ABSTRACT
The Parmenides and Theaetetus can be thought of as roughly contemporary, although the Theaetetus, judging from a ‘reference’ in it to the Parmenides (183 E), seems to have been concluded later. Each of the dialogues deals with one basic problem. In the Theaetetus the question is: what is knowledge? In the Parmenides the question is about the basis of metaphysics, the One and Being. In both cases the discussion is about concepts which Socrates has presupposed throughout-or which have been lost in ambiguity. What is the precondition for existence? How can knowledge be known? We cannot expect the two dialogues to solve insoluble problems but rather to analyze the implications of the questions.
