear the nature".

It does not much matter to the Description Theory exactly how this "making clear" is to be done. What is distinctive is just the assumption that the essence must somehow or other be made clear before a noise or mark can possibly succeed at the onoma functions. To be sure, Plato explores a bit of how such making clear might be accomplished, via a kind of verbal imitation:

May I not go up to a man and say to him, "This is your portrait," and showing him perhaps his own likeness, or perhaps that of a woman. And by "show" I mean bring before the sense of sight. Certainly. Well, then, can I not go to the same man again and say, "This is your onoma"? An onoma is an imitation (IL;iL1pa), just as a picture is ... and then bring before his sense of hearing perhaps the imitation of himself... or perhaps the imitation of a female? (430e-43 la; cf. 423e)

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In detail, the making clear might be accomplished by imitation at the most primitive pronunciation level:

[The ancient onoma-giver] appears to have thought that the compression and pressure of the tongue in the pronunciation of delta and tau was naturally fitted to imitate the notion of binding and rest. And perceiving that the tongue has a gliding movement most in the pronunciation of lambda, he made the onomata "level" (XEia - leia), "glide" itself (6Xt6fiotveLv - olisthanein), "sleek" (Xvnap6v - liparon), "glutinous" (xoXXiEs - kollodes) and the like to conform to it. Where the gliding of the tongue is stopped by the sound of gamma, he reproduced the nature of "glutinous" (yXaLXp6v - glischron), "sweet" (-yXvxv - gluku) and "gluey" (yXoLWaes - gloiodes). And again, perceiving that nu is an internal sound, he made the words "inside" (Mv8ov - endon) and "within" (ivr6s - entos), assimilating the meanings to the letters. (427b-c)

Nonetheless, Plato makes it clear that the central thesis of the Description Theory is making essence clear in some way or another, not necessarily imitating it by muscular likeness. The second is, if you like, the Special Theory. But the first is the important General Theory:

Do not insist that an onoma must have all the letters and be exactly the same as the thing ... [Grant that various linguistic elements] may be employed which are not appropriate to the things in question, and the thing may nonetheless be given an onoma and described, so long as the intrinsic quality ('nThos) of the thing is retained. (432e)

Whether the same meaning is expressed in one set of syllables or another makes no difference. And if a letter is added or subtracted, that does not matter either, so long as the essence of the thing remains in force and is made plain in the onoma (E's aV YXPa'iTS n i OvoiLC TOV 1rp&yRaros 8iqXovpitV Tvorp bV6RaTL). (393c-d)

From beginning to end in the dialogues, it is this and not pure onomato- poeia which is given as the interesting philosophical core of Cratylus' fpvoGs story. Some typical expressions:

The business of an onoma, as we were saying, is to express the nature (&Xot T-iv plvoLv). (396a, Jowett translation)

Correctness of an onoma, we say, is the quality of showing the nature of the thing ("TLs V8ECkETOLL otov TrL Tb Irp&yR.u). Shall we call that a satisfactory statement? Yes. (428e)

Onomata, we said, indicate nature to us (a UI1rivELv riV ovoCxv) . . . Otherwise, as I have been saying all along, they would not be onomata at all. (436e, c)

Which of the two classes of onomata are the ones you now want to claim are not really onomata ... the class of those which point towards rest (Tx 'e-i rrv TT&MOV

&yov'ra) or those which point towards motion? We agreed just now that the matter is not to be determined by mere show of hands. But then, since the onomata are in conflict, some of them claiming that they are like the truth and others claiming that they are, how can we decide? ... What shall show us which of the two kinds are the true onomata and show (86r;varr) the truth of things? (438c-d, my translation)

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(Compare 393e, 424d, 425d, 433d.) Once again, note the different verbs especially: 8iqX6w, EV8e(XVV[IL, pa v.LLV, EIrC ... &yw, 8ELxvvul. None have especially much to do with imitating something. All still have lots to do with telling us about that something's nature.

Cratylus' assumptions are not the only assumptions we can make, though, nor the only assumptions which Plato explores. There is a second story as well.

THE PROXY THEORY. This other story is Hermogenes' "convention" theory of correctness. Hermogenes claims that simple agreement by a community of men to employ a piece of their own voice in place of a thing is sufficient to make that noise into the perfectly proper onoma for that thing:

For my part, Socrates, I ... cannot come to the conclusion that there is any correctness of onomata other than convention and agreement. For it seems to me that whatever onoma you give to a thing is its right onoma; and if you give up that onoma and change it for another, the later onoma is no less correct than the earlier, just as we change the onomata of our servants. For I think no onoma belongs to any particular thing by nature, but only by the habit and custom of those who employ it and who established the usage. (384c-d)

This sort of story I shall call a "Proxy Theory" and in Hermogenes' hands it also consists of four theses, direct counters to each of Cratylus' theses:

(A') The sign-relation between some onoma 0 and some thing T is not a "natural" one, in that neither the nature of 0 itself nor the nature of T itself puts any restrictions whatsoever on which Oes can be sign-related to which Tes and vice versa. (384d7) (B') Hence any arbitrary 0 will do as well as any other to be sign-related to some T. And any arbitrary T will do as well as any other to be sign-related to some 0. (384d4-5, 433e6-9) (C') The existence of a sign-relation between some 0 and some T is established solely and entirely by simple agreement (6i.oXoy(o) or convention (EvvOxq) before-hand. It is perpetuated in a similar way, by habit (v6oos) and custom (?0os) and nothing else. (384dl-3, 385al-2, d7-lO, 433e2-4, 434e4) (D') Which 0 happens to be sign-related to which T will therefore differ with different communities of men - and could intelligibly (but degenerately) differ even with different private individuals communing with themselves. (384d4-5, 385a5-12, d7-e3, 435a8)8

Hermogenes' story also takes for granted that there is some sort of correctness to onomata (i.e. success in performance).9 But it incorporates an

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entirely different set of prerequisites. The condition for success here, says Hermogenes, is the existence of a custom (or "pact" or "habit" or "agreement" or "convention") in a community of speakers and hearers to use a noise or mark 0 in place of thing T. Cratylus' "making clear the essence" and the like have no bearing on the ability of some 0 to discharge the onoma functions. Simple agreement on usage has every bearing. There is and there need be no "natural" relation between 0 and T. The basis of the sign-relation between them is nothing more (nor less) than that 0 has been sanctioned by its speakers and writers for use for T.

Once again, this view stems from perfectly ordinary and familiar facts about what is needed to get another to recognize what I mean when I open my mouth or wiggle my pen. (i) Consider the seemingly easy use of ostensive definitions in teaching children, for instance. I point to different objects of the same kind, chairs say, and mouth the word for it. I pray that somehow my son will make an association in his head between hearing that noise and seeing that kind of thing. I judge he has when he can repeat the noise and point to some other chair than the ones I began with. Here I ostensively teach the noise char (or the mark "chair"), but of course I might have used any noise or mark at all, so long as we agreed between ourselves on which linguistic item was to be associated with which (kind of) thing. A big "so long as", perhaps, but still it is that and nothing else which ensures that when char or "chair" is used by either one of us, the other will be directed to the thing he is intended to be directed to. (ii) Turning to large linguistic communities, the same considerations seem to provide familiar social contract theories about how men first talked. Adam decides to use the noise 0 in place of the animal T. After naming all the animals this way, he sits down to teach Eve, Cain and Abel. So now we have a small group of users of 0 and the practice spreads. Spread far enough and it becomes what we call "convention". The actual meetings to standardize usage are of little import; we don't have to imagine a congress of communicants coming to order say. In the last analysis what "convention" means is simply "wides- pread social habit"", however acquired and perpetuated. When a speaker wants to pick T out and get T across to others, he habitually utters 0. When a listener hears 0 he habitually recognizes this intention and so habitually thinks of T himself. That's all there is to the matter of communicating. (iii) The same sort of account is sometimes suggested even by made-up onomata. How can a speaker communicate something new and unfamiliar when there is no onoma for it? By pointing. "Look over there. I've just coined the word 'f for that kind of thing. That's what I shall be referring to when I use 'f hereafter. Be forewarned." I accompany my bodily gesture,

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pointing, with a vocal gesture, oral blasting. In the long run the vocal gesture on its own can become customary (i.e. habitual) and hence a genuine onoma.

Few of us would approve of this type of story any more. Since Ludwig Wittgenstein, ostensive definition and ostensively based convention have fallen on hard times. Who today would claim to understand at all how Adam pulled it off in the Garden of Eden? Still, none of this bothered Plato in the Cratylus:

An onoma ... is whatever people happen to agree to use for (voipuvOL xaxetv

xaXXoL) a thing, just a piece of their voice applied to (m qOeyy6wvoL) the thing. (383a)

I cannot conceive of any other correctness in onomata than this: I may call (xaXEiv) a thing by one onoma which I gave (IOiriv) to it and you by another which you gave. (385d)

Convention (kvAhxwv) is the sole principle of correctness in onomata and it makes no difference at all whether we accept the existing convention or adopt an opposite one according to which small things would be dubbed (xaxEtv) instead with the onoma "great" and great things with the onoma "small". (433e, my translations; cf. 416c, 435c-d)

As before, the expressions to attend to in these passages (and others like 383b, 384d-e, 409d, 427c-d) are not the well-run-in nouns "convention" and "custom", so much as the verbs for the relation between onoma and thing which convention and custom sanctify. Agreement "to use 0 for T", "to call T by 0", "to give 0 to T", "to dub T by 0" and so on - these agreements are the necessary and sufficient conditions for success with onomata. Though Plato never uses the terminology of "proxy" or "surro- gate" or "stand-in", understandably enough, agreement on any of these just is agreement to let 0 be a vocal proxy for T for the purposes of communicating verbally.

IV. Which Is Plato's Own View?

It has sometimes been common knowledge, and it is perfectly plain in any case, that Plato presents us with a choice between pvxos and vo6ios in the Cratylus:

If onomata are to be signs for things, can you suggest any better way of making them signs than by making them as much as possible like the things which they are to signify? Or do you prefer the theory advanced by Hermogenes who claims that onomata are conventional and signify to those who establish the convention and knew the things beforehand. . .? Which of these two theories do you prefer? (433e)

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Ignoring the interesting question: 'Which is right?" take up the interesting question: "Which did Plato think right?" Which of the characters Cratylus, Hermogenes and Socrates is meant to be Plato's own persona? Is Cratylus meant to win out in the end, or Hermogenes, or both, or neither?10

I think we can resolve such problems only when we slow down to attend to the actual philosophical calibre of the actual philosophical argumentation. The Cratylus probably contains more arguments per page than any other dialogue save the Parmenides. The most important:

(a) Personal names changeable at will (384d). (b) Truth values in sentences and their parts (385b-c). (c) Possibility of wisdom and folly (385d-386c, 391d-392d). (d) Natural constraints on tools (386d-387d, 388e-390e). (e) Flux onomata (402a-d, 411 b-412d). (f) Foreign origin of Greek onomata (409d-410a, 421c-d). (g) Superiority of ancient onomata (414c-d, 418a-419b). (h) Unlimited alteration of onomata suicidal (414d-e). (i) Generalization from the etymologies (422c-e, 426d-427d). (j) Deaf and dumb languages (422e-423e). (k) Paradox of false judgements (429b-430a, 431 e-432d). (1) True and false "assignment" in copies (430b-43 1 b). (m) "ExXpknOrs" / "axX'vp6'nrp" a test case (434b-435b). (n) Onomata for numbers (435b-c). (o) Overall consistency of onomata (436c-d). (p) Double etymologies (436e-437d). (q) Labours of the original onoma-giver (438a-e). (r) Stability in referents required for onomazon (439c-440c).

Plentiful they may be, these arguments are also of strikingly uneven quality. With a single exception, all of them fall into four and only four groups: bad arguments for Descriptions, good arguments against Descriptions, bad arguments against Proxies, good arguments for Proxies. Now Plato is as capable of giving a horrible argument for a view he personally favours as the rest of us, and sometimes just as unawares; so we mustn't confuse 2300 years of hindsight in assessing pieces of reasoning for 2300 years of foresight. Nonetheless, the fact that the barrage of Cratylus arguments are ofjust these four permutations surely signals some degree of deliberate, selfconscious design.

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for against against for Description Proxy Description Proxy

good f, h, k, m, a, f, m, n ____________ ~p , r

bad c, d, e, g, b, c q _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ i,j , 1, o _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _J__ _ _ _

The pattern is too striking to be ignored. Plato himself is a Proxy man. He always was actually (e.g. Charm. 163d). And he remained so to his dying day (e.g. Theaet. 177d-e, 184c Pol. 26le, Soph. 218c, Epist. VII 343a-b; but cf. Tim. 29b-c).

It would be tedious to examine very many of the Cratylus arguments in detail to see which are bad in reference to what view, etc. At the same time, it would be cavalier to skip offjustifying the above assignments entirely. So compromise. Consider briefly just the type of reasoning which seems to convince Socrates in the end. In central cases of onomata, he finally realizes, convention and agreement are in fact the only factors which figure.

Three of Plato's favorite examples. (i) Early on, Hermogenes illustrates his vo6ios story with a characteristic treatment of the onomata of slaves. Whatever onoma you choose to give to some thing is correct, he says, and if you change it for another, the new onoma is no less correct 'just as we change the onomata of our servants" (384d). Perhaps occasional slave onomata are descriptive: Hylas, for instance, was probably hoped to be as beautiful as the hero Hylas; Parmenon was so-called presumably because of his special faithfulness ("Trusty"); maybe Chryso and Xanthidian ("gold") were blonds. Even so this isn't the case with very many of these, and it is never what is responsible for their success anyway - since they are obviously changeable at will, whimsically, arbitrarily, with no impairment in ability to do what real onomata should do: even a whimsically changed onoma still picks out one of my slaves from the others and gets across which one is intended. (ii) With onomata for numbers, convention is even more clearly the driving force:

Both convention and custom must (&vcyxatov) contribute something towards the indication of our meaning when we speak. For, my friend, if you will just turn your attention to numbers, where do you think you can possibly get onomata to apply to each individual number on the principle of likeness unless (Eo'v ii) you allow agreement and convention on your part to control the correctness of onomata? (435b, my emphasis)

Now it is not too difficult to find vaguely "natural" onomata in the most common Greek mathematical notation:1

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A I A 10 I 100 P 1000 /A 10,000 M (orAM or MA) 2 B 20 K 200 v' 2000 ,B 3 F 30 A 300 T 3000 4 a 40 M 400 Y 29 KO 5 E 50 N 500 (I) Ill PIA (AIP, PAI) 6 C 60 _ 600 X 293 Evr 7 Z 70 0 700 1 754 'NA 8 H 80 11 800 Q E 9 83 90 9 900 T 58,592 M,D9B1I

Thus alpha, because it is the first letter of the alphabet, is especially appropriate for the first number, 1. The letter mu, because it is the first letter of the onoma "countless" (IV'pwl), is especially suitable for the number 10,000. Yet beta with a stroke before it stands for 2000 while omicron with a stroke doesn't stand for 70,000. (Indeed, the stroke is as arbitrary a mark as you can imagine.) Though the second letter of the alphabet may be especially apt for the second number, the seventeenth letter (pi) doesn't stand for the seventeenth number (17) but for the eighth number in the second set of nines (80) - and extra symbols not in the Greek alphabet had to be added just to get sets of nines in the first place (e.g. sampi). Thus even the most "natural"-seeming mathematical notation is still basically conventional: it works just to the extent and because we agree already on which symbols to use for which numbers. (iii) This is borne out by a general principle quietly used throughout the Cratylus but rarely commented on - that simple adoption of foreign onomata by Greek speakers suffices to make them into perfectly legitimate Greek onomata:

If anyone should ask you what natural appropriateness or correctness there was in these onomata you have employed, "going" (i6v) and "flowing" (p?ov) and "giving" (80vv) - What answer should I make? Is that your meaning? Yes. We acquired just now one way of making an answer with a semblance of sense in it. Saying, if there is an onoma we do not know about, that it is of foreign origin. Now this may be true of some of them. (42 lc-d; cf. 409d-410b, 416a)

The examples of slave, number and foreign onomata might suggest we construct an inductive generalization here. But the resulting argument would be fairly weak - what would justify going from only three cases to all cases? - and in fact Plato is not content to leave it at that. He argues as well that these onomata involve central cases of genuine onomata. Such is the presumption throughout the Cratylus, and presumed by all parties. So, for instance, the initial dispute between Cratylus and Hermogenes is

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phrased entirely in terms of personal names (such as the onomata we give our slaves); both insist that personal names have no special features which set them off from any other word or expression. Similarly, when Socrates goes further to develop the Description Theory, he develops it first in terms of the personal names of gods and heroes like "Astyanax" and "Hermes" (392b-397b, 401b-408d) and then in terms of general words, which he claims are indistinguishable in function, like "hero"', ";man ", "justice", "day" and "beautiful" (397e-400c, 409a-421c). Personal names, that is, are taken as the basic type and the others are elaborations of the basic principle already applied to that basic type. Onomata of foreign origin are also expressly central. They include, after all, an enormous variety: mass nouns like "fire" and "water" (409d, 410a); natural kind terms like "dog" (410a); adjectives like "sevil" and "useful" (416a, 417c); abstract nouns like "6dis- tress" and "wisdom" (419c, 412b); even personal names like "Letho" (406a) - all in addition to the participles ("going", "flowing" etc.) we ran into before.

What these additional considerations give us is an inductive generalization that is very chesty indeed:

(1) The personal onoma of a personal slave can be changed at will without damaging its ability to perform the onoma functions for that thing. (Nothing in the nature of the slave's onoma, nor in the nature of the slave himself, constrains which personal name can be used successfully for which slave - otherwise they couldn't be changed "at will".) (2) The onomata of numbers are only fitfully descriptive, so simple convention among users of the notation must have sufficed to make certain marks into the onomata for certain numbers. (3) Many Greek onomata happen to be of foreign origin, so simple adoption by a Greek polis also seems enough to make noises and marks into onomata. (4) These three sorts of cases are not curiosities and exceptional, however, but perfectly central, standard, run-of-the-mill. They are precisely the sorts of cases we are referring to by "onomata"; if any linguistic items merit the title "onomata", they do. (5) What holds true of a central or standard case of an X holds true for each and every genuine X. (6) Therefore the features of (1) through (3) hold true of all onomata. Which noise or mark goes with which thing can be changed without impairing the onoma function. Nothing in the composition of the onoma and nothing in the nature of its referent constrains some

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onoma's success. Simple convention among its users, simple adoption by Greek speakers and hearers, can guarantee such success though, even all on its own. (7) This is the Proxy Theory.

In central cases of onomata, that is, the operative principle turns out to be not resemblance and depiction but agreement and habit. So too for onomata in general then. Not only is the Description Theory false (we have counterexamples). The Proxy Theory is in fact true (it fits the central cases).

V. Epilogue

In the Cratylus, I have been arguing, Plato worries at a central semantic topic. Do general words hook up to their proper referents more or less in the manner personal names hook up to their proper referents - as simple linguistic proxies? Or are general words more on a pattern with potted definitions or verbal pictures of their proper referents - descriptive of them? I've been arguing that Plato was self-conscious and explicit about these alternatives. That he knew the stakes and presuppositions. That he opted for the Proxy story to the exclusion of the Description story.

This has a wider bearing on the semantic system which Plato is in the course of building up over the "Middle" and "Critical Period" dialogues. In the end, this system consisted of three semantic theses. (i) A "Naming Thesis" - general words hook up to the Forms they refer to by being their proper names (e.g. Prot. 349a-d, Parm. 147d-e). (ii) An "Eponymy Thesis" - general words hook up to the sensibles they refer to only derivatively, eponymously, in virtue of the especially intimate relation those sensibles have to the named Forms (e.g. Phd. 102a-103b, Tim. 51e-52a). (iii) A "Stating Thesis" - whole sentences hook up to the states of affairs they refer to doubly indirectly, by putting together proper and eponymous names in an order which matches (or fails to match) the order in which their respective referents are arranged in nature (e.g. Soph. 259e-263d, Phil. 40c-e). The Cratylus discussion is right at home in all this. Separating off a "Naming Thesis" from an "Eponymy Thesis"' amounts to separating off the job of naming a thing from the job of predicating a property of the thing. Naming (picking out a single thing) is what is done by a word-to-One hook - that is, by a piece of language functioning as a proper name. Predicating (saying what is common to several things) is what is done by a word-to-Many hook - that is, by a piece of language functioning as an

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eponymous name. It is really the point of the Description Theory to jam these two functions together. It is really the point of the Proxy Theory to disentangle them from each other. The Cratylus ultimately approves their separation.12

Massey University

1 For further discussion and citations see an earlier article, "Plato's Semantics and Plato's Parmenides", Phronesis, XXV (1980), pp. 44-5 and fn. 5. 2 Here are some less eccentric opinions. (i) A study of the etymological formation of Greek words: Ernst Cassirer, The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms (Yale, 1952), 1, p. 118; W. D.Ross, "The Date of Plato's Cratylus" Revue Internationale de Philosophie, IX (1955), p. 191. (ii) An attempt to trace to trace the historical origin of language: Wincenty Lutoslawski, Origin and Growth of Plato's Logic (Longmans, 1897), pp. 228-9; H. N. Fowler, Plato: Cratylus, Parmenides, Greater Hippias, Lesser Hippias (Heinemann, 1926), pp. 3-4. (iii) A search for the prerequisites of a philosophically perfect notation: George Grote, Plato and Other Companions of Sokrates (Murray, 1867), II, p. 506; Raphael Demos, "Plato's Philosophy of Language", Journal of Philosophy, LXI (October 29, 1964), pp. 598-9; Norman Kretzman, "Plato on the Correctness of Names", American Philosophical Quarterly, VIII (April, 1971), p. 137. (iv) An examination of the presuppositions of "Early Period" definition hunts: Rosamund K. Sprague, "Reply to Dr. Levinson", in Essays in Ancient Greek Philosophy, ed. by J. P. Anton and George L. Kustas (State U. of New York, 1971), pp. 367-9; Kuno Lorenz and JOrgen Mittelstrass, "On Rational Philosophy of Language: The Programme of Plato's Cratylus Reconsidered", Mind, LXXVI (January, 1967), pp. 1, 4; Georgios Anagnostopoulos, "The Significance of Plato's Cratylus", Review of Metaphysics, XXVII (December, 1973), pp. 333-7. (v) One more facet of the ubiquitous fifth-century nomos/phusis debate: W. K. C. Guthrie, A History of Greek Philosophy (Cambridge, 1969, 1978), III, pp. 204-6, V, p. 5; C. J. Classen, "The Study of Language amongst Socrates' Contemporaries". African Classical Association Proceedings, II (1959), pp. 40-3; R. B. Levinson, "Language, Plato and Logic", in Essays in Ancient Greek Philosophy, pp. 260-1. (vi) An investigation of how far an onomatopoeic principle holds for human speech: Roger Brown, Words and Things (Free Press, 1958), pp. 111-2, cf. 112-21, 129-38; Carl Sagan suggests dolphins communicate this way incidentally, The Dragons of Eden (Random House, 1977), pp. 107-8 fn. 1. 3 Collected Papers, (Harvard, 1931, 1933), IV, para. 537 with II, paras. 245-6. For discussions of type / token in the Cratylus see: Kretzman, "Plato on the Correctness of Names", pp. 129-30; Charles Kahn, "Language and Ontology in the Cratylus", in Exegesis and Argument, ed. by Edward Lee et al (Van Gorcum, 1973), pp. 164-5; and especially Jeffrey Gold, "The Ambiguity of 'Name' in Plato's Cratylus" Philosophical Studies, XXXIV (1978), pp. 223-32. 4 This translation of 8iXow is deliberately chosen not to preclude what a candidate onoma must do in order to pull this off- imitate, say, versus stand proxy for. We are still operating at the what-is-the-function level, and not yet on the level of prerequisites-for- success-at-that-function. In this context (435a) "effect a communication" is the right

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reading. In other places 81X&6w is linked with likeness and resemblance as "disclosing" or "making manifest the essence" (e.g. 393d, 422d). These ambiguities have caused great misunderstanding of the Cratylus procedure; with care, though, some sense can be made of it. 5 Compare Kahn, "Language and Ontology in the Cratylus," pp. 152-3: Plato here is not really concerned with the problem of the correctness of names, in the sense in which this problem is defined by the two rival theses, but ... with a quite different. . . question: What are some of the minimum conditions that must be satisfied by the name-relation, or more generally the sign-function, in order for words to serve in communicating information, that is, in order for true and false statements to be possible?

Also note Anagnostopoulos, "Plato's Cratylus: The Two Theories of the Correctness of Names", Review of Metaphysics, XXV (June, 1972), pp. 708-9: The question of how names are correct can be answered in the same way we would answer a similar question about any other ... instrument. That is, it can be answered by finding the necessary and sufficient conditions to be realized in a particular instrument if it is to perform a certain function. In the case of names, the question can be answered by finding the necessary and sufficient conditions to be realized in a phoneme so that it can perform the function of teaching and separating things according to their nature. (cf. pp. 72 1-2) 6 Compare the theses ascribed to Cratylus by: Kretzman, "Plato on the Correctness of Names", p. 126; Richard Robinson, "The Theory of Names in Plato's Cratylus", Essays in Greek Philosophy (Clarendon, 1969), pp. 108-110; Anagnostopoulos, "Plato's Cratylus', p. 694. 7 See especially: Nehring, "Plato and the Theory of Language", Traditio, III (1945), pp. 19-21; J. V. Luce, "Plato on Truth and Falsity in Names", Classical Quarterly, XIX (1969), pp. 225-6; Jorge Luis Borges, "The Analytical Language of John Wilkins", Other Inquisitions: 1937-1952 (U. Texas, 1964), pp. 101-6; I. M. Crombie, An Examination of Plato's Doctrines, (Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1963), II, p. 478. 8 Compare the theses ascribed to Hermogenes by: Kretzman, "Plato on the Correctness of Names", p. 126 and "History of Semantics", in Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. by Paul Edwards (Macmillan, 1967), VII, pp. 360-1; Anagnostopoulos, "Plato's Cratylus", pp. 695-8. The "autonomous idiolect" possibility in (D') is made far too much of. In fact it plays no great role in the Proxy theory and though Socrates scores some quick points off it in the beginning, it is completely ignored when he comes to agree with Hermogenes in the end. 9 The point is commonly muddled. Many commentators act as if admitting that there is correctness of some kind to onomata gives the whole show away to Cratylus. Thus: Crombie, Examination of Plato's Doctrines, II, p. 479, 481; Luce, "Plato on Truth and Falsity in Names", p. 227; Rudolf Weingartner, "Making Sense of the Cratylus" Phronesis, XV (1970), p. 14; Kretzman, "Plato on the Correctness of Names", p. 133. It doesn't of course. What is at question is whether the undoubted correctness (successful- ness) there is in correct (successful) onomata is due to natural or to conventional factors. 10 Some suggested winners. (i) Cratylus: Anagnostopoulos, "Significance of Plato's Cratylus" pp. 331-2; Jerry Clegg, "Self-Predication and Linguistic Reference in Plato's Theory of Forms", Phronesis, XVIII (1973), p. 27. (ii) Hermogenes: Robinson, "Criticism of Plato's Cratylus", Essays in Greek Philosophy, pp. 120-2, 127; Josiah B. Gould, "Plato about Language: The Cratylus Reconsidered", Apeiron, III (January, 1969), pp. 25-6. (iii)

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Both together: Nehring, "Plato and the Theory of Language", pp. 25-8; Gold, "Ambiguity of 'Name' in Plato's Cratylus" pp. 227, 245-6. (iv) Neither: Weingartner, "Making Sense of the Cratylus' pp. 6, 17, 20-1, 25. (v) Plato can't make up his mind: Crombie, Examination of Plato's Doctrines, II, pp. 485-6. 1 Thomas L. Heath, A Manual of Greek Mathematics (Dover, 1931), pp. 14-7. 12 The consequences for the hoary issue of "Self-Predication" are obvious.

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Plato's Semantics and Plato's "Cratylus"