Part I
0. Introduction
0.1 Outline of Approach
0.2 Biographical Prelude
1. The Reality of Ideas (Parmenides)
2. The Idea of Happiness (Philebus)
In his denial of the objective reality of moral values, Friedrich Nietzsche evinced an aristocratic sensibility whereby one creates value for oneself. It is striking, then, that Plato, the first philosopher to articulate a notion of the absolute Good, should likewise be thoroughly aristocratic in his sensibility. Nietzsche recognized the incongruity of an aristocrat taking his values from extrinsic absolutes, so he imagined a contrarian reinterpretation of Plato, wherein the latter did not really believe in Ideas, but proposed them as a deliberate falsification or myth by which he elevated the vulgar utilitarianism of Socrates into something noble. This reinterpretation, needless to say, has not been accepted by subsequent scholars, leaving the paradox unscathed.
Recognizing this problem should enable us to examine Plato’s treatment of the Good in a new light. Otherwise, who needs another commentary on Plato? By taking this approach from the point of view of aristocratic sensibility, we set ourselves apart from the vast majority of modern idealists, who have internalized democratic ideals. In the transition from Plato to Plotinus to Christianity to liberalism, the notion of the absolute Good has become wildly distorted from the original intuition. We now have what Nietzsche caricatured as a static, lifeless, unreal ideal. It has become so wrapped up in romantic notions, even identified with God Himself, so that the more hardnosed realists among us have understandably turned away from any notion of objective morality, or have confined it to a purely religious dimension of existence.
Making morality purely subjective, however, effectively reduces it to sensibility, which is necessarily vulgar for most people. The result in a democratic society is that vulgarity becomes morality, defeating the aristocratic sensibility that first transcended objective morality. Nietzsche sought to avoid this result by making immoralism the privilege of a few, and by opposing democracy. These cats are already out of the bag, so to speak, so it is no longer possible to dissociate immoralism from the cultural wasteland of democratic society.
In Plato himself, for those with eyes, there is an aristocratic self-assuredness that motivates his ascent toward the notion of absolute Good. He approaches this notion with rationalistic rigor, and is by no means blind to the objections that we erroneously conceive as modern.
The answers to how he transcended these objections can only be seen at the intersection of his logic, metaphysics, and ethics. We may ask, as Nietzsche did of the idealists, what is the meaning of this rationalistic approach to the Good, i.e., what sensibility did Plato evince by taking this approach? Lacking Nietzsche’s anti-idealist prejudice, we may provide answers that do not require a contorted, implausible reading of Plato. Somehow his aristocratic sensibility is compatible with his secure conviction in an absolute Good.
So much of his thought has become common to all philosophies (e.g., abstraction, ideas, unity, essence), that we must take pains to distinguish his original conceptions from our common patrimony. In this endeavor, it is necessary not only to consider the impersonal ideas, but the man who conceived them, for only in him will we find the sensibility that informs their meaning.
We take no position on the disputed chronology of Plato’s works, and do not pretend that each work is absolutely consistent with all others. In cases of discrepancy, there is often little hope of identifying which is the mature
thought, so we just consider each argument on its merits. Nonetheless, each dialogue reveals something of the man at the time of writing, and there is a general consistency across the dialogues, and with what Aristotle tells us of Plato.
Plato’s dialogues presuppose discourse: ethics and other problems are to be worked out with others, not just on your own. Thus shared concepts are necessary. As with Socrates, Plato must be understood in the context of the Athenian culture that provided his concepts. This is not a liability, but an asset, since it is only within a determinate society that any ethics can really be proved. Those who speak only of generic men make prescriptions for a fictional being, only to be disappointed when real men find no use for them. Plato did not merely receive Greek Athenian concepts, but sought to understand them. We should treat them as data on which ethical philosophy operates.
Plato’s belief in absolute Good was not an a priori conviction, but something he arrived at through discursive reasoning, engaging the notions of his fellow Greeks and winnowing them with dialectic. He was not a chop logician who pretended that everything could be proved true or false with facility. He accepted paradoxes in reality, yet insisted on working through them, to come at some synthesis or deeper understanding. In this, he already contains much of the method of modern philosophy.
Not all of Plato’s dialogues directly treat the concept of absolute Good, but fifteen of them at least have parts that address this topic. These will form the outline of our study.
First, in Parmenides, Plato works through the famous paradoxes of this and other predecessors, giving us the motivation for his Ideas. In Philebus, he argues for a supreme intelligence, first by showing that wisdom and intelligence are superior to sensual pleasures, then contending that true philosophical or scientific understanding requires discerning a limited number of classes from infinite possibilities. In Euthydemus, he distinguishes how to speak truthfully, the province of philosophy, as opposed to sophistically like a rhetorician.
Plato does not confine absolute Good to dry intellect. In Ion, he proclaims that poetic art is really a divine gift, and shows appreciation of its Dionysian quality. While discussing whether pleasure is the good in Protagoras, he praises both Prometheus’ gift of arts and fire, and Zeus’ gift of justice and respect for others, again showing he values both the Dionysian and Apollonian impulses as good. This appreciation is also shown in Phaedo, where Socrates is told by his daemon to cultivate the arts, inspiring him to write lyrics for Apollo.
It is in Phaedo where Plato attempts a synthesis, considering philosophy a kind of art. In the philosophic art, the soul finds truth not with the senses, but with pure thought. Only pure thought can contemplate the absolute, i.e., reality abstracted from concrete materializations, per his analysis of Parmenides. “True philosophers make dying their profession,” he intends as poetic irony, for their task, like that of death, is to separate the soul from the body, yet in this case to perfect life, not destroy it. He also offers a utilitarian justification of philosophy, where one pursues the sublime pleasures of wisdom. This dialogue also expounds his views on the immortality of souls and a theory of participation as causation. “I am assuming the existence of absolute beauty and goodness,” he says, showing this theory is consequent to the assumption of absolute beauty. Plato shows he is an artist first and a philosopher in consequence.
The Good would be little more than a word to us unless we can see it manifested in concrete actions in this life. The one who values beauty can appreciate the exhortation in Crito not to live but to live well. If this beauty is absolute, it implies an objective law for living well. Such absolute morality is easily, though superficially, criticized by relativistic rhetoricians who claim “might is right,” as in Gorgias. This is a fault of the rhetorical method, which produces belief without knowledge, inviting Plato’s disparagement of this art. Naturally, it is in the Republic where his thoughts on right action find their most comprehensive expression. Like most Greek citizens, he saw the polity as the highest forum of moral action; indeed, he saw this as the primary purpose of the polity. In particular, the republic defines and administers justice, which is not just the actions of the strong taking advantage of others. Following the Socratic dictum that the just are happy, he enumerates the virtues of citizens. If people follow these principles, laws are unnecessary. In the Republic we also find the ethical motivation of the tripartite soul. Here, however, Plato opposes the authority of poetry, mainly because poets give undignified representations of the gods. Their art is just an imitation of life, which in turn is an imitation of ultimate reality. This disparagement of art, though qualified, is linked to Plato’s belief that philosophy as theory and republicanism as practice constitute the highest art of man, realizing the absolute Good.
There are less intellectual virtues recognized by Plato as well. In Charmides, he tries to understand temperance (sophrosyne), a received Greek value that permeated Attic culture. In Laches, he probes the meaning of courage or manliness (arete), which is the archetype of all virtue.
Lastly, there are virtues that show reverence or love for others. The loftiest of these is piety or holiness, discussed in Euthypro, followed by friendship (philia), discussed in Lysis. Phaedrus discusses romantic love (eros), and the Symposium contrasts sacred and profane love. This last includes Aristophanes’ myth of the original three sexes of four-legged man, which on the surface is the only classical argument for the positive moral value (not just liceity) of homoerotic love. We will find, however, that the meaning of this myth is more subtle, as with all Platonic allegory.
In sum, Plato’s concept of the absolute Good is heavily informed by his notion of beauty, which is manifested not only in his discussion of love, but in all the virtues, which are parts or aspects of the Good. This aesthetic basis of ethics is not as far removed from Nietzsche’s Dionysian insight as the latter’s anti-idealism would have us believe, which accounts for why the great immoralist had such conflicting attitudes toward Plato. In Plato we may get a glimpse of how it is possible for a man to submit to universal ideals without making himself common.
Platon, which means broad,
was not the philosopher’s birth name, but a nickname given in youth, most likely referring to his build when he was a wrestler. He was born Aristocles, son of Ariston, purportedly descended from Athenian kings. His mother was Perictione, a descendant of Solon. Both lineages claimed to go back to Poseidon. He was born auspiciously on Apollo’s birthday, the seventh of Thargelion, in the first year of the eighty-eighth Olympiad (May 28/29, 427 BC; the Greek day began at sunset). This noble birth was followed by a traditional Athenian education of poetics and gymnastics (typically starting at the age of seven). He belonged to the last generation before the new system of higher education was introduced c. 420 BC by foreign rhetoricians known as Sophists. He learned letters in the school of Dionysius, and learned gymnastics from the wrestler Ariston.
This early experience undoubtedly cultivated his aristocratic appreciation for excellence in body no less than mind, as expressed in his later praise of physical beauty and martial virtue. Plato the wrestler and poet cannot be reduced to a purely bookish intellectual. Indeed the term “intellectual” was invented by the modern Left (during the Dreyfus affair) to distinguish the non-productive class of thinkers. No engineer or experimental scientist needs to regard himself as an intellectual, but only as intelligent, for doing rather than thinking is his main business. Plato, too, we shall see, was a man of creative activity.
In his youth, he wrote dithyrambs, then lyric poetry, then tragedies, following the same progression of Dionysian art articulated by Nietzsche in The Birth of Tragedy. He gave sweet-voiced recitations, though he was also a stutterer (ischnophonos, lit. feeble-voiced; see usage in De Audibilibus). This sublime combination of delicacy of feeling with robustness of frame embodies the union of strength and beauty found in Greek sculpture. The plastic arts, which Nietzsche ascribed to the Apollonian aesthetic impulse, are nonetheless expressive of the values of a master class that delights in their own glory.
Much has been made of Plato, then aged twenty, destroying his poetry and following Socrates after hearing him speak at the Dionysian festival (9th-13th Elaphebolion; March 30–April 3, 406 BC). Did this really imply a renunciation of Dionysian art for the sake of philosophy, or was it just a decision not to become a poet? Whichever was the case, his extant writings prove that he never lost his appreciation of dramatic art.
From Socrates, he gained a low opinion of democracy, insofar as it chose leaders based on wealth or charisma rather than wisdom. This disillusionment with the current Athenian constitution was shared by other leading men after the debacle of the Peloponnesian War. The revolution in 404 BC, which brought the Thirty Tyrants to power, involved several of Plato’s relatives. Plato himself held sympathy and hope for the tyrants at first, but was soon disillusioned. While he consistently expressed preference for a free polity with equality among citizens, he did not hold that all men were of equal worth, nor that all were capable of citizenship. Unlike Aristotle, however, he almost never mentions slaves, even to disparage them; such silence may reflect aristocratic indifference.
Socrates also taught Plato to be highly individualistic, not receiving common notions of justice, virtue, happiness, etc., but thinking everything out for yourself. This would be manifested in his contrast between higher and lower forms of knowledge. Distinctions in wisdom would constitute a sort of natural aristocracy for Plato, though he did not overtly link wisdom with superiority of birth. While the mark of a philosopher is dialectic reasoning, i.e., critical thinking or inquiry, mere adeptness at logic or mathematics did not suffice. Attaining the ineffable insights of the philosophical life required years of practice at thought and discourse, facilitated by a temperate life of virtue, free from luxurious excess.
When Socrates died in 399 BC, Plato was still a young man of twenty-eight, having followed him for just over seven years. Socrates made a lasting impression, if not in doctrinal content, then certainly in his approach to philosophy epistemologically and ethically. Indeed, everyone who encountered Socrates admired him especially for his principled adherence to moral virtue, without regard for the opinions of the populace or the state.
Nonetheless, when it came to philosophical doctrines, Plato had an eclectic education. After Socrates’ death, he followed Cratylus the Heraclitean, and then Hermogenes who professed the philosophy of Parmenides. He later visited Cyrene and the Pythagoreans in Italy. He learned divine matters from Egyptian priests, and would have visited the Magi had he not been prevented by wars in Persia.
While not all aristocrats were wealthy, Plato evidently never had to worry about money, having received eighty talents from Dionysius, presumably Dionysius the Elder, tyrant of Syracuse, who was a known patron of the arts. He first became involved with the Syracusan court only indirectly, through Dion, who joined his school after meeting him in Tarentum in 387 BC. Plutarch says he excelled among Plato’s disciples, and this is corroborated by the encomium given after his death (354 BC) by Plato in the Seventh Letter.
For the details of Plato’s later misadventures in Sicily, I refer the reader to the Seventh Letter, the only epistle of Plato likely to be authentic. Its authenticity holds up on linguistic grounds, and those who find it spurious on the basis of content may fail to grasp how far removed Plato was from the bourgeois understanding of philosophy and intellectualism. They cannot understand why Plato praises Socrates only as a moral hero and regards Dion with high esteem as a philosopher. Yet Plato is not so vulgar as to think that intellectualism ranks as high as moral virtue; indeed he considers such virtue to be the source of true wisdom. He is thus giving Socrates the highest praise, attributing to him that which is the object of philosophy. His esteem for Dion as a philosopher does not imply that the latter was a great metaphysician or dialectician, but that he was a man of great worth, an evaluation consistent with the deep personal affection Plato manifestly held for him.
Most scandalous of all, Plato in this letter denies that matters of first philosophy can be fixed in writing. This is not only on account of the conventionality of language, but also because words, images and thoughts give us only qualities and individuations, not the essence, which we can apprehend only in flashes of intuition. This denial that anything of lasting value in philosophy can be written is also mentioned in Phaedrus [275c], and is more generally consistent with the ancient view that the highest matters are to be reserved for live discourse, much as the highest laws or nomoi were unwritten and intuited. Attempts to reduce first philosophy to verbal forms will only confound those who do not grasp the underlying intuitions. Lacking practice in contemplating such questions and leading lives of intemperance, even those who are highly intelligent will miss the object and think they can refute the stated doctrine, bringing it to ridicule. If this letter were accepted as authentic, we would have to accept that modern intellectualism is something Plato regarded with contempt.[1]
Plato was always concerned with the application of his thought in real societies. Some even suggest that his work should be considered as pedagogy for a philosopher-king. At any rate, this was his emphasis in his later years, with his misadventures in Sicily, and his construction of the Laws. Accordingly, his ethics is always socially oriented, concerned with the life that is good for all men, not just one person in isolation.
Since the object of ethics is social, and the primary means of acquiring truth is through oral discourse and dialogue (though Plato also valued and kept many books), it only makes sense that Platonic ethics should rely on the existence of shared values. Without these, there is nothing that can be intelligibly discussed. Plato does not assume that all reality must be intelligible to humans, but regards intellect as our best available tool to learn about reality. Sensation alone would just give us an infinite chaos of data without structure. Classification under ideas helps us work with reality (though we may wonder, more critically, if this is just a useful falsification). If ideas are non-existent, he will argue, then so are all concrete things.
Parmenides of Elea, the most esteemed metaphysician of the pre-Socratic era, held that the unreality of non-existents implied that reality consisted only of a unified and unchanging being, the One, contrary to all appearances of generation and corruption. Anything that the mind could conceive thereby existed, and the contemplation of eternal unchanging being was the way to truth, as contrasted with the mere opinion inferred from changing appearances. Parmenides’ counterintuitive philosophy was defended by his disciple Zeno, who crafted skillful paradoxes about likeness and unlikeness, change and permanence, unity and multiplicity, to show the untenability of the alternative. Only the One could transcend all these antitheses, so the One must exist. Plato takes up the problem of reconciling the One with the multiplicity we observe as a motivation for his Ideas, which resolve the diversity of existents into their unity, making reality intelligible. He takes a strong view about the reality of Ideas, holding them to be more than merely useful formal constructs, but actual patterns or forms in nature. This notion is so engrained in our thinking, that the Greek word idea, which originally meant shape
or form,
has been transformed by Platonic usage into meaning a conception.
Yet Plato’s own usage was more restrictive: it is not merely a conception in the sense of anything that we can imagine or think, but something in reality that answers to our thought.
The Parmenides dialogue[2] proves that Plato was not at all naïve about the many possible objections to his doctrine, and that he did not adopt it without subjecting it to strict logical rigor. The first half of this dialogue gives us some insight into the motivation for his belief in Ideas.
Plato’s abstraction of universal ideas was in part an attempt to solve the problem of the One and the Many. If existents were many, Zeno contended, you would have to say they are both like and unlike, which is impossible. Therefore in reality only the One exists. This problem arises only if you restrict your notion of being to the concrete, so that when you say, X is like,
‘is’ refers to concrete identification, so that like
is also a concrete existent (i.e., a trope). It is only if you consider like
and unlike
as abstractions, in which we can participate to varying degrees and respects, that there is no contradiction in the same things being like
and unlike.
The Platonic doctrine of participation resolves the contradiction between plurality and unity.
Apparent logical confusion exists only in visible objects. With abstractions there is logical clarity where that which is X cannot also be not X. You could not have absolute unity be many or the absolute many be one. It is only concrete things that can participate in both unity and many to varying degrees. The same holds for all opposite qualities. Note that Plato’s solution is static, only because the problem is posed in a way that refers to static being. This does not deny dynamics. We are only considering the logically simplest case.
There are abstract ideas not only of one and many, but also of the just, the beautiful, and the good. Socrates in the dialogue considers it less certain whether there are abstract ideas of man, fire, or water. There certainly are not ideas of hair, mud, dirt or anything vile or worthless; these are exactly as they appear to us. These are aristocratic distinctions, as Plato identifies the nobler existents (defined aesthetically) with abstractions, while that which is vile (again, an aesthetic valuation) participates in no idea at all. Yet the dialogue’s Parmenides rebukes Socrates’ refusal to apply ideas to all things, attributing this to a youthful fear of others’ opinions and of sounding ridiculous. Thus the seeker of truth should not allow aristocratic sensibility to cut off paths of inquiry.
Another social danger of the doctrine of participation arises when we say that we participate in divinity, for that implies that we have divinity in some way. In Athenian culture, that could be considered not merely ridiculous, but even blasphemous.
The whole of an idea can be in many participants, since it is not some concrete thing of which there can only be a limited resource. Notwithstanding participation, an idea is inseparable from itself. (This is much like Gregory Palamas’ account of divine glory.) Such a notion is problematic only if you think of the idea as a concrete object, like a sail spread over many things, for only part of the sail is over each thing.
Plato recognizes that an idea is not to be identified with thought (i.e., the act of thinking), since thought is individuated and many. The idea is that to which a thought refers, and the idea is the same in every distinct act of thought referring to it. In this way, we can see how thoughts partake of an idea. Does this mean that all things that participate in ideas must be made of thoughts?
I think the most likely view is, that these ideas exist in nature as patterns, and the other things resemble them and are imitations of them; their participation in ideas is assimilation to them, that and nothing else. [Parmenides, 132d]
Strikingly, Plato’s ideas are not thoughts, but patterns in the order of nature to which things conform by similitude, not necessarily by mediation of thought. We might explain this conformity in terms of some natural principle. (This accounts for why Aristotle identifies the nature
of a class of substances with its essence, i.e., the idea which is stated by the definition.)
Plato is not naïvely molding reality into the image of our thoughts. Rather, he recognizes that numerous individual objects have certain likenesses, and this fact presents a problem to which ideas offer an answer in reality. Our thoughts, and their corresponding words and images, are attempts to glean these ideas from individuated phenomena. The thoughts themselves, however, fall short of being ideas, since they too are individuated. Plato is looking beyond the human mind toward ineffable reality when he points toward Ideas.
This lack of naivety is further demonstrated by Plato’s awareness of objections to his doctrine, some of which are more acute than the trivial observation that the map is not the territory.
Plato’s Ideas are not the map
constituted of thought-symbols, but the unitary Realities that are evidenced in the likenesses among distinct objects. The reality of such likenesses, to be sure, makes reality intelligible and science possible, but human thought or science is not confused with its object.
Objection 1: If the participating thing resembles the idea, then the thing and the idea are like, so shouldn’t there be some higher idea in which they both participate? This yields a problem of infinite regression. Therefore participation cannot be merely by likeness.
Objection 2: The absolute idea does not exist in us, for then it would not be absolute. It seems, then, that the reality of absolute ideas is experientially unprovable (which is why Plato treats it as a supposition). Further, absolute ideas should have relations among themselves, not to concrete things. Likewise concrete things are related only to each other (e.g., master-slave), not to ideas. We should therefore have no knowledge of absolute ideas, including the absolute good and beautiful.
Objection 3: If God has absolute knowledge, then He cannot know anything of the concrete, because there is no relation between ideas and the concrete. There can be no relation between absolute knowledge and concrete knowledge.
On the contrary, those who deny the reality of ideas deny the possibility of discourse, because each instance of an idea is never the same! How could I know what is meant by a term if each instance of its use must be considered as referring to a different thing? How can we know what someone else is thinking unless we consider his thought and our thought as referring to the same idea? What sense does it make to say A is a horse
and B is a horse
if the term ‘horse’ does not mean the same thing in both instances? If all that exists is the concrete, then reality is thoroughly unintelligible.
To deal with the objections, it is necessary to develop a rhetorical art, not just dialectic. In this regard, Plato is a maturation of Socrates. Recognizing that dialectic can be used to throw nearly anything into doubt, one must have an epistemology grounded in principles beyond dialectic. A good approach is to focus on the more clearly demonstrable, without getting sucked into disputes about doubtful matters. One must consider not only the problems of this doctrine of ideas being true, but other, far worse problems of it being not true. We should not assume that reality will be dialectically perspicuous. Reality may be paradoxical, and the true doctrine may be the one that avoids the more serious logical contradictions or self-stultifying implications of its negation.
This approach of focusing on sound principles, and comparing the problems of each doctrine with those of its negation, is unfortunately neglected in modern philosophy of science. All too often, we see the opposite approach, overturning well-established logical and metaphysical principles on the basis of what is doubtful or poorly understood in physics, i.e., ontological interpretations of relativity and quantum mechanics.
What would happen if Parmenides expounded his doctrine of the One in terms of sound logical and metaphysical principles? The dialogue answers this hypothetical, having Parmenides argue that the One cannot be a whole, for a whole is that which lacks no parts, but the One (i.e., a unity or monad) has no parts. That is to say, the One is not the All (contrary to the doctrine of the historical Parmenides). If the One has no parts, it has no beginning or end, so it is unlimited. It cannot be in a place, for it would then be circumscribed or limited. Nor can it be in itself as though the self surrounded it, for a whole cannot be both active and passive in the same action.
Here Plato introduces a metaphysical thesis that may need justification to modern readers. To the Greeks it would have been obvious from the definitions of active and passive that they are mutually exclusive. Still, many modern philosophers have invoked some notion of self-agency, especially when dealing with God, human free will, and quantum randomness. The possibility of self-agency is not denied here, for Plato only requires that the same thing as a whole cannot be both active and passive in the same action. A part or component of a thing may act on another part or component. A thing may be active in one action and passive in another. For the same whole object A to both act and act upon its identical whole self A in the same action, however, would entail that A merely receives a tendency toward some state S from itself, implying that it already had such tendency, which is to say no action at all takes place. Alternatively, if we allowed that the tendency was somehow not in the power of A as active to impart, then what we would have is something coming from nothing as such, contrary to all philosophy.
The One cannot change, Parmenides says (both in the dialogue and historically), because then it would become something other than itself, and no longer be one. (The resolution of this conundrum would have to await Aristotle’s concepts of potentiality and actuality.) It cannot move into a place, for that is possible only for something which has parts. Therefore it cannot be in anything. Thus it can never be in itself, because then it would be in that with which itself is identical, but it cannot be in anything. To be in itself, it would have to be touching itself from the inside, much as it would the boundaries of a place.
To be immobile or at rest locally is to be in the same place. To be absolutely immobile or unchanging would entail being constantly in oneself as in a place. Yet the One cannot be in itself at all, much less constantly. Since the One has no parts, it cannot touch itself from within, so to speak, so being in oneself in any sense is inapplicable to it. Thus the One is not immobile, nor is it mobile. [139ab]
The One cannot be the same as another or itself. Nor can the One simply be Sameness absolutely. Two things can be the same without becoming one, proving that the nature of Unity or Oneness is not identical with Sameness. This is obvious from considering that a thing which becomes the same as many, necessarily becomes many, not one.
This lack of self-identity already indicates that the One transcends Being (i.e., it cannot be said to be or not be). This is confirmed by the fact that the One cannot exist in time, since it does not grow older than itself. Therefore it has no participation in past, future or present, so one cannot truly say it is
or is becoming.
Therefore it cannot partake of being at all. Note that this argument entails an intrinsically temporal, dynamic notion of being and coming-to-be. This idea that the One transcends Being finds it way through Neoplatonism into the mystical theology of Pseudo-Dionysius, influencing Greek Orthodoxy via Gregory Palamas.
The One, having no being, cannot be named or described or thought or known or perceived. We cannot even say that the One is
or is one.
If you were to allow that the One has being, then it could be divided into parts (being and unity). Each of these parts would have being and unity, making the one infinite in number. [142-43] One might retort that this assumes that all distinctions must involve a division into parts, but in discussing unity as such, even a plurality of principles would be a contradiction.
From the last conclusion (that the one is many by virtue of having being), a new argument is drawn: Unity, considered in itself, is distinct from being, even from the being of one. We might retort that the distinction between unity and the being of unity is purely logical, not necessarily metaphysically real. But for present purposes, mere plurality of concept suffices. Being, one, and the other, are three distinct things. We select any two of them and they may be called both,
in which case each is one
in number. You can add to these to make three, etc. Therefore, if one exists, number must exist, and an infinite multitude. [143] That is, all numbers can be derived from one. Plurality is derived from the notion of unity.
All these many things exist, i.e., existence is split up into many things. Anything that exists is a part of existence, but that which is no part would be one thing. Thus unity is an attribute of every part of existence, large or small. [144c]
Since the One is in many places at once, it must be divided into parts, which would make it many in number.
Then what we said just now—that existence was divided into the greatest number of parts—was not true for it is not divided, you see, into any more parts than one, but, as it seems, into the same number as one for existence is not wanting to the one, nor the one to existence, but being two they are equal throughout. [144de]
Both One and Being (existence) are divided into the greatest number of parts.
This contradiction of the earlier thesis that the One is without parts is the first of many antinomies throughout the dialogue. Each of these arise by treating the One under a single mode of existence, i.e., as a concrete existent, without any distinction between Oneness as essence and its realization in concrete existents, i.e., without any notion of ideas or participation. These antinomies arise whether we assume the One exists or that the One does not exist.
A way out of this conundrum, only hinted at in Parmenides, but expounded more fully in the Sophist and the Statesman, is to admit a notion of participation such that X may partake of Y without X being identical to Y or being a subset of Y, for X may stand in some relation to some Y that is altogether other than X. It may even stand in relation to a Y that does not correspond to any actual existent, yet has positive conceptual content.
How can the many partake of Unity? A particular object can be considered a unity in the sense of a union of parts, or in the sense of this one
distinguished from others. It is in this latter sense that the many partake of unity. Many
as concept does not partake of the concept Unity,
but many
as concrete objects each must partake of unity, for there can be no plurality unless we can distinguish one
from others.
The antinomies about the One also apply to Others (i.e., beings other than unity). They both are and are not, are like and unlike themselves and others. If both the One and the Others have the same paradox of being and not being, there must be something that transcends being, and that can only be Unity. We cannot strictly prove that the One is, only that: if the One is not, then nothing is,
and, whether the One is or is not, the One and the Others in relation to themselves and to each other all in every way are and are not and appear and do not appear.
In other words, you cannot logically prove that the One exists, but you can prove that without it, nothing else can be. This is really then an a posteriori demonstration.
The doctrine of participation, though not proven logically, points toward the need for something to transcend being or existence, bridging the division between is
and is not.
This transcendent thing is Unity or Union. Beneath all appearances of division, there is an underlying unity of reality, even of being and not-being.
By means of ideas, we discern a unity among many objects, which are informed by a similar property. This identity in form makes the objects alike while remaining distinct. There are potentially innumerable ways we could group or classify objects by shared properties, but only some of these will actually enhance our understanding of reality. If we classified all living things by their body size, this would not give us anywhere near the same degree of insight as classification by anatomical structures and functions, or by recent common descent. The latter classifications enhance our understanding by pointing to how similar processes yield similar results in different objects, so we can explain a multitude of phenomena in terms of a few principles.
In the field of ethics, the study of what people ought to do or seek, our understanding would be deepened by a unified idea underlying behaviors that are more ethically correct. Plato, like most aristocrats, conceived ethics in terms of self-improvement. The word arete, which we translate as virtue, means excellence.
Thus we may search among things that make men more excellent in any sense. This in turn requires us to discern which things make a man better. The betterment of man is conceived in terms of approaching or achieving a most desirable state, called eudaimonia (good spirit
), which we translate as happiness.
This state of flourishing or living well is considered to be favorable or advantageous, so anything that leads us to this state is also advantageous. Those attributes or behaviors that are more excellent will better help a man to achieve happiness, and so the more excellent attributes are eo ipso more advantageous.
The Philebus dialogue[3] begins by contrasting the doctrine of Philebus with that of Socrates. The former holds that enjoyment, pleasure or gaiety are most excellent and advantageous, while the latter holds that wisdom, thought or memory are most desirable. If there is a unifying idea among advantageous things, it may help us find what makes life happy for all.
If some find happiness in pleasure and others find it in wisdom, perhaps neither of these is the unifying idea. Instead there might be some third thing, superior to both pleasure (hedone, another name for Aphrodite) and wisdom (phronein, prudence), though it may be more akin to one or the other.
Not all pleasures are good, for a fool may be pleased with his folly and one may take pleasure in one’s lack of self-restraint. Yet a wise man may be pleased with his wisdom and one may take pleasure in self-restraint. This is compatible with Epicurean arguments about the pleasure
of virtue, though here we insist that not all pleasure is virtuous. The followers of Socrates are not arguing that pleasant things are not pleasant, but that most are bad and only some are good. Things of the same class may have opposition within them with respect to some quality. One should at least concede that not all pleasures are alike and some are opposed to each other. At a minimum, we may say that pleasures are many and unlike, and the same is true of wisdom. [13-14]
This is a special case of the principle (from Parmenides) that the one is many and the many are one, i.e., things can be of like class yet different in particulars. The unity here postulated is not of perishable things combined as parts of a whole, but the unity of universals: man is one, ox is one, beauty is one, good is one. Do such unities really exist? If so, how is it that they are neither generated nor destroyed as perishable things? How can this unity be in all its exemplars yet still be one, or is it separated from itself? [15]
Plato appeals to antiquity for an illustrative myth: the ancients, who were better than we and lived nearer the gods, handed down the tradition that all the things which are ever said to exist are sprung from one and many and have inherent in them the finite and the infinite.
[16c] As with most Platonic myths, this is mainly the philosopher’s invention, only loosely informed by cultural traditions. It gives the didactic figure of the one and many as father and mother of all that is. Thus both unity and plurality can be found in everything without contradiction. As discussed in Parmenides, the Many or Others are innumerable or infinite, so everything is both finite and infinite. We should look first for one unifying idea in every thing, and once we grasp that, we should look for two or three, until we can see… just how many it is.
[16d] There is a characteristic number of each kind of thing, defined by how many classes there are within that kind. And we must not apply the idea of infinite to plurality until we have a view of its whole number between infinity and one; then, and not before, we may let each unit of everything pass on unhindered into infinity.
[16de]
That is the ancient way, but current men try to make the one and the many too quickly or too slowly, in haphazard fashion, and they put infinity immediately after unity; they disregard all that lies between them, and this it is which distinguishes between the dialectic and the disputatious methods of discussion.
[16e-17a]
For example, sound is one, but it is infinite in number, since it passes through each and all of us, i.e., there are (potentially) infinite instances of sound. We may have grammatical knowledge of the number of sounds as two, low and high, or three, if we add intermediate, but this would not suffice to make one a musician. We would need to know the number and quality of intervals
with respect to pitch, the limits of theses intervals, and all combinations derived from them. [17c] Here we treat tones as fundamental qualities from which secondary qualities are derived. If we were to simply treat sound as an infinite number, we would not gain any (scientific) knowledge or wisdom about sound. This illustrates why we should not go straight from one to infinity, but should seek an intermediate finite number of classes.
The reverse also holds; starting with infinity, we should not go straight to one. We start with the infinity of sounds, and first perceive there are many, not one. We may enumerate the vowel sounds and learn all the consonants as well. To learn grammar we must learn all such sounds and appreciate their common bond or unity in a single science. This is building up from subclasses, finding commonality systematically.
We may apply the first approach when treating our question: which is preferable, wisdom or pleasure? Each of them is one. How is each of them one and many, yet not immediately an infinity of individual phenomena, but rather of definite number? [18d] This framing of the question shows how seriously Plato took the role of definite numbers of things. Diogenes Laertius, often criticized for having a superficial understanding of Plato, was actually correct to emphasize the enumerations made by the philosopher. The number of a thing gives the most fruitful knowledge of that thing.
We should first distinguish kinds of pleasure and wisdom. [19a] If neither pleasure nor wisdom is the good, but some third thing better than both, then we no longer would need to distinguish kinds of pleasure to help understand the good, since pleasure would not be identical with the good. [20bc] In that eventuality, we would not need to distinguish kinds of wisdom either. Note the implicit assumption that the Good as such is to be found in that which exemplifies it to the highest degree, i.e., in whatever is best.
This aligns with the perspective of aristocrats (aristoi, the best ones
). Also implied, but subject to scrutiny, is the notion that there is a single thing that is best
for all men.
There are also some explicitly stated assumptions: (1) the nature of the Good is perfect; (2) the Good is sufficient; (3) every intelligent (knowledgeable) being pursues it, desires it, wishes to catch and get possession of it, and has no interest in anything in which the Good is not included.
[20cd] Under these assumptions, if either pleasure or wisdom is the Good, those who possess it should have no need of anything else. So let us examine the life of pleasure without wisdom and that of wisdom without pleasure. [20e]
If a life of pleasure were thoroughly without wisdom or knowledge, you would not know if you were enjoying your pleasures or not, since you would be devoid of intellect (agnoein, unknowing
). [21] Intellect perfects our mode of appreciating pleasure. It enables us to enjoy pleasure in a way inaccessible to animals. No man would prefer the life of a mollusc, even if it were free from all pain, for the mollusc has no appreciation of what pleasure it might experience. From a human perspective, the life of a mollusc or any brute beast, however pleasant it might be, would be practical non-existence by comparison. We would be robbing ourselves of life should we exchange modes of existence with some less intelligent animal.
On the other hand, who would want to live with perfect wisdom and knowledge, yet have no share in pleasure or pain, being utterly unaffected by anything? [21de] This seems to imply that the divine life is undesirable, or else the divine life includes affects of pleasure. Again, Plato is taking a human perspective, and for us divine impassibility, as conceived by Epicurus and other Greeks, and later by the Christians, would be an undesirable state. The happiness being sought is happiness for humans.
From these considerations, it follows that a life with both pleasure and wisdom would be preferable (for humans) to either of the lives just described. [22a] Although this combined life is best, perhaps one of the components (pleasure or wisdom) is the cause of the other, making it superior. [22c]
To address this question, we start by classifying things as infinite or finite. The infinite, in a sense, is many. If we consider comparatives, such as hotter, colder, more, less, it is evident that these can go on indefinitely. Fixed quantity, by contrast, is definite and static. Thus all comparatives should go in the class of infinite rather than finite. [24] Relatives such as equality, double, etc. are classed as finite because they are definite numbers (ratios). [25] Mixing the infinite with the finite means to take the indefinite and make it definite, imposing balance or harmony. This mixing makes things best and harmonious. [26] Here we see the Greek aversion to excess expressed in mathematical terms, replacing a spectrum of intensive magnitude (mere comparatives) with definite ratios ordered to achieve some desired result. The particular ratio depends on the natures in question, e.g., what dose of medicine to use to restore health from a given illness. What is assumed is that there is a range of potential quantity and a means of imposing some definite quantity or ratio.
So far we have three classes of things in the cosmos. First, the infinite, the unifying principle of which is the more or less.
The second class is the finite, though we have not shown what is their unity. The third class is that which combines the infinite with finite measure. The infinite may be thought of as becoming
while the finite is being,
so the third class combines becoming and being. Yet there is a fourth class, for everything comes into being through a cause (aitian).
Being made or created is the same as coming into being; these differ only in name. The creative agent leads, and what is created follows after it. Whatever caused all things that come into and out of being is distinct from the three classes, since these are all of mutable things. [27] The mixed life of pleasure and wisdom is of the third class, being a mixture of all infinite things bound by the finite. Philebus supposes that pleasure and pain have no limit in admitting of more or less, for pleasure would not be absolute good if it were not infinite in number and degree.
Even on this favorable assumption, pleasure falls short, for it is better for it to be bounded or moderated, and even this falls short of that which causes this mixed life to come into being. Insofar as we contemplate an absolute cause, i.e., that which causes all things in the cosmos to come into being, that cause must be immutable, as it transcends and antecedes becoming.
Plato shows self-awareness of the professional bias that may make philosophers identify this ultimate cause as mind: all philosophers agree—whereby they really exalt themselves—that mind is king of heaven and earth.
[28c] We must examine if this supposition is well founded. Shall we say, Protarchus, that all things and this which is called the universe are governed by an irrational and fortuitous power and mere chance, or, on the contrary, as our forefathers said, are ordered and directed by mind and a marvellous wisdom?
[28d]
Consider the elements: the fire in us is small, poor, weak, while that in the universe is marvellous in quantity, beauty and power. Therefore, it is that our fire is nourished by the cosmic fire rather than the other way around. [29] The universal principle that gives fire its power thereby gives power to individual instances. Elements gathered into a unit are called a body. Thus our body derives its power from the body of the universe. Here Plato thinks of the universal
not as an abstraction, but as a collective of all in the cosmos.
hole in modern physics, since we do not really understand mind as a physical property in its own right, and instead try to reduce it to corporeal properties, absurdly. The aforementioned fourth class (after the infinite, the finite, and combinations of these), the cause which exists in all things, gives our bodies souls and the various arts, such as healing, which is called the sum of all wisdom. If something so exalted is found among the four classes, surely they cannot fail to contain the fairest (most beautiful) nature.
The four classes are interrelated: there is in the universe a plentiful infinite and a sufficient limit, and in addition a by no means feeble cause which orders and arranges years and seasons and months, and may most justly be called wisdom and mind.
[30c] Reality discloses (1) the infinite, the superabundance of comparative possibilities in the cosmos, and (2) the finite number of existing things that are realized. Third, there is a harmony that brings order to the infinite by confining it to a finite number of principles. This order is achieved by whatever cause brings into being the first three classes. Such a cause is certainly powerful, and it deserves to be called wisdom or mind insofar as it is a principle of harmony and order.
Reason and mind in the proper sense cannot come into being without soul. Since reason and mind certainly do exist, and are most perfectly realized in the gods, this power gave Zeus his kingly soul, and so on for the other deities. [30cd] The original power or cause is mind in the broad sense (a principle of harmony and order) and must be the highest or strongest form of mind, since it imparted mind to the gods and other intelligent beings. Mind (Nous always rules the cosmos. [30d] As mind belongs to the fourth class, it is the cause of all. [30e] We see that Plato, like Aristotle, has a notion of causality that is co-occurrent with its effect, so it would not do for Mind to create the cosmos and then disappear. As the order and harmony of the cosmos clearly persist, so too must that what gives the things of this ordered world (the first three classes) their being. The thesis that the source of a power is to be found in the greatest exemplar of that power does not imply that all things have already been done, as Nietzsche complained, for the first cause or origin is not in the remote past, but occurs now.
Mind belongs to the class of cause, while pleasure belongs to the class of the infinite, if we generously assume that pleasure may increase without limit. Pleasure and pain originate in the third class, which includes health and harmony. We have pleasure when harmony is composed and pain when it is disrupted. Some examples are hunger and eating, thirst and moisture. [31] This does not prove that all pleasure and pain is like this, but it suffices to show that at least one kind of it is so. A second kind of pleasure or pain would be anticipation of the conditions of harmony or disharmony. [32]
If the destruction of harmony is pain and its restoration is pleasure, what about things in which neither is going on? There must be a third condition that is neither pleasure nor pain. One might live the life of wisdom in this condition. Perhaps the gods actually do live in this condition. [33] Possibly such a condition is best for the gods, but it might not be best for men.
Anticipatory pleasure, which is solely in soul, is to be explained by memory. Suppose some affections of the body never reach the soul, but others affect both body and soul jointly. The soul forgets
(i.e., does not remember, because it is not affected in the first place) the former type, but not the latter. What we call memory
is the preservation of perception. [34a] Recollection occurs when the soul re-perceives any experience it had in company with body. When the soul loses some memory of perception or something learned and regains this on its own, this is called recollection, i.e., the soul recalls an experience it had in company with the body. Thus Plato distinguishes memory and recall. Memory is preserving or storing perception, while recollection is recovering a memory that was lost.
To desire something involves simultaneously apprehending that thing and experiencing its current absence. One who desires drink is empty and wants to be filled. There is no contradiction in desiring to drink some definite thing while one is not actually drinking it, yet it seems otherwise with comprehension by perception or memory. How can you desire to perceive some definite thing without thereby perceiving it, or desire to remember some definite thing without thereby remembering it? When you desire you feel emptiness, but somehow you apprehend fullness. It cannot be the body that apprehends fullness (drink), for it is actually empty, so it must be the soul that apprehends this, by means of memory (stored perception). Thus, properly speaking, there is no such thing as bodily desire. Only the soul desires, by remembered sensations of fullness, contrary to the actual or current sensation of hunger, thirst, etc. The body does not hunger or thirst or have any other affection; the soul does. Thus all impulse (setting in motion toward some desired end) and desire and ruling principle is of the soul. By means of desire, a man can be in between pleasure and pain, suffering from his present condition, and remembering pleasures that could end his pain though he does not possess them. [35] Remembering pleasure, though it is a form of apprehending pleasure, is not the same as experiencing it currently. Without such distinction, it would be pointless to speak of desiring pleasure, for the act of desiring it would be the same as having it.
The thought or apprehension of pleasure is not the same as possessing pleasure; indeed such apprehension might even cause pain. If one has no hope of attaining a remembered pleasure, such memory would make his pain twofold. If he does have hope, however, then his current pain is mixed with some pleasure. [36] It is hope, not mere desire or remembrance of pleasure, that brings some modicum of pleasure even in a state of deprivation.
Is it possible for there to be false
pleasure (or pain)? One may have a false opinion, i.e., a thought that does not correspond to reality. Yet this seems impossible in the case of pleasure, for how could one be mistaken in thinking that one feels pleasure? The mere fact of experiencing pleasure is sufficient proof, for pleasure is subjective, and no correspondence with extra-conscious reality is needed. How is it that false pleasure is impossible but false opinion is possible? After all, even if your opinion is false,
you really do have an opinion. We must be regarding truth or falsity as added attributes of opinion, extrinsic to its experience. Are pleasure and pain therefore without attribute? No, they have qualities, such as great, small, intense. They might also have goodness, rightness, etc. While our experience of pleasure or pain cannot err as to what it is, it may err as to what is causing it. In that case, Plato says, it should not be considered right or good or excellent. [37]
Pleasure may come to us in connection with a false opinion. Shall we say then it is somehow false? Suppose someone sees the image of a man, but mistakenly thinks it is the work of some shepherds. Even if he does not state this false opinion, he retains the false perception. [38] Perceptions are not bare sensation, but can include mistaken interpretations, even if these are unstated.
Memory is like a book:
Memory (memen) unites with the senses (aistehesis, sense-perception), and they and the feelings which are connected with them seem to me almost to write words in our souls; and when the feeling in question writes the truth, true opinions and true statements are produced in us; but when the writer within us writes falsehoods, the resulting opinions and statements are the opposite of true. [39a]
In addition to this writer inside us, there is a painter who illustrates what the writer has written.
When a man receives from sight or some other sense the opinions and utterances of the moment and afterwards beholds in his own mind the images of those opinions and utterances.
[39b] Images of true opinions (i.e., correct perceptions of present or past reality) are true. Such writings and pictures, though they are of past or present experiences, may also relate to the future, especially as hopes. Images of abundance, pleasure and enjoyment (considered with respect to the future) are true
for those who are friends of the gods, because their hopes will be realized, while these same images are false for those who are not friends of the gods. Thus the bad have false pleasures painted in their souls; they rejoice in false pleasures. [40ab] Here the distinction of true
and false
is not between the kinds of pleasure desired, but between whether or not the hope for a pleasure will be realized.
In summary: he who feels pleasure at all in any way or manner always really feels pleasure, but it is sometimes not based upon realities, whether present or past, and often, perhaps most frequently, upon things which will never even be realities in the future.
[40d] The same holds for false fear, anger and other emotions or affections. [40e]
Protarchus remarks that pleasures or pains are not necessarily bad if they are false, but are bad only if they are involved in another evil. [41a] Socrates notes other errors we may have about pleasure and pain. First, we can misjudge which pleasure or pain is greater or smaller. [41e] We might also think pleasures or pains are greater or less than they really are. [42a] This can occur because they are perceived or compared at varying distances (from our immediate experience). [42b] Since pleasure and pain are affections, a body that is unchanged would experience neither pleasure nor pain. [42e] Yet a body is always in flux or undergoing change. [43a] Plato’s essentialism does not deny the omnipresent reality of change in the corporeal world. Since change is always occurrent, this implies that fluctuations or changes as such are not a (sufficient) cause of pains or pleasures. [43b] A specific kind of change is required. Great changes cause pains or pleasures, but moderate changes cause no pain or pleasure. [43c] This means one can have a life of pleasure, pain, or neither. Freedom from pain is not the same as pleasure. When you hear anyone say that the pleasantest of all things is to live all one’s life without pain, what do you understand him to mean?
[43d] In fact, freedom from pain is just a privation, not a pleasure. Plato here opposes the nihilistic pseudo-hedonism that would later be espoused by Epicurus. Such a philosophy would be a flight from life, not a pursuit of good.
People who think that freedom from pain is a pleasure must imagine that they would feel pleasure whenever they are not in pain, yet this is certainly a false opinion. [44a] Others might deny the existence of pleasure, and claim that all so-called pleasures are merely refuges from pain.
[44bc] This disdain for pleasure, though ill-founded, is motivated by some innate and not ignoble repugnance
toward the power of pleasure. They recognize that there can be trickery in the attractiveness of pleasure. We may make use of their dislike to examine pleasure from another perspective. [44cd]
To learn about a quality, study that which is greatest in it, i.e., that which most perfectly exemplifies it. To know about hardness, look at the hardest things. For pleasure, look at the most pleasant. [44e] We want to examine the most extreme and intense. [45a] Do the strongest pleasures and pains occur in the healthiest or the sickest? The greatest pleasures gratify the greatest desires, and desires are strongest in those who are sick, hungry, thirsty, or otherwise deprived. Thus the subsequent pleasure is greatest or most intense for them. [45b] Further, the most intense pleasures are in those who are riotous or dissolute, as compared with the self-restrained. This implies that the greatest pleasures and the greatest pains originate in some depravity of soul and body, not in virtue.
[45d] Here virtue is manliness or strength, as indicated by physical health and the power to exert self-restraint or self-discipline.
We can experience occurrent mixtures of pleasure and pain, sometimes regarding them as pleasure, sometimes as pain, depending on the direction of the process, i.e., if it is restorative or destructive. For example, we relieve itching by scratching. Though this is a mixture of pleasure and pain, on the whole we regard it as a pleasure, because it is restorative. [46] Mixtures of pain and pleasure can be unequal. When an inflammation is internal, so that it cannot be reached by scratching, the pain is greater than the pleasure. When pleasure predominates, any little pain makes a man impatient. Excessive pleasure makes him delirious and foolish and he calls them [pleasures] the greatest of all things and counts that man the happiest who lives most entirely in the enjoyment of them.
[47]
We may take pleasure in the pains of others, for it is neither wrong nor envious to rejoice in the misfortunes of our enemies.
[49] Whether we regard pleasure and pain as affections of the body, the soul, or both, these two affections can occur as a mixture. [50]
True pleasures are unmixed with pain. One such pleasure comes from beauty of form. Such beauty is not the relative beauty of animals or paintings, but the beauty of a straight line or circle, which is absolute or by nature. Such pleasures are incomparable to the pleasure of scratching, for they provide satisfaction with no admixture of pain. There are colors that have this kind of beauty, and sounds with pure notes that are absolutely beautiful. Smell is less divine, but is still unmixed with pain. [51cd] These natural beauties may be considered pure qualities, such as the red, green, and blue to which our retinal cones are attuned. They are absolute
only in the sense that they do not depend on personal taste, but align with how human nature is constituted. Likewise the musical tones are independent of individuality. Their beauty is absolute
not in the sense of being independent of mental experience, but in how they affect human nature.
There is also a true pleasure that comes from knowledge, for there is no pain associated with knowing as such, nor with the lack of knowledge. We may be pained by reflecting on the event of having lost knowledge, but there is no natural feeling
of pain, i.e., there is no pain inherent in the loss of knowledge. [52] Only a few experience this feeling of pleasure unmixed with pain. We are using aesthetics as our starting point, as we speak of beauty and feeling, but we do so in a way that refers to the nature of things and how they affect humans.
Purity is more beautiful than a mixture, so a little bit of pure white is more beautiful than a great deal of mixed white. In this way, pleasure uncontaminated with pain is most pleasant and beautiful, even if smaller and less frequent. [53]
If the absolute good is that desired for its own sake, then generation cannot be an absolute good, for generation is entirely for the sake of being. Shipbuilding is so that ships may exist. We would not desire shipbuilding except insofar as we desire ships. If there is some good in the process of shipbuilding that we desire for its own sake, that would be incidental to shipbuilding as such. If pleasure is a form of generation, it would not be an absolute good. Hunger and thirst can be relieved by processes of generation, i.e., eating and drinking, so we tend to regard those processes as pleasures. Some might foolishly say that they would not want to live without hunger or thirst so they should not be denied the subsequent pleasure of their relief. [54] By making pleasure into a process or generation, they effectively refute the idea that pleasure is a good.
The opposite of generation is destruction; thus pain may be viewed as a destructive process antithetical to pleasure. Under the assumption of pleasure as process, those who choose pleasure preceded by pain are choosing generation and destruction, not a life without pleasure or pain. [55] That is, acceptance of pain for the sake of pleasure does not enable one to transcend pleasure as one’s good, which is absurd if pleasure is a generative process.
If a man could make himself good by experiencing pleasure, it would seem to follow that the man who suffers pain is a bad man, but this is absurd. [55b] Clearly, those who speak of pleasure and pain as good
or bad
are speaking of them as desirable or undesirable, without any reference to whether they improve a man or make him worse.
Applying the same treatment to knowledge as the good, we try to identify the purest exemplars of knowledge. Some knowledge is productive, while some has to do with education. Some of the manual arts may be more closely allied to knowledge than other arts. We may identify the ruling elements of each art, i.e., that which makes them art (techne), a human skill informed by knowledge, and not mere chance. If arithmetic, measurement (of length, area, volume) and weighing (all considered here as skills or arts), were removed from all arts, the arts would be worthless. There would be nothing left in those dependent arts but guessing. [55de]
Some arts are less dependent on knowledge than others. If we had no measurement, the art of music might nonetheless attain harmony by guesswork based on practice (trial and error). The same is true in agriculture and medicine, and there is correspondingly less certainty in these arts. [56] Other arts, such as architecture and construction, are more dependent on measurement, making them more accurate and knowledge-based.
Having identified arithmetic as an exact art, we may enumerate its kinds. The arithmetic of philosophers is different from that of the people, For some arithmeticians reckon unequal units, for instance, two armies and two oxen and two very small or incomparably large units; whereas others refuse to agree with them unless each of the countless units is declared to differ not at all from each and every other unit.
[56e] Thus there are two kinds of arithmetic, one which allows unequal units, as when we speak of two armies
though they are unequal in size, and another that insists on a quantitative equality among units. The difference depends on what we consider to be the function of number: a merely practical enumeration of objects, which can be arbitrarily dissimilar, or a means of expressing the quantity inherent in each unit that is numbered. As mathematicians are concerned with quantity as such, and only incidentally with real-world objects, the latter function of number would make more sense for their arithmetic. In the practical world, the former function of number is sufficient and useful. A similar distinction in kind may be made between measurement in construction and philosophical geometry.
As this distinction can be made in each of the arts (applications of knowledge), we may say in general that there are two kinds of knowledge, one purer than the other, just as earlier we found one pleasure is purer than another. It seems that the various arts have different degrees of exactness. [57] Each named art is really two, and the philosophers’ version has more clearness and purity, greater accuracy and truth about measures, numbers, etc. Yet while arithmetic and geometry are most exact arts or sciences
(epistemas, used by Plato here as overlapping with techne to signify practical knowledge or skill), perhaps dialectic is to be most preferred.
To which art, Protarchus asks, does dialectic belong? Socrates replies, Clearly anybody can recognize the art I mean; for I am confident that all men who have any intellect whatsoever believe that the knowledge which has to do with being, reality, and eternal immutability is the truest kind of knowledge.
Protarchus counters that Gorgias says the art of persuasion surpasses all others for this, he says, makes all things subject to itself not by force, but by their free will.
[58b] Socrates responds that the present question is not which art is best and most useful, but which art, however little and of little use, has the greatest regard for clearness, exactness, and truth.
[58] In modern language, we would say the art with most certainty (lit., trueness
).
Most arts and the men who study them make use of opinion and investigate matters of opinion (doxa). Even if they think they are studying nature, they are studying things of this world, the manner of their production, their action, and the forces to which they are subjected.
[59] Here Plato speaks of physics, not as a science of nature, but as a farrago of opinions about transient phenomena. The physicists of his day (and even of ours to some degree), do not study eternal verities, but transient productions of the present. None of these things are certain, by the standard of strictest truth, since none of them is ever in the same state. Change, which is the subject of physics, makes things uncertain. Strict logic applies only when you can hold something fixed in meaning.
How can we gain anything fixed whatsoever about things which have no fixedness whatsoever?
Modern mathematics offers an apparent answer, allowing us to treat change as a fixed concept, namely the time derivative, and thus to define static relations of change, or force laws, as differential equations. This is accomplished, however, only by invoking the notion of limit, which is really a process masquerading as a fixed value.
That fixed and pure and true and what we call unalloyed knowledge has to do with the things which are eternally the same without change or mixture, or with that which is most akin to them; and all other things are to be regarded as secondary and inferior.
[59c] Logic requires idealized objects of this sort in order to be valid. Plato here proves that we can only have certainty about such objects, if they exist, but not that they exist. If no such objects exist, then it is impossible to have such certainty about anything existent, though we could still have certainty about relations among abstractions.
This consideration helps us see why Aristotle made natures
or principles of motion into static essences. This is the only way they could be intelligible, and subjects of certain, philosophical knowledge. This is true even in modern natural sciences: we can understand changeable things only insofar as we conceptualize them, and consider what is like among them, abstracting from accidental or circumstantial differences (e.g., ignoring irregularities of shape, friction, drag).
An aristocratic sensibility directs the dialogue to seek the finest of eternal, unchanging things as most deserving of honor: And of the names applied to such matters, it would be fairest [most observant of custom] to give the finest [most beautiful] names to the finest things, would it not?
[59c] Are not mind, then, and wisdom the names which we should honor most?
[59d] Mind or nous is the faculty for understanding what is true or real, i.e., intellect. Wisdom
here is not sophia but phronesis, the faculty to discern how to act virtuously. Plato is concerned with practical wisdom, just as he has been concerned with practical sciences, considering them as skills or arts. In this he follows Socrates who identified phronesis with being a virtuous person (see Meno), so that phronesis is a synonym for virtuousness. Ethics is eminently a practical science, as it seeks what is good or beneficial to man.
What is the right mixture of wisdom (phronesis) and pleasure? It was established earlier that the one who has the good always has no need of anything, but this is not the case of one who has wisdom only or pleasure only. Imagine someone who had pleasure, but could have no true opinion that he is pleased, no knowledge of what he felt, or even memory of the feeling. [60de] The emptiness of such an experience further argues for the necessity of wisdom, for the human experience of pleasure is satisfying precisely because we have understanding of it.
Socrates offers a prayer to whichever god presides over the mixing, be it Dionysus (mixer of wine and water) or Hephaestus (god of metallurgy). Pleasure is like a fount of honey, to be mixed with wisdom, which is like pure, healthy water. [61c] To get the best results, we should mix the greatest pleasure with the most exact art, that of immutable things, i.e., the best exemplars of pleasure and wisdom. [61de]
Supposing a man has wisdom about the nature of justice, and of the divine circle and sphere (ideals), he should be lacking if he did not also have knowledge of the human sphere and circles, using these and other patterns to build houses. Man is ridiculous and incomplete if he has only divine knowledge and no human knowledge. Thus we should include in our mixture even some impure, uncertain arts of the false rule, circle, etc. We must also include music, if our life is to be life at all,
though it is full of guesswork and imitation, lacking purity. [62] We may let in all the less pure forms of knowledge, as long as they do not dispossess us of the first.
What about pleasures? Are there any lesser yet necessary pleasures to mix with true pleasures? We should admit only pleasures that can live together with wisdom and mind. These include true pleasures, but not intense pleasures, which contain countless hindrances [for wisdom, arts and sciences] inasmuch as they disturb with maddening pleasures the souls of men in which we dwell, thereby preventing us from being born at all, and utterly destroying for the most part, through the carelessness and forgetfulness which they engender, those of our children which are born.
[63de] We may accept true and pure pleasures united with health and self-restraint
as handmaids of virtue
, for these naturally belong to wisdom. But we should not accept pleasures which follow after folly (aphrosunes) and all baseness (kakias).
In short, we include only those pleasures that are not at odds with wisdom, and indeed pertain to wisdom by their nature. Only these can be combined with wisdom in a mixture that is restful (astasiastotaten, not torn by faction).
Plato classifies pleasures into those that belong to wisdom and those that oppose wisdom. There are none that are merely indifferent, since anything that does not support wisdom distracts from the pursuit of wisdom, especially in proportion to the intensity of pleasure. The pleasures deemed suitable to mix with the purest wisdom are not necessarily the most intense pleasures, but they are true pleasures, unmixed with pain, associated with perception and knowledge. It may seem arbitrary that we should choose only those pleasures that conform with wisdom, rather than make pleasure the standard with which wisdom must be compatible. Yet truth, which is indispensable to the good, is found in wisdom.
That in which there is no admixture of truth can never truly come into being or exist. [64b]
Our account of the good, or any positive being, is incomplete if we do not include truth. This does not mean merely that our account is true, but that there is truth in the good (or other positive being) as such. Here truth
means what we might call reality, rather than a correspondence between a statement and reality. Since the arts or wisdom are considered as practical knowledge, they are knowledge of reality, that is, of truth,
of being or essence. Thus knowledge is necessary to our account of the good. This being granted, any pleasures included in the good must be compatible with knowledge or wisdom. The base pleasures which promote utter thoughtless cannot be compatible with any sort of knowledge, and their indifference to knowledge makes them opposed to a man acquiring or possessing knowledge. Thus they cannot be included in a harmonious mixture with any kind of wisdom.
The primary quality that makes a good mixture is the measure of things mixed. Thus the power of the good has taken refuge in the nature of the beautiful,
[64e] for proportion has to do with beauty (kallos) and virtue (arete), especially as the latter involves moderation and a sense of balance or fitness.
Beauty, which involves proportion (symmetria, commensurability), and truth are the cause that make the mixture good, [65a] like an incorporeal governing noble body. [64] Thus measure, beauty, and truth make the mixture good. Let us see whether mind or pleasure is more akin to these three.
First, we compare each with truth. Pleasure is the greatest of impostors… in the pleasures of love, which are said to be the greatest, perjury is even pardoned by the gods.
In contrast, mind is either identical with truth or of all thins most like it and truest.
Nous is intellect or understanding, so it eminently has to do with truth; no notion of truth is possible without it. Pleasure is at best indifferent to truth.
Second, we compare with measure. Pleasure is immoderate, while mind or knowledge is in harmony with measure. Again, pleasure seems indifferent and sometimes even opposed to what makes the mixture good, while mind contributes to its harmony.
Third, we compare with beauty. Wisdom or mind is never unseemly. But pleasures, and the greatest pleasures at that, when we see any one enjoying them and observe the ridiculous or utterly disgraceful element which accompanies them, fill us with a sense of shame; we put them out of sight and hide them, so far as possible; we confine everything of that sort to the night time, as unfit for the sight of day.
[66a] Here the shame
that is felt is not associated with evil or sin, but with ridiculousness, or lack of beauty or decorum. It is disgraceful in the sense of being undignified, as the aristocrat is no better than the commoner when intoxicated with pleasure, and perhaps no better than a beast. This is an appeal to aesthetic sensibility, not to morality, which we are setting out to discover, not to presuppose.
We may now rank desirable things as they contribute to goodness, and thus happiness. First among possessions is metron, metrion, kairion, i.e., measure, moderation, fitness (right time or place). This, we have seen, is most essential to the goodness of the mixture (of wisdom and pleasure). Second is symmetron, kalon, telon, ikanon, i.e., proportion, beauty, perfection, sufficiency (sufficing, becoming, befitting), which depends on measure. Thus far we have the virtues of moderation and decorum. Third is nous, phronesis, i.e., mind, wisdom, by virtue of affinity with truth and the other qualities of harmony. Fourth is epistemas, technas, doxas orthas, i.e., sciences, arts, and true opinions. This fourth class is more akin to pleasure than to the absolute good. Fifth are the painless pleasures of soul, which accompany knowledge and perceptions.
Only after all these do we come to pleasure, which is a low ranking good:
But not first, even if all the cattle and horses and other beasts in the world, in their pursuit of enjoyment, so assert. Trusting in them, as augurs trust in birds, the many judge that pleasures are the greatest blessings in life, and they imagine that the lusts of beasts are better witnesses than are the aspirations and thoughts inspired by the philosophic muse. [67b]
Modern men make this same blunder, elevating pleasure because of its esteem among animals, and considering man as nothing more than an animal. Yet what is the greatest good for cattle need not be anywhere near the highest good for man, who is capable of so much more. Furthermore, man’s way of being is such that even pleasure is no comfort without knowledge that he is experiencing pleasure, for our mode of being involves conscious, discursive thought. Moreover, our thoughts are not limited to transient things, but are more truly knowledge and understanding when they are directed to eternal, unchanging principles.
We did not come to this conclusion by the philosopher’s prejudice that all men should be philosophers. Indeed the wisdom that is emphasized here is phronesis, not sophia. We start only with the pursuit of what is good for man in the sense of making him happy; that which is sought for its own sake and not for the sake of something else and is sufficient for happiness. Neither pleasure nor wisdom alone suffice to give happiness, so we seek a mixture that is harmonious, so it maximizes our happiness. This mixture must include some wisdom, which is consistent with true pleasures unmixed with pain, the same that we found to be most satisfying even when we considered pleasure alone. We discard those pleasures that are anitithetical to wisdom.
Since the absolute good is a mixture of pleasure and wisdom, we identify the qualities of the mixture as the greatest exemplars of good: the first quality of mixture is measure, moderation; second is beauty, symmetry, decorum; then comes mind and wisdom, which are most akin to truth, a property of mixture. Note that truth ranks third! So far is Plato from a mere will to truth,
he makes it subordinate to beauty. Next come the arts, practical sciences and true opinions. These are more akin to pleasure than good insofar as they deal with transient things rather than the eternal. They belong to the psyche rather than the nous. Only then do we get to pleasures, and even here we admit only those pleasures of the psyche that accompany knowledge and perceptions, and are compatible with wisdom. From purely utilitarian
considerations, i.e., seeking what makes man most happy, we arrive at a decidedly non-hedonistic account of the Good. What remains is to determine practical principles whereby we might attain the desired harmony (moderation), beauty (decorum) and true knowledge that are most essential to the absolute good (for humans), though they cannot complete our happiness unless accompanied by the pleasure or enjoyment of reflecting upon them.
[1] See: Charles H. Kahn. Book review: The Pseudo-Platonic Seventh Letter.
Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, Nov. 2015.
[2] Plato. Parmenides. In: Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vol. VI, translated by Harold N. Fowler. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd., 1926.
[3] Plato. Philebus. In: Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vol. III, translated by Harold N. Fowler. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd., 1925.
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