THE SOCRATIC
PARADOXES
THE SOCRATIC PARADOXES
In the early dialogues Plato depicts Socrates as claiming not to
know anything worthwhile. At the same time Plato portrays
Socrates as sympathetic with some counterintuitive theses:
1. No one errs willingly.
2. Virtue is just a kind of knowledge.
3. The virtues are inseparable from one another.
4. Virtue is suf ficient for happiness .
 Etymologically speaking, something ‘paradoxical’ goes against
opinion. Why are these theses paradoxical in this sense?
THE STRUCTURE OF PLATO’S
PROTAGORAS
The Protagoras illustrates major themes of Socratic moral
thinking. The following topics are discussed in the following
order:
1. Is virtue teachable?
2. Is virtue divisible into distinct, separable parts? Or are all
virtues identical with one thing?
3. Is pleasure the good?
4. Do we ever intentionally do what we know to be bad?
5. How do cowardly and courageous individuals dif fer from one
another?
6. Is virtue identical with knowledge?
7. Is virtue teachable?
THE HEDONIST THESIS
The question: Is pleasure the good?
 By “the good” Socrates does not mean the only good thing.
What else is good, on the view Socrates is defending?
 What might Socrates mean by “pleasure is the good”?
THE HEDONIST THESIS
The question: Is pleasure the good?
 By “the good” Socrates does not mean the only good thing.
What else is good, on the view Socrates is defending?
 What might Socrates mean by “pleasure is the good”?
Roughly, pleasure is the source of all goodness. Or, perhaps
better: pleasure is the criterion of goodness.
HEDONISM DEFENDED
Bad pleasures and good pains generate doubts about hedonism.
 Far from making trouble for hedonism, Socrates thinks bad
pleasures and good pains actually provide confirmation for
the view. What’s his argument?
HEDONISM DEFENDED
Bad pleasures and good pains generate doubts about hedonism.
 Far from making trouble for hedonism, Socrates thinks bad
pleasures and good pains actually provide confirmation for
the view. What’s his argument?
In calling some pleasures bad and some pains good, pleasure is
our criterion. And we are unable to identify any further criterion
at work.
SOCRATES, PLATO, AND HEDONISM
Plato’s considered viewpoint, explicit in later dialogues, is that
hedonism is false.
Is the hedonism of the Protagoras something Plato gets from
Socrates? Or is it just part of an ad hominem argument against
the many? This is a matter of dispute.
WEAKNESS
Incontinence/Weakness of Will/ Akrasia: S is able to do what S
believes to be (all things considered) the best available option,
but intentionally does something less good instead.
 Illustrations?
Socrates denies that incontinence is psychologically possible.
BETWEEN RECKLESSNESS AND ILLNESS
Suppose Todd steals a copy of the Republic from the public
library. In everyday thinking we distinguish three ways of
thinking about Todd’s act:
1. Reckless Todd. He might ’ve played it safe. But he thought it
worth the risk, so he went for it.
2. Weak Todd. His better judgment told him not to do it, but he
failed to exert self -control. He went ahead and took the
thing.
3. Klepto Todd. He thought it wrong to take it and would have
preferred all things considered not to take it, but he couldn’t
help himself. His impulse to steal was irresistible .
SOCRATES’ THESIS
 Reckless Todd and Klepto Todd are both doing the less good
thing unintentionally. So how do they dif fer?
Socrates wants to show that so -called Weak Todd is also acting
unintentionally. No one intentionally does less than the best.
He challenges the common view that weakness is a distinct
category by rejecting the idea that so-called Weak Todd has a
correct judgment about what is best. Weak Todd is really no
dif ferent from Reckless Todd.
SOCRATES’ ARGUMENT
We have no good explanation of why anyone would act
incontinently.
The explanation of the many: S does less than the best because S
is overcome by pleasure.
But: pleasure = the good.
So the many are saying: S does less than the best because S is
overcome by goodness.
Consider two options:
Action A
amount of goodness:
10
Action B
4
Why would anyone, knowing the difference in value, choose B over
A? Clearly its goodness cannot account for the choice of B!
Perhaps the goodness of A could explain the choice of A over B,
but it cannot account for the choice of B over A .
A FURTHER CONSIDERATION
Plausible assumptions about human nature seem to rule out the
possibility of incontinence.
Suppose S is choosing between X and Y.
A . If S believes it would be better all things considered to do X
than Y, then S wants to do X more than Y. (358d)
B. If S wants to do X more than Y, then S will choose to do X
rather than Y.
THE PROBLEM RESTATED
 Our folk-psychological reason explanations account for
actions by showing how they make sense from the subject ’s
point of view: the agent has reason to perform the action,
given her desires and her beliefs about the world. (next slide)
 In cases of weakness it seems that the agent is not doing
what makes sense from her own point of view—she is not
doing what she has reason to do.
 The upshot is that our folk -psychological framework for
explaining behavior is unable to make such behavior
intelligible.
REASON EXPLANATIONS (ILLUSTRATION)
Why did Bob go to the refrigerator and take out a beer?
A reason explanation might take the following form:
 While watching football, Bob came to desire a beer.
 Bob believed that the best available means to acquiring a
beer was to go to the refrigerator and take out a beer.
CONCLUSION/ACTION:
 Bob went to the refrigerator and took out a beer.
Note that reason explanations presuppose that agents are able
to reason. They are able to infer a course of action from
premises/assumptions.
TOPIC FOR DISCUSSION
 Is Socrates underestimating our folk psychology? Does
commonsense have the resources to make weakness of will
intelligible?
SELF-CONTROL
Suppose S judges action A to be better than B. At the same
time doing A will be harder and require discipline or self control.
Perhaps S might fail to do A either because (i) S lacks the selfcontrol required or because (ii) S has the self -control required
but chooses not to exert self -control.
 Do these seem like promising ways of making sense of
weakness within our folk -psychological framework?
 How might Socrates best respond?
SELF-CONTROL
(i) S lacks the self-control required or (ii) S has the self -control
required but chooses not to exert self-control.
Socrates would reject both of these ways of making sense of
weakness:
(i) If S does not have the self -control abilities required, then S is
unable to do otherwise. But weakness requires the ability to do
otherwise.
(ii) We still have no good explanation of why someone would
choose what they judge to be worse. Talk of “self-control”
suggests that the self is tempted by something judged to be
less good. But if you judge it to be less good, don’t you want it
less? So why would you be tempted?
APPARENT INCONTINENCE
Socrates does not deny that people sometimes seem to act
weakly. So what is actually going on in such cases? His
answer: ignorance.
He realizes this answer is opaque. We will work up to it in
stages.
TWO CLAIMS DISTINGUISHED
In his statement of what the many think at 352e, Socrates defines
weakness as failure to what is best even though one knows what is
best and is able to do it. Distinguish the following two claims.
K. Knowledge incontinence is psychologically impossible: no one
ever acts contrary to what one knows to be the best option.
B. Belief incontinence is psychologically impossible: no one ever
acts contrary to what one believes to be the best option.
Is Socrates committed only to K and not B? Not likely. It is widely
agreed that Socrates is committed to B as well as K. His
endorsement of B comes out in claims like: “No one errs willingly.”
(358d)
 Why does this passage suggest that Socrates accepts B as well
as K?
“NO ONE ERRS WILLINGLY”
Restated, Socrates is saying: no one willingly or intentionally
chooses the less good option (errs).
This is a general point about intentional behavior, whether it is
guided by knowledge or belief. No one intentionally does what
they know or believe to be less good.
FURTHER REFINEMENTS
B. Belief incontinence is psychologically impossible: no one
ever acts contrary to what one believes to be the best available
option.
Socrates’ understanding of B is subtle. He accepts both of the
following:
Synchronic belief incontinence IS NOT psychologically possible:
no one ever acts contrary to what one, at the moment of action,
believes to be best.
Diachronic belief incontinence IS psychologically possible:
sometimes one acts contrary to one’s belief about what is best
because belief is unstable.
THE INSTABILIT Y OF BELIEF
“To acquire an untied work of Daedalus is not worth much, like
acquiring a runaway slave, for it does not remain, but it is worth
much if tied down, for his works are very beautiful. What am I
thinking of when I say this? True opinions. For true opinions,
as long as they remain, are a fine thing and all they do is good,
but they are not willing to remain long, and they escape from a
man’s mind, so that they are not worth much until one ties
them down by giving an account of the reason why… After they
are tied down, in the first place they become knowledge, and
they remain in place. That is why knowledge is prized higher
than correct opinion, and knowledge dif fers from correct
opinion in being tied down .” (Meno 97e-98a)
THE STABILIT Y OF KNOWLEDGE
Because knowing what is best involves grasping why it is best,
one who knows will not be deceived, e.g., by temporal illusions .
Diachronic knowledge incontinence is psychologically
impossible: no one ever acts contrary to what one knows to be
the best available option. The science of measurement ensures
that the knower will not be duped by temporary changes in
perspective.
We are now able to grasp the sense in which so -called weak
acts are due to ignorance: they are due to lack of knowledge
about what is best.
VALUE ILLUSIONS?
 Can you think of any examples of value illusions (temporal or
otherwise)? How might a science of measurement help to
avoid error in these cases?
VALUE ILLUSION IN NATURE
There is some (less than decisive) evidence that male fiddler
crabs (Uca mjoebergi) exploit susceptibility to size illusion when
displaying for females.
WHERE WE ARE NOW
Protagoras 351b-362a (summary)
1. Is pleasure the good?
2. Do we ever intentionally do what we know to be bad?
3. How do cowardly and courageous individuals dif fer from one
another?
4. Is virtue identical with knowledge?
5. Is virtue teachable?
WHAT’S WRONG WITH THE COWARD?
 From the point of view of the many, the coward has a problem
with fear. What’s the problem, exactly?
COWARDICE & FEAR
From the point of view of the many, cowards can miss the mark
principally in two ways:
1. The coward can go wrong by fearing things more than he
should. E.g., he might be overly concerned about personal
comfort or avoiding injury.
2. Even when the coward recognizes what the correct response
to the circumstances is, he can go wrong by allowing himself
to be driven by fear, thus failing to exert self -control.
COURAGE AS WISE ENDURANCE
From these points we might infer:
Courage = d f In the face of future evils, ( i) knowing which among
available options are genuinely worse (more to be feared) and
to what extent, and (ii) having the will to act in accord with that
knowledge.
Note that this is likely what Laches has in mind when he
defines courage as wise endurance.
ILLUSTRATION
Take the soldier who courageously sticks to his post even
though his safety is threatened. The soldier knows that in the
circumstances at hand it is worse to flee one’s post. It is worse,
say, because of how shameful fleeing in those circumstances is.
And because it is worse, fleeing is actually more to be feared!
The soldier not only knows what the right thing to do is; he has
the will to endure in the face of fears concerning his own safety.
 Does this account adequately capture our commonsense
notion of courage, or do we need to add that the courageous
person will not need to exert significant ef fort towards self control? (Some regard straining to do the right thing in the
face of fears as a sign of cowardice .)
SOCRATES ON COURAGE
Part (ii) of the definition above seems to be an important
addition because we think it is possible that someone might
know what is right but fail to do it because he fails to exert self control (or because he failed to develop normal capacities of
self-control).
Since Socrates denies that it makes sense to speak of self control in this context, he will want to modify the account of
courage above.
 What account will Socrates prefer?
SOCRATES ON COURAGE
Courage = d f In the face of future evils, knowing which among
available options are genuinely worse (more to be feared) and
to what extent.
FEAR VS KNOWLEDGE
Socrates: knowledge is in control. The many respond: virtue
requires more than knowledge because fear is a powerful force.
1. Pathological fear. One has fear without an expectation of
future evil. (E.g. upon seeing a harmless pet mouse.)
2. Exaggerated fear. One’s degree of fear is not proportional
to one’s judgment about the potential for harm. The danger
is real but admittedly not so bad. (E.g. in fearing public
speaking, one’s fear of embarrassment might be out of step
with one’s judgment about how bad embarrassment really
is.)
3. Foolish fear. One’s fear is entirely a product of a mistaken
judgment about potential danger —mistaken either in
whether there is something to be feared or in how serious
the threat is. (E.g. someone falsely judges that to embarrass
oneself really is the worst thing that can happen .)
WHAT WOULD SOCRATES SAY?
1. Pathological fear. One has fear without an expectation of
future evil.
2. Exaggerated fear. One’s degree of fear is not proportional
to one's judgment about the potential for harm. The danger
is real but admittedly not so bad.
3. Foolish fear. One’s fear is entirely a product of a mistaken
judgment about potential danger —mistaken either in
whether there is something to be feared or in how serious
the threat is.
 Given Socrates’ definition of courage, the courageous person
will not have foolish fear. How might he address the
possibility of being overcome by pathological or exaggerated
fear?
WHAT WOULD SOCRATES SAY?
1. Pathological fear. One has fear without an expectation of
future evil.
2. Exaggerated fear. One’s degree of fear is not proportional
to one's judgment about the potential for harm. The danger
is real but admittedly not so bad.
 How might Socrates address the possibility that one might be
overcome by pathological or exaggerated fear ?
Socrates: Fear = d f Expectation of future evil (Protagoras 358d)
 How does this definition rule out the possibility of
pathological & exaggerated fear?
WHAT WOULD SOCRATES SAY?
1. Pathological fear. One has fear without an expectation of
future evil.
2. Exaggerated fear. One’s degree of fear is not proportional
to one's judgment about the potential for harm. The danger
is real but admittedly not so bad.
Socrates: Fear = d f Expectation of future evil (Protagoras 358d,
Laches 198b)
Fear cannot come apart from one’s expectations/judgments
about future evil. The extent to which S fears E is just a function
of how bad (& how likely) S judges E to be . So pathological &
exaggerated fear are not possible!
FEAR AS EXPECTATION OF FUTURE EVIL
 Any worries about Socrates ’ definition of fear?
SOCRATES UNDER ATTACK
In the Laches the following view of courage is attributed to
Socrates: Courage = d f knowledge of what is and is not to be
feared. Let’s call this the Socrates-Nicias account of courage.
Socrates and Nicias entertain three objections to this account.
We will consider each in turn.
LACHES’ OBJECTION
Doesn’t the Socrates-Nicias account of courage have the
consequence that the courageous will be those who can predict
future events, say, prophets or scientists?
 Why does this objection miss the mark?
LACHES’ OBJECTION
Doesn’t the Socrates-Nicias account of courage have the
consequence that the courageous will be those who can predict
future events, say, prophets or scientists?
 Why does this objection miss the mark?
Nicias wants us to draw a distinction between two kinds of
knowledge:
1. Knowledge of what states of af fairs will occur.
2. Knowledge of what states of af fairs are good/bad.
An expert can be better at predicting what will occur without
knowing the value of those outcomes. The courageous person
knows about value.
A LINGERING WORRY
 Won’t the courageous person need to know more than just
how to rank various outcomes in terms of value? Won ’t the
courageous person know how to bring about the best
outcomes? And this is more than just knowledge of good &
evil.
SOCRATES’ FIRST OBJECTION
Aren’t wild beasts sometimes courageous ? The Socrates-Nicias
account of courage seems to be too narrow in failing to
accommodate courage in wild beasts.
 Why does the Socrates-Nicias account seem ill -suited to
include such cases of courage? How does Nicias respond to
this objection?
SOCRATES’ FIRST OBJECTION
Aren’t wild beasts sometimes courageous ? The Socrates-Nicias
account of courage seems to be too narrow in failing to
accommodate courage in wild beasts.
 Why does the Socrates-Nicias account seem ill -suited to
include such cases of courage? How does Nicias respond to
this objection?
Nicias wants us to draw the following distinction:
1. Animals, children, and foolish adults can be rash (or even
mad).
2. Only the one who knows what is & isn ’t to be feared is
courageous.
A LINGERING WORRY
 Are Socrates & Nicias “over -intellectualizing” what it is to be
courageous? Perhaps being courageous is more about being
conditioned/trained in ways that produces certain habits.
Perhaps our behavior is more continuous with animals than
Socrates & Nicias are acknowledging.
SOCRATES’ SECOND OBJECTION
 Socrates’ second objection is a reductio ad absurdum
argument. What’s that?
REDUCTIO AD ABSURDUM
Illustration:
1 . Sam stole the goat.
2. If Sam stole the goat, Sam’s shoes are muddy.
3. Sam’s shoes are muddy. (by modus ponens)
4. Sam’s shoes are not muddy.
5. Sam didn’t steal the goat.
P (target of the reductio)
P→Q
Q (by modus ponens: next slide)
-Q
-P
MODUS PONENS
P→Q
P
Q
SOCRATES’ SECOND OBJECTION
(A REDUCTIO AD ABSURDUM)
1. Courage is the science (knowledge) of what ought to be an
object of fear & what ought not.
2. Fear = expectation of future evil. Hence,
3. Courage is the science of future evils and non-evils (goods).
4. The same science has understanding of the same things,
whether future, present, or past. E.g., mineralogy, the study
of properties of minerals, articulates laws that are context sensitive but not time-indexed. Accordingly,
5. Courage is the science of all goods & evils. So,
6. Courage is the whole of virtue. But,
7. Courage is just one part of virtue. Hence,
8. Courage is not knowledge of what is & isn’t to be feared.
RESPONSE TO SOCRATES’
SECOND OBJECTION
 How does Socrates in the Protagoras implicitly respond to his
objection in the Laches?
THE UNIT Y OF VIRTUE
Protagoras endorses the commonsense idea that one might be
courageous and yet lack other virtues like wisdom. Socrates has
shown that courage just is knowledge of good and evil, so one
cannot be courageous without being wise .
 Is Protagoras’ view really our commonsense view ? Isn’t the
courageous person someone who is dependable in matters of
danger? Someone who is unjust, intemperate, and unwise
does not seem to be the sort of person we can count on to do
the right thing in dangerous contexts . Presumably a
courageous person must be sensitive to the demands of
justice; someone who lacked such sensitivity might be better
labeled as rash.
VIRTUE AS TEACHABLE
 How does Socrates’ thesis that the virtues are identical with
one thing relate to the overarching question in the Protagoras
of whether virtue is teachable?
VIRTUE AS TEACHABLE
 How does Socrates’ thesis that the virtues are identical with
one thing relate to the overarching question in the Protagoras
of whether virtue is teachable ?
If virtue amounts to knowledge of good & evil, presumably it is
teachable!
THE SOCRATIC PARADOXES
1.
2.
3.
4.
No one errs willingly.
Virtue is just a kind of knowledge.
The virtues are inseparable from one another.
Virtue is suf ficient for happiness.
We have already discussed 1 , 2, & 3. Why think Socrates is
committed to 4?
APOLOGY 30CD
“Neither Meletus nor Anytus can harm me in any way; he could
not harm me, for I do not think it is permitted that a better man
be harmed by a worse; certainly he might kill me, or perhaps
banish or disfranchise me, which he and maybe others think to
be great harm, but I do not think so . I think he is doing himself
much greater harm doing what he is doing now, attempting to
have a man executed unjustly.”
 What assumptions about harm might Socrates be making
here?
A PLAUSIBLE SUGGESTION
1. If S is virtuous, then S is happy.
2. Something is a harm to S only if it adversely af fects S ’s
happiness. Hence,
3. The only way to harm a virtuous person is to deprive that
person of her virtue. Otherwise, she will continue to be
happy and so will not be harmed. But,
4. Killing, banishing, disenfranchising will not remove S ’s
virtue. Hence,
5. Killing, banishing, disenfranchising will not harm S.
GORGIAS 473A
“Doing injustice is worse than suf fering it.”
 How might this thesis presuppose the idea that virtue is all
you need for happiness?
GORGIAS 473A
“Doing injustice is worse than suf fering it. ”
 How might this thesis presuppose the idea that virtue is all
you need for happiness?
Doing injustice makes you an unjust person. Being unjust
prevents you from a sure path to happiness (provided being
virtuous is suf ficient for happiness).
Meanwhile, suf fering injustice needn ’t have any impact on your
well-being (if being virtuous is suf ficient for happiness).
A LINGERING WORRY
Socrates does not of fer a working theory of what human
happiness/well-being consists in. Until this issue is settled, it is
hard to see how we can determine whether having a certain
character is by itself enough to yield happiness.
In the early dialogues we do not find Socrates arguing for the
claim that virtue is suf ficient for happiness. In the Republic we
finally get an argument, though it is for the comparative claim
that the virtuous person is happier than the vicious one.