A DEBATE

RESPONSE

Dun-dun-dun!

Position 1

Position 2

First: because a group of people are becoming more economically efficient, Nemo notes that it satisfies a conception of collective action, but…

Position 1

Position 2

PLATO

• Collective Action: “Group’s steps or actions while working toward a common goal. When individuals engage in collective action, the strength of the group’s resources, knowledge and efforts combines all parties to more readily achieve the shared goal.”

• Two parts:

1. Groups steps or actions

2. Working toward Common Goal

• I only need to disprove a single one of these parts. Admittedly, I picked the weaker case to make (group’s steps), though there’s an argument for both.

THE UTOPIAN

SOCIETY

• Plato’s utopian society would be instituted at once

• All the dominos are put into place

• Plato says “go” and knocks over the first domino

• Is the fourth domino actually satisfying collective action by knocking over the fifth, even when it’s being pushed?

• Seems to be more consistent with Plato committing the action, as he’s already laid it all out, and the consumers are simply actors.

GROUP’S

STEPS OR

ACTIONS?

• You may argue that everything in reality is preceded by another action, degenerating my argument into something deterministic and, ultimately, redundant.

• The difference is that, as you mentioned also, “reason” determines action in Plato’s society. Reason is objective, I think you’ll agree.

• The goal that uses reason, though, is highly subjective.

• The goal results in a timeless state. Plato, as Socrates, says as much.

• The determinism is due to the artificiality, not how reality works.

A POTENTIAL

RESPONSE

• Furthermore, the goal isn’t shared by the group. Plato’s Socrates was very specific about the three different driving forces of the body and its parallels to the makeup of society.

• Additionally, the largest two groups (comprising the vast majority of the population) can’t use reason to act because that’s not a function of their classes. They use spirit and appetite.

• Even the philosopher-king and the guardians are nothing but a line of dominoes.

• Hence, the artificiality of the society

• Different humans, by pre-selection, have fundamentally different goals and are led to believe that they are different races.

WORKING

TOWARD A

COMMON

GOAL? –

A DISUNITY

• All of this is in the name of virtue, and wisdom, and The Good, etc.

• Wisdom comes down to, essentially, keeping to yourself. Farmers farm. Warriors fight.

• Socrates includes lawmaking with things requiring talent and education.

• But governance is different. I can choose not to buy a head of lettuce. The only way I can reject law in the same way is to leave a state.

• While Socrates prepares to drink the hemlock, his supporters beg him to leave. He rejects this, and recites a version of the Social Contract theory.

THE

SUBJECTIVE

STATE

• Other commenters in this thread have raised similar questions of the fairness of escaping.

• Hume’s criticism of the Social Contract theorists also applies to Socrates: “Can we seriously say, that a poor peasant or artisan has a free choice to leave his country, when he knows no foreign language or manners, and lives from day to day, by the small wages which he acquires? We may as well assert, that a man, by remaining in a vessel, freely consents to the dominion of the master; though he was carried on board while asleep, and must leap into the ocean and perish, the moment he leaves her.”

PLATO’S

SOCIAL

CONTRACT

• Plato’s utopia is a system where all are subservient to “reason”, the tool used to achieve the “virtuous state”.

• But the state is only perfect in that it relies on circular reasoning.

1. Why do we keep to what we do best? So we can have a virtuous state.

2. Why do we have a virtuous state? So we can keep to what we do best.

• So what’s the ultimate authority? Nothing. Emptiness. Reason is just a tool to use, not an object.

THE SERVANT

STATE

• Is the ultimate authority “The Good”, something that’s hardly knowable?

• Nearly a religion, another thing that’s been discussed in the thread.

– Socrates’ devotion to the concept of The Good approaches that of a religion, an argument toward introducing false gods.

• But his is worse. Most religions have recorded “divinely inspired” doctrine, and can be held accountable through that authority.

• Socrates makes the state even less accountable by limiting access to this realm to just a handful of people.

• Knowledge is also “a priori”. Can’t blame Socrates for discovering truth, right?

TO THOSE

WHO SAY

“THE GOOD”

IS THE

ULTIMATE

AUTHORITY

• I’m skeptical because the guy who is pitching us The Good, The World of Forms, and all the other stuff is telling us to sell the noble lie.

• Goes back to our first rift:

– Socrates said he knew nothing (with heavy sarcasm), but he created his utopia. Would lend credence that Plato considered Socrates the model for the philosopher-king. Otherwise, why isn’t he tending to his own garden?

– Could be that Socrates sees himself as a vessel or divine agent.

– Ironically, I seem to remember him criticizing rhapsodes in Ion for the same thing.

AUTHORITY

• Socrates states that Ion’s talent as an interpreter cannot be an art, a definable body of knowledge or an ordered system of skills.

• If you’re inspired, as with a divine sign, it eliminates the possibility that you are spreading knowledge.

• This may be Socrates’ answer and fits with the Jesus analogy – a god is speaking directly through him.

ION

• Nemo stated that:

– “But if personal growth is the attainment of wisdom and virtue, then all the Platonic dialogues are about personal growth.”

• This is correct, but only for guardians. The vast majority of people are to be guided toward steering with their appetite. Once you falter in your training, your education ends.

• The rest of humanity amounts to little more than cattle.

ABOUT

KNOWLEDGE

• Nemo’s final comment regarding the US Constitution is important, because it illustrates Socrates’ feeling that popular opinion is exclusive from reason.

• Liberal society is founded on the premise that popular opinion and reason are not mutually exclusive.

• Alexander Hamilton, in Federalist #1, asks, “whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government from reflection and choice.”

FINAL

COMMENT