Deducing from Socrates’ argument, if you eat those chips on your plate when you
are full, you are committing injustice. In the Republic by Plato, Socrates argues that
justice in an individual is the mind’s appetite, reason, and spirit working in harmony
together. He uses the analogy that justice in the soul is good like health in the body. His
argument is very weak because Socrates has not met Glaucon’s challenge, to show that
justice is valuable in itself. Socrates does not logically prove his health analogy and his
argument does not prove that justice is good for its own self.
Socrates says that justice is each of the three parts of our psyche – appetite, spirit,
and reason – working in harmony, each doing its own task; however, he says that if one
part runs rampant outside of its bounds, then this will lead to injustice. For example, my
appetite may tell me to eat a bag of chips when I am not hungry while my reason will tell
me not to. I should listen to my reason in this case because my appetite is not for a
necessary desire, but if I follow my appetite then I will be leading an unhealthy lifestyle
and committing injustice. Each of the three parts must perform their own task and not
stray into the others’ duties or become too powerful. If this balance is maintained, then
justice will prevail in the individual because he will make sound decisions through reason
with influences of appetite and spirit.
His analogy comes into play to show justice is valuable. Earlier, Glaucon stated
that having health was good “for its own sake and also for the sake of what comes from
it” (33). Socrates wants to show justice is valuable in the same ways as health. If he can
prove this, then he may have met Glaucon’s challenge. Socrates says that “just and unjust
acts are no different for the soul than healthy and unhealthy things are for the body”
(120). This whole analogy is weak because it contains a major assumption which goes
unproven; he cannot assume that health is good for its own sake without proving it. If
health happens to be good only for its consequences, and health and justice share the
same characteristics, then it could be said that justice is also good only for its
consequences. In order for Socrates’ argument to be strong here, he needs to show how
health is good intrinsically. Socrates analogy is not completely weak because he does a
good job in using logical appeals to show how health and justice are similar and valuable.
If you do not have health for the body and justice for the soul, then you will naturally
(here is his logical appeal) have their opposites, disease and injustice, both of which are
invaluable. His analogy, however, is weak because he assumes health is good in itself
instead of proving it.
Socrates’ overall argument is still weak because it does not help to show justice is
valuable intrinsically. For example, without the reader having to make assumptions, all
that can be seen in Socrates’ analogy is the consequences of being healthy and just. Being
healthy produces such consequences as longevity, lower insurance rates, and higher
sexual appeal. In this analogy and throughout this section, Socrates seems to forget that
he is trying to show that justice is good by itself, and gives examples of how justice is
good due its consequences. An example of this is when Socrates says “One who is just …
binds together those parts and … becomes entirely one, moderate and harmonious. Only
then does he act” (119). This section talks of a just man’s actions. However, actions
produced from having the three parts in the soul balanced are still consequences. He later
says, “…just actions produce justice in the soul” (120). Since we have justice defined as
harmony in the soul, then this quote is saying that being externally just produces the
consequence of a clear conscience. Again, this points to the consequences of being just.
His argument is weak because it is straying from meeting Glaucon’s challenge and the
idea of justice being intrinsically good.
There is a difference between being valued consequentially and being valued
intrinsically, which was established earlier in the book. While Socrates also believes
justice is good for its consequences, his examples of justice and its consequences do not
lead to the conclusion that justice is valuable for itself. For example, advocates of vitamin
C claim it is good because it prevents cancer and strengthens the heart. However, if
someone just shows that vitamin C prevents cancer, this alone does not show that vitamin
C also strengthens the heart. This is why Socrates’ argument is weak here; it advocates
only consequences of justice which do not prove justice is good intrinsically.
Another way of showing the argument focuses on the consequences is by looking
at why Socrates is saying justice is valuable. If the end results were negative, then
Socrates would not be able to argue that justice is valuable because he has only given
consequences. This shows that he has not proved justice is valuable in itself, because in
order to show something is valuable intrinsically, it must be stripped of all its
consequences and still be shown to be valuable. If being just produced an unhealthy mind
or led to bad results, then Socrates’ claim of justice being valuable would not hold. So
again Socrates only shows why justice is good consequentially.
So Socrates definition of justice and analogy lead his argument to show that
justice is valuable for its consequences, instead of showing why it is valued intrinsically.
The only reasons to be just Socrates has given here are that it will produce a healthy mind
and just actions. These are both consequences of justice and have nothing to do with
intrinsic value. It is worthy to note that these do a good job in the sense of showing why
humans should aspire to be just. In addition, Socrates has shown an important insight into
the human psyche, which is a major foundation today’s modern psychiatrists use. Given
that, Socrates’ argument is weak in the sense that he does not show the intrinsic value of
justice, which is Glaucon’s challenge.
To conclude, Socrates argues that justice is the mind being harmonized in three
areas- reason, appetite, and spirit. His argument is weak because his analogy is built from
an assumption and his overall argument shows why justice is valuable consequentially,
not intrinsically. The whole point of the Republic is for Socrates to show why justice is
valuable in itself to answer Glaucon’s challenge, which he has yet to do. This argument is
important because it defines what Socrates idea of justice is, which will be built upon to
attempt to show why justice is important later on in the Republic. Regardless if Socrates’
idea of justice has not been shown to be good in itself, it is still a great model in which to
live our lives to bring peace between each other and within one’s soul.