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[244d] the statement that a name has any existence.

Theaetetus
Why?

Stranger
Because he who asserts that the name is other than the thing, says that there are two entities.

Theaetetus
Yes.

Stranger
And further, if he asserts that the name is the same as the thing, he will be obliged to say that it is the name of nothing, or if he says it is the name of something, the name will turn out to be the name of a name merely and of nothing else.

Theaetetus
True.

Stranger
And the one will turn out to be the name of one and also the one of the name.1

Theaetetus
Necessarily.

Stranger
And will they say that the whole is other than the one which exists or the same with it?


1 In other words, “one,” considered as a word, will be the name of unity, but considered as a reality, it will be the unity of which the word “one” is the name. The sentence is made somewhat difficult of comprehension, doubtless for the purpose of indicating the confusion caused by the identification of the name wlth the thing.

Plato. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vol. 12 translated by Harold N. Fowler. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921.

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