Michael asked:

(1)To check the terms:

a priori knowable prior to experience

a posteriori knowable only after experience

analytic statement statement in which the predicate is contained within the subject, e.g. all bachelors
are male

synthetic statement statement in which the predicate is not so contained, e.g. all bachelors are stupid

Kant argued synthetic a priori knowledge is possible. I find his argument convincing. However, I
believe I have found an example of analytic a posteriori knowledge: "all bicycles have two wheels".
This is clearly analytic as the predicate is contained within the subject, since a bicycle has two wheels
by definition. If it did not, it would not be a bicycle. However, if our definition of "bicycle" comes from
experience, is this statement not also a posteriori? Humans establish the definition of "bicycle"
because they experience many objects, with varying numbers of wheels and need a term that refers
to a group of objects with only one common property — having two wheels. Experience of objects
with varying numbers of wheels is what makes it necessary to establish the definition of bicycle, thus
it is essential to understanding the statement. Therefore, the statement is not merely analytic, but a
posteriori. Are there any faults in this reasoning?

(2)A philosopher consults an agony aunt, saying he and his assistant have tried and tried with no
success to understand synthetic a priori knowledge. She replies: "Well, it looks like 'im an' you 'ell
can't understand it then". Do you like this pun?

(3)Can you recommend a dialogue of Plato that deals mainly with his epistemology and metaphysics
and is suitable for an A-level philosopher?

Sorry this is a long question.

============

An objection to your bicycle example is that "All bicycles have two wheels" is a latently synthetic
statement. It can be rephrased as "People take having two wheels to be a condition of being a
bicycle". Analytic a priori propositions, such as "5 = 5," are propositions that would result in
contradictions if denied. If the last five people in the world died, their corpses would still add up to five
— "5 = 5" is true irrespective of anyone's experience. But there would no longer be bicycles — only
things that used to be called bicycles when there were people around to call them such.

T. P. Uschanov

Research Assistant

Department of Philosophy

University of Helsinki

51