Assignment Problem: The following passage from Plato (Meno, 80d-e) expresses the paradox of inquiry:
Meno: How will you look for it, Socrates, when you do not know what it is? How will you aim to search for something you do not know at all? If you should meet with it, how will you know that this is the thing that you did not know?
Socrates: I know what you want to say, Meno ... that a man cannot search either for what he knows or for what he does not know. He cannot search for what he knows - since he knows it, there is no need to search - nor for what he does not know, for he does not know what to look for.
Analyze this passage by answering the following questions:
Q1. What is the difference between knowledge and information?
Q2. Why is it impossible to gain knowledge? That is, explain the problem of ultimate justification.
Q3. How does Socrates avoid the paradox, that is, how can he believe that we have knowledge even though he says we cannot gain it?
Q4. Make sure that you do not just restate or quote Plato's words that express this problem. That is, make sure you use your own language to express your interpretation of this problem.
Q5. Make sure that you explain how every attempt to gain knowledge leads to one of the horns of Munchausen's trilemma.