2026 Theses Doctoral

Language, Knowledge, and Self-knowledge in the Platonic Alcibiades

Haagenson, Jacob

This dissertation proposes a novel account of self-knowledge and self-care in the Platonic Alcibiades I. I argue (chapter I) against a recent trend in scholarship which finds in this dialogue a conception of self-knowledge that is so “generic” as to be uninformative. I seek to explicate arguments in Alcibiades I for the claim that “the person is the soul” (a conclusion which can be reached universally by each person) by showing that such arguments motivate us to investigate our individual souls, attending to our idiosyncratic ambitions and beliefs.

I advance (chapter II) a new interpretation of self-care by exploring the relationship envisaged in this dialogue between speech acts and identity – that is between who we are and what we have to say. On my reading, dialectic not only reveals the content of our souls but, as our proper activity, improves our souls. I continue to explore (chapter III) the treatment of language in Alcibiades I by arguing that learning a language, even though commonplace, yields a minimal sort of conceptual knowledge. Moreover, this minimal conceptual knowledge is a crucial precondition for the deeper knowledge we ultimately seek.