On closer inspection the aviary model does not solve the initial paradox of false judgment, which is the problem of how one can not know what one knows or be wrong about what one knows. To successfully “get hold of” a piece of knowledge in our minds, we must identify the correct piece of knowledge. Put another way, if we get hold of the wrong thing, or misidentify it, when asked a certain question about it, then we cannot say that we really know that thing. For example, if you “got hold of” the philosopher Heraclitus to identify the author of a quote that was in fact said by Thales, then you do not truly know Heraclitus. As a result, due to this impasse with false judgments, Socrates changes tack. He opts to reverse the order of enquiry and look at false judgment again only after he has first defined “what, exactly, knowledge is” (93).

In response to Socrates’s question regarding a definition of knowledge, Theaetetus reiterates his earlier suggestion that knowledge is true