A SOLUTION TO THE PARADOX OF ANALYSIS JOHN-MICHAEL KUCZYNSKI ABSTRACT: This essay attempts to solve the so-called paradox of analysis: if one is to have any questions about x, one must know x; but if one knows x, one has no questions about x. The obvious solution is this: one can inquire into x if one knows some, but not all, of x’s parts. But this solution is erroneous. Let x′ be those parts of x with which one is acquainted, and let S be the percipient in question. As with x, either S knows x′, in which case he has no questions about it; or S does not know x′, in which case he has no questions about it. My solution is this. Perception and cognition give us, not the thing-in-itself, but a certain analogue of the thing-in-itself. To inquire into x, it is necessary to know not x, but only some analogue of x; and to learn more about x is to become acquainted with increasingly precise analogues of x. I. Introduction If one is oblivious to x, one cannot have any questions about x. Therefore, in order to investigate x, it is necessary to be cognizant of x. In other words, one can seek to know only that which one already knows. Thus, it is possible for one to have a question only if one knows the answer to that question. But, of course, if one knows the answer to a given question, one ipso facto no longer has that question. This is the “paradox of analysis.” 1 It is the purpose of this essay to solve this paradox. “There 2 is an obvious answer to the paradox: it is possible for one to inquire into x if (and only if) one has partial but incomplete knowledge of x. For example, I may know Joe Smith – that is, I may be acquainted with him and thus be cognizant of him – but not know everything about him. Under this circumstance, I may wish to know more about Joe Smith: I may inquire into him. As a rule, we do not know everything about those things © Metaphilosophy LLC and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. 1998 1 The paradox was (to my knowledge) first formulated by Plato in the Meno [80]: “a man cannot enquire either about that which he knows, or about that which he does not know; for if he knows, he has no need to enquire; and if not, he cannot; for he does not know the very subject about which he is to enquire” (The Dialogues of Plato, trans. B. Jowett [Random House, 1937] ). 2 Statements within quotation marks are those of an imaginary interlocutor. © Metaphilosophy LLC and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. 1998. Published by Blackwell Publishers, 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA METAPHILOSOPHY Vol. 29, No. 4, October 1998 0026–1068