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[188a]

Socrates
Then this, at any rate, is possible for us, is it not, regarding all things collectively and each thing separately, either to know or not to know them? For learning and forgetting, as intermediate stages, I leave out of account for the present, for just now they have no bearing upon our argument.

Theaetetus
Certainly, Socrates, nothing is left in any particular case except knowing or not knowing it.

Socrates
Then he who forms opinion must form opinion either about what he knows or about what he does not know?

Theaetetus
Necessarily.

Socrates
And it is surely impossible that one who knows a thing does not know it, or that one who does not know it


Plato. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vol. 12 translated by Harold N. Fowler. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921.

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  • Commentary references to this page (2):
    • James Adam, The Republic of Plato, 1.327C
    • James Adam, The Republic of Plato, 4.436B
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