Book IV
44a (124) - by this point, the analogy has been established between the health of the body and the health of the psyche - where health in the psyche is at the same time "virtue" (arete) or excellence.
This health rests on the justice of the psyche -
where justice is the harmony of each of the three elements of
the psyche fulfilling their respective functions in proper
relationship with one another, i.e.
reason (wisdom)
spirit (courage/honor)
appetite (moderation)
In addition, it seems clear that life is not an absolute value - but life worth living depends on some minimal degree of bodily health. By analogy - and since the health of both psyche and body depend on the proper functioning/health/virtue of the psyche - it would seem that justice, as the health of the psyche is the first condition of "the good life," the life worthy of a human being.
But this means: any actions which compromise the health/virtue of the psyche - no matter what additional consequences/benefits may accrue from thos actions - thereby compromise precisely that central element of human existence/the good life.
Such actions, by definition, are unjust. The conclusion of the argument at this stage is
no matter what other "goods" may be gotten (money, honor, power, etc.) through unjust actions -
such goods are not worth the central cost - the loss of the health/virtue of the soul - because this cost/lost makes life no longer worth living.
Given this definition of justice, Socrates can now address the central objections and arguments launched against justice in books I and II:
"So, as it seems, it now remains for us to consider whether it is profitable to do just things, practice fine ones, and be just - whether or not one's being such remains unnoticed; or whether it is profitable to do injustice and be unjust - provided one doesn't pay the penalty and become better as a result of punishment." (444e-445a/125)
But Glaucon demonstrates that he understands Socrates' argument in his reply:
"But Socrates," he said," that inquiry looks to me as though it has become ridiculous by now. If life doesn't seem livable with the body's nature corrupted, not even with every sort of food and drink and every sort of wealth and every sort of rule, will it then be livable when the nature of that very thing by which we live is confused and corrupted, even if a man does whatever else he might want except that which will rid him of vice and injustice and will enable him to acquire justice and virtue? Isn't this clear now that all of these qualities have manifested their characters in our description?" (445a-b/125)
Book V
Includes the development of the argument that the natures of women
and men are equal (except with regard to physical strength),
so that both women and men of suitable nature will be trained
as guardians (455d/134f.)
THIS IS CRUCIAL! While we have yet to be introduced to Plato's analogy of the line and the allegory of the cave - at this point Socrates goes beyond what is (as revealed to us by the senses - an empiricist epistemology) to what ought to be (as discerned through reason and argument - a rationalist/idealist epistemology)
The introduction of the countercultural/revolutionary/radical
notion of equality between women and men (a minimal definition
of "feminism") not only makes Plato one of the earliest
and perhaps most significant feminist philosophers in the
Western tradition;
it also makes a larger point:
epistemology --> ontology / human nature --> ethics/politics
empiricist --> materialism / atomistic, desire-driven --> self-interest / authoritarian regimes (Aristotle / Machiavelli / Hobbes / Skinner ): preservation of the status quo
rationalist --> idealism / rational, altruistic --> self-rule in community / egalitarian/democratic regimes (if not Plato, then early Christian community, Locke, Jefferson, Kant, M. L. King, Jr.): revolutionary/reform -- progress towards enlarging the "moral community"
Given this orientation towards the idea - manifested in the recognition that "equality" is a mathematical relationship first, one never fully realized in the empirical/sense domain, but then appropriated into ethical/political significance - so Socrates can conclude that "...the way things are nowadays proves to be, as it seems, against nature." (456b/135)
The community of women and children
Note that the point here may be less a matter of a
"literalistic" reading of a serious prescription of
how regime should really function - and more a matter of
calling into question the basic assumption of self-interest which,
uncontrolled, destroy the requisite unity of the city.
See especially 461e/141f. - John Lennon fans will note the uncanny
anticipation of "All through the day, "I" "me"
"mine", "I" "me" "mine, I"
"me" "mine" in Socrates' critique of "my
own" and "not my own" - now as referring to a shared
property - as a technique for short-circuiting destructive self-interest,
as manifested in and focused on individual private property (including
women and children).
Book V
This book includes an attack on the prevailing ("the many's") opinion of philosophers - partly in response to Adeimantus' eloquent expression of what many of us feel in response to Socrates:
...here is how those who hear what you now say are affected on each occasion. They believe that because of inexperience at questioning and answering, they are at each question misled a little by the argument; and when the littles are collected at the end of the arguments, the slip turns out to be great and contrary to the first assertions....Now someone might say that in speech he can't contradict you at each particular thing asked, but in deed he sees that of all those who start out on philosophy - not those who take it up for the sake of getting educated when they are young and then drop it, but those who linger in it for a longer time - most become quite queer, not to say completely vicious; while the ones who seem perfectly decent, do nevertheless suffer at least one consequence of the practice you are praising - they become useless to the cities." (487b-d/167)
Part of Socrates' rejoinder calls into question the absolute value assumed by the critique of "utility":
"However, bid him blame their uselessness on those who don't use them and not on the decent men." (489b/169)
At least part of the point here is that "usefulness"
really means "usefulness for _X_" - i.e., utility is
defined by a previously established set of goals or values. To
say that something is "useless" is not an absolute critique
- but a relative one: something is useless only in relation to
a given set of goals or values - but should those goals or values
change, that same something might become quite "useful"
indeed.
(discussion of the Good, the sun)
Book VII
opens with the allegory of the cave (514a/193ff)
Book X
begins with a consideration of poetry -
but notice: while poetry is criticized for its limitations to the imitative/sense domain - it is not rejected dualistically.
In particular, attend to Socrates' comments:
"...we'll chant this argument we are making to ourselves as a countercharm, taking care against falling back into this love, which is childish and belongs to the many. We are, at all events, aware that such poetry mustn't be taken seriously as a serious thing laying hold of truth, but that the man who hears it must be careful, fearing for the regime in himself, and must hold what we have said about poetry." (608a/291)
"For the contest [agon] is great, my dear Glaucon," I said, "greater than it seems - this contest that concerns becoming good or bad - so we mustn't be tempted by honor or money or any ruling office or, for that matter, poetry, into thinking that it's worthwhile to neglect justice and the rest of virtue." (608b/291)
This seems to suggest that "the last temptation" in the agon towards the Good (= the ascent out of the cave) is poetry.
And yet - the Republic concludes not with an argument,
but with a piece of poetry (in the broad sense) - i.e., the tale
or mythos of a certain Er (see 614b/297ff.)
This story reinforces the Platonic teaching regarding the health
of the soul - but now at a different level, with the pretty story
of reward and punishment in the afterlife for those who are just/fail
to be just.
--> Observation 1: Socrates' philosophic quest
does not exclude poetry, but rather includes it - in part,
in the form of a "salutary rhetoric" that helps "seal
in" the central philosophical/rational argument developed
earlier
-- and this one two levels:
a) the level of his interaction with his interlocutors (Glaucon,
Adiemantus, etc.), and
b) the level of the Republic itself as a poetic/philosophical
document.
--> Observation 2: compare this "religious" conclusion with the beginning of the Republic, i.e., Socrates' visit to the festival of the Goddess (!), the opening "hijacking" at the hands of the sophistic sons of (now "religious") Cephalus, etc.
Observation 3: In these many ways, the Republic is clearly a carefully crafted narrative/poesis - leading to a basic division:
IF there is philosophical truth to be discovered through reason and argument - the Republic stands as a narrative expression of that discovery. This does not mean, however, that the philosophic truth of the Republic is reducible sheerly to "narrative" (as Lyotard would have it): this is to commit a basic fallacy of affirming the consequent:
Where we find truth --> we find narrative
The Republic is a narrative.
Therefore narrative defines "truth."
This doesn't necessarily resolve the larger diremption - for this comment rests on and presumes the legitimacy of logic and reason to defend logic and reason as going beyond narrative.
The alternative (postmodern) view is that there is only narrative - with "logic" and "reason" being simply one kind of narrative.
Plato can reply that this would be just what we might expect of poets - i.e., those epistemologically limited to the domains of sense and imagination, who literally cannot see beyond those domains to the objects of reason (the mathematical and the ideas).
The postmodernist might reply that the notion of a domain "beyond" sense and imagination remains - a narrative!
(I think the postmodernist is wrong for important reasons - having to do with the arguments regarding the epistemological and ontological priority of the mathematicals and the ideals. But this is something for us to pursue.)