Abstract

In these comments I express doubts about the success of one aspect of Giannopoulou’s intertextual reading of the Theaetetus and Alcibiades I. I argue that the role of interpersonal eros in prompting or bringing about self-knowledge in another is not adequately accounted for; it is not clear what an eros adds to the dialectic in the Alcibiades. If a robust role for eros as a vehicle of self-knowledge is sought, then the Phaedrus is the more illuminating dialogue because it shows how the lover and beloved are transformed by their eros. But comparisons to the Phaedrus would draw the Alcibiades away from the view of self-knowledge found in the Apology and in Giannopoulou’s interpretation of the Theaetetus.