What Is Doxa?
I have argued that Plato conceives of doxa first and foremost as cognition of what seems. This may sound like a marginal or technical notion. This chapter argues that it is in fact central to Plato’s thought. Throughout the dialogues Plato is particularly concerned to point out and warn against two cognitive deficiencies: (1) the tendency to mistake images for reality (“dreaming”), and (2) the failure to look beyond particular phenomena to underlying unifying explanations (atheoretical thought). Given his epistemology and metaphysics, Plato holds that these two deficiencies go together, and thus he is concerned with a particular way of thinking that exemplifies both. This way of thinking, moreover, is naturally characterized as cognition of what seems. I show how this view of doxa relates to previous interpretations.