Theory and History of Ontology

by Raul Corazzon - e-mail: raul.corazzon[at]formalontology.it

For an overview see the Index of the Pages, the SITE MAP or the Alphabetical Index of the Philosophers: A-F - G-O - P-Z; You can also download this page as

Table of Contemporary Ontologists (click on the image to see the PDF file)

Plato's Parmenides and the Dilemma of Participation

Index of the Section: "Semantics and Predication Before Aristotle: Parmenides and Plato"

• Parmenides of Elea's Way of Truth

  • Annotated bibliography (A - D)

  • Annotated bibliography (E - K)

  • Annotated bibliography (L - Q)

  • Annotated bibliography (R - Z)

  • Critical Editions and Translations of Parmenides' Poem

• Plato's Parmenides and the Dilemma of Participation

• Semantics, Predication, Truth and Falsehood in Plato's Sophist

  • Annotated bibliography on Plato's Sophist. First Part: A - J

  • Annotated bibliography on Plato's Sophist. Second Part: K - Z

• Plato's Cratylus and the problem of the "correctness of names"

INTRODUCTION: THE ANCIENT INTERPRETATIONS OF PLATOS' PARMENIDES

"Plato's Parmenides was probably written within the last two decades preceding the death of its author in 347 B.C. (1) Despite almost two millennia of documented commentary, however, scholars today are still struggling to make sense of the dialogue. Almost every major discussion of the Parmenides in this century has begun with some remark about its extraordinary difficulty; (2) and no line of interpretation has yet been offered that a majority of commentators find persuasive.

The main problem of interpretation, most agree, is what to make of Plato's treatment of the several hypotheses that constitutes the second portion of the dialogue (Stephanus 137C-166C, referred to subsequently as "Parmenides II"). One source of perplexity is that this latter portion fails to exhibit any obvious continuity of subject matter with the first part of the dialogue ("Parmenides I"), making it difficult to determine what the dialogue as a whole is about. To make matters worse, the argumentation of the second part is so extremely condensed that it sometimes gives the appearance of being incoherent. As a result, not only are individual arguments often very hard to decipher, but moreover it is far from apparent what Plato was trying to accomplish with these arguments in the first place.

(...)

Two major lines of interpretation were already established by the time of Proclus' Parmenides Commentary in the fifth century A.D., (3) and both have prominent followers in the present century. As Proclus notes in the first book of his commentary,  (4) some readers view the dialogue as an exercise in logic. Within this group, some read Parmenides II as a polemical tour-de-force in which methods of argument derived from Zeno are turned against their originator, in an effort by Plato to show that Zeno's own monistic views lead to absurdities of the very sort he purports to demonstrate against the champions of pluralism. Others within this group read the second part more or less at face value, as a demonstration of a logical method that will enable Socrates to avoid the pitfalls in his theory of Forms that are exposed by Parmenides in the first part of the dialogue. In either case, readers of this persuasion view the dialogue primarily as a dialectical exercise, devoid of any positive metaphysical content.

The second major line of interpretation identified by Proclus (5) assigns Parmenides II a definite metaphysical purpose. An early version of this approach (perhaps associated with Origen in the third century A.D. (6) identifies the topic of the dialogue as the Being of the historical Parmenides, with the consequence that the exclusively negative results of the first hypothesis come to be viewed as adding to the pluralistic list of features denied of the singular Being in Parmenides' poem. The tradition of interpretation with which Proclus himself joins forces, on the other hand, is that beginning with Plotinus and moving through Porphyry to lamblichus and Syrianus. As Proclus puts it, (7) commentators of this group take the subject of the dialogue to be "all things that get their reality from the One," which he later identifies with the Good of Plato's Republic. (8) Keying upon the conclusion at Parmenides 142A that the One can be neither expressed nor conceived, Proclus reads the results of the first hypothesis as a demonstration of the ineffable transcendence of this Supreme Principle. (9)"

(1). See W. K. C. Guthrie, A History of Greek Philosophy, vol. 5, p. 34. The most recent attempt to assign a date to the Parmenides is G. R. Ledger's Re-Counting Plato, which locates it between the Republic and the Theaetetus sometime before 369 B.C. My own view of the matter, defended in appendix B of Plato's Late Ontology, is that the second part of the dialogue at least was composed somewhat later, perhaps around the time of the Sophist and the Statesman.

(2). Thus, for example, the opening comment of F M. Cornford (Plato and Parmenides, p. V) that ancient and modern scholars alike have differed more widely about the second part of the Parmenides than about any of the other dialogues, that of M. Miller (Plato's Parmenides, p. 3) that the Parmenides is "the most enigmatic of all of Plato's dialogues," and R. S. Brumbaugh's opening remark in Plato on the One that no other work in the history of philosophy has retained the obscurity of this particular writing.

(3). A history of commentary on the Parmenides up to the time of Proclus is given in John Dillon's introduction to Proclus' Commentary on Plato's Parmenides, translated in part by Glenn Morrow and completed by Dillon.

(4). Proclus' Parmenides Commentary 630.37-635.27.

(5). Ibid. 635.31-640.16.

(6). See Dillon in Proclus' Commentary on Plato's Parmenides, p. 8.

(7). Proclus' Parmenides Commentary 638.18-19.

(8). Ibid. 1097.10, passim.

(9). Ibid. 46K ff., from the Latin translation. The manner in which this reading anticipates, and to some extent inspires, the "negative theology" of the Middle Ages is noted by Cornford (Plato and Parmenides, p. VI) and by R. Klibansky (Plato's Parmenides in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, pp. 286, 309). 

From: Kenneth M. Sayre - Parmenides' Lesson - Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press 1996 pp. XI-XII.

STRUCTURAL OUTLINE OF PLATO'S PARMENIDES

"0. Stage-setting (126a-127d)
1. The elicitation of Socrates' theory of forms by Zeno's contradictions (127d-130a)
2. Parmenides' refutations of Socrates' theory (130a-134e)

(1) Inquiry into the range of the forms (130b-130e)
(2) The exposure of how participation appears to contradict the unity of the form (130e-133a)

(i) Against the unity (to be understood as the integrity) of the participated form, the dilemma of participation by whole or by part of the form (130e-13 le)
(ii) Against the unity (to be understood as the singularity) of the participated form, the regress arguments (131e-133a)

(3) The exposure of how, if the forms and their participants belong to separate domains, forms are unknowable (133a-134e)

3. Parmenides' reorienting help: the method of "gymnastic" (135a-137c)
4. Parmenides' return to Zenonian contradiction: the four pairs of apparently antithetical hypotheses (137d-166b)

(1) If the One is, it both has none of the possible characters, including being and unity, (hypothesis I, 137d-142a) and has all of the possible characters (hypothesis II, 142b-155e) and transits between them (hypothesis Ha, 155e-157b).
(2) If the One is, "the others" both participate in it and as a result have all the possible characters (hypothesis III, 157b-159b) and do not participate in it and as a result have no characters at all (hypothesis IV, 159b-16od).
(3) If the One is not, it both is, as referent of speech and knowledge, different from "the others" and participates in greatness, equality, and smallness and participates in being in some sense, transiting between being and not-being, (hypothesis V, 16ob-163b) and -- since it does not participate in being in any sense -- cannot have any characters at all (hypothesis VI, 163b-164b).
(4) If the One is not, "the others" both will not "truly" have, but will "seem" and "appear" to have, all the possible characters (hypothesis VII, 164b-165e) and -- since they cannot participate in anything that is not -- cannot even "seem" and "appear" to have any of the possible characters (hypothesis VIII, 165e-166b)."

From: Mitchell H. Miller, Jr. - Plato's Parmenides. The conversion of thr soul - Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1986, pp. 185-186 (Appendix A)

A SURVEY OF RECENT INTERPRETATIONS OF PLATO'S PARMENIDES (under construction)

A brief introduction to the current research on Plato can be found in:

Gerald Press - The state of the question in the study of Plato - Southern Journal of Philosophy, 34: 507-532 (1996). Reprinted in: Nicholas D. Smith (ed.) - Plato. Critical assessments. Volume I. General issues of interpretation - London, Routledge (1998) pp. 309-332. 

"The sheer magnitude of the scholarly literature on Plato makes its assessment difficult. Even if we leave aside editions and translations, the study of Plato is carried on in many languages other than the more familiar English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish and by scholars in an astonishing diversity of fields: anthropology, archeology, art history, classical philology, city planning, drama, education, geography, history, law, literature, mathematics, medicine, music, penology, philosophy, politics, psychology, religious studies, rhetoric, and sociology. At least partly for this reason, there has been no really comprehensive review of the literature recently and it is questionable whether such a thing is even possible. The problem can be reduced to more manageable proportions by distinguishing among the diverse purposes for which scholars study Plato's dialogues. For a substantial amount of the Plato literature is essentially concerned with discovering Plato's answers to the questions of concern to contemporary scholars and researchers, or, more plainly, 'the enterprise of mining Plato for the purposes of one's own philosophizing' [cited from Rudolph Weingartner]. Guthrie is correct that there is nothing intrinsically better about what he calls, on the other hand, 'the historical approach' or 'a scholar's approach,' but the difference is often overlooked. The historical and scholarly approach has its own aims and uses, and is the concern here. Of that still substantial Plato literature which is left, there is a further distinction to be made between the study of Platonism, which involves study of the dialogues along with many other factors, texts, and influences, and the study and interpretation of the dialogues in and for themselves . That is to say, the subject of these pages is the state of the question about how to understand and interpret the dialogues of Plato, to discover their meaning in their own context, in terms of their own aims, functions, structures, and principles." (p. 309).

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL RESOURCES ON PLATO

• Harold Cherniss - Plato's bibliography 1950-1957 (with critical annotations) - Lustrum. Internationale Forschungsberichte aus dem Bereich des klassischen Altertums, 4, 1959 pp. 5-308 and 5, 1960 pp. 321-618; Register to the Plato-Report (Lustrum 4/5) pp. 619-648. (Reprinted Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1960,  with a supplement by H. J. Mette)

• Luc Brisson - Plato's bibliography 1958-1975 - Lustrum 20, 1977 pp. 5-304

• Luc Brisson, Hélène Ioannidi - Plato's bibliography 1975-1980 - Lustrum 25, 1983 pp. 31-320 (Corrigenda à Platon 1975-1980 - Lustrum 26, 1984 pp. 205-206)

• Luc Brisson, Hélène Ioannidi - Plato's bibliography 1980-1985 - Lustrum 30, 1988 pp. 11-294 (Corrigenda à Platon 1980-1985 - Lustrum 31, 1989 pp. 270-271)

• Luc Brisson, Hélène Ioannidi - Plato's bibliography 1985-1990 - Lustrum 34, 1992 pp. 7-338

• Luc Brisson, Frédéric Plin - Platon 1990-1995. Bibliographie - Paris, Vrin 1999 (416 pages)
  TABLE DES MATIÈRES: Introduction P. 7; 1. Listes des périodiques et des ouvrages comprenant une collection d'articles mentionnés dans cette bibliographie p. 15; Périodiques p. 15; Actes de congrés, mélanges, recueils p. 27; 2. Platon et ses oeuvres p. 47; Oeuvres complètes p. 48; Oeuvres choisies p. 51 Oeuvres particulières p. 53; Anthologies p. 60; 3. Travaux d'Interprétation sur Platon et ses oeuvres p. 63; 4. Index général analytique p. 365; Table de l'index p. 367; Index p. 374; 5. Addenda aux tranches antérieures p. 407; Références dans Platon 1990-1995 aux précédentes tranches de bibliographie platonicienne parues dans Lustrum p. 407; Comptes rendues de livres mentionnés dans Platon 1980-1985 et dans Platon 1990-1995, qui ont paru entre 1990 et 1995 p. 411.

• Luc Brisson, Benoît Castelnérac - Platon 1995-2000. Bibliographie - Paris, Vrin 2004 (384 pages)

• Luc Brisson, Frédéric Plin - Bibliographie platonicienne 2002-2003. in: Études platoniciennes, 1, (2004) pp. 299-348

• Luc Brisson, Frédéric Plin - Bibliographie platonicienne 2004-2005. in: Études platoniciennes, 2, (2006) pp. 414-459

• Richard Kraut (ed.) - The Cambridge Companion to Plato - Cambridge, Cambridge University Press 1992 (Bibliography pp. 493-529)  

The Plato bibliography for the period 2000-2009 is available (in PDF format) at The International Plato Society.

LEXICA

A new Greek Lexicon of Plato's works is available:

• Plato. Edited by Roberto Radice - Electronic edition by Roberto Bombacigno - Biblia, Milano (Italy) 2003.

  From the Preface: "This volume and the enclosed CD-ROM contain a fully lemmatised lexicon of the writings of Plato in John Burnet's critical edition (Platonis Opera, 5 vol., Oxford University Press, 1900-1907).
  This lexicon on the work of Plato is the first volume of Lexicon, a Lexicons Series dedicated to Ancient Philosophy, which is part of a multimedia project that includes printed volumes, CD-ROMs and an Internet site (www.biblia.it). A more complete description of the project can be found at this website.

  The purpose of the Lexicon project is to create a powerful, scientifically reliable and easily usable resource for terminological and conceptual searches for scholars of ancient philosophy. The Lexicon archives contain original language texts by the major Greek thinkers in the most recent critical editions or the editions normally used in historical/philosophical research. All the texts are coded and indexed to facilitate in-depth searches by forma and lemma and are presented in electronic form (on-line and on CD-ROM, with a search engine) and in a printed volume. Obviously, the printed volume cannot offer all the characteristics available in the electronic edition. However, because the electronic publishing is still in a transitional phase, it was deemed appropriate to supply support facilities that are also accessible to people without access to computerised research tools, or who work in environments without a computerised workstation.

  The electronic version of Lexicon is available in both on-line and off-line versions; the latter is distributed on CD-ROM with the printed volume. The two versions use the same search interface and the same technology. There are two differences: a) the on-line version allows for parallel searches within several lexicons while, with the CD-ROM version, only one lexicon can be consulted; b) the CD-ROM version allows users greater scope for personalising the text by means of notes, codes and markers."

   

• Schäfer, Christian, Platon-Lexikon. Begriffswörterbuch zu Platon und der platonischen Tradition, Darmstadt (Wissenschftlche Buchgesellschaft) 2007.

RECENT CRITICAL EDITIONS AND TRANSLATIONS OF PLATO'S PARMENIDES

Greek Text

1. Platonis Opera - Recognovit brevique adnotatione critica instruxit Ioannes Burnet - Oxford, Clarendon Press 1905.

2. Platonis Parmenides [et] Phaedrus - Recognovit brevique adnotatione critica instruxit Claudius Moreschini - Roma, Edizioni dell'Ateneo 1966. Greek text, with editorial matter in Latin (the best edition available) 

English Translations

1. The Parmenides of Plato - by Alfred Edward Taylor - Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1934

2. Plato and Parmenides. Parmenides' Way of Truth and Plato's Parmenides - Translated with an introduction and a running commentary, by Francis Macdonald Cornford - New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company 1939

3. Plato's Parmenides - Translation and analysis by Reginald E. Allen - Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press 1963 (Revised edition New Haven, Yale University Press 1997)

4. Parmenides - Translated by Mary Louise Gill and Paul Ryan; introduction by Mary Louise Gill - Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing. Company., 1996

5. Parmenides' lesson. Translation and explication of Plato's Parmenides, by Kenneth M. Sayre, Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1996

6. Plato's Parmenides - Translation and introduction by Albert Keith Whitaker, Newburyport: Focus Publinshing, 1996

7. The Parmenides and Plato's late philosophy. Translation of, and commentary on the Parmenides with interpretative chapters on the Timaeus, the Theaetetus, the Sophist and the Philebus by Robert G. Turnbull, Toronto: Toronto Studies in philosophy, 1998

8. The philosophy of forms: an analytical and historical commentary on Plato's Parmenides, with a new English translation by A. H. Coxon, Assen: Van Gorcum 1999

9. Plato's Parmenides - Translated with introduction and commentary by Samuel Scolnicov, Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003 

French Translations

1. Platon - Parménide, Théetète, Le Sophiste - Traduction de Auguste Diés - Paris: Gallimard 1992

2. Platon - Parménide - Traduction inédite, introduction et notes par Luc Brisson, Paris: GF-Flammarion 1994 

Italian Translations

1. Platone -  Parmenide. introduzione, traduzione, note e apparati di Maurizio Migliori ; testo greco con edizione critica a cura di Claudio Moreschini; appendice bibliografica di Claudio Marcellino, Milano: Rusconi 1994

2. Platone - Parmenide, traduzione di Giuseppe Cambiano [1981], introduzione e note di Francesco Fronterotta, Bari: Laterza, 1998

3. Platone - Parmenide, traduzione, introduzione e note di Luc Brisson, versione italiana a cura di Amalia Riccardo, Napoli: Loffredo 1998 

German Translations

1. Platon - Parmenides - Übersetzt und herausgegeben von Hans Günter Zekl, Hamburg: F. Meiner 1972

2. Platon - Parmenides - bersetzt und herausgegeben von E. Martens, Stuttgart: Reclam 1987

3. Platon's Parmenides - Kommentar und Deutung von Ingeborg Schudoma, Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann 2001 

Spanish Translations

1. Platon - Parménides Por G. R. de Echendía, Madridr: Alianza 1987

2. Platón -  Diálogos Parménides, Teeteto, Sofista, Politico - Traducción e introducciones, Maria Isabel Santa Cruz (Parménides. Político); A. Vallejo Campos (Teeteto); Nestor Luis Cordero (Sofista). - Revisión, C. García Gual y F. García Romero  - Madrid: Gredos, 1988 (vol. V).

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY ON PLATO'S PARMENIDES

N.B. I will dedicate to the "Third Man Argument" a separate bibliography.

1. Il Parmenide di Platone e la sua tradizione. Edited by Barbanti Maria and Romano Francesco. Catania: CUECM 2002.
   Atti del III Colloquio Internazionale del centro di Ricerca sul Neoplatonismo. Università degli Studi di Catania, 31 maggio - 2 giugno 2001.
   Indice: M. Barbanti, F. Romano: Prefazione 7; Carlos Steel: Une histoire de l'interpretation du Parménide dans l'antiquité 11; Luc Brisson: S'il (= le monde) est un. La seconde partie du Par
   ménide de Platon considerée du point de vue de Parménide et de Zénon 41; Maurizio Migliori: L'unità del Parmenide e it suo intento protrettico 59; Franco Ferrari: Unità e oggetto del Parmenide. Problemi e proposte 85; Giovanni Casertano: Ogni uno di fronte a gioventù e vecchiaia 109; Franco Trabattoni: L'errore di Socrate 143; R. Loredana Cardullo: Il Peri Ideon di Aristotele e il Parmenide di Platone, ovvero: da un comune tentativo di "salvare" le idee verso un inevitabile scontro dottrinale155; Eva Di Stefano: Il Parmenide di Platone e il Didaskalikos di Alcinoo185; Francesco Romano: La probabile esegesi pitagorizzante (accademica, medioplatonica e neopitagorica) del Parmenide di Platone 197; Maria Barbanti: La teologia di Origene e la prima ipotesi del Parmenide 249; Gerald Bechtle: Speusippus and the Anonymous Commentary on Plato's Parmenides: how can the One be a Minimum? 281; Alessandro Linguiti: Sulla datazione del Commento al Parmenide di Bobbio. Un'analisi lessicale 307; Jean Pépin: Le Parménide dans les Sentences de Porphyre 323; John Dillon: Iamblichus' identifications of the subject-matters of the hypotheses 329; John J. Cleary: Proclus' elaborate defense of Platonic Ideas 341; Lambros Couloubaritsis: Georges Pachymere et le Parménide de Platon 355; Cocetto Martello: Riflessi del Parmenide in Giovanni Eriugena 371; Werner Beierwaltes: L'interpretazione ficiniana del Parmenide platonico 389; Annalisa raponi: Natorp e il Parmenide di Platone 411; Piero Di Giovanni: Il "Parmenide" di Platone nell'opera di Enzo Paci 425; Paolo Manganaro: Parmenide tra Heidegger e Platone 447-456.

    

2. Platone e l'ontologia. Il Parmenide e il Sofista. Edited by Bianchetti Matteo and Storace Erasmo. Milano: Albo Versorio 2004.

    

3. Plato's Parmenides. Proceedings of the Fourth Symposium Platonicum Pragense. Edited by Havlicek Ales and Karfik Filip. Prague: OIKOYMENH Publishers 2005.
   Contents: Preface 7; Constance C. Meinwald: Literary elements and dialogue form in Plato's Parmenides 9; Dimitri El Murr: La critique de la participation en Parménide, 131a-132b: unité, unicité et le paradoxe de Zenon 21; Béatriz Bossi: Is Socrates really defending conceptualism in Parmenides, 132b3-d4? 58; Karel Thein: The second "Third Man Argument": what difference does the likeness make? 75; Francesco Fronterotta:Methexis et Korismos dans l'interpretation du Parménide de Platon 88; Kenneth Sayre: The method revisited: Parmenides, 135e9-136c6 125; Filip Karfik: Par rapport a soi-meme et par rapport aux autres. Une distinction clef dans le Parménide de Platon 141; Samuel Scolnicov: The conditions of knowledge in Plato's Parmenides 165; Stepán Spinka: Relation, Sein und Zeit 181; David Ambuel: On what is not: Eleatic paradox in the Parmenides and the Sophist 200; Luc Brisson: Les quatre dernières series de deductions dans la seconde partie du Parménide de Platon 216; Denis O'Brien: Le Parménide historique et le Parménide de Platon 234; Luc Brisson: Réponse a Denis O'Brien 257; Monique Dixsaut: Les hypothèses du Parménide: construire des mondes conceptuels possibles 263; John Dillon: Speusippus and the ontological interpretation of the Parmenides 296; Index locorum 313-323.

    

4. Allen Reginald Edgar, "Participation and predication in Plato's middle dialogues," Philosophical Review 69: 147-164 (1960).
   Reprinted in: R. E. Allen (ed.) - Studies in Plato's metaphysics - London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1965 pp. 43-60 and in: N. D. Smith (ed.) - Plato. Critical assessments - Vol. II: Plato's middle period: metaphysics and epistemology - Lond, Routledge, 1998 pp. 57-71.

    

5. Ambuel David. On what is not: Eleatic paradox in the Parmenides and the Sophist. In Plato's Parmenides. Proceedings of the Fourth Symposium Platonicum Pragense. Edited by Havlícek Ales and Karfík Filip. Prague: Oikoimené 2005. pp. 200-215

    

6. Anscombe Gertrude Elizabeth Margareth, "The new theory of forms," Monist 50: 403-420 (1966).
   "In the relatively naive early theory of forms, Plato uses unreflectively such words as "one," "being," "whole," "same," "other"; when he came to reflect on these words and to treat them as signifying forms, he encountered many difficulties -- especially in view of his principle of "self-predication," that the form (being) is itself. An attempt is here made to delineate the "new" theory involved in the "Sophist" and "Parmenides", in two main aspects: participation of one form in another, and negation and incompatibility. A constructable model for these relations of forms is described. "

    

7. Berti Enrico, "Struttura e significato del Parmenide di Platone," Giornale di Metafisica 26: 497-527 (1971).
   Reprinted in: E. Berti - Studi aristotelici - L'Aquila: Japadre 1975 pp. 297-327

    

8. Bluck Richard Stanley, "The Parmenides and the 'Third Man'," Classical Quarterly 6: 29-37 (1956).

    

9. Bluck Richard Stanley, "Forms as standards," Phronesis 2: 115-127 (1957).

    

10. Brisson Luc. Une nouvelle interprétation du Parménide de Platon. In Platon et l'objet de la science. Edited by Morel Pierre-Marie. Bordeaux: Presses de l'Université de Boredaux 1996. pp. 69-112

     

11. Brisson Luc, "'Is the World One?' A new interpretation of Plato's Parmenides," Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 22: 1-20 (2002).

     

12. Brisson Luc. Les quatres dernières séries de déductions dans la seconde partie du Parménide de Platon. In Plato's Parmenides. Proceedings of the Fourth Symposium Platonicum Pragense. Edited by Havlícek Ales and Karfík Filip. Prague: Oikoimené 2005. pp. 216-233

     

13. Brisson Luc. Réponse a Denis O'Brien. In Plato's Parmenides. Proceedings of the Fourth Symposium Platonicum Pragense. Edited by Havlícek Ales and Karfík Filip. Prague: Oikoimené 2005. pp. 257-262
    Réponse à Le Parménide historique et le Parménide de Platon pp. 234-256.

     

14. Brumbaugh Robert. Plato on the One. The hypotheses in the Parmenides. New Haven: Yale University Press 1961. pp.

     

15. Brumbaugh Robert, "The text of Plato's Parmenides," Review of Metaphysics 26: 140-148 (1973).

     

16. Brumbaugh Robert, "Notes on the history of Plato's text: with the Parmenides as a case study," Paideia: 67-79 (1976).

     

17. Brumbaugh Robert, "The purposes of Plato's Parmenides," Ancient Philosophy 1: 39-48 (1980).

     

18. Calogero Guido. Studi sull'eleatismo. Roma: Tipografia del Senato del dott. G. Bardi 1932.
    Second edition with two new appendixes Firenze, La Nuova Italia, 1977
    First edition translated in German as: Studien über den Eleatismus Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1970

     

19. Cherniss Harold, "Parmenides and the Parmenides of Plato," American Journal of Philology 53: 122-138 (1932).
    Reprinted in: H. Chermiss - Selected papers - edited by Leonardo Tarán - Leiden: Brill 1977 pp. 281-297.
    
    "The antinomies of the Parmenides were composed for the purpose of showing that the Eleatic dialectic of Zeno when applied to the monistic Being of Parmenides produces the same paradoxes as when used against pluralism. It is demonstrated that the second part of the dialogue is formally an elaborate parodia of the poem of Parmenides and metodically a parodia of the logic-chopping of Zeno. By this means the psychological purpose of the dialogue is elucidated, the unity of the dialogue is made evident, and its relationship to the Sophist is established."

     

20. Chroust Anton Hermann, "The problem of Plato's Parmenides," New Scholasticism (21): 371-418 (1947).

     

21. Cornford Francis MacDonald. Plato and Parmenides. Parmenides' Way of truth and Plato's Parmenides. London: K. Paul, Trench, Trubner & co. Ltd 1939.
    Translated, with an introduction and a running commentary by F. M. Cornford.
    Reprinted by Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980

     

22. Coxon Allan H. The philosophy of Forms. An analytical and historical commentary on Plato's Parmenides. With a new English Translation. Assen: Van Gorcum 1999.

     

23. Cresswell Max J., "Participation in Plato's Parmenides," Southern Journal of Philosophy 13: 163-171 (1975).

     

24. Curd Patricia, "Parmenidean clues in the search for the Sophist," History of Philosophy Quarterly 5: 307-320 (1988).
    "The paper challenges the view that in both the "Parmenides" and the "Sophist" Plato suffers from confusion about identity and predication. I claim that the arguments of part II of the "Parmenides" are not infected with this confusion. Further, I argue that part II of the "Parmenides" explores and investigates ideas (especially about being and not-being) that are crucial to the solution of the problem of not-being in the "Sophist" (a solution that does not depend on distinguishing identity and predicative senses of 'to be')."

     

25. Dillon John. Speusippus and the ontological interpretation of the Parmenides. In Plato's Parmenides. Proceedings of the Fourth Symposium Platonicum Pragense. Edited by Havlícek Ales and Karfík Filip. Prague: Oikoimené 2005. pp. 296-311

     

26. Dixsaut Monique. Les hypothèses du Parménide: construire des mondes conceptuels possibles. In Plato's Parmenides. Proceedings of the Fourth Symposium Platonicum Pragense. Edited by Havlícek Ales and Karfík Filip. Prague: Oikoimené 2005. pp. 263-295

     

27. Fronterotta Francesco. Guida alla lettura del Parmenide di Platone. Bari: Laterza 1998.

     

28. Fronterotta Francesco. Methexis. La teoria platonica delle idee e la partecipazione delle cose empiriche. Dai dialoghi giovanili al Parmenide. Pisa : Scuola Normale Superiore 2001.

     

29. Fronterotta Francesco. Méthexis et Chôrismos dans l'intérprétation du Parménide de Platon. In Plato's Parmenides. Proceedings of the Fourth Symposium Platonicum Pragense. Edited by Havlícek Ales and Karfík Filip. Prague: Oikoimené 2005. pp. 88-124

     

30. Gadamer Hans-Georg, "Der platonische Parmenides und seine Nachwirkung," Archivio di Filosofia 51: 39-51 (1983).
    Translated in Italian as: Il Parmenide platonico e la sua influenza in: Hans Georg-Gadamer - Studi platonici - Casale Monferrato, Marietti 1984, vol. II pp. 265-278

     

31. Gardeya Peter. Platons Parmenides. Interpretation und Bibliographie. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann 1991.

     

32. Gerson LLoyd P., "Dialectic and forms in Part One of Plato's Parmenides," Apeiron 15: 19-28 (1981).

     

33. Gerson LLoyd P. Plato's development and the development of the Theory of Forms. In Plato's forms: varieties of interpretation. Edited by Welton William. Lanham: Lexington Books 2002. pp. 85-110

     

34. Gourinat Jean-Baptiste. La dialectique des hypothèses contraires dans le Parménide de Platon. In La philosophie de Platon. Edited by Fattal Michel. Paris: L'Harmattan 2002. pp. 233-261

     

35. Graeser Andreas. Prolegomena zu einer Interpretation des zweiten Teils des Platonischen Parmenides . Bern: P. Haupt 1999.

     

36. Hägler Rudolf-Peter. Platons Parmenides: Probleme Der Interpretation. Berlin : Walter de Gruyter 1983.

     

37. Jyiuan Yu, "On Plato's theory of the "Metheksis" of Ideas," Philosophical Inquiry: 25-37 (1991).

     

38. Kim Sung-Jin. Die Widerspruch und das Urteil in Platons Parmenides. Untersuchungen zur platonischen Dialektik. New York: Peter Lang 1989.

     

39. Lynch William. An approach to the metaphysics of Plato through the Parmenides. Washington: Georgetown University Press 1959.
    Second edition: Westport, Greenwood Press 1969

     

40. Malatesta Michele, "One instance of tollendo tollens in Plato's Parmenides 127e1-7," Metalogicon 10: 33-40 (1997).

     

41. Malcolm John, "Semantics and self-predication in Plato," Phronesis.A Journal for Ancient Philosophy 26: 286-294 (1981).

     

42. Mates Benson, "Identity and predication in Plato," Phronesis.A Journal for Ancient Philosophy 24: 211-229 (1979).
    Reprinted in: S. Knuuttila and J. Hintikka - The logic of Being - Dordrecht: Reidel 1986 pp.29-47

     

43. McCabe Mary Margaret. Unity in the Parmenides: the unity of the Parmenides . In Form and argument in late Plato. Edited by Gill Christopher and McCabe Mary Margaret. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1996. pp. 5-48

     

44. Meinwald Constance. Plato's Parmenides. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1991.

     

45. Migliori Maurizio. Dialettica e verità. Commentario filosofico al Parmenide di Platone. Milano: Vita e Pensiero 1990.

     

46. Miller Mitchell. Plato's Parmenides. The conversion of the soul. Princeton: Princeton University Press 1986.

     

47. Miller Mitchell, ""Unwritten teachings" in the Parmenides," Review of Metaphysics 48: 591-633 (1995).

     

48. Moravcsik Julius. Forms and dialectic in the second half of the Parmenides. In Language and Logos. Studies in ancient Greek philosophy presented to G. E. L. Owen. Edited by Schofield Malcolm and Nussbaum Martha. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1982. pp. 135-154

     

49. Moravcsik Julius. Plato and Platonism: Plato's conception of appearance and reality in ontology, epistemology, and ethics, and its modern echoes.1992.
    See in particular the Chapter 4: The Parmenides: Forms and Participation reconsidered pp. 129-167

     

50. Nadal J., "Rémarques sur le Parménide de Platon et la pensée du non-être," Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale 89: 11-32 (1984).

     

51. Nehamas Alexander, "Self-predication and Plato's Theory of Forms," American Philosophical Quarterly 16: 93-103 (1979).
    Reprinted in: A. Nehamas - Virtues of authenticity. Essays on Plato and Socrates - Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1999, pp. 176-195

     

52. Niewohner Friedrich Wilhelm. Dialog und Dialektik in Platons Parmenides: Untersuchungen zur sogennanten platonischen 'Esoterik'. Meisenheim am Glan: A. Hain 1971.

     

53. O'Brien Denis. Le Parménide historique et le Parménide de Platon. In Plato's Parmenides. Proceedings of the Fourth Symposium Platonicum Pragense. Edited by Havlícek Ales and Karfík Filip. Prague: Oikoimené 2005. pp. 234-256

     

54. Paci Enzo. Il significato del Parmenide nella filosofia di Platone. Milano: Principato 1938.
    Second edition: Milano, Bompiani 1988

     

55. Peterson Sandra, "A reasonable self-predication premise for the Third Man Argument," Philosophical Review 82: 451-470 (1973).
    Reprinted in: Nicholas D. Smith (ed.) - Plato. Critical assessments - New York, Routledge, 1998, vol. IV pp. 51-66

     

56. Peterson Sandra, "A correction," Philosophical Review 82: 96 (1975).
    Reprinted in: Nicholas D. Smith (ed.) - Plato. Critical assessments - New York, Routledge, 1998, vol. IV pp. 67-68

     

57. Peterson Sandra, "New rounds of the exercise of Plato's Parmenides," Modern Schoolman: 245-278 (2003).

     

58. Peterson Sandra. The Parmenides. In The Oxford Handbook of Plato. Edited by Fine Gail. New York: Oxford University Press 2008. pp. 383-410
    "Plato's Parmenides contrasts with Plato's other works in several ways. For example, Socrates is depicted as "very young" (127c5), perhaps fifteen or perhaps nineteen. Parmenides questions Socrates, who contradicts himself; in other dialogues of question and answer, Socrates typically questions others, who contradict themselves. Parmenides refutes Socrates on the topic of forms, items such as justice itself and good itself, while the older Socrates of other dialogues presents forms as central to philosophy; the dialogue thus raises the question whether its criticism of forms signals Plato's revision of views expressed in previous writings. The Parmenides is the only dialogue in which forms are the main topic. The dialogue's second part, 137c-166c, is the longest passage of unrelenting argument in Plato's writings. Its arguments arc his most puzzling."

     

59. Rickless Samuel, "How Parmenides saved the Theory of Forms," Philosophical Review 107: 501-554 (1998).

     

60. Rickless Samuel C. Plato's Forms in transition. A reading of the Parmenides. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2007.

     

61. Rist John, "The Parmenides again," Phoenix 16: 1-14 (1962).
    About Runciman (1959)

     

62. Robinson Richard. Plato's earlier dialectic. Oxford: Clarendon Press 1953.
    Second edition (first edition 1941).
    See the chapter XIII: Hypothesis in the Parmenides pp. 223-280, previously published in Classical Philology (1942).

     

63. Runciman Walter Garrison, "Plato's Parmenides," Classical Philology 64: 89-120 (1959).
    Reprinted in: R. E. Allen - Studies in Plato's metaphysics - London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1965 pp. 149-184.

     

64. Ryle Gilbert, "Plato's Parmenides," Mind 48: 129-151 (1939).
    Reprinted in: R. E. Allen - Studies in Plato's metaphysics - London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1965 pp. 97-147.

     

65. Sayre Kenneth. Plato's late ontology: a riddle resolved. Princeton: Princeton University Press 1983.

     

66. Schofield Malcolm. Likeness and likenesses in Parmenides. In Form and argument in late Plato. Edited by Gill Christopher and McCabe Mary Margaret. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1996. pp. 49-78

     

67. Scolnicov Samuel, "Things worth wondering at: a response to Sandra Peterson," Modern Schoolman: 279-287 (2003).

     

68. Scolnicov Samuel. The conditions of knowledge in Plato's Parmenides. In Plato's Parmenides. Proceedings of the Fourth Symposium Platonicum Pragense. Edited by Havlícek Ales and Karfík Filip. Prague: Oikoimené 2005. pp. 165-180

     

69. Sellars Wilfrid, "Vlastos and the Third Man," Philosophical Review 64: 405-437 (1955).

     

70. Silverman Allan. The dialectic of essence: a study of Plato's metaphysics. Princeton: Princeton University Press 2002.

     

71. Steel Carlos. Proclus comme témoin du texte du Parménide. In Tradition et traduction. Les textes philosophiques et scientifiques grecs au Moyen Age latin. Hommage à Fernand Bossier. Edited by Beyers Rita et al. Leuven: Leuven University Press 1999. pp. 281-303

     

72. Steel Carlos. Une histoire de l'interpretation du Parménide dans l'antiquité. In Il Parmenide di platone e la sua tradizione. Edited by Barbanti Maria and Romano Francesco. Catania: CUECM 2002. pp. 11-40

     

73. Sternfeld Robert and Zyskind Harold. Meaning, relation and existence in Plato's Parmenides. The logic of relational realism. New York: Peter Lang 1987.

     

74. Sweeney Leo, "Participation in Plato's Dialogues: Pahedo, Parmenides, Sophist, Timaeus," New Scholasticism 62: 125-149 (1988).
    "The aim of this paper is to give a synthetic and overview interpretation of what Plato intends by "participation" in several dialogues. "Phaedo", 100 sqq.: participation is the effect of the Forms' presence in things and of their having something in common. "Parmenides", 248-249: participation consists of things "being-caused-as-images-of Forms," where "cause" will in later dialogues be disclosed to be the Forms as models and goals and intellects as agents. "Sophist", 219 sqq. and 266a sqq.: by productive art intelligent agents -- human and divine -- cause products to participate through contemplation of Forms as models. "Timaeus", 26b-30d and 47e sqq.: working with the receptacle as the participant underlying all participation, the divine craftsman uses the Forms as models and telic causes in producing individual souls and bodies, together with the entire visible universe itself. "Symposium", 210e-211b, "Phaedo", 79d and "Republic", vi, 511d suggest that Plato's philosophy is not a phenomenology."

     

75. Tai-Bum Yang. Das Problem des Nichtseienden in Platons Parmenides. Zur neuen Interpretation des platonischen Dialogs Parmenides. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann 2008.

     

76. Trabattoni Franco, "Una nuova interpretazione del Parmenide di Platone," Elenchos 14: 65-82 (1993).

     

77. Turnbull Robert G. The Parmenides and Plato's late philosophy. Toronto: University of Toronto Press 1998.
    Translation of and commentary on the Parmenides with interpretative chapters on th Thimaeus, the Theatetus, the Sophist, and the Philebus

     

78. Vlastos Gregory, "Self-predication and self-participation in Plato's later period," Philosophical Review 78: 74-78 (1969).
    Reprinted in: G. Vlastos - Platonic studies - Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1973 pp. 335-341.

     

79. Wahl Jean. Étude sur le Parménide de Platon. Paris: F. Rieder et C.ie 1926.
    Fourth edition Paris: Vrin 1951

     

80. Wundt Max. Platons Parmenides. Berlin: Verlag von W, Kohlhammer 1935.

     

81. Zekl Hans Gûnther. Der Parmenides. Untersuchungen über innere Einheit, Zielsetzung und begriffliches Verfahren eines platonischen Dialogs. Marburg: Elwert 1971.

     

82. Ziermann Christoph. Platons negative Dialektik. Eine Untersuchung der Dialoge "Sophistes" und "Parmenides". Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann 2004.

     

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