1 357b (Category 1 good) Soc thinks there are goods (e.g. joy)
people enjoy per se, not because of what comes from them
2 357c (Category 2 good) Soc thinks there are goods that people
enjoy per se and because of what comes from them (e.g. knowing,
seeing, and being healthy). Glaucon thinks these can also be per
se goods.
3 357 c-d (Category 3 good) Soc also agrees that there are goods we
like only for what comes from them and not per se (e.g.medical
treatment of the sick, medicine itself, and other ways of making
money). All these examples are instances of burdensome jobs.
4 358a - Soc thinks justice is the finest good (i.e. something valued
per se and because of what comes from it).
4.1 Glaucon thinks most people think justice is a category 3 good.
5 358c (Glaucon's manifesto) First, I'll state what kind of thing people
consider justice to be and what its origins are. Second, I'll argue
that all who practice it do so unwillingly, as something necessary,
not as something good. third, I'll argue that they have good reason
to act as they do, for the life of an unjust person is, they say, much
better than that of a just one.
6 358d - G - But I've yet to hear anyone defend justice in the way I
want, proving that it is better than injustice.
6.1 origin of justice - doing injustice is naturally good and suffering
it naturally bad. People long ago who suffered and committed
injustice found the badness of suffering it to far outweigh the
goodness of doing it. The people who lacked the power to do
injustice and avoid suffering it made laws so that they would at
least not have to suffer injustice. This position is inbetween
the best and the worst.
7 359b G people value it not as a good but because they are too
weak to do injustice with impunity.
8 359c - the nature people naturally pursue is to outdo others and get
more and more, but nature is forced by law into the perversion of
treating fairness with respect.
9 359d - The ring of Gyges. The ring allows a person to get whatever
they desire with impunity.
10 360b - The just and the unjust man would follow the path of
injustice if they had the ring.
11 360d - people who would praise a just man were he given the ring
and committed no injustice would do so to deceive each other to
avoid suffering injustice. But the people would actually think the
man stupid or wretched for not seizing the opportunity to commit
injustice.
12 360e - to see which life is better it's important to look at the
extreme's of each lifestyle: the completely just lifestyle and the
completely unjust lifestyle.
13 361a - the extreme of injustice is to be believed to be just without
being just.
14 361c - the extreme of justice would require the just person to be
seen as unjust, since a reputation for justice might mean that the
person is being just for the sake of honors and rewards. He would
be a person who 'doesn't want to be believed to be good but to be
so.'
15 361e G thinks the supporters of the unjust life think the just person
'will be whipped, stretched on a rack, chained, blinded with fire,
and, at the end, when he has suffered every kind of evil, he'll be
impaled, and will realize then that one shouldn't want to be just but
to be believed to be just.
16 362b G - the unjust man is able to acquire wealth, thus enabling
him to 'benefit his friends and harm his enemies.'
17 362c G since the unjust man is wealthy he a. makes adequate
sacrifices to the gods, b. sets up magnificent offerings to them, c.
treats his friends better than the just man, and d. treats the gods
better than the just man. Furthermore, people (the supporters of
injustice?) say 'that gods and humans provide a better life for
unjust people than for just ones.'
18 362d Q - what does it mean to 'throw me to the canvas'?
19 Adiemantus's interruption:
19.1 Counter argument 1
19.1.1 He seeks to make Glaucon's position clearer by
presenting an argument opposed to his position (i.e. that
end with injustice being praised and justice not).
19.1.2 I think the main push of his counter argument is aimed at
Glaucon's claim that (359b) people do not value justice
as a good.
19.1.3 For, he argues that fathers teach their sons that the
gods promise many benefits for being just and many
punishments for being unjust. What Adeimantus is
saying is that people don't praise justice for the reasons
Glaucon gives: that justice guards against suffering
injustice. People praise it because they've been taught
by their parents that it benefits (in a positive sense) the
one who practices it. Thus, contra Glaucon, people
would value justice as a positive good. When
Adiemantus says 'This, then, is the way people praise
justice and find fault with injustice,' I take him to mean
'these are the actual reasons people praise justice and
find fault with injustice.'
19.2 Counter argument 2
19.2.1 364 In this argument I take him to be attacking the claim
that justice is not good. For, even poets who dishonor
just people and think the unjust have better lives
consider just people to be better than unjust people.
They also think that justice is a fine thing
19.3 Counter? argument 3
19.3.1 364b-367 This is a long winded argument designed to
call into question the claim that justice is better for one's
soul than injustice. Adiemantus argues that from a
religious standpoint, injustice is more profitable than
justice in terms of pre-mortem and post-mortem
existence. Furthermore, 'No one, whether in poetry or in
private conversations, has adequately argued that
injustice is the worst thing a soul can have in it and that
justice is the greatest good' (366e).
20 Adiemantus - If people knew justice was the greatest good for
their souls, they wouldn't need to enter into laws (367)
21 Q - strange request: 'Follow Glaucon's advice, and don't take
reputations into account, for if you don't deprive justice and
injustice of their true reputations and attach false ones to them,
we'll say that you are not praising them but their reputations and
that you're encouraging us to be unjust in secret' (367b). So, I
take Adiemantus's line of thought to be that if one hypothetically
imagines justice and injustice to have reputations that don't belong
to either, one won't run the risk of praising either merely for their
respective reputations. In short, this method will determine which
is better per se.
22 reputation = the effects of something
23 Adiemantus's request: 'Therefore, praise justice as a good of that
kind, explaining how -- because of its very self -- it benefits its
possessors and how injustice harms them. Leave wages and
reputations for others to praise' (367d)
24 369 Soc - To undertake this request, Socrates wishes to draw an
analogy between a city and an individual. The purpose of this
method is to be able to see more clearly the nature of justice
(since it is supposably easier to see that nature of justice in the
city than in a person).
25 The beginnings of a city:
25.1 369b - a city comes to be because none of us is selfsufficient, but we all need many things
25.2 369d - Surely our first and greatest need is to provide food to
sustain life...Our second is for shelter, and our third for
clothes and such
25.3 370b - a person is better at a craft if he only practices one.
25.3.1 to do a craft correctly requires close attention for, 'if one
misses the right moment in anything, the work is spoiled'
25.4 370c - The result, then, is that more plentiful and betterquality goods are more easily produced if each person does
one thing for which he is naturally suited, does it at the right
time, and is released from having to do any of the others.
26 Origin of war
26.1 373e It comes from those same desires that are most of all
responsible for the bad things that happen to cities and the
individuals in them. I think Soc is talking about the desire for
a luxurious life (or perhaps a desire for a decadent life). At
any rate, the immediate cause of war seems to be the
acquisition of neighboring lands for the use of supporting a
luxurious and or decadent lifestyle (373d)
27 375c - a gentle nature is the opposite of a spirited one.
28 Dogs are philosophical
28.1 376b - Soc thinks a dog loves learning since 'it defines what
is its own and what is alien to it in terms of knowledge and
ignorance'
28.2 376b - the love of learning is the same thing as philosophy or
the love of wisdom
29 Nature of the guardian:
29.1 376c - Philosophy, spirit, speed, and strength must all, then,
be combined in the nature of anyone who is to be a fine and
good guardian of our city.
30 Education
30.1 What has developed over a long period is best - physical
training, music, and poetry for the soul (376e)
30.1.1 music and poetry come before physical training
30.2 377 children should learn false stories first (stories are
grouped under music and poetry) that have some truth in
them (probably fairy tales)
30.2.1 The beginning of any process is most important.
Children are most malleable at that stage.
30.3 377c - children should be read the fine and beautiful stories.
30.4 378 - children shouldn't be read stories with great falsehoods
(e.g. 'a story (that) gives a bad image of what the gods and
heroes are like' (377e)
30.5 378c - the 'gods warring, fighting, or plotting against one
another...aren't true'. Further, such stories, if told to
guardians, will make them shameless in provoking hatred in
one another.
30.6 378d - The young can't distinguish what is allegorical from
what isn't, and the opinions they absorb at that age are hard
to erase and apt to become unalterable
31 Theological digression
31.1 379c - Gods only cause the good things in people's lives 'good things are fewer than bad ones in our lives.'
31.2 380 - should a tale involving a god punishing someone really
be the work of a god, it should be interpreted by poets as a
remedial punishment.
31.3 380c - This, then, is one of the laws or patterns concerning
the gods to which speakers and poets must conform, namely,
that a god isn't the cause of all things but only of good ones.
31.4 A. God cannot change form via an external affection
31.4.1 381b - Whatever is in good condition, then, whether by
nature or craft or both, admits least of being changed by
anything else
31.5 B. God cannot change himself either
31.5.1 381c - A God would either change himself into
something more beautiful or into something worse or
uglier (false dilemma).
31.5.1.1 A God wouldn't change into something more
beautiful, because then it would admit of a
deficiency. Further, it wouldn't change into
something uglier, for no one would want to do that.
Therefore, the God's don't change themselves at
all.
31.5.2 381e - Stories about the gods taking on different
appearances a. terrifies children, b. blasphemes the
gods, and c. makes children more cowardly
31.6 C. The Gods do not make us believe false things about them
through sorcery (e.g. that they change their form)
31.6.1 382 - Since the God would be deceiving us by means of
a true falsehood (382b -a falsehood that is a. obviously
false and b. false about a very important matter). And,
since 'Falsehood in words is a kind of imitation of this
affection in the soul (i.e. true falsehood), an image of it
that comes into being after it and is not a pure
falsehood.' And since all the gods hate a true falsehood.
31.6.2 382d For, falsehood isn't useful to a god
31.6.2.1 In the case where it's useful and not deserving of
censure, namely, telling embellished tales of the
gods, it is useful just because we don't know the
truth about ancient events. But gods know the truth
about events, and thus have no use for making
'false likenesses of ancient events because of his
ignorance of them'
31.6.2.2 382e - Therefore the daemonic and the divine are
in every way free from falsehood.
31.7 382e - Given A, B and C: 'A god, then, is simple and true in
word and deed. He doesn't change himself or deceive others
by images, words, or signs, whether in visions or in dreams.
Book 3
1 386 The historically dubious tales of the gods shouldn't be taught
to the guardians in order for them to a. honor the gods, b. honor
their parents, and d. not take their friendships lightly
2 386b Guardians can't be unafraid of death if they believe in a
Hades full of terrors
3 387b children and men are supposed to be free and to fear slavery
more than death.
4 387d Decent men don't think death is a terrible thing for someone
decent to suffer. Further, decent men are most self-sufficient in
living well and has least need of anyone else. 387e Therefore,
decent people will 'least give way to lamentations and bear
misfortune most quietly when it strikes'
5 388 Lamenting should be frowned upon
6 388d If lamenting in the stories of the gods isn't frowned upon,
guardians will be more prone to lamenting (even for trivial things)
7 388e Guardians shouldn't be lovers of laughter.
7.1 For, a violent change of mood is likely to follow
7.2 The idea seems to be that the guardians shouldn't be
overcome by anything (including laughter).
8 389b Falsehood is useful as a form of drug
9 389c - Only rulers should be able to use falsehood, for if private
citizens told falsehoods to the ruler, it would be like a member of a
ships crew lying to the captain about the condition of the boat. (i.e.
it would be dangerous)
10 389e - 390 - Guardians should practice moderation in terms of
respect and obedience to rulers and control over the appetites
(drink, sex, and food). (390c) Further, they shouldn't listen to
stories about the gods that promote licentiousness.
11 390d - The 'words or deeds of famous men, who are exhibiting
endurance in the face of everything, surely they must be seen or
heard'
12 390d Guardians musn't be money-lovers or to be bribable
13 391d-e - children of the gods can't do wrong - 'We'll compel the
poets either to deny that the heroes did such things or else to
deny that they were children of the gods. They mustn's say both
or attempt to persuade our young people that the gods bring about
evil or that heroes are no better than humans...it is impossible for
the gods to produce bad things.'
14 391e - A man 'will be ready to excuse himself when he's bad' if he
thinks the gods or the offspring of gods did bad things in the past.
14.1 For that reason, we must put a stop to such stories, lest they
produce in the youth a strong inclination to do bad things.
15 What stories concerning humans should be told?
15.1 391c Then we'll agree about what stories should be told
about human beings only when we've discovered what sort of
thing justice is and how by nature it profits the one who has it,
whether he is believed to be just or not.
16 394e - a single individual can't imitate many things as well as he
can imitate one.
17 395c - guardians must imitate 'people who are courageous, self-
controlled, pious, and free, and their actions.'
18 396d narrators are should use imitation narrative for characters
only when they are doing good things in the narrative. Or, if he
does imitate the character, he'll do so only in play.
19 397b - Two kinds of style: being scrupulous in what you imitate
and doing the opposite of that. The style involving little variation,
and the mixed style.
20 397d - most people like the mixed style.
21 398 - Soc prefers the more boring poet for the city - But, for our
own good, we ourselves should employ a more austere and less
pleasure-giving poet and storyteller, one who would imitate the
speech of a decent person and who would tell his stories in
accordance with the patters we laid down when we first undertook
the education of our soldiers.
22 What kind of music should the city have?
22.1 398d As far as words are concerned, they are no different in
songs than they are when not set to music...Further, the
mode and rhythm must fit the words
22.2 399c - Leave me, then, these two modes (Dorian and
Phrygian), which will best imitate the violent or voluntary
tones of voice of those who are moderate and courageous,
whether in good fortune or in bad.
22.3 Meter
22.3.1 400 The meter should match that 'of someone who
leads an ordered and courageous life'
22.4 400d - the style and content of the words conform to the
character of the speaker's soul.
23 401d - education in music and poetry permeates the soul and
makes one graceful. It will also help one sense when something
isn't fine, so that she'll know to avoid it.
24 402c - just as one can't be a competent reader until mastering all
the letters, so one can't be educated in music and poetry 'until we
know the different forms of moderation, courage, frankness,
highmindedness, and all their kindred, and their opposites too'
25 Sexual pleasure isn't part of love
25.1 403 - the right kind of love is by nature the love of order and
beauty that has been moderated by education in music and
poetry...therefore, the right kind of love has nothing mad or
licentious about it...then sexual pleasure mustn't come into it.
26 403d - It seems to me that a fit body doesn't by its own virtue
make the soul good, but instead that the opposite is true -- a good
soul by its own virtue makes the body as good as possible
27 404 Guardians must be like 'sleepless hounds, able to see and
hear as keenly as possible and to endure frequent changes of
water and food, as well as summer and winter weather on their
campaigns, without faltering in health'
28 405 - It's a sign of shame and vulgarity that one needs lawyers
and doctors.
29 405c - It's even more shameful for someone to live like a nit-picky
lawyer because she is ignorant of how better it is to live a life of
refinement.
30 407c - excessive care of the body makes 'any kind of learning,
thought, or private meditation difficult...for it makes a person think
he's ill and be all the the time concerned about the body.'
31 Chronically sick people (who could prevent being sick) shouldn't
be treated:
31.1 408b - But they didn't consider the lives of those who were by
nature sick and licentious to be profitable either to
themselves or to anyone else. Medicine isn't intended for
such people and they shouldn't be treated, not even if they're
richer than Midas.
31.2 Because it says "by nature sick and licentious," Plato may be
pointing only to people who could have prevented their illness
(though, I don't think this makes his claim much morally
better).
32 The cleverest doctor is the soul doctor
32.1 408d The cleverest doctors are those who...have had contact
with the greatest number of very sick bodies...have
themselves experienced every illness, and aren't very healthy
by nature, for they don't treat bodies with their
bodies...Rather they treat the body with their souls...
33 A judge must have a good upbringing if he is to judge.
33.1 409 - it isn't possible for a soul to be nurtured among vicious
souls from childhood, to associate with them, to indulge in
every kind of injustice, and come through it able to judge
other people's injustices from its own case, as it can diseases
of the body.
33.1.1 It's not clear to me what he means by 'from its own
case.' What I think he means is that a person who is
unjust couldn't judge another person who is unjust since
the judge wouldn't know just from unjust. Furthermore, if
a person doesn't know just from unjust, she wouldn't be
able to judge a person just or unjust (for how could she
know whether the person was just or not?).
33.1.2 Evidence for this view: 409d - A vicious person would
never know either himself or a virtuous one, whereas a
naturally virtuous person, when educated, will in time
acquire knowledge of both virtue and vice.
34 409 - A judge must be an old person who has learned late in life
what injustice is like, not by practicing it, but through knowledge
35 409c - someone who has a good soul is good
36 410c - the effect that lifelong physical training, unaccompanied by
any training in music and poetry, has on the mind, or the effect of
the opposite, music and poetry without physical
training..[is]...Savagery and toughness in the one case and
softness and overcultivation in the other.
37 Music and physical training mitigate the spirited part of human
nature and the wisdom-loving part of human nature:
37.1 411e - It seems, then, that a god has given music and
physical training to human beings not, except incidentally, for
the body and the soul but for the spirited and wisdom-loving
parts of the soul itself, in order that these might be in
harmony with one another, each being stretched and relaxed
to the appropriate degree.
38 412c - the rulers must be older and the ruled younger
38.1 and they must be the best guardians
39 412d - And someone loves something most of all when he
believes that the same things are advantageous to it as to himself
and supposes that if it does well, he'll do well, and that if it does
badly, then he'll do badly too.
40 One can discard a belief in two ways: voluntarily or involuntarily:
40.1 413 - voluntary when one learns that the belief is false,
involuntary in the case of all true beliefs.
40.2 Involuntary:
40.2.1 A - 413b. theft - those who are persuaded to change
their minds or those who forget, because time, in the
latter case, and argument, in the former, takes away
their opinions without their realizing it.
40.2.2 B. compelled - those whom pain or suffering causes to
change their mind
40.2.3 C. victims of magic - those who change their mind
because they are under the spell of pleasure or fear.
41 Rulers must be tested for fidelity:
41.1 413d - (theft) We must keep them under observation from
childhood and set them tasks that are most likely to make
them forget such a conviction or be deceived out of it...
41.2 (compelled) And we must subject them to labors, pains, and
contests in which we can watch for these traits.
41.3 413e (victim of magic) Like those who lead colts into noise
and tumult to see if they're afraid, we must expose our young
people to fears and pleasures, testing them more thoroughly
than gold is tested by fire.
42 414b 'Guardian' now means ruler of the city, and 'soldiers'
auxiliaries (supporters of the guardians' convictions)
43 The belongings of auxiliaries:
43.1 416d no more that is wholly necessary (of food) (provided for
by taxing citizens)
43.2 e - they'll have common messes and live like soldiers in a
camp
43.3 417 they won't handle currency or own their own land
Book 4
1 419 Adeimantus: the just city isn't a happy one for the guardians.
The guardians have no amenities (see 466)
2 420-421 - Soc - just as a statue wouldn't look like a person if its
eyes were painted purple rather than black, so a city wouldn't be
just if its guardians lived so luxiuriously. Guardians need to live
more austerely for the sake of the justice of a city.
3 421b - our aim is to see that the city as a whole has the greatest
happiness.
4 Nature provides the amenities for a city that's well governed:
4.1 421c -In this way, with the whole city developing and being
governed well, we must leave it to nature to provide each
group with its share of happiness.
5 Poverty and wealth corrupt workers and makes products worse:
5.1 Wealth: 421d - produces idleness and carelessness in one's
craft
5.2 Poverty: 421d - a person will make worse crafts because
lacking the proper equipment, and teach one's to be a worse
craftsman.
6 422 - Wealth 'makes for luxury, idleness, and revolution'
7 422 - Poverty makes for 'slavishness, bad work, and revolution as
well'
8 422 - Adeimantus: But if the city is to be somewhat deficient of
funds, how can it expect to protect itself against a wealthy city?
8.1 422a-d - a city with good fighters could easily defeat these
wealthy cities which are inexperienced in the craft of war.
Even if these wealthy cities solicited the help of other cities to
fight against the just city, those cities wouldn't fight the just city
because it would be too much effort. Rather, they would turn
against the wealthy cities and join sides with the just city.
9 422e - A very wealthy city isn't a city
9.1 If not, at least 'each of them consists of two cities at war with
one another, that of the poor and that of the rich, and each of
these contains a great many.'
10 423 - Whatever limit in size it is that a city can grow and not
become two cities is the limit a city which wants to be just one city
should be.
11 423c - Order 1 (guardians must make sure the city is sufficient in
size and number) is less easy than order 2 (offspring of the
guardians must be sent to do the occupations that best suit their
capacities).
12 423 e - All the orders given to guardians will be viewed as easy
provided they (the guardians) are well educated (so that they can
see that it's worth it to preserve the happiness of the city)
13 424 - And surely, once our city gets a good start, it will go on
growing in a cycle.
14 424c - New music threatens the system, thus, new music
shouldn't be tolerated.
15 424d - Then it seems, I said, that it is in music and poetry that our
guardians must build their bulwark.
16 424d - Adeimantus on the slippery slope of new music.
16.1 It is insidious
16.2 It steps into government and threatens the very foundations
of society
17 425b - It's foolish to legislate etiquette. 'Verbal or written decrees
will never make them come about or last.'
18 425c - 'the start of someone's education determines what follows.
Doesn't like always encourage like?'
19 425e - Adeimantus - It isn't appropriate to dictate to men who are
fine and good. They'll easily find out for themselves whatever
needs to be legislated about such things.
20 425e - People who focus on making laws and amending them are
like sick people (licentious people) 'who aren't willing to abandon
their harmful way of life'
21 426c - A city that threatens its citizens with death for threatening
the political establishment is just like the sick person who treats a
person as an enemy (i.e. treats badly) who tells her the truth (that
to get better one needs to change one's lifestyle). So, just as a
sick person treats a person badly who tell her the truth, so a city
treats a person (presumably Soc) badly who tells it the truth.
22 426d - A person who is ignorant of what a true statesman is
shouldn't be hated for thinking he is one when many people say
that he is. They should be thought amusing.
23 427 - A true lawgiver oughtn't to bother with that form of law or
constitution (i.e. 425d re: market business, private contracts,
cases of insult or injury, lawsuits, establishing of juries, dues,
regulation of market, city, harbor, etc.)
23.1 For, such laws could only apply to either of two cities: badly
governed or well-governed cities.
23.1.1 In badly governed cities such laws are useless (cf. hydra
head 426e).
23.1.2 In well-governed cities people figure out what's best to
do on their own as a result of their upbringing.
24 **427d The just city has been created for the investigation
into the merits of justice vs. injustice to commence.
24.1 We must look at the city and 'see where the justice and the
injustice might be in it, what the difference between them is,
and which of the two the person who is to be happy should
possess, whether its possession is unnoticed by all the gods
and human beings or not.'
25 427e - Soc thinks the city so described is completely good
25.1 as well as wise, courageous, moderate, and just
26 City as wise
26.1 428b - Soc thinks the city is wise because it has good
judgment. (However, cf. 430c)
26.2 428b - good judgment is a kind of knowledge.
27 City as courageous
27.1 429c - courage is a kind of preservation
27.1.1 The thing being preserved is 'the belief that has been
inculcated by the law through education about what
things and sorts of things are to be feared.'
27.2 430b - Adeimantus recognizes that Soc can't mean that law
inculcated the belief and Soc. agrees.
27.3 430c - Soc amends what he's describing as civic courage as
opposed to courage simpliciter.
27.4 433d (nice summary of it) -- the preservation among the
soldiers of the law-inspired belief about what is to be feared
and what isn't
28 City as Moderate
28.1 430e - it is more like a kind of consonance and harmony than
the previous ones. (cf. 431e)
28.1.1 it's the mastery of certain kinds of pleasures and
desires.
28.2 431 - a person is self-controlled whose better part of the soul
controls the worse
28.3 431d - likewise, any city whose superior few control the
desires of the inferior(??) many is said to be moderate
28.4 431e - in this city, moderation is located in the ruled and the
ruler since both agree as to who is to rule. In this way is
moderation a kind of harmony...'Because, unlike courage and
wisdom, each of which resides in one part, making the city
brave and wise respectively, moderation spreads throughout
the whole'
28.5 432 - moderation: the unanimity between the naturally worse
and the naturally better as to which of the two is to rule both
in the city and in each one
28.6 433d (nice summary) - agreement in belief between the
rulers and the ruled.
29 *Enter Justice*
30 justice as doing one's own work
30.1 433b - it turns out that this doing one's own work -- provided
that it comes to be in a certain way -- is justice.
30.2 433c - I think that this is what was left over in the city when
moderation, courage, and wisdom have been found. It is the
power that makes it possible for them to grow in the city and
that preserves them when they've grown for as long as it
remains there itself.
30.3 435b - But a city was thought to be just when each of the
three natural classes within it did its own work...
31 433e - justice (which consists in everyone's doing his own work)
rivals widom, moderation, and courage in its contribution to the
virtue of the city. The city is made good by its presence alone.
32 Justice as property rights
32.1 433e ...no citizen should have what belongs to another or be
deprived of what is his own.
33 The Three Classes:
33.1 434c - money-making, auxiliary, and guardian class
33.1.1 money-making class seems (though I don't have textual
evidence for this) to correspond with the
appetitive/irrational part of the soul).
33.1.2 auxiliary class corresponds with the spirited part of the
soul characterized sometimes as angry and/or
enthusiastic (441). It is also likened to a dog.
33.1.3 guardian class. This class corresponds with the rational
part of the soul. it is likened to a shepherd. It is also
called the deliberative part of the soul (441)
33.1.3.1 434b - judges seem to be part of the guardian class
33.2 434c - Mixing these classes is injustice, and the opposite
justice
34 435 - A city is like a man if they share in some feature
35 435c - if an individual has these same three parts in his soul
(money-making, auxiliary, and guardian class), we will expect him
to be correctly called by the same names as the city if he has the
same conditions (?moderate, courageous, and wise?) in them
35.1 Plato pic 1
35.2 440d - the auxiliary part is like a dog
35.3 440d - the guardian class is like a shepherd
36 435e - the three parts of a city come from within humans. For,
where else does spirit come from but people like the Thracians,
Scythians, etc. Or, where does love of learning or love of money
come from?
37 436 - Do we learn, get angry, or desire pleasure with the same
part of ourselves, or do we do them with three different parts?
37.1 Plato pic 3
38 436d - The Spinning Top example
38.1 point - contradiction isn't possible. The top taken as a whole
isn't moving and still, but parts of the top are moving and
other parts are still.
38.2 437 - the same thing can't 'be, do or undergo opposites (e.g.
be moving and not moving), at the same time, in the same
respect, and in relation to the same thing'
38.3 Another example of contradiction: 439b (the bow example)
39 The soul mirroring the world:
39.1 437b - Assent and dissent, wanting to have something and
rejecting it, taking something and pushing it away incorporate
thirst, hunger, the appetites as a whole, and wishing and
willing in its class.
39.1.1 Plato pic 2
39.2 437c - the soul nods in assent.
40 Appetites per se
40.1 437e - thirst itself is for drink and hunger itself is for food.
However, if thirst is coupled with a hot climate or body, a
person will be thirsty for cold drink (the same idea goes with
food).
40.2 437e - each appetite itself is only for its natural object, while
the appetite for something of a certain sort depends on
additions.
41 438b-d - just as greater is related to lesser, so knowledge itself is
related to something it is set over (e.g. of what can be learned
itself)...a particular sort of knowledge is of a particular sort of thing.
42 438d - all crafts and kinds of knowledge are particular things
43 Distinction between relations of particulars
43.1 438e - two particulars that are related needn't be the same.
'For example, knowledge of health or disease isn't healthy or
diseased, and knowledge of good and bad doesn't itself
become good or bad.'
43.2 So, there's the knowledge of the disease and the disease.
They aren't the same.
44 439c - when someone wants to drink but restrains himself from
doing so, there are two different parts of his soul at play (the
rational and the appetitive parts of the soul)
45 Enter the workings of the Soul
46 Breakdown of the soul:
46.1 439d - We'll call the part of the soul with which it calculates
the rational part (like a shepherd 440d) and the part with
which it lusts, hungers, thirsts, and gets excited by other
appetites the irrational appetitive part, companion of certain
indulgences and pleasures
47 Spirit's (or anger's) place in the soul
47.1 440 - anger isn't part of the appetites. For, if it was, Leontius
wouldn't have been angry with himself for letting his appetites
overcome his rationality when he looked at the corpses.
Think of it this way: anger could be one of three things: an
appetite, something rational, or something different from
both. Whether anger is something rational hasn't been
broached yet (but is in 440e). However, the answer will be
that anger (or spirit) is different from rationality because
children display spirit without rationality and because Homer
says spirit and rationality are different (441b-c). If it is an
appetite, it wouldn't be against the urges of the appetite.
However, as for the case of Leontius, anger does go against
the appetite. Thus, anger must be something different from
the appetite.
47.2 440b - spirit is anger or similar to anger
47.3 440d - spirit or anger is likened to a dog
47.4 The beginnings of the discussion of akrasia?
47.4.1 440b - If there's a fight between appetite and rationality,
anger (or spirit) always takes the side of rationality (cf.
440e). If I have a rational urge to study rather than
watch TV, if I succumb to my appetite to watch TV, I
don't get mad at my rational urge to study and think
(curse my rational impulse to study). Rather, I get mad
at my appetite to watch TV.
47.5 440c - The nobler you are the less angry you get when you
suffer remedially.
47.6 440d - If someone believes herself to have been treated
unjustly, her spirit gets angry and fights for justice.
47.7 Two arguments for anger not being part of the rational part of
the soul:
47.7.1 Glaucon - 441 - Some children are full of spirit and seem
to have no share of rational calculation. Thus, the
rational is different from the spirit.
47.7.2 Soc - Homer thinks they're different, so they are. After
all, Homer says 'He struck his chest and spoke to his
heart.'
47.7.3 problem - How are we defining rationality? For, if it is
reasoning correctly from a set of presuppositions (true or
not), spirit may not be different from rationality. For, a
child may reason correctly that it's best to steal out of a
cookie jar, provided her belief is that doing so is
beneficial, and what parents don't know won't hurt them.
And, it's pretty clear that children do so enthusiastically.
48 The upshot of discussing the constitution of the soul:
48.1 441c - We are pretty much agreed that the same number and
the same kinds of classes as are in the city are also in the
soul of each individual
49 Justice in a man
49.1 441d - Since 'a man is just in the same way as a city...[and
since] each one of us in whom each part is doing its own
work will himself be just and do his own' it's important to know
how each part should work.
49.2 ordering of the soul:
49.2.1 Rationality, then Spirit, then Appetites
49.2.2 441e - the rational part should rule: '...since it is really
wise and exercises foresight on behalf of the whole soul'
49.2.3 the spirited part should obey the rational part - for the
aforementioned reason
49.2.4 The work of the rational and spirited part of the soul is to
both exercise and listen to music and poetry (cf. 411e).
49.2.5 441e - The rational part and the spirited part should rule
the appetitive part since it is 'the largest part in each
person's soul and is by nature most insatiable for
money.' And also so that it doesn't try to take over
classes 'it isn't fit to rule, thereby overturning everyone's
whole life.'
49.2.6 442b - the rational part and the spirited part should rule
over the whole soul and body
49.3 What certain parts of the soul are responsible for
49.3.1 spirited part - responsible for courage (442c)
49.3.2 rational part - responsible for wisdom (442c)
49.3.3 the spirited part working together harmoniously with the
rational part is responsible for moderation (442d)
50 Mission accomplished 443c
50.1 443c - Then the dream we had has been completely fulfilled - our suspicion that, with the help of some god, we had hit
upon the origin and pattern of justice right at the beginning in
founding our city
51 The just man fully described: 443d-e
51.1 he is his own friend
51.2 he acts to preserve his inner harmony
52 Enter the investigation of Injustice
53 444b - Injustice 'must be a kind of civil war between the three
parts, a meddling and doing of another's work, a rebellion by some
part against the whole soul in order to rule it inappropriately'
54 444b - the straying of such parts is the 'whole of vice'
55 Info about justice, injustice, virtue, and vice:
55.1 444c - just and unjust actions are no different for the soul
than healthy and unhealthy things are for the body.
55.2 444d - justice is produced when the parts of the soul are in a
natural relation of control.
55.3 444e - Virtue seems, then, to be a kind of health, fine
condition, and well-being of the soul, while vice is disease,
shameful condition, and weakness.
56 445b - learning about injustice is helpful in seeing most clearly that
a just life is better than an unjust one.
57 445c - there are as many types of soul as there are specific types
of political constitution
57.1 445d - there are five forms of constitution
57.2 445e - one of the constitutions goes by two names: a
kingship and an aristocracy. They're the same constitution
(presumably) because 'whether one man emerges or many,
none of the significant laws of the city would be changed, if
they followed the upbringing and education we described.'
Book 5
1 449 - The constitution that goes by the name kingship and
aristocracy is the only good and correct constitution
2 The four kinds of bad constitution:
2.1 taken up in book VIII
3 Defense of the claim: as regards wives and children, anyone could
see that the posessions of friends should be held in common (see
423e-424a).
3.1 450e - Soc. is timid in responding to this
3.2 451 - So I bow to Adrastea for what I'm going to say, for I
suspect that it's a lesser crime to kill someone involuntarily
than to mislead people about fine, good, and just institutions.
4 452 - music and poetry are considered as one craft
5 452 - with respect to their culture, were women to do the same
things as men, it would be ridiculous for women to exercise naked
in the gymnasiums.
6 452c - cultural taboos can subside (Greeks used to think it was
ridiculous for men to exercise in the nude, but then started to do
this when other nations did). Something should be ridiculous only if
it's bad.
7 Warning against disputation (i.e. raising trivial objections instead of
focusing on the form of an argument)
7.1 453e - Soc thinks someone is disputing with him when his
imaginary interlocutor accuses him of contradiction. The
contradiction is this: men and women can't follow the same
way of life when it's also true that different natures follow
different ways of life and men and women are different.
7.1.1 454c - Soc thinks this objection works only if the
differences between men and women are relevant. It
might be just as absurd as banning hirsute men from
being cobblers just because they aren't bald.
8 454d - souls can be distinguished by a person's craft (e.g. a
doctor's soul is different from a carpenter's).
9 455 - Soc wants to show that 'no way of life concerned with the
management of the city is peculiar to women.
10 Criteria for determining whether one is or isn't naturally well suited
for something (455b):
10.1 1. was it easy for them to learn or difficult?
10.2 2. could one in a short period find things out for himself or
couldn't after a long period?
10.3 3. Does one's body adequately suit his thought while the
other is opposed his? (I don't get this)
11 455c - Men are superior to women in every craft. Glaucon thinks
that it's only most crafts.
12 455d - Women share by nature in every way of life just as men do,
but in all of them women are weaker than men.
12.1 So, men and women are naturally suited to the same things,
only, men happen to do the things they're suited for better
than women who are suited for the same things.
13 456b - women who are guardians by nature should live with men
who are of the same nature and share their guardianship.
14 456d - guardians are the best men and citizens.
15 457 - Guardian women must strip for physical training and share
in war. However, their training will be lighter since they're the
weaker sex.
16 The Law of Sharing women and children:
16.1 457d - all these (guardian) women are to belong in common
to all the men, that none are to live privately with any man,
and that the children, too, are to be possessed in common,
so that no parent will know his own offspring or any child his
parent.
16.2 Defense of the law:
16.2.1 In short, it leads to the greatest city. For, the greatest
city is one which has common pleasures and pains. It
can have this provided everyone views one another as
kinsman. However, for everyone to treat everyone else
in the city as a kinsman requires 'the having of wives
and children in common by the guardians' - 464.
16.2.2 458e - promiscuity isn't ok.
16.2.3 459b-d - just as breeding the strongest animals yields
the strongest offspring, so breeding the strongest
humans yields the strongest offspring.
16.2.4 Institution of Eugenics:
16.2.4.1 459e - the best men must have sex with the best
women as frequently as possible, and the opposite
for inferior men and women.
16.2.4.2 459e - The offspring of the best men must be
reared and not the offspring of the inferior men. (I'm
not sure about the reason for this, but it seems to
be in order to keep the inferior offspring from
getting any ideas about doing what isn't in his or her
nature to do)
16.2.4.3 459e - This process should be secret so there will
be as little dissension among the guardians as
possible.
16.2.4.4 460 - Sophisticated lottery system of marriage: If
you aren't chosen, you don't get to procreate.
16.2.4.4.1 beneficial feature of the system: the inferior will
blame luck rather than the rulers on their luck.
16.2.4.4.2 its aim - to attain the best distribution and
number of the sexes in the city depending on
the circumstances (e.g. war, disease, etc.)
16.2.5 Raising of children:
16.2.5.1 460b - When they are born they'll be taken over by
officials.
16.2.5.2 460c - superior and inferior offspring are separated
(and live separately)
16.2.6 When men and women may copulate (460e):
16.2.6.1 women - between the age of 20-40. However,
women may continue to copulate after that age
provided they copulate with either: a. her son and
his descendants or b. her father and his ancestors
(461c)
16.2.6.2 men - between the age that he passes his peak as
a runner and 55. However, he too may continue to
copulate after 55 provided he copulates with either:
a. his daughter, his mother, his daughter's children,
or his mother's ancestors (461c)
16.2.7 Sanctions against violations of Eugenics laws:
16.2.7.1 461b - If men (perhaps this is the gender unspecific form
of 'man') copulate outside of the appropriate age
range they'll be blamed as bringing 'an illegitimate,
unauthorized, and unhallowed child' into the city.
16.2.8 Familial Identification:
16.2.8.1 461d - Fathers identifying offspring and vice versa:
children born in the tenth or seventh month after a
man became a bridegroom are to be considered
the man's children.
16.2.8.2 461d - identifying siblings: whoever was born at the
same time will be each others' siblings.
16.2.8.3 461e - the law allows brothers and sisters to have
sex (lottery and Pythia permitting)
17 The greatest good and evil of a city 462b:
17.1 that which tears a city apart and makes it many instead of
one is the greatest evil.
17.1.1 a city is torn apart when some citizens rejoice greatly
and others suffer greatly in the same things.
17.2 that which binds a city together is the greatest good.
17.2.1 a city is bound together when its citizens rejoice and are
pained by the same successes and failures (462b)
17.2.1.1 464 - the cause of this is the having of wives and
children in common by the guardians
17.2.1.2 464b - Then, the cause of the greatest good for our
city has been shown to be the having of wives and
children in common by the auxiliaries.
17.2.2 462c - The best city is one in which there is wide
agreement in who owns what: one in which most people
say 'mine' and 'not mine' about the same things in the
same way
17.2.3 The greatest city acts like a man's body when the man
hurts his finger: the entire organism feels the pain - 462c
17.2.4 Familial identity: more than a name:
17.2.4.1 463e people of the city who are called kinsman
ought to be treated as kinsman.
17.2.4.1.1 This law seems to destroy the I-it relationship,
replacing it with an I-thou.
17.2.5 The greatest city seems to be the one with the most
agreement on things and the least dispute on things 464d.
17.2.6 464d - The benefits of no private ownership: lawsuits
and mutual accusation will disappear because they have
everything in common except their own bodies.
17.2.7 The laws of the city will induce men to live at peace with
one another- 465b:
17.2.7.1 464e - No lawsuits - (Duke it out?) young men of
the same age are to defend themselves against
insult or injury (because they aren't legally allowed
to enter into lawsuits) in order to keep them in good
physical shape.
17.2.7.1.1 Spirited men will be less likely to make a
bigger issue out of things if they handle these
issues this way. (perhaps the idea is similar to
that of boy fights. The boys usually end up
making friends after).
17.2.7.2 465 - older men given authority to rule over
younger.
17.2.7.3 lawgivers will be protected: No younger men will fail
to show respect to elders or strike elders - For the
laws will make them feel A. shame for doing so or
B. Fear, since many of the people will come to the
aid of the elder.
17.2.8 The laws also help the guardians escape petty and
shameful evils:
17.2.8.1 465c - poor man's flattery of the rich, issues of
rearing children, debt, etc.
18 465d - guardians will live a life more blessedly happier than the
victors in the Olympic games.
18.1 For 'the Olympian victors are considered happy on account of
only a small part of what is available to our guardians'
18.2 The victory of the guardians consists in: the preservation of
the whole city, and the upkeep and possession of the
necessities of life.
18.3 466 - Thus, it's not true in 419a that the guardians won't be
very happy.
19 ENTER - 466d: the possibility of the claim: as regards wives
and children, anyone could see that the posessions of friends
should be held in common (see 423e-424a).
20 Waging of War:
20.1 Men and women will campaign together. They will bring their
kids to the battles both to help and observe what they will one
day have to do. 467
20.2 Glaucon - But the men and women could lose the battle and
make it impossible for the rest of the city to recover (since
their offspring will die). 467b
20.2.1 467c-e - Just make it so that the children will be safe
(e.g. teach them at an early age to ride horses)
20.3 The outcome of bad soldiers - 468:
20.3.1 Deserters will be made craftspersons.
20.3.2 Captives will be treated by their captives however they
wish.
20.4 the outcome of good soldiers - 468b
20.4.1 They get crowned with a wreath, shaken with the right
hand, and kissed by adolescents and children - 468 b-c.
20.4.2 purpose of honoring good men and women: A. to reward
them and B. to continue to train them. - 468e
20.5 The rites for those who died honorably on campaign:
20.5.1 468e - they will be said to be of the golden race.
20.5.2 469 - the type of funeral will be prescribed by the god
Apollo
20.5.3 469 - graves will be cared for and worshiped at.
20.6 What soldiers become after they die honorably in battle:
20.6.1 469 - they become 'Sacred daemons living upon the
earth, Noble spirits, protectors against evil, guardians of
articulate mortals'
20.7 Treatment of enemies:
20.7.1 469b - Greek (enemies?):
20.7.1.1 they shouldn't be enslaved. Nor should other nonGreek cities be allowed to enslave them 'as a
precaution against being enslaved by Barbarians.
20.7.1.1.1 The idea here is this I think: If Greek enslaves
Greek and the Barbarians go to war against
the Greeks, the enslaved Greeks are likely to
side with the Barbarians. However, if Greek
doesn't enslave Greek, both parties will likely
battle the Barbarians. (469c).
20.7.2 treatment of enemy dead:
20.7.2.1 plundering enemy dead is not ok since it's foolish in
that it's like treating the lifeless body as an enemy
(469d)
20.7.2.2 469e - Nor may soldiers 'refuse the enemy
permission to pick up their dead.'
20.7.2.3 469d - 'Or don't cowards make this an excuse for
not facing the enemy' (I don't understand this)
20.7.3 Treatment of enemy property:
20.7.3.1 An army shouldn't ravage enemy land or burn their
houses, except destroy the year's harvest only
470b
20.7.3.1.1 the analogy between civil war and war:
20.7.3.1.1.1 just as in civil war it isn't right to ravage
the land and burn houses because it
shows a lack of love for the city and
corrodes the mindset people should have
that they'll one day be reconciled (470d-e)
so it isn't right to do such things to a
foreign enemy. For, the mindset should
be that one day they'll be reconciled 471b
21 ENTER 471c: Glaucon reminds Soc. to stay on track in
showing the possibility of his constitution (re: no private
property)
22 472c - It is satisfactory for a man to come as close to the just as
possible.
23 472e - it's not unreasonable to make a model of a perfect city and
be unable to show that it's possible to found such a city.
24 473 - It's impossible to do anything in practice the same as in
theory
25 473 - Soc only needs to show how 'a city could come to be
governed in a way that most closely approximates our description'.
26 473b - The task at hand is to find out what cities are doing wrong
and what is the smallest change that would allow a city to reach
our sort of constitution
27 473d - The change that needs to be made is to have philosophers
rule as kings, or else there will never be peace. (Soc sees this as
a potentially embarrassing and bold claim)
27.1 Defense of this claim:
27.1.1 474c - If someone loves something she loves all of that
thing
27.1.2 475 - Since philosophers love wisdom, they must love
the whole of wisdom.
27.1.3 475c - But the one who readily and willingly tries all
kinds of learning, who turns gladly to learning and is
insatiable for it, is rightly called a philosopher, isn't he?
27.1.4 475d - Glaucon interjects:
27.1.4.1 But wouldn't many strange people be philosophers
then? (e.g. lovers of sight seeing, and lovers of
music). But these people wouldn't want to sit
through a philosophical discussion.
27.1.4.2 Soc Response 475e: They aren't philosophers but
like philosophers.
27.1.4.2.1 476 - the just is only one thing, though it looks
like many because it manifests itself 'in
association with actions, bodies, and one
another' (and the same follows for the unjust).
27.1.4.2.2 476b - People who are lovers of sights and
music are lovers of the likenesses of the forms
(i.e. the manifestations of the forms), not the
forms themselves. Further, they can't know
the nature (form) of the beautiful itself.
27.1.4.2.3 476c - It is dreaming to think that a likeness is
not a likeness but rather the thing itself that it is
like
27.1.4.2.4 476d - someone has knowledge who sees the
beautiful itself 'and the things that participate in
it and doesn't believe that the participants are
it or that it itself is the participants'
27.1.4.2.5 477 - Seems to be talking about what we today
call: tautologous, contingent, and
contradictory. What 'completely is' may be
what we call tautologous (true in all possible
worlds), 'what is in no way' may be what we
call contradictory (false in all possible worlds),
and what 'is such as to be and also not to be'
might be what we call contingent (possibly true
and possibly false). What is contingent is
between tautologous and contradictory.
However, to avoid an anachronism, what is
'such as to be and also not to be' is
intermediate between what purely is and what
is in no way.
27.1.4.2.5.1 plato 477
27.1.4.2.6 Digression on the nature of powers:
27.1.4.2.6.1 477d - powers don't have accidents or
modes (like colors or shapes) to
distinguish them from other powers
27.1.4.2.6.2 477d - powers are distinguished only by
what they are set over and do
27.1.4.2.7 477e-478 - knowledge and opinion are two
different powers (they do different things) set
over two different things.
27.1.4.2.8 478c - opinion is set over neither what is nor
what is not.
27.1.4.2.8.1 This amorphous thing opinion is set over
is likened to relations (e.g. doubles (479b,
bigs and smalls 479b) that can't obtain
(presumably) without its opposite. For
example, you can't have big without small
and vice versa. The analogy being drawn
seems to take big and small as the
extremes, and their relation as big and
small as the intermediate between them.
It is also likened to an aesthetic principle
that something can't be beautiful without a
little ugliness in it (479). The analogy
drawn here pits the apparent beauty as
the intermediate between the beautiful
parts and the ugly parts. It is also likened
to tough cases when there is no set public
criteria for what is to count as what (e.g.
whether a eunuch counts as a man, a bat
as a bird, a cut piece of wood as a tree, or
a piece of pumice as a stone) - 479c. In
sum, what neither is nor is not should be
considered as a fuzzy or vague thing.
27.1.4.2.9 478c - opinion is darker than knowledge but
clearer than ignorance.
27.1.4.2.10 478d - opinion is intermediate between
knowledge and ignorance.
27.1.4.2.10.1 Plato 478
27.1.4.2.11 Conclusion (480): We won't be in error, then,
if we call such people (i.e. lovers of sights
and sounds) lovers of opinion rather than
philosophers or lovers of wisdom and
knowledge.
Book 6
1 Further distinctions between philosophers and non-philosophers
484b:
1.1 Philosophers: those who are able to grasp what is always the
same in all respects
1.2 non-philosophers: those who can't do the above and wander
among the many things that vary in every sort of way
2 The guardian of a city should be a philosopher since:
2.1 All non-philosophers are blind, whereas philosophers aren't
2.1.1 a keen-sighted guardian is better than a blind one (484c).
2.1.2 there isn't much difference between a blind person and
someone who isn't a philosopher (484c-d)
2.1.2.1 the non-philosopher has no model in her soul (484d)
2.2 Philosophers by nature can't love falsehood:
2.2.1 A philosopher is a lover of wisdom
2.2.2 Truth belongs to wisdom (485c)
2.2.3 Thus, philosophers can't by nature love falsehood 485d
2.3 Philosophers are moderate and not money lovers:
2.3.1 When someone loves something, they care mainly about
that thing 485d
2.3.2 Philosophers love wisdom
2.3.3 Philosophers are then concerned only with the pleasures
of the soul itself and not care about the pleasures of the
body (i.e. what money can get him) 485d
2.3.4 The philosopher is also moderate presumably because he
places the rational part of his soul as ruler over his soul
(see 430)
2.4 Philosophers aren't narrow-minded or slavish:
2.4.1 If someone is slavish then they are narrow-minded
2.4.2 However, philosophers can't be narrow-minded since they
have a 'soul that is always reaching out to grasp
everything both divine and human as a whole' (486)
2.4.3 Thus, they can't be narrow-minded nor slavish
2.5 Philosophers won't be cowardly and fear death:
2.5.1 486b - For philosophers who think so deeply will see that
death isn't something terrible.
2.6 Philosophers are fast learners:
2.6.1 Otherwise, they would get discouraged and stop
philosophizing since it would pain them so much and they
would get so litle in return (486c)
2.7 Philosophers have good memory:
2.7.1 If they had bad memory, they would be empty of
knowledge. But, if this person labored in vain, he would
come to hate himself and the activity of philosophizing.
Thus, a philosopher can't have a bad memory 486c
2.8 Philosophers are graceful
2.8.1 Since philosophers love truth and the love of truth is most
akin to what is moderate (i.e. what is measured), since
what is moderate draws a person to what is graceful, a
philosopher must be graceful. (487d ) - very sketchy
argument.
2.9 Summary of the qualities of a philosopher:
2.9.1 he's by nature good at remembering, quick to learn, highminded, graceful, and a friend and relative of truth,
justice, courage, and moderation (487)
3 Adeimantus interjects:
3.1 But haven't all people who have seriously studied philosophy
either ended up vicious cranks or rendered completely useless
to society? 487b-d
3.1.1 Soc Response: Philosophers appear to be cranks, but in
actuality aren't
3.1.1.1 the Simile 488: philosophers are like semiincompetent shipowners that sail ships with crew
who don't believe the art of navigation can be taught.
the sailors despise the captain for thinking he knows
about navigation and try to take over the ship.
Moreover, they think he's a crank for thinking he
knows about navigation.
3.1.2 Soc 2nd Response 489b: However, Philosophers are
useless to the majority. But, it's the majority's fault for not
taking advantage of what the philosopher says.
3.1.2.1 Philosophers don't have an obligation to compel
people to make use of what they say, just as
captains aren't obligated to beg sailors to be ruled by
them 489b
3.1.2.2 489c - Furthermore, if a ruler is of use he won't be
others to be ruled by him
3.1.3 Soc 3rd Response 489d: Further, most philosophers are
vicious, but this isn't philosophy's fault:
3.1.3.1 so-called philosophers are vicious because they
have been corrupted 490e
3.1.3.2 How a person can become corrupted:
3.1.3.2.1 paradoxically, 'each of the things we praised in
that nature tends to corrupt the soul that has it
and to drag it away from philosophy' (e.g.
courage, moderation, wisdom, and justice) 491c
. Furthermore, good things can corrupt a
person as well: e.g. beauty, wealth, physical
strength, powerful relatives, etc. 491c
3.1.3.2.1.1 e.g. 494c - it can cause arrogance.
3.1.3.2.1.1.1 All the goods in conjunction with the
Mob opinion can corrupt a person who
has a philosophic nature. The Mob
(consisting of friends and relatives) will
make requests and flatter the one with
the philosophic nature, thereby
making him arrogant and overly
confident - 494d
3.1.3.2.1.1.2 Even a person with a resilient
philosophic nature will likely succumb
to the pressures of the Mob - 494e
3.1.3.2.2 A person with a philosophic nature who has an
inappropriate environment to nurture his nature
becomes vicious - 491e
3.1.3.2.2.1 The inappropriate environment is the Mob
opinion (the greatest sophist) - 492b-c
3.1.3.2.2.1.1 What it does/how it behaves:
3.1.3.2.2.1.1.1 It compels people on pain of
fines, disenfranchisement, and
death to go along with its beliefs.
- 492d
3.1.3.2.2.1.1.2 494 - The majority can't tolerate
or accept the reality of the
beautiful itself, as opposed to the
many beautiful things, or the
reality of each thing itself, as
opposed to the corresponding
many.
3.1.3.2.2.1.2 Why the environment is inappropriate:
3.1.3.2.2.1.2.1 Hence, the majority are not
philosophic and disapprove of
those who practice philosophy 494
3.1.3.2.2.1.3 Who else is part of the mob?
3.1.3.2.2.1.3.1 Even the sophists it believes are
its rivals teach what it teaches 493
3.1.3.2.2.1.4 It's crooked message:
3.1.3.2.2.1.4.1 Wisdom for sophists is just the
convictions the majority express
when they are gathered together
- 493
3.1.3.2.2.1.5 What it's like:
3.1.3.2.2.1.5.1 The Mob is likened to a beast 493b
3.1.4 Soc 4th Response 494c: Philosophy is reproached
because those who aren't fit to do it do it anyways, and
there are few true philosophers to defend it (495c)
3.1.4.1 Why non-philosophers crave to do philosophy:
3.1.4.1.1 the position of philosopher is full of fine names
and adornments and is vacated (495d)
3.1.4.2 What philosophic imposters are like:
3.1.4.2.1 They are like bald-headed tinkers who mary out
of their league (495e)
3.1.4.3 Those who are philosophers:
3.1.4.3.1 exiles, great souls living in small cities, those
afflicted with an illness which prevents him or
her from doing politics (496 b-d)
3.1.4.4 Philosophers can't stem the tide of injustice:
3.1.4.4.1 madness and injustice are so entrenched in
society that true philosophers can't come to the
defense of justice without perishing nor ally with
anyone in defense of justice - 496c
3.1.4.5 The life of these philosophers:
3.1.4.5.1 they lead a quiet life and do their own work 496d (they're, to quote John Mayor 'just waiting
on the world to change')
3.1.4.6 What satisfies a true philosopher:
3.1.4.6.1 to lead her present life free from injustice and
impious acts and depart from it with good hope,
blameless and content (496e)
3.1.4.6.1.1 This isn't the greatest accomplishment
though. For, a true philosopher could
accomplish more given a better
environment (497)
4 The prospects for a suitable environment for true philosophers:
4.1 None of our present constitutions is worthy of the philosophic
nature - 497b
4.1.1 Philosophers now are like a foreignn seed, sown in alien
ground - which is - likely to be overcome by the native
species and to fade away among them - 497b
4.2 The best constitution:
4.2.1 partly the one already broached in discussion of the just
city (the best constitution being a oligarchy or a kingship).
However, it wasn't developed enough - 497d
4.3 The way the city takes up philosophy is the opposite of how it
ought to take up philosophy - 497e:
4.3.1 Presently, men never mature in philosophy, yet think they
have. They treat it as a sideline. When they are old, they
have no interest in philosophy. - 498.
4.3.2 How a city ought to take up philosophy:
4.3.2.1 They should always be studying philosophy, but
more so when they are old and have more time to.
When they are young, they should stay in good
physical shape so as to be better at philosophy - 498
b-c
4.3.3 498d (fun fact) - Socrates believes in incarnation, and that
entering in dialogue will benefit others in the next life who
have yet to understand the arguments in the present life.
4.4 Why people aren't convinced by Soc's arguments:
4.4.1 they have never seen the just man or just city- 498e
4.5 It's not impossible for a philosopher king to either compel his
city to obey him or for a god to inspire a city with a true erotic
love for true philosophy - 499b-c:
4.5.1 It is, however, difficult for this to happen - 499d
4.6 The mob can change it's negative view of philosophy if
someone will only explain to it what a true philosopher is 499e-500
4.6.1 obstacles to the mob changing its view:
4.6.1.1 vicious crank philosophers indulging in quarrels and
using philosophy innapropriately- 500b
4.6.1.1.1 Again, these aren't true philosophers, since true
philosophers wouldn't get into quarrels since
they would have no time to do so (since they're
so busy studying the forms) - 500b
4.6.2 People as philosophical outposts:
4.6.2.1 Those who become true philosophers by imitating
the things that are could put what they find into other
peoples' characters and not just his own -500d
4.7 How it's possible for the just city to come about:
4.7.1 The offspring of kings or rulers could be philosophic in
nature - 502
4.7.2 It's possible for one of those offspring not to be corrupted,
especially since there's so much time for this to happen 502b
4.7.3 Only one true philosopher is sufficient to establish the just
city provided the city obeys him - 502b
5 How the saviors of our constitution will come to be in the city, what
subjects and ways of life will cause them to come into being, and at
what ages they'll take each of them up - 502c
5.1 Only a few people will be fit to be philosopher kings:
5.1.1 All the qualities of a philosopher king rarely go together in
the same mind (503c). qualities: ease of learning, good
memory, quick wits, smartness, youthful passion, highmindedness, etc.
5.2 potential philosopher kings must be tested even more
strenuously:
5.2.1 he must take the longer road and put as much effort into
learning as into physical training - 504d
5.2.2 he needs to study the most important thing: the form of
the good - 505
5.2.3 The usefulness of just, courageous, moderate, and wise
things depends on their relation to the form of the good 505
5.2.4 505 - we have no adequate knowledge of the good.
5.2.5 The benefits of all other kinds of knowledge turns on the
knowledge of the good - 505
5.3 Common beliefs about the form of the good:
5.3.1 the majority believe that pleasure is the good, while the
most sophisticated believe it's knowledge - 505b
5.3.2 How both groups get it wrong:
5.3.2.1 the sophisticated people don't know the form of the
good but think they do - 505b
5.3.2.2 the majority don't know the form of the good either,
for their argument that pleasure is the form of the
good results in contradiction - 505c
5.4 Why people shouldn't be in the dark about the good:
5.4.1 505e - every soul pursues the good and does whatever it
does for its sake (so people desire the good, and
presumably it's possible for them to obtain it)
5.4.2 If they don't know the good, they won't know about the
goods of other things which knowledge of the good would
give them - 506
6 Glaucon interjects: tell us whether you consider the good to be
knowledge or pleasure or something else altogether (506b)
6.1 506c - Soc says he doesn't know the answer
6.2 506c - Soc thinks opinions without knowledge are shameful
and ugly things
6.3 506c - those who express a true opinion are like blind people
who happen to travel the right road.
6.4 506e - Soc isn't willing to say what the good is (cus it would
take so long), but he's willing to say what the offspring of the
good is.
7 Soc's account of the offspring of the good:
7.1 beauty itself and good itself each have a being - 507b
7.2 the many beautiful things and the rest are visible but not
intelligible, while the forms are intelligible but not visible - 507b
7.3 Sun Analogy:
7.3.1 You can't see without light 507d-508
7.3.2 sight is the most sun-like of the senses - 508b
7.3.3 508b - sun is the cause of sight itself and seen by it.
7.3.4 The good is like the sun, and the offspring of good is like
sight - 508c
7.3.5 508e - what gives truth to the things known and the power
to know to the knower is the form of the good.
7.3.6 the good is the cause of knowledge and truth, and is also
an object of knowledge - 508e
7.3.7 The good is more beautiful than knowledge and truth 508e
7.3.8 the good is responsible for the existence of objects of
knowledge as well as their being known - 509b
7.3.9 The good is not being but superior in rank and power
(presumably to knowledge and truth - or perhaps to
being?) - 509b
7.4 The strata of knowing something:
7.4.1
7.4.2 Understanding: the best form of knowing - 513e. Uses
hypotheses as stepping stones to the first principle -513b.
Doesn't mistake hypotheses for first principles. Doesn't
use anything visible at all to help it come to a first
principle. This is the domain of dialectic
7.4.3 Thought: makes use of images to come to conclusions,
and mistakes hypotheses for first principles - 510b. this is
the realm of the sciences (e.g. geometry). e.g. 510d people draw a shape and then draw conclusions from it.
They aren't drawing conclusions about the shape they
drew but about the square itself (perhaps the form of
square). This can't arrive at a first principle because it
cannot reach beyond its hypotheses (presumably
because it mistakes them for first principles) 511.
7.4.4 Opinion: This is the stock thought pulls from in order to
come up with conclusions 510. It is also what other shiny
substances of surfaces reflect 509e, 510e and 511.
7.4.5 Imagination: reflections of the stock of objects in the
opinion subsection. It consists of shadows, reflections in
water, reflections from shiny objects, etc -509e.
7.4.6 Good summary: 534
Book 7
1 Education and the lack of it can be likened to the allegory of the
cave:
1.1 Allegory of the Cave
1.1.1 The cave
1.1.1.1 the cave 1
1.1.1.2 Inside the cave:
1.1.1.2.1 Inside the cave
1.1.2 Soc's explanation of allegory:
1.1.2.1 The visible realm is the prison dwelling - 517b
1.1.2.2 The light of the fire inside is the power of the sun 517b
1.1.2.3 the upward journey is the upward journey of the soul
to the intelligible realm - 517b
1.1.2.4 The form of the good is the last thing to be seen in
the knowable realm - -517b
1.2 What the form of the good causes and does:
1.2.1 it is the cause of all that is correct and beautiful in
anything - 517c
1.2.2 it produces both light and its source in the visible realm 517c
1.2.3 it controls and provides truth and understanding in the
intelligible realm - 517c
1.3 Behavior of enlightened people:
1.3.1 uninterested in human affairs, but interested solely in
pressing upwards - 517c
1.3.2 behave oddly to people in the cave since enlightened
people are adjusting to the darkness - 517d
1.4 A Misconception about education:
1.4.1 It's not about putting knowledge into souls that lack it -
518c
1.4.1.1 The idea here is that people think education is all
about making people able to learn. However, they
already are (518c)
1.5 How to really educate someone:
1.5.1 To learn the good, people must turn their entire soul to
focus on it. - 518c
1.5.1.1 Soc. thinks that people have just been studying the
wrong things. - 518d
1.6 Why uneducated people can't rule:
1.6.1 they don't have a goal their actions aim at - 519c
2 On Philosopher kings:
2.1 Obstacle for philosopher kings:
2.1.1 They may be tempted to never leave the isles of the
blessed and help the unenlightened - 519c.
2.2 The Duty of philosopher kings:
2.2.1 They can't be allowed to stay in the isles of the blessed,
but must come down into the cave and help the
unenlightened - 519d
2.2.1.1 Why it is just for them to do so:
2.2.1.1.1 because they are naturally fitted to be rulers 520c
2.2.2 However, they get to spend most of their time in the pure
realm - 520d
2.3 How philosopher kings will respond to the duty:
2.3.1 As something compulsory (or as something they don't
want to do). - 520e and 521b
2.4 The subjects which cause people to become philosopher
kings:
2.4.1 What type of subjects?
2.4.1.1 521d - the subject these kings must be taught should
be relevant to warriors
2.4.1.2 It can't be the subject of physical training though nor
music and poetry, for these are only concerned with
the growth and decay of the body 521e-522
2.4.1.3 They are clearer than opinion but darker than
knowledge -533d
2.4.2 What a summoner is:
2.4.2.1 a summoner is a puzzle created by sense
perception, when one perceives that something is no
more itself than its opposite. - 523c
2.4.2.1.1 e.g. - if sense perception were to declare one
and the same thing to be hard and soft, we'd
naturally be puzzled. - 524
2.4.2.1.2 these puzzles seem to be the result of a clash
between sense perception and presuppositions
(e.g. that something can't be both hard and
soft).
2.4.2.2 If a subject is a summoner, it is fit as a subject of
study for philosophers - 524e
2.4.3 1st subject - Arithmetic is such a subject -525b
2.4.3.1 522c - math (should be studied by Philosopher kings)
- since it is the thing shared by all crafts and is useful
in battle (522d also)
2.4.3.2 For we see the same thing to be both one and an
unlimited number (perhaps a blend of the ideas of
discreteness and continuousness?) - 525
2.4.3.3 It leads the soul forcibly upward and compels it to
discuss the numbers themselves, never permitting
anyone to propose for discussion numbers attached
to visible or tangible bodies - 525d
2.4.3.4 arithmetic is the hardest subject -526c
2.4.4 2nd subject Geometry
2.4.4.1 Practical uses: 'setting up camp, occupying a region,
concentrating troops, deploying them, army
formations' - 526d
2.4.4.1.1 527c - helps you learn other subjects quicker.
2.4.4.2 What it's knowledge of: it is knowledge of what
always is, not what comes into being and passes
away - 527b
2.4.4.2.1 Deals with plane surfaces -528
2.4.5 3rd subject Depth
2.4.5.1 consists of cubes and whatever has depth -528b
2.4.5.2 not too much work done here - 528d
2.4.6 4th subject Astronomy
2.4.6.1 about revolving solids - 528
2.4.6.2 Bad astronomy:
2.4.6.2.1 Trying to learn something about sensible things
- since you can't (529c)
2.4.6.3 Good Astronomy:
2.4.6.3.1 Using planets as a model in the study of true
motion - 529d
2.4.6.3.2 These things must be grasped by reason and
thought, not by sight -529d
2.4.6.3.3 is studied like geometry problems and not by
means of looking at the real planets in the sky 309b - I'm not sure how he would want us to
study astronomy without the planets.
2.4.7 5th subject Harmonics -530d
2.4.7.1 Bad harmonicists:
2.4.7.1.1 They seek out the numbers that are to be found
in these audible consonances, but they do not
make the ascent to problems.
2.4.7.1.1.1 the real problems involve giving an
explanation of something - 'They don't
investigate, for example, which numbers
are consonant and which aren't or what the
explanation is of each' -531c
3 Dialectics:
3.1 531d - Soc seems to make an insulting comment about
dialecticians - 531d (Why would he do this?)
3.2 If you know something then you can give and follow an
account of it:
3.2.1 'those who can either give nor follow an account don't
know anything at all of the things we say they must know'
- 531e
3.3 What is dialectic?
3.3.1 Its quality is that it is intelligible and imitated by sight - 532
3.3.2 it's the journey taken 'whenever someone tries through
argument and apart from all sense perceptions to find the
being itself of each thing and doesn't give up until he
grasps the good itself with understanding itself' - 532
3.4 What it takes to see the truth itself:
3.4.1 dialectic will reveal it just in case the person seeking it is
experienced in the 5 previous subjects - 533
3.4.2 Be able to give an account of hypotheses - 533c
3.4.3 Should be able to distinguish it (e.g. the good) from
everything else and survive refutation -534c
3.5 Soc thinks there is something as the truth itself (perhaps
'thought'?) - 533
3.6 Dialectic is above all the other subjects and completes them
like a coping stone - 534e
4 On Philosopher king training:
4.1 Who will be trained in the 6 subjects -535:
4.1.1 535 - 536 - those with the natural qualities of a
philosopher king
4.1.2 536b - shouldn't allow illegitimate people to study the 6
subjects
4.2 Philosopher kings should be young since older people can't
learn as much when they're older 536d
4.3 Why learning mustn't be compulsory for future philosopher
kings:
4.3.1 'because no free person should learn anything like a
slave. Forced bodily labor does no harm to the body, but
nothing taught by force stays in the soul' -536e
4.4 Best method of teaching: play:
4.4.1 'That way you'll also see better what each of them is
naturally fitted for' -537
4.5 When people will be chosen for philosopher king training:
4.5.1 'when they're released from compulsory physical training'
-537b
4.6 Test of a true philosopher king:
4.6.1 at 20 years of age he should be able to bring what he
knows into a 'unified vision of their kinship both with one
another and with the nature of that which is.' - So, to use
the allegory of the cave, he should be able to compare
the statues with their shadows they cast on the wall, or
the reflection of the sun in the water with the actual sun.
4.6.2 Test for whether you're dialectical: can you achieve a
unified vision - 537c
4.6.3 at age 30 he'll be tested in dialectic (but with great care). 537d
4.6.3.1 Why great care? - The danger of dialectic - it can
make you lawless (i.e. without a moral center)
4.6.3.1.1 A person who becomes lawless by means of
dialectic is like a child who after living with a
wealthy family finds out that he doesn't know
who his real father is. As a result, he doesn't
treat his father with as much respect, but treats
his flatterers with much more. Lawless men
lose sight of what is truly good (just as the child
loses sight of who his real father is) because
people refute what they learned from childhood
(538a-e)
4.6.3.2 The extent of the testing: 15 years - 540
4.6.4 Children shouldn't learn how to argue when they're
young:
4.6.4.1 Otherwise, they'll try to contradict each other for
sport, be refuted themselves, and disbelieve what
they did before - 539c
4.6.5 Why people should only learn argument when they're
older:
4.6.5.1 They'll imitate the right people (i.e. the ones who
engage in argument to find truth rather than for sport)
- 539d
4.6.6 Completion of training:
4.6.6.1 age 50 - 540
4.6.6.2 They get to see the good. -540
4.6.6.3 However, they have to go into politics as a duty 540b
5 Ordering a city:
5.1 It will be ordered through philosopher kings sending all 10 year
old children into the country to be reared through the
philosopher king's customs -541
Book 8
1 543-544b - summary of the just city
2 The point of discussing the constitutions:
2.1 so that, having discovered the most unjust [constitution] of all,
we can oppose him to the most unjust? In this way, we can
complete our investigation into how pure justice and pure
injustice stand, with regard to the happiness or wretchedness
of those who possess them, and either be persuaded by
Thrasymachus to practice injustice or by the argument that is
now coming to light to practice justice.
3 the four constitutions (all diseased -544c and inferior -545):
3.1 1. Spartan constitution - timocracy or timarchy - 545b (praised
by the Cretan and Liconian) - 544c
3.1.1 victory-loving and honor-loving - 545
3.2 2. Oligarchy (filled with a host of evils) - 544c
3.2.1 based on a property assessment, in which the rich rule,
and the poor man has no share in ruling -550d
3.3 3. Democracy (antagonistic to oligarchy) - 544c
3.4 4. Tyranny (surpasses all the constitutions) - 544c
3.5 5. Soc thinks there's one more - 445d It is the best kind of
constitution. (kingship or aristocracy) (and 544e)
4 The diversity of forms of constitution:
4.1 'there are as many forms of human character as there are of
constitutions' - 544d
5 When it's best to give birth:
5.1 calculation - 546a-c ???
6 The consequences of copulating at the wrong time (civil war -546d
and timocracies -547b):
6.1 'the children will be neither good natured nor fortunate' -546c
6.2 they 'won't be able to guard well the testing of the golden,
silver, bronze, and iron races'
6.3 Thus, (presumably since they won't be good at distinguishing
the golden from the silver from the bronze, etc.) there will be
intermixing of these -547
6.4 the intermixing will 'engender lack of likeness and
unharmonious inequality' which will 'breed war and hostility' 547
7 What happens during civil war?
7.1 The creation of a timocracy -547b
8 Timocracy: the middle way compromise -547b:
8.1 What it emerges from:
8.1.1 an aristocracy -545c
8.2 It's characteristics:
8.2.1 The gold and silver races compromise with the bronze
and iron races. -547b
8.2.2 land and houses are distributed as private property -547b
8.2.3 they both enslave the free people who once helped the
economy (maybe they were once tourists or foreigners) 547b
8.2.4 They occupy themselves with war and with guarding
against those whom they've enslaved - 547c
8.2.5 The middle way compromise is a midpoint between
aristocracy and oligarchy - 547c
8.2.6 It's main focus will be war - 548
8.2.7 The love of victory and honor is most predominant in it
548c
8.2.8 It has a predominance of the spirited element - 548c
8.3 What man corresponds to this constitution -549?
8.3.1 obstinate
8.3.2 possessing only rudimentary training in rhetoric, music
and poetry (but loves them)
8.3.3 harsh with slaves
8.3.4 Thinks he has a right to rule based only on how good of a
warrior he is
8.3.5 loves money -549b
8.3.5.1 lack of reason causes this - 549b
8.3.6 proud and honor-loving -550b
8.4 How a timocratic man comes to be -550:
8.4.1 imitates his just father but also his unjust mother and
servants who think that the father should be more harsh
with people who wrong him and be more interested in
other peoples' affairs (meaning he won't be a jack of all
trades -551e) -549e-550.
8.4.2 The mother and servants nourish his appetitive part and
his father the rational part -550b
9 Oligarchy
9.1 What it emerges from: a timocracy -550d
9.2 How a timocracy is transformed into an oligarchy or the
pedigree of an oligarchy:
9.2.1 peoples' treasure houses destroy the constitution- 550d
9.2.2 people stretch the laws relating to how they may spend
their money and ultimately disobey the laws altogether 550d
9.2.3 then people imitate people who do this -550e
9.2.4 Why does wealth cause a decrease in virtue?
9.2.4.1 virtue and wealth are opposed -550e
9.2.5 Rulers make it so that only the wealthy can rule -551
9.3 An oligarchy's characteristics:
9.3.1 It's first fault - those who rule it aren't qualified -551c
9.3.2 second fault - (it's divided) it's two cities: one of the poor
and one of the rich plotting against each other -551d
9.3.3 probably unable to defend itself in times of war (551d):
9.3.3.1 For, if you're going to fight a war you need to either
have A. the majority fight, B. the oligarchs alone fight
(the rich) or C. mercenaries fight. But, the oligarchs
wouldn't have the majority fight for fear of them, the
oligarchs alone couldn't stop an enemy, and the
oligarchs wouldn't pay the mercenaries because of
their love of money.
9.3.4 leaders will be jacks of all trades 551e
9.3.5 fourth fault: allowing people without resources to live in
the city (the greatest of all evils -552):
9.3.5.1 The problem:
9.3.5.1.1 Those who have no resources are like stingless
drones or drones with stingers. The stingless
drones are the old beggars, and the drones with
stingers are the thieves. They both afflict the
city -552c
9.3.5.1.2 The drones are ruled by unnecessary desires 559d
9.3.5.2 How these poor people come to be poor:
9.3.5.2.1 it is 'the result of lack of education, bad rearing,
and a bad constitutional arrangement' -552e
9.4 What kind of man is like an oligarchy:
9.4.1 He's like a timocrat's son who, like his father who lost
everything he owns through being falsely accused in
court, loses his property as well. The son then places
money over honor in his soul out of a fear of death. He
also places appetite over the rational and spirited. -553bd
9.4.2 He's ruled by necessary desires -559d
9.5 How an oligarchic man is like an oligarchic constitution:
9.5.1 He attaches the greatest importance to money -554
9.5.2 thrifty worker that satisfies only his necessary appetites (a
tight-wad) -554
9.5.3 enslaves all his other desires as vain -554
9.5.4 doesn't value education -554b
9.5.5 tend to treat orphans unjustly -554c
9.5.6 holds his evil appetites in check through some decent part
of himself. However, the evil appetites aren't restrained
by reason but by 'compulsion and fear,' or, the fear that
he'll lose his belongings -554d
9.5.7 his soul would be in a kind of civil war -554d
9.5.8 'generally his better desires are in control of his worse' 554e
9.5.9 doesn't want to spend for the sake of reputation or honor 555
10 Democracy
10.1 By what means an oligarchy turns into a democracy:
10.1.1 through its 'insatiable desire to attain what it has set
before itself as the good, namely, the need to become
as rich as possible' -555b
10.2 How the desire for wealth turns an oligarchy into a
democracy:
10.2.1 The wealthy people don't enact laws to prevent young
people from being unwise with their belongings, loan
money to them at high interest rates, and inevitably call
in the loans the young are unable to pay -555c. Thus,
many people become poor, hate the rich, and crave
revolution -555d.
10.2.1.1 Interesting feature of this: By implication, 'it is
impossible for a city to honor wealth and at the
same time for its citizens to acquire moderation, but
one or the other is inevitably neglected' -555d
10.2.1.2 special idiom: the phrase 'people of no common
stamp' means people who are wealthy ('stamp'
means a particular kind of person. In this case it is
a person who isn't common or poor)-555d
10.2.2 Oligarch's are unwilling to prevent this evil in two ways:
10.2.2.1 1st way: by making laws 'preventing people from
doing whatever they like with their own property' 556
10.2.2.2 2nd way: making the majority of loans at the
loaner's own risk. -556b
10.2.3 The makings of the panzee generation:
10.2.3.1 556c - oligarchs raise their kids in such a luxurious
setting that they become sloth, pampered, and dull.
10.2.4 How the panzee generation falls into civil war:
10.2.4.1 the poor realize that the rich are physically weaker
in battle, and that the only thing keeping the rich in
power is the poor's unwillingness to revolt. -556d
10.2.4.2 Since the panzee generation is just like a sick body
who 'needs only a slight shock from outside to
become ill,' it only needs a small provocation (e.g.
one side bringing in people to fight another side) to
fall into civil war -556e
10.2.5 When democracy comes to be:
10.2.5.1 'when the poor are victorious...and giving the rest
an equal share in ruling under the constitution, and
for the most part assigning people to positions of
rule by lot' -557
10.3 The characteristics of a democracy:
10.3.1 How people live under a democratic constitution:
10.3.1.1 A. they have freedom of speech and many other
freedoms -557b
10.3.1.2 B. Everyone has a license to do what he wants 557b
10.3.1.3 C. people are free to live how they want -557b
10.3.2 What kind of people live in a democracy:
10.3.2.1 As a result of A, B, and C, people in a democracy
are of all varieties -557c
10.3.3 Why a democracy seems to be the most beautiful of
constitutions:
10.3.3.1 on analogy: we think of embroidered coats as
beautiful which have 'every kind of ornament.'
Thus, since a democracy is like a coat in having
every kind of people, it is beautiful in a similar way 557c
10.3.4 Why a democracy is a good place to look for
constitutions:
10.3.4.1 Since a democracy gives its citizens great freedom,
it follows from this freedom that there should be
many different constitutions -557d
10.3.5 The type of freedoms available in a democracy -557e:
10.3.5.1 1. freedom not to rule (plus for philosopher kings) or
be ruled
10.3.5.2 2. freedom to abstain from war
10.3.5.3 3. freedom to abstain from peace (I guess this
would be a plus for Spartans?)
10.3.5.4 4. freedom to serve in public office as a juror (cus
who doesn't want that?)
10.3.5.5 5. If you're condemned to death, you can still do
everything you would normally do until your
execution. And, those condemned to death are at
peace!! -558
10.3.6 The democracy as tolerant and not small-minded:
10.3.6.1 558b - It doesn't judge a person according to his
upbringing
10.3.6.2 It isn't small-minded in that it doesn't think a person
necessarily has to have the exact kind of upbringing
to become good prescribed by Socrates. -558b
(Soc thinks this is good!)
10.3.7 Who rules in a democracy:
10.3.7.1 no one - 558c
10.3.8 Equality in a democracy
10.3.8.1 a democracy 'distributes a sort of equality to both
equals and unequals alike -558c
10.3.9 What its flaw is:
10.3.9.1 its insatiable desire for freedom -562c
10.4 How a democratic person comes to be -558c:
10.4.1 First, he's like his oligarchic uneducated miserly father in
being thrifty and controlling his spendthrift desires by
force -558d
10.4.2 Digression: What necessary and unecessary desires
are:
10.4.2.1 Necessary desires: something is a necessary
desire iff? A. we must act on it (presumably to
survive -559b) and B. it benefits us. -559
10.4.2.1.1 Example of a necessary desire:
10.4.2.1.1.1 A. eating 'to the point of health and well-
being and the desire for bread and
delicacies' -559b
10.4.2.1.1.1.1 It's necessary because without bread
we can't survive, and without
delicacies our well-being will be
squashed -559b
10.4.2.1.2 Type of desire: money-making -559c
10.4.2.2 Unnecessary desires: something is an unnecessary
desire iff? A. we can desist from acting on it (e.g.
through training) and B. it leads either to no good or
to harming us -559
10.4.2.2.1 Example of an unnecessary desire:
10.4.2.2.1.1 A. eating beyond your well-being -559c
10.4.2.2.2 Type of desire: spendthrift -559c
10.4.3 Then, the son starts to associate with the drones
(probably thieves) and gets a taste of all the pleasures
there are to be had -559e
10.4.4 Then, like the oligarchic city in civil war the son's soul
experiences a civil war. On the one side of his soul
stands the desire for what is unnecessary, which
receives help from thieves. On the other side stands the
necessary desire and his parents and household who
support it. -559e
10.4.4.1 Visual of this
10.4.4.1.1 Plato 559E
10.4.5 Occasionally, there's peace between the two parts of his
soul when the oligarchic part gains an advantage.
However, when that happens, there are still latent
democratic desires that grow in the son's soul until they
ultimately take over. This democratic growth occurs in
an environment absent of 'knowledge, fine ways of
living, and words of truth' which tends to block it.
Consequently, 'false and boastful words and beliefs rush
up and occupy this part of him.' -560b-c
10.4.6 Then he calls 'insolence good breeding, anarchy
freedom, extravagance magnificence, and
shamelessness courage' -560e
10.4.7 561b - he caves into any pleasure that comes along
10.4.8 561c - he thinks no desire is better than any other which isn't true
10.4.9 There's no order or necessity in his life -561d
10.4.10 561e - he's a complex man, full of different
constitutions
11 Tyranny
11.1 tyranny has the finest constitution and man - 562\
11.2 Tyrannies evolve from democracies -562
11.3 How Tyrannies evolve from democracies:
11.3.1 Democracies need better rulers because theirs are
drunk. -562d
11.3.2 Freedom runs amok:
11.3.2.1 In a democracy there are many role reversals,
shattered social stratification, and things that are
just backwards (562d -563c) (e.g. Fathers fearing
sons, sons acting like fathers, slaves being as free
as their masters - even animals are as free as
humans! etc.)
11.3.3 563e - the people in democracies are so sensitive that
they can't bear the slightest bit of slavery
11.3.4 Then, just like the fall of the oligarchy, civil war ensues 563e
11.3.5 Since 'excessive action in one direction usually sets up a
reaction in the opposite direction' -563e it makes sense
that 'extreme freedom' lead to 'extreme slavery' -564
11.4 The disease that enslaves democracy: idle drones -564b:
11.4.1
11.4.2 The three parts of a democracy:
11.4.2.1 1. The class of idlers - in most cases it is the
dominant class - 564d
11.4.2.2 2. Rich people (drone fodder) - are organized 564e
11.4.2.3 3. The worker class - work with their own hands. 565 - when assembled, they are the most powerful
class. -565
11.4.3 How a democratic drone (leader) becomes oligarchic:
11.4.3.1 When the rich people want their money back, the
democratic leaders fear for their money and keep it
safe through oppression - 565c
11.4.4 How the democratic drones keep their money safe:
11.4.4.1 They accuse the rich of being oligarchs and plotting
against the people (worker class). Thus, they pit
each side against the other - 565c
11.4.4.2 Through subjugation:
11.4.4.2.1 1. they keep the people (workers) doing what
they do by exploiting workers' ignorance and
deceiving them - 565c
11.4.4.2.2 2. They keep the rich doing what they do
through threats or penalties (Soc. calls this
'stinging') - 565c
11.5 From whence springs a tyrant:
11.5.1 Due to impeachments, judgments and trials on the side
of the workers/rich and on the side of the leaders, the
workers get fed up - 565c
11.5.2 The workers nurture a champion - the soon to be tyrant 565c
11.5.3 Then, once the champion spills kindred blood, he
becomes a tyrant (Soc calls him a wolf) - 565e
11.6 Some things tyrants do:
11.6.1 stir up civil wars against the rich - 566
11.6.2 requests bodyguards from the people (Soc calls this a
famous request) -566b
11.6.2.1 people give him this because they fear for his
safety but not their own -566b
11.6.3 charge the rich with being enemies of the people, and
put them to death - 566c
11.7 What enemies of a tyrant do:
11.7.1 If they can't expel him or put him to death by accusing
him before the city, they plot secretly to kill him -566b
11.8 What tyranny is like when it comes into being:
11.8.1 566e - first it is all roses: the tyrant says he's no tyrant,
makes promises, frees people from debt, redistributes
land, pretends he's gracious and gentle.
11.8.2 The tyrant maintains the status quo:
11.8.2.1 if things become to peaceful, he stirs up another
war 'so that the people will continue to feel the need
of a leader' -566e
11.8.2.2 He'll make them spend most of their time focusing
on their daily needs by levying a war tax on them.
This way they won't have as much time to plot
against him -567.
11.8.2.3 Finds clever ways of getting rid of people who might
want to challenge his rule (e.g. putting them at the
mercy of his enemies) -567
11.8.2.3.1 Who he gets rid of:
11.8.2.3.1.1 the bravest of those who helped him
establish his tyranny -567b
11.8.2.3.1.2 anyone who is brave, large-minded,
knowledgeable, or rich - 567b
11.8.2.3.2 analogy: opposite what a doctor does, a tyrant
draws off the best and leaves the worst -567c
11.8.3 What the citizens think of the tyrant:
11.8.3.1 they hate him for the above reasons: making them
poor, making them fight, and killing some of them
for getting ideas of freedom -567b
11.8.4 Then the tyrant gains bodyguards:
11.8.4.1 Who they consist of:
11.8.4.1.1 foreign drones (or bad men), and freed slaves
of the citizens -567e
11.8.4.2 Digression: The wise poets praise tyranny, but Soc
won't allow them into his just city -568b
11.8.4.3 How he pays for the bodyguards:
11.8.4.3.1 He'll use the sacred treasuries, property of the
people he has destroyed, and finally his
father's estate (the people who nurtured the
tyrant and helped him become who he is). 568d
11.8.5 How the people feel about all of this:
11.8.5.1 They feel cheated, since:
11.8.5.1.1 1. the purpose for installing the tyrant was so
that he would take care of them and not vice
versa -569
11.8.5.1.2 2. the purpose of installing the tyrant was so
that they'd be free from the rich and snobby
people (who are embodied now in the tyrant),
not so that they'd be enslaved by their slaves
and have to support them -569
11.8.5.1.3 3. they want the tyrant to leave and take all of
his companions with him -569
11.8.6 What a tyrant would do to his people:
11.8.6.1 He would use violence on the people given he
takes away their weapons -569
Book 9
I. Tyranny Continued
A. Digression on desires:
1. There are 'dangerous, wild, and lawless forms of desire in
everyone.' Otherwise, why would people have dreams in
which they do awful and shameful things? -571-572c
a. A model of a healthy person's dream state vs. an
unhealthy person's dream state.
(1) Plato 571c pic
B. The evolution of the tyrant:
1. Like his democratic father, the soon to be tyrant is lead into
lawlessness by his profligate friends. However, his father
and others try to pull him towards the middle of lawlessness
and the oligarchic nature (aka the democratic nature).
However, his profligate friends plant a powerful erotic seed of
longing in him for unecessary pleasures (e.g. incense, myrrh,
wreaths, wine, etc.). Once this is planted, madness rules the
soul and exiles any good thoughts like shame or moderation
-572c -b
2. large numbers of foolish miscreants in a city give rise to
tyrants -575c
a. sidenote - they also tend to make lots of small troubles in
a city during peace time -575b
C. How a tyrant lives:
1. His desires are insatiable:
a. He indulges in 'feasts, revelries, luxuries, girlfriends' etc. 573d
b. his desires grow both day and night -573d
2. How he satisfies his desires
a. To satisfy his desires he will take from his parents (by
force if necessary). However, he won't kill them for their
goods, but enslave them -574b-c
b. He does awful things he used to do only in his sleep in the
waking world (e.g. loot a tempe, murder, etc.). 574e -575
c. He enslaves his fatherland if it doesn't yield willingly to his
demands -575d
d. He makes friendly with people he wants something from
and turns on them once he acquires it -575e-576
3. associates with docile flatterers -575e
4. 'someone with a tyrannical nature lives his whole life without
being fiends with anyone, always a master to one man or a
slave to another and never getting a taste of either freedom
or true friendship' -576
a. consequently he is untrustworthy -576
b. Question: I don't know what he means when he says 'a
master to one man or a slave to another.'
5. he is 'as unjust as anyone can be' since 'His waking life is
like the nightmare we describe earlier' -576b
6. The longer he lives as a tyrant, the worse he becomes -576b
D. How a tyrant is most wretched (or perhaps very wretched 578b) -576b
1. Argument 1:
a. P1 - a tyranical man is like a city ruled by a tyrant -576c
and 577c
(1) even in the respect of virtue and happiness -576b
(2) closely examining the tyranical city (for the sake of the
argument) is like closely examining the tyrant. -577
b. P2 - a city ruled by a tyrant is the most wretched -576e
(1) In what ways it is wretched:
(a) 1. it is 'full of slavery and unfreedom, with the most
decent parts enslaved and with a small part, the
maddest and most vicious, as their master' -577d
I. A soul like this (the whole soul) 'will also be least
likely to do what it wants and, forcibly driven by
the stings of a dronish gadfly, will be full of
disorder and regret.' -577e
(b) 2. it is poor -577e
I. a soul like this 'must always be poor and
unsatisfiable' -578
(c) 3. it is full of fear -578
c. Conclusion: Therefore, a tyranical person is wretched in
the same way the tyranical city is wretched
d. Argument 2: How an actual tyrant is worse off than a mere
tyrannical person (a non-tyrant)
(1) P1 -He must pander to slaves in order to survive -579
(2) P2 - He can't go sight seeing and he really wants to
(and is in a kind of prison) -579b
(3) P3 -He's 'compelled to compete and fight with other
bodies all [his] life' -579e
(4) P4 - a merely tyranical person doesn't have to do the
things in P1 and P2 (although maybe P3) in order to
survive. -579d
(5) Conclusion: the actual tyrant is most wretched, since a
merely tyranical person need not do the things in P1,
P2, and maybe P3. -579d
2. A summary of how a tyrant is most wretched:
a. 'he is inevitably envious, untrustworthy, unjust, friendless,
impious, host and nurse to every kind of vice, and that his
ruling makes him even more so' -580
II. Ranking the king, timocrat, oligarch, democrat, and tyrant in
terms of happiness -580b:
A. The Three Proofs -583b:
1. Proof One: The king is the happiest and the tyrant the least 580c
a. given all that has been written on the subject already
presumably
2. Proof Two: Another way of telling which is happiest of the
kinds of rulers -580d:
a. The Division of the soul:
(1) There are three parts of the soul -580d:
(a) 1. The rational (or the learning-loving or
philosophical -581b) - used for learning -580e
(b) 2. The spirited (or The victory loving/honor loving 581b) - used for getting mad -580e. It is dedicated
'to the pursuit of control, victory, and high repute' 581
(c) 3. The appetitive/money-loving - its central feature
is its love of profit (since money is the means to
getting food, drink and sex) -580e -581
b. The three kinds of people related to the division of the
soul -581c:
(1) 1. philosophic
(2) 2. victory-loving
(3) 3. profit-loving
c. The three types of pleasure corresponding to each
division of the soul:
(1) 1. philosophic - 'knowing where the truth lies and
always being in some such pleasant condition while
learning' -581e
(a) These people think the other pleasures are
necessary but less important or pleasing than
knowing the truth - 581e
(2) 2. victory-loving - gaining honor - 581d
(a) These people think the other pleasures are
worthless insofar as they don't help him gain honor.
-581d
(3) 3. profit-loving - making money - 581d
(a) These people think the other pleasures are
worthless insofar as they don't help him make
money. -581d
d. The argument:
(1) P1 -Philosophers are the best judges of which way of
life is best -582e:
(a) P1 -To judge which way of living (1, 2, or 3) is
better requires the judge of experience, reason,
and argument - 582
(b) P2 - Philosophers experience the 2nd and 3rd
pleasure to the same degree as those to whose
lifestyle they belong as well as experience the 1st
kind of pleasure. -582 b-c
I. P3 - Philosophers are the best judges, as far as
experience goes, of which way of life is best 582d ( given P1 and P2)
II. P4 - Philosophers are the best judges as far as
reason goes.
A. Since Philosophers alone gain experience in
the company of reason -582d
III. P5 - Philosophers are the best judges as far as
argument goes.
A. Since argument is a philosopher's instrument
most of all -582d
(c) Conclusion: The judgment of a philosopher is the
best judge -582e
(2) P2 -Philosophers judge learning most pleasing, spirit
second, and appetite third -583
(3) Conclusion - Learning is the most pleasing, followed
by spirit (since it is more similar to learning than is
appetite - 583), and then appetite (since it is least
similar to learning -583).
3. Proof Three: A third way of telling which is the happiest ruler
(583-586b):
a. The third is dedicated in Olympic fashion to Olympian
Zeus the Savior -583b
b. Conclusion: Ignorant people are less fulfilled by their
pleasures and experience lower-grade pleasures than
people with knowledge (e.g. a king). -585d-e. The reason
for this is that the pleasures of ignorant people are 'neither
entirely true nor pure but are like a shadow-painting' 583b
c. Crucial background information to the proof:
(1) Pleasure and Pain diagram:
(a) Plato 583
(2) Pleasure is not the cessation of pain or vice versa:
(a) Only two areas of pleasure's genesis ('pleasure'
may need scare quotes!): (1) that which comes
from pain and (2) that which doesn't come from
pain:
I. Type 1 -583d - Someone can enjoy relief from
pain and consider it pleasure. However, it isn't
pleasure, but only an intermediate state of calm.
A. Argument (583c-584):
1. P1. Pleasure is the cessation of pain and vice
versa (Assumption for ID)
2. P2. There is an intermediate state between
pleasure and pain that is neither of them.
a. 'And is there such a thing as feeling
neither pleasure nor pain? -There is' 583c
3. P3. If pleasure is the cessation of pain, then the
intermediate state will be pleasure.
a. 'And haven't you also heard those who
are in great pain say that nothing is more
pleasant than the cessation of their
suffering?' -583d
4. P4. There is an intermediate state between
pleasure and pain that is pleasure (MP 1, 3)
5. P5. If pain is the cessation of pleasure, then the
intermediate state will be pain.
a. 'And when someone ceases to feel
pleasure, this calm will be painful to him'
-583e
6. P6. There is an intermediate state between
pleasure and pain that is pain (MP 1, 5)
7. P7. There is an intermediate state between
pleasure and pain that is both pleasure and
pain (Add 4, 6)
a. 'then the calm we described as being
intermediate between pleasure and pain
will sometimes be both.' -583e
8. P8. It is impossible for the intermediate state to
possess both pleasure and pain while also not
possessing it.
a. 'Now, is it possible for that which is
neither to become both? -Not in my
view.' -583e
9. Conclusion. It's not the case that pleasure is the
cessation of pain and vice versa. (ID, 2, 7, 8)
a. 'Then, how can it be right to think that
the absence of pain is pleasure or that
the absence of pleasure is pain?' -584
B. How Soc. explains away the appearance that
P1 is true:
1. it's 'some kind of magic' -584
II. Type 2 -584b - Someone can feel pleasure
without it coming from pain.
A. Why an extra argument against P1 is needed:
1. The argument from type 1 only talked about
one type of pleasure: pleasure coming from
pain. Thus, Soc wants to close this door of
argument to someone thinking they could
show P1 by means of it -584b
B. Argument -584b:
1. P1. If pleasure is the cessation of pain,
pleasure should always be preceded by
pain.
2. P2. Sometimes people experience a
pleasure of smell that isn't preceded by
pain -584b
3. P3. pleasure is not the cessation of pain
(MT 1, 2)
4. P4. If pain is the cessation of pleasure,
there should be pain whenever pleasure is
absent.
5. P5. Sometimes people don't experience
pain after having a pleasure of smell.
6. P6. Pain is not the cessation of pleasure
(MT 4, 5)
7. Conclusion: It is not the case that pleasure
is the cessation of pain or vice versa (Add
3,6)
d. The point of showing an intermediate area between
pleasure and pain:
(1) The intermediate area between pleasure and pain is
the area inhabited by the pleasures of the majority of
people (and presumably tyrants) -586.
(2) the pleasure and pain thing works as a parallel for the
up middle and down analogy to come. It also
identifies the area in which the low-grade pleasures of
tyrants is located - the middle area (that shadow
painting).
e. What the pleasures of those inexperienced in truth are:
(1) Analogy of the up, middle, and down 584d-585:
(a) Up represents pure pleasure, middle represents
neither pure pleasure nor pure pain (but rather a
mixture of pleasure and pain -586c and 585), and
down represents pure pain.
(2) Based on the analogy, it seems the pleasures of those
inexperienced in truth are not pure pleasures, but just
the absence of pain -585
f. Which will bring more pleasure: being filled with pure
pleasures or shadow painting pleasures?
(1) The argument is very hard to construct. The main
idea however, seems to be that people who fill
themselves with belief, knowledge, and understanding
will experience higher end pleasures than those who
fill themselves only with drink, delicacies, and food.
Thus, the tyrants and majority of people will be less
happy than those who know the truth (585b-586c)
(a) A stab at The argument:
I. P1. Something is a true pleasure iff it is an action
whereby one is filled with what partakes of
enough pure being not to count as a shadow
painting pleasure. -585d
A. Why I make it 'true pleasure' instead of just
'pleasure':
1. Because Soc seems to think that
something can be a pleasure while also not
being a true pleasure (586b).
B. Why do I make it a biconditional?
1. To block the idea that shadow painting
pleasures could be true pleasures - 586
C. How Soc might put it: That which is related to
what is always the same, immortal, and true,
is itself of that kind, and comes to be in
something of that kind (585c)... is pleasure 585d
D. Why I cast the premise this way:
1. Soc says: 'if being filled with what is
appropriate to our nature is pleasure...' 585d It seems that what is appropriate to
our nature partakes of pure being, but it's
not clear to what extent that which is
appropriate to our nature must participate in
pure being to count as being 'appropriate to
our nature.' For that reason, I set the bar at
what I think Soc would agree with.
4. Conclusions to all three proofs:
a. A person governed by the philosophic part of his soul is
the happiest.
(1) 'Therefore, when the entire soul follows the
philosophic part, and there is no civil war in it, each
part of it does its own work exclusively and is just, and
in particular it enjoys its own pleasures, the best and
truest pleasures possible for it' -587
b. A tyrant will live most unpleasantly, and a king most
pleasantly -587b
(1) For, what is farthest from philosophy and reason is
most distant from law and order. Tyrants are most
distant from law and order. Thus, they are farthest
from philosophy (where the best pleasures are to be
found). -587
(2) And this is where I lost interest in taking detailed
notes.