Abstract

Most philosophers regard Plato as the father of metaphysical realism: the first philosopher, with his theory of Forms, to posit universals as a solution to the problem of attribute agreement. As a result, the belief in universals has come to be known as "Platonism" and its adherents "Platonists." But the truth is that Plato never explicitly refers to the Forms as "universals." Nor can we confidently infer from what Plato does say about the Forms that he even intends them to be considered as universals. In the light of the evidence, I marshal that the standard view of Plato's metaphysics is false. Contrary to philosophical idiom, Plato was not a Platonist; he was a nominalist, who believed that the Forms are concrete particulars. Furthermore, contrary to popular belief, Plato came to believe in the Forms not because of the problem of attribute agreement, but because of certain epistemological considerations, specifically, the question of how knowledge is possible in a changing world. ;We can best discern Plato's nominalism through his patent preference for the acquaintance model of knowledge. His predecessors, including Homer, Xenophanes, Heraclitus, and Parmenides, tended to model knowledge on perception, treating "knowing" as essentially synonymous with "seeing" or "having seen." Thus, knowledge in the ancient world came to be understood as a matter of direct acquaintance. Following philosophical tradition, Plato continued to conceive of knowledge in these terms, as a "sensing" with the mind's eye, a "touching" with spirit hands, a sort of extrasensory perception. This ultimately influenced his thinking about the Forms. Because epistemological considerations ultimately served as Plato's chief incentive to posit the Forms, how he thought of the Forms would have been largely influenced by how he thought of knowledge. Since knowledge for Plato is direct and immediate, resulting from an act of noetic perception, the Forms, as the objects of knowledge, must be things we "perceive." But, if we think about it, concrete physical particulars are the objects of perception. Thus, it is reasonable to think that Plato took the Forms to be concrete particulars, though of a nonphysical sort