208
Socrates
SOC. But he is still, as we say, without knowledge, though he has right opinion?
Socrates
SOC. Yes, but with his opinion he has rational explanation; for he wrote with the method in terms of letters in his mind, and we agreed that that was rational explanation.
Theaetetus
THEAET. True.
10
Socrates
SOC. There is, then, my friend, a combination of right opinion with rational explanation, which cannot as yet properly be called knowledge?
Theaetetus
THEAET. There is not much doubt about it.
Socrates
SOC. So it seems that the perfectly true definition of knowledge, which we thought we had, was but a golden dream. Or shall we wait a bit before we condemn it? Perhaps the definition to be adopted is not this, but the remaining one of the three possibilities one of which we said must be affirmed by anyone who asserts that knowledge is right opinion combined with rational explanation.
Theaetetus
THEAET. I am glad you called that to mind. For there is still one left. The first was a kind of vocal image of the thought, the second the orderly approach to the whole through the elements, which we have just been discussing, and what is the third?
Socrates
SOC. It is just the definition which most people would give, that knowledge is the ability to tell some characteristic by which the object in question differs from all others.
15
Theaetetus
THEAET. As an example of the method, what explanation can you give me, and of what thing?
