THE QUESTION CONCERNING THE POSSIBILITY OF THE ΨΕΥΔΗΣ ΔΟΞΑ
and the other, cannot posit the one in place of the other. But should he represent only one of the two, then he would not have it as that which, or better, as that instead of which he posited the other.
So (thirdly) it is said in summary (190 d 11 ff.):
οὔτ᾽ ἄρ᾽ ἀμφότερα οὔτε τὸ ἕτερον δοξάζοντι ἐγχωρεῖ ἀλλοδοξεῖν. ὥστ᾽ εἴ τις ὁριεῖται δόξαν εἶναι ψευδῆ τὸ ἑτεροδοξεῖν, οὐδὲν ἂν λέγοι: οὔτε γὰρ ταύτῃ οὔτε κατὰ τὰ πρότερα φαίνεται ψευδὴς ἐν ἡμῖν οὖσα δόξα.
'Then neither he who intends both, nor he who intends just one, can intend that one thing is something else [ἀλλοδοξεῖν]. And so anyone who sets out to define distorted view as τὸ ἑτεροδοξεῖν will be talking nonsense [for he assumes an impossible phenomenon]. So neither by this method nor by our previous method is a distorted view found to exist in us.'
How could we nevertheless maintain that this third attempt comes closer to the phenomenon than do the earlier attempts? Is it perhaps because here the διανοεῖν (the δόξα) is more forcefully presented as λόγος? No, for that would result in the examination coming off course, to seeing the phenomenon as impossible. Instead, we maintained this because the attempt is now made to seriously consider the fact that the ψευδὴς δόξα, i.e. the δόξα in general, relates to the one and the other. More precisely, the third explanation sees that what is puzzling about the phenomenon is that it has two objects, the one and the other. Holding fast to this insight, the attempt is made to understand, and to bring forth, how the one and the other are posited. The explanation runs: the one is posited instead of the other. This explanation does indeed see the task in the proper and decisive way, but it is not adequate as a solution. The dual object and its duality are explained in an erroneous manner. For if the ψευδὴς δόξα is a distorted view, which confuses something with another thing, this distortion is not adequately captured by saying that in such a view one thing is substituted for another. If the one is posited instead of the other, at bottom this means that just one thing is always posited, such that the other is disregarded or left aside; the one as the other, then instead of the other. In brief, interchanging is not the same as confusing; the essence of the latter cannot be grasped through the former. The two phenomena are mixed up, not only by Theaetetus but also by Schleiermacher. The guiding perspective of the third attempt (the substitution of one for the other) does not suffice. It leads precisely to the obfuscation of the phenomenon. When we clearly understand this, it is also not difficult to see how fundamentally erroneous is Schleiermacher's commonly accepted translation of