Tentative assent

Use in the book

Charmides answers “perhaps” when Socrates suggests that his ability to speak Greek should enable him to express his opinion about temperance (159a). The reply leaves room between being asked for an account and confidently possessing one. In the quietness argument his guarded assent at 160b accepts the direction of the examples without becoming an independent proof of their adequacy. At 165a Critias himself imagines that someone might think the Delphic command different from the injunction to be temperate; the possible alternative belongs to his reconstruction of other people’s interpretation.

The weakened epistemic result at 170c–d is repeatedly framed through seeming and guarded agreement. The interlocutors have provisionally allowed the faculty under discussion, so these replies should not be transformed into Plato’s unconditional endorsement of an actual psychology. Most conspicuously, at 172c Critias allows that the lesser benefits suggested at 172b may be all they can obtain; Socrates answers that perhaps this is so, and perhaps the inquiry has sought nothing useful. The competing possibilities prevent a simple summary in which a final positive theory has already been secured. They also explain why interpreters differ about how completely the lesser-benefit possibility is dismissed. The lexical caution is modest: preserve the hesitation and then examine the argument, rather than treating every short reply as either a theorem or a refusal.

Places to read

1. 159aCharmides cautiously answers the proposal that he can state his opinion.
2. 160bThe assessment of quick and quiet actions receives guarded assent.
3. 165aCritias allows a possible alternative interpretation of the Delphic command.
4. 170c–170dThe restricted knowing-that result is accepted with language of appearance and qualification.
5. 172b–172cThe suggestion of a lesser benefit is entertained without an unqualified final settlement.

Translation in this edition

The edition’s “perhaps,” “it seems so,” “it looks that way” and “apparently” preserve different conversational shades. The ordinary tentative use of kindyneuein does not mean that each speaker is literally describing physical danger.

κινδυνεύω

Attested: κινδυνεύει / κινδυνεύοντας (kindyneuei / kindyneuontas). To seem likely, in the tentative assent to the comparison of quickness and quietness; to be in danger, in the imagined rescue of people at sea under genuine expert guidance. References: 160b, 173b. Lexical identification: lemma: κινδυνεύω. See Tentative assent.