Resumen
Resumen de Crátilo
Para quién es
For readers curious about language, meaning and early philosophy, and for anyone who likes to watch a good argument being built through playful word games and rival ideas about names.
De qué trata este libro
Cratylus is a dialogue by Plato, the Athenian philosopher who died in 348 BC. It is usually placed among his middle works, though scholars cannot date it with certainty. It is the earliest surviving book in the Western tradition devoted to a single question: where do words get their meaning? Is the word horse just a sound we have agreed to use, or does it fit the animal in some deeper way?
Three speakers take part. Hermogenes believes names are matters of agreement. Cratylus believes every thing has a name that is right for it by nature. Socrates stands between them and tests both views, sometimes with serious arguments and sometimes with playful word games. Along the way you meet a theory of the name-giver as a craftsman, a long run of explanations of Greek words, and a surprising claim about how letters imitate things. By the end the talk turns from words to knowledge itself. You will see why Plato thinks we must look at things, and not only at names, if we want the truth. Let us begin with the two rival views that start the argument.
En este resumen
- 1Two rival theories about what names areFree
- 2Names are tools made by a skilled namer
- 3Etymologies of heroes and gods reveal hidden meaning
- 4Many names seem to say that everything flows
- 5Sounds may imitate things and custom still counts
- 6Knowledge must come from things, not names
Idea clave 1 de 6
Two rival theories about what names are
The dialogue opens with a quarrel already under way. Hermogenes tells Socrates that his friend Cratylus claims each thing has a name that belongs to it by nature. Cratylus even says that Hermogenes is not truly the name of this man at all. Hermogenes is puzzled and a little hurt, and he asks Socrates to judge.
Hermogenes himself holds the opposite view. For him a name is whatever people agree to call a thing. If you decide to call a horse a man and a man a horse, then the names simply change. He compares it to household slaves, who may be renamed by their masters at will. The Greek word for this idea is nomos, meaning custom or law, and the view is called conventionalism.
Cratylus defends the other side, which takes its label from physis, the Greek word for nature. On his view a correct name shows the real character of the thing named. A wrong name is not really a name at all, just noise. This is a bold claim, and it makes language a kind of window on reality.
Socrates does not pick a side at once. He says the question is hard and that he has learned only a little about it. Then he begins to test Hermogenes first. The opening shows how Plato frames a problem: two tidy positions, each with an appeal, each with a cost, and a guide who will not let either one off easily.
That’s 1 of 6 key points.
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
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Who’s who
- Socrates
- Socrates questions Hermogenes and Cratylus, testing their rival accounts of how names relate to the things they name.
- Hermogenes
- Hermogenes is Cratylus’s friend and Socrates’ interlocutor, defending the view that names depend on human agreement.
- Cratylus
- Cratylus disputes his friend Hermogenes’ account of naming, insisting that things have names that belong to them by nature.
About this edition
Every format is free to start, and print and large print are at cost.
- LengthAbout 53,000 words
- Reading timeAbout 3 h 30 min
- Listening time5 h 55 min
- FormatseBook, large-print eBook, audiobook, 15-minute summary
- LanguagesEnglish and 5 other languages
Questions about Crátilo
What is Plato's Cratylus about?
It is a dialogue about the correctness of names. Hermogenes says names come from agreement, Cratylus says they fit things by nature, and Socrates tests both views. It also touches on knowledge and the idea that all things flow.
Who are Hermogenes and Cratylus?
Hermogenes is a speaker who holds that names are set by convention. Cratylus is a follower of Heraclitean ideas who holds that names are right by nature. Socrates talks with both and questions their claims.
Are the etymologies in Cratylus meant to be serious?
Scholars disagree. Some read the word explanations as a joke at the expense of other thinkers. Others think Plato takes part of the method seriously. Modern linguists do not accept most of the explanations as true history of the words.
Is Cratylus hard to read?
The argument is clear. The opening and closing sections are easier to follow.
What is the main message of Cratylus?
Names are useful tools, but they are not a safe guide to truth. Plato suggests that we should study things themselves, and that knowledge needs objects that stay stable enough to be known.