Sunday, May 29, 2016

3 Socrates in Aristophanes, Plato, and Xenophon

The Clouds opens with Strepsiades’ soliloquy; he cannot sleep, he curses the war – The Clouds was staged in 423, during the Peloponnesian war – he curses his extravagant son, he dreads his creditors. Finally, he thinks up a way of how to avoid paying the creditors. He wakes up his son Pheidippides: ‘Look here! Do you see this door and this house?’ – Ph.: ‘I do. But what is this all about, father?’ – Str. ‘This is a Thinkery of wise souls (psuchȏn sophȏn tout’ esti phrontistȇrion). There live men (entauth’ enoikous’ andres) who persuade by speaking that the heaven is a “choker” (hoi ton ouranon legontes anapeithousin hȏs estin pnigeus), and it is around us (k’astin peri hȇmas houtos), and we are charcoal (hȇmeis d’ anthrakes). They teach (houtoi didaskous’), if someone gives them money (argyrion ȇn tis didȏi), to win by speaking (legonta nikan), right and wrong (kai dikaia k’adika).’ – Ph.: ‘Who are they (eisin de tines)? – Str.: ‘I don’t exactly know their name (ouk oid’ akribȏs t’ounoma); they are subtle thinkers (merimnophrontistai), beautiful and good (kaloi te k’agathoi).’ – Ph.: ‘Ah (aiboi), those wretches (ponȇroi g’), I know (oida). You mean those braggarts (tous alazonas), pale (tous ȏchriȏntas), barefoot (anupodȇtous legeis), among them the miserable Socrates (hȏn ho kakodaimȏn Sȏkratȇs) and Chaerephon (kai Chairephȏn).’ (91-104)

Strepsiades, who wants to send his son to the Thinkery of the ‘wise souls’ to learn forensic oratory so that he wins any lawsuit his creditors might bring against him, does not even know the name of Socrates. And so he mixes together bits of relevant information and complete misinformation. Consider his introductory identification of Socrates and his disciples as ‘wise souls’ (psuchȏn sophȏn). Dover comments: ‘psuchȏn: Souls are insubstantial and, as we shall see, the philosophers are not “real men” but pale and feeble.’ This certainly is how Strepsiades’ son Pheidippides views them (lines 102-4). But there is much more to it, for in Plato’s Alcibiades Socrates persuades his young friend that ‘man is the soul’ (hȇ psuchȇ estin anthrȏpos, 130c5-6), ‘so that he commands us to know our soul (psuchȇn ara hȇmas keleuei gnȏrisai) who commands “Know thyself”( ho epitattȏn gnȏnai sauton, 130e8-9). At the time when Aristophanes wrote The Clouds the relationship between Socrates and Alcibiades must have been the talk of the town.

When Strepsiades tells his son that the men are ‘subtle thinkers beautiful and good (kaloi te k’agathoi), this phrase, which expresses Socrates’ ideal of moral and intellectual integrity, triggers an instant recognition in the city-wise Pheidippides. Let me quote two passages from Xenophon’s Memorabilia concerning Socrates and his ideal of kalokagathia: ‘He always discussed human things in his investigations (autos de peri tȏn anthrȏpinȏn aei dielegeto skopȏn). What is godly (ti eusebes), what is ungodly (ti asebes); what is beautiful (ti kalon), what is ugly (ti aischron); what is just (ti dikaion), what is unjust (ti adikon); what is prudence (ti sȏphrosunȇ), what is madness (ti mania); what is courage (ti andreia), what is cowardice (ti deilia); what is a state (ti polis), what is a statesman (ti politikos); what is government (ti archȇ anthrȏpȏn), and what is a governor (ti archikos anthrȏpȏn); – and concerning other such things (kai peri tȏn allȏn), the knowledge of which (ha tous men eidotas), he believed (hȇgeito), would make men beautiful and good (kalous k’agathous einai).’ (I.i.16)

Pheidippides linked Socrates’ kalokagathia with his being barefoot. Xenophon links it in his next passage with ‘Socrates’ endurance of cold and heat and every kind of toil’ (pros cheimȏna kai theros kai pantas ponous karterikȏtatos): ‘Making his followers desire virtue (aretȇs poiȇsas epithumein), he gave them hope (kai elpidas paraschȏn) that if they take proper care of themselves (an heautȏn epimelȏntai), they will become beautiful and good (kalous k’agathous esesthai).’ (I.ii.2-3)

The Wikipedia defines kalokagathia as ‘a phrase used by classical Greek writers to describe an ideal of gentlemanly personal conduct. Socrates gave it a new meaning, where kalos, ‘beautiful’, means in the first place the beauty of the soul. The best example of the way Socrates understood this ideal can be found in Plato’s Theaetetus. A geometrician Theodorus praises Theaetetus, one of his disciples, as an exceptionally endowed and talented young man. He tells Socrates: ‘He isn’t beautiful (ouk esti kalos), but resembles you in the snubness of his nose and the prominence of his eyes’ (143e8-9). When Theaetetus joins them, Socrates engages him in a discussion on knowledge, and at one point he asks him: ‘But what about the power which makes clear to you that which is common to everything (hȇ de dia tinos dunamis to t’ epi pasi koinon dȇloi soi) … that to which you apply the words “is” (hȏi to ‘estin’ onomazeis), “is not” (kai to ‘ouk esti’) and the others we used in our questions just now (kai ha nundȇ ȇrȏtȏmen peri autȏn)? What is that power exercised by means of? What sort of instruments are you going to assign to all those things (toutois pasi poia apodȏseis organa), by means of which the perceiving element in us perceives each of them (di hȏn aisthanetai hȇmȏn to aisthanomenon hekasta)?’ – Theaetetus: ‘You mean being (Ousian legeis) and not being (kai to mȇ einai), likeness (kai homoiotȇta) and unlikeness (kai anomoiotȇta), the same (kai to t’auton) and different (kai heteron), and also one (eti de hen te) and any other number (kai ton allon arithmon) applied to them (peri autȏn). And it’s clear (dȇlon de) that your question is also about odd and even (hoti kai artion te kai peritton erȏtais), and everything else that goes with those (kai t’alla hosa toutois hepetai). What you’re asking is by means of what part of the body (dia tinos pote tȏn tou sȏmatos) we perceive them with our soul (tȇi psuchȇi aisthanometha).’ – Socrates: ‘You follow me perfectly, Theaetetus (Hupereu, ȏ Theaitȇte, akoloutheis). That’s exactly what I’m asking (kai estin ha erȏtȏ auta tauta).’ – Theaetetus: ‘Well, good heavens (Alla ma Dia), Socrates (ȏ Sȏkrates), I couldn’t say (egȏge ouk an echoimi eipein); except that I think (plȇn g’hoti moi dokei) there simply isn’t any instrument of that kind (tȇn archȇn oud einai toiouton ouden toutois organon) particular to those things (idion), as is in the case of those others (hȏsper ekeinois) [eyes for seeing, ears for hearing, etc., J.T.]. On the contrary, it seems to me that the soul itself, by means of itself (all autȇ di’ hautȇs hȇ psuchȇ), considers the things which apply in common to everything (ta koina moi phainetai peri pantȏn episkopein).’ – Socrates: ‘Theaetetus, you’re beautiful (Kalos gar ei, ȏ Theaitȇte), not ugly, as Theodorus was saying (kai ouch, hȏs elege Theodȏros, aischros); because someone who speaks beautifully (ho gar kalȏs legȏn) is beautiful and good (kalos te kai agathos).’ (185c4-e5; tr. John McDowell, with few exceptions. McDowell translates tȇi psuchȇi at 185d3 ‘with our minds’, I translate ‘with our soul’ and hȇ psuchȇ at 185e1 ‘the mind’, I translate ‘the soul’; he translates kalos at 185e3 ‘handsome’ and kalȏs at 185e4 ‘handsomely’, I translate ‘beautiful’ and ‘beautifully’; he translates kalos te kai agathos at 185e4 ‘handsome and a fine person’, I translate ‘beautiful and good’.)

***

Socrates in the Apology is distancing himself from ‘a Socrates’ (Sȏkratȇ tina), whom the Athenians saw in the comedy of Aristophanes (en tȇi Aristophanous kȏmȏidiai) ‘swinging there around (ekei peripheromenon) and saying that he walks on air (phaskonta te aerobatein, 19c2-3).’ It seems that neither Socrates’ rejection of this picture at the trial, nor Plato’s immortalization of this rejection in the Apology succeeded in driving this comic scene out of the minds of Plato’s contemporaries. Or was it Plato’s sense of truth that prompted him to explain what Aristophanes saw in Socrates that prompted him to caricature Socrates swinging high in the air and saying: ‘I would never have truly discovered (ou gar an pote exȇuron) the matters on high (ta meteȏra pragmata) if I had not hung up (ei mȇ kremasas) my intellect (to noȇma) and my subtle thought (kai tȇn phrontida leptȇn) had not mixed in the similar air (katameixas es ton homoion aera, Ar. Cl. 227-9)’? For Socrates in the Theaetetus – on his way to the King Archon’s office to face the charge Meletus has brought against him (epi tȇn Melȇtou graphȇn hȇn me gegraptai, 210d2-3’ – described the true philosopher as follows: ‘It’s only his body that’s in the state (tȏi onti to sȏma monon en tȇi polei keitai), here on a visit (autou kai epidȇmei), whereas his intellect (hȇ de dianoia) … flies about everywhere (pantachȇi petetai), as Pindar says (kata Pindaron), “in the depths of the earth” (tas te gas hupenerthe), and on the surfaces when it does geometry (kai ta epipeda geȏmetrousa), and “above the heavens” (ouranou th’ huper) when it does astronomy (astronomousa), searching in every way into the total nature of each of the things which are (kai pasan pantȇi phusin ereunȏmenȇ tȏn ontȏn hekastou holou).’ (173e2-174a1, tr. McDowell)

Friday, May 27, 2016

2 Socrates in Aristophanes, Plato, and Xenophon

In the post I put yesterday on my blog I argued that Socrates’ distancing himself in the Apology from ‘a Socrates’ (Sȏkratȇ tina) whom the Athenians saw in the comedy of Aristophanes should not prevent us from enjoying his caricature in The Clouds. More can be said about the points I made there.

In The Clouds 193-4 a would be disciple of Socrates, Strepsiades, asks, pointing at Socrates’ disciples he can see at the forecourt of Socrates’ ‘Thinkery’: ‘But why is their anus looking into the heaven?’ The disciple accompanying him replies: ‘It itself on itself (autos kath’ hauton) learns to do astronomy (astronomein didasketai).’ Yesterday I observed: ‘Note the phrase autos kath’ hauton; Aristophanes appears to make fun of the expression with which Socrates in Plato’s dialogues characterizes the Forms. See e.g. Plato’s Symposium where Diotima introduces the young Socrates to the notion of the Beauty auto kath’ hauto ‘itself in itself’ (211b1).’

Most of the past year I was preoccupied with arguing that Plato’s insistence on the historicity of the discussion between a very young Socrates, Zeno, and a very old Parmenides, which he enacted in his Parmenides, ought to be taken seriously. (See ‘Plato’s defence of the Forms in the Parmenides’ on my website.)

In the dialogue, Socrates asks Zeno: ‘Do you not acknowledge that there exists (ou nomizeis einai) itself in itself (auto kath’ hauto) some Form of similarity (eidos ti homoiotȇtos)?’ (128e6-129a1) With this question the young Socrates introduces his theory of Forms in the Parmenides; Parmenides subjects it to criticism, yet insists that if anyone rejects the Forms, ‘not allowing the Form of each thing to be always the same’ (mȇ eȏn idean tȏn ontȏn hekastou tȇn autȇn aei einai), ‘he will thus utterly destroy the power of philosophic discussion’ (houtȏs tȇn tou dialegesthai dunamin pantapasi diaphtherei, 135c2-3).

In The Clouds Socrates’ Deity, the Clouds, which form the Chorus, enter the stage with the words: ‘Shaking off the rainy cloud (aposeisamenai nephos ombrion) from immortal Form (athanatas ideas), let us view (epidȏmetha) the earth with a far-reaching eye (tȇleskopȏi ommati gaian). (286-290).’

What can the ‘immortal Form’ of the Deity possibly be? The Clouds enter the scene as ‘maidens carrying rain’ (parthenoi ombrophoroi, 299). Strepsiades asks: ‘What happened to them (ti pathousai), if they are truly clouds (eiper nephelai g’ eisin alȇthȏs), that they look like mortal women (thnȇtais eiksasi gunaixin, 340-1)?’ Socrates answers: ‘They become everything they want to’ (gignontai panth’ hoti bulontai, 349). Thus on seeing a man who is stealing from public property: ‘showing his nature (apophainousai tȇn phusin autou), they suddenly became wolves (lukoi exaiphnȇs egenonto, 351-2). ‘Yesterday they saw Cleonymus, the greatest coward who threw away his shield; because of it they became deer’ (elaphoi dia tout’ egenonto, 353-4). – Dover explains in his edition of The Clouds: ‘elaphoi: Proverbislly timid’ – ‘And now (kai nun g’), since they have seen Cleisthenes (hoti Kleisthenȇ eidon), you can see (horais), because of it they became women (dia tout’ egenonto gunaikes, 355).’ – Dover explains: ‘Kleisthenȇ: The stock effeminate of the Old Comedy.’

Obviously, the female form in which the Chorus enters the stage is not the ‘immortal Form’ of the deity. To get a notion of it, we must look at what Socrates says about them: ‘They are the great goddesses (megalai theai) to men of leisure (andrasin argois); they (haiper) give as (hȇmin parechousin) thought (gnȏmȇn), discussion (dialexin), and intellect (kai noun, 316-17)’.

I see Socrates’ view of ‘discussion’ dialexin as a divine gift as particularly important. Firstly, because Parmenides insisted that whoever denies the existence of Forms utterly destroys ‘the power of discussion’ (tȇn tou dialegesthai dunamin); secondly, because Socrates in Phaedrus – which, in harmony with the ancient biographic tradition I view as Plato’s first dialogue, written while Socrates was still alive (see The Lost Plato on my website) – says that all souls that enter the human body must have seen the Forms before entering it, ‘for man must understand (dei gar anthrȏpon sunienai) that which is spoken according to Form (kat’ eidos legomenon), as it comes from many sensations (ek pollȏn ion aisthȇseȏn) gathered together into one by reason (eis hen logismȏi sunairoumenon, 249b’.

This second point gains on importance if we consider the version of the words of the Clouds preserved by all the codices with the exception of the codex Ravennas: athanatais ideais epidȏmetha tȇleskopȏi ommati gaian, which means ‘let us see the earth by means of immortal Forms with the far-reaching eye’. The human souls in the Phaedrus can use speech and understand what is spoken only because of their transcendental memory, that is memory they acquired by directly seeing the Forms prior to entering the human Form, memory that is operative in every speech act. According to this version of the Chorus’ words, Socrates’ Deity views the things on earth directly by means of the immortal Forms.

Aristophanes wrote two versions of The Clouds, and the text we have is a combination of the two. I believe that both versions of the lines 286-290, the Ravennas’ version and the version preserved by the other codices, are authentic, each belonging to a different version of the play. For each version of those lines highlights different aspects of Socrates’ Forms. (See ‘Introduction’ Ch. IX. ‘The two versions of the play’, in Dover’s edition of The Clouds, Oxford University Press 1968.)

Thursday, May 26, 2016

1 Socrates in Aristophanes, Plato, and Xenophon

When Bertrand Russell wrote the History of Western Philosophy, he could still write that Socrates ‘was unquestionably a well-known figure in Athens, since Aristophanes caricatured him in The Clouds.’ (p. 89) This changed with Popper, who in The Open Society and its Enemies promoted the principle that ‘Plato’s evidence is the only first-rate evidence available to us’: ‘Burnet has applied this principle to Xenophon; but we must apply it also to Aristophanes, whose evidence was rejected by Socrates himself, in the Apology’. Popper goes on to say: ‘The Socrates of the Apology very impressively repeats three times (18b-c; 19c-d; 23d) that he is not interested in natural philosophy.’ Reflecting on the use made by Burnet and Taylor [Taylor was the only important disciple and adherent of Burnet] of Aristophanes’ evidence, Popper says: ‘They hold that Aristophanes’ jests would be pointless if Socrates had not been a natural philosopher. But it so happens that Socrates (I always assume, with Burnet and Taylor, that the Apology is historical) foresaw this very argument. In his apology, he warned his judges against this very interpretation of Aristophanes, insisting most earnestly that he had neither little nor much to do with natural philosophy, but simply nothing at all. Socrates felt as if he were fighting against shadows in this matter, against the shadows of the past; but we can now say that he was also fighting the shadows of the future.’ (Op. cit. n. 56 on Chapter 10, pp. 307-8)

Socrates says in the Apology that he has no part in ‘knowledge’ which the natural philosophers claim to possess. Distancing himself from the caricature of ‘a Socrates’ (Sȏkratȇ tina), whom the Athenians saw in the comedy of Aristophanes (en tȇi Aristophanous kȏmȏidiai) ‘carried there around (ekei peripheromenon) and saying that he walks on air (phaskonta te aerobatein), and talking a lot of other nonsense (kai allȇn pollȇn phluarian pluarounta), about things of which I do not know either much or little (hȏn egȏ ouden oute mega oute mikron peri epaiȏ)’, Socrates insists: ‘not that I mean to speak disparagingly of this kind of knowledge (kai ouch hȏs atimazȏn legȏ tȇn toiautȇn epistȇmȇn), if someone has wisdom concerning such things (ei tis peri tȏn toioutȏn sophos estin) … But I have no part in these things (alla gar emoi toutȏn ouden metestin).’ (19c2-8).
With this in mind, let us look at The Clouds. Strepsiades, the ‘Twister’, as his name says, enters the courtyard in front of Socrates’ ‘Thinkery’ (phrontistȇrion). He points at men he can see there looking in the earth and asks why they are doing it (ti pot’ es tȇn gȇn blepousi houtoii). The disciple of Socrates, who let Strepsiades in, answers: ‘They search into the things down under the earth’ (zȇtousi houtoi ta kata gȇs). – Str.: ‘And what are doing these men, bending right down?’ – Disc.: ‘They gape about in Erebos under the Tartaros.’ – Str. ‘But why their anus is looking into the heaven? (ti dȇth’ ho prȏktos es ton ouranon blepei)’  (Dover notes on line 193 in his edition of The Clouds: 'prȏktos is "anus", not "buttocks", and the superficial resemblance between anus and eye makes blepei ['looks'] more vivid.') – Disc. ‘It itself on itself learns to do astronomy (autos kath’ hauton astronomein didasketai).’ (Ar. Cl. 187-194) – Note the phrase autos kath’ hauton; Aristophanes appears to make fun of the expression with which Socrates in Plato’s dialogues characterizes the Forms. See e.g. Plato’s Symposium where Diotima introduces the young Socrates to the notion of the Beauty auto kath’ hauto ‘itself in itself’ (211b1). – After thus being forcefully reminded of Socrates, the disciple turns to his fellow disciples who are engaged in the study of natural philosophy: ‘But get in that you are not caught by Him (all’ eisith’, hina mȇ ‘keinos humin epituchȇi, 195)!’ – Obviously, studying natural philosophy, the disciples were doing something Socrates did not approve of.
Xenophon may help us to understand this point, where he says that Socrates recommended his followers ‘to make themselves familiar with astronomy, but only so far as to be able to find the time of night, month and year, in order to use reliable evidence when planning a journey by land or sea, or setting the watch, and in all other affairs that are done in the night or month or year, by distinguishing the times and seasons aforesaid. This knowledge, again, was easily to be had from night hunters and pilots and others who made it their business to know such things. But he strongly deprecated studying astronomy so far as to include the knowledge of bodies revolving in different courses, and of planets and comets, and wearing oneself out with the calculation of their distance from the earth, their periods of revolution and the causes of these. Of such researches, again he said that he could not see what useful purpose they served. He had indeed attended lectures on these subjects too; but these again, he said, were enough to occupy a lifetime to the complete exclusion of many useful studies.’ (Xen. Mem. IV. vii. 4-5)

Let me yet bring in the scene to which Socrates refers in the Apology: ‘a Socrates carried there around and saying that he walks on air’ (19c3). Strepsiades asks Socrates, who is hanging in a basket in the air, what he is doing. Socrates: ‘I walk in the air and think about the Sun (aerobatȏ kai periphronȏ ton hȇlion)’. – Str.: ‘So you look down upon the gods from the basket? (epeit’ apo tarrou tous theus huperphroneis)’ (224-226) Dover notes on periphronȏ in line 225: ‘Socrates means “think about”.’ On huperphroneis in line 226 Dover notes: ‘Strepsiades treats Socrates as physically above the divine beings who are the object of his study … huperphronein has something of the flavour of perioran, “regard as unimportant”, and huperphronein is always “be proud” or “despise”. The English “look down on” is a suitable translation here.’

Here we can see with what prescience Socrates in the Apology began by defending himself against the old charges raised against him: ‘Socrates is an evil-doer; a meddler who searches into things under the earth and in heaven,’ which the judges could see in Aristophanes’ comedy (Pl. Ap. 19b-c). His accuser Meletus acts in the Apology exactly like Strepsiades, the Twister, acted in The Clouds. When Meletus claims that Socrates is an atheist, the latter asks: ‘Why do you say these things (hina ti tauta legeis), Meletus? So, I believe that neither the sun nor moon are gods? (oude hȇlion uode selȇnȇn ara nomizȏ theous einai)’ – Meletus: ‘I assure you, judges, that he does not: for he says that the sun is stone (epei ton men hȇlion lithon phȇsin einai), and the moon earth (tȇn de selȇnȇn gȇn).’ – Socrates: ‘Do you think that you are accusing Anaxagoras (Anaxagorou oiei katȇgorein)?’ (26c-d)

Reading Apology 26c-d against the background of Socrates’ observations about the Sun in Xenophon’s Memorabilia, as he refutes Anaxagoras’ views about the Sun (for this see the last paragraph in my preceding post on ‘Socrates in Plato and Xenophon’), we can better appreciate the corresponding scene in Aristophanes’ comedy with Socrates’ ‘I think about the Sun’.

Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Socrates in Plato and Xenophon

Burnet’s attempt to give the Phaedo back to the reader failed miserably, but his discrediting of Xenophon as a source of information on the historical Socrates one the day. K. R. Popper writes: ‘It is to Burnet that we owe our insight into the following principle of method. Plato’s evidence is the only first-rate evidence available to us; all other evidence is secondary.’

Popper identifies the historical Socrates with the Apology – ‘I always assume, with Burnet and Taylor, that the Apology is historical’ – and then he maintains that the Socrates of the Apology cannot be reconciled with the Phaedo; in the Phaedo ‘Socrates appears as a Pythagorean philosopher of “nature”,’ whereas ‘the Socrates of the Apology very impressively repeats three times (18b-c; 19c-d; 23d) that he is not interested in natural philosophy (and therefore not a Pythagorean): “I know nothing, neither much nor little, about such things”, he said (19c); “I, men of Athens, have nothing whatever to do with such things” (i.e. with speculation about nature). Socrates asserts that many who are present at the trial could testify to the truth of this statement; they have heard him speak, but neither in few nor in many words has anybody ever heard him speak about matters of natural philosophy (emou peri tȏn toioutȏn dialegomenou, 19d4-5) … any doubt of Socrates’ veracity in the Apology makes of him one who lies for the sake of saving his skin.’ (The Open Society and its Enemies, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London and Henley, 1966, repr. 1977, vol. I, n. 56 to Ch. 10, pp. 307-8.)

If Socrates’ dialegomenou means ‘speaking about’, then Popper is right. But if this were so, Socrates was lying in the Apology itself. For when Meletus accuses him of claiming that ‘the sun is stone and the moon is earth’, Socrates ridicules him for mistaking him for Anaxagoras ‘whose books (ta Anaxagorou biblia) are full of these doctrines (gemei toutȏn tȏn logȏn) … which are so absurd (houtȏs atopa onta).’

Socrates’ dialegesthai does not mean ‘speak about’, it means to search, to try to find out by means of logos, through discussion. To understand this point better, we must go to Xenophon. For his Socrates was saying that Anaxagoras ‘in declaring the sun to be fire, ignored the facts that men can look at fire without inconvenience, but cannot gaze steadily at the sun; that their skin is blackened by the sun’s rays, but not by fire. Further, he ignored the fact that sunlight is essential to the health of all vegetation, whereas if anything is heated by fire it withers. Again, when he pronounced the sun to be a red-hot stone, he ignored the fact that a stone in fire neither glows nor can resist it long, whereas the sun shines with unequalled brilliance for ever.’ (Xenophon, Memorabilia IV. vii. 7, tr. E. C. Marchant)

Socrates was a much better observer of the sun than Anaxagoras, he reflected on what we can learn about it with the help of our senses, and this is why he realized that he did not know and could not find any ways of knowing what the sun truly is, what causes it to be the way it is. Xenophon says that Socrates ‘did not even discuss (oude dielegeto skopȏn) that topic so favoured by other talkers, “the Nature of the Universe” (peri tȇs tȏn pantȏn phuseȏs); and avoided speculation on the so-called “Cosmos” of the Professors, how it works (hopȏs ho kaloumenos hupo tȏn sophistȏn kosmos ephu), and on the laws that govern the phenomena of the heavens (kai tisin anankais hekasta gignetai tȏn ouraniȏn) … Moreover, he marvelled at their blindness in not seeing (ethaumaze d’ ei mȇ phaneron autois estin) that man cannot solve these riddles (hoti tauta ou dunaton estin anthrȏpois heurein); since even the most conceited (epei kai tous megiston phronountas) talkers on these problems (epi tȏi peri toutȏn legein) did not agree in their theories [with one another, J.T.] (ou t’auta doxazein allȇlois) … Some hold that What is is one (tois men dokein hen monon to hen einai), others that it is infinite in number (tois d’ apeira to plȇthos); some that all things are in perpetual motion (kai tois men aei hapanta kineisthai), others that nothing can ever be moved at any time (tois d’ ouden an pote kinȇthȇnai); some that all life is birth and decay (kai tois men panta gignesthai te kai apollusthai), others that nothing can ever be born or ever die (tois de out’ and genesthai pote ouden oute apolesthai).’ (Xenophon, Memorabilia I. i. 11-14, tr. Marchant)

Tuesday, May 24, 2016

Plato’s Phaedo and John Burnet on Xenophon’s Socrates

Russell says in his History of Western Philosophy that Burnet suggests that Xenophon is copying Plato in depicting Socrates. This served Russell as a major factor in his refraining from discussing the historical Socrates, and, in this respect, the majority of classical philosophers are in harmony with Bertrand Russell. So let us examine the reasons that led Burnet to his view.

John Burnet says in the ‘Introduction’ to his edition of Plato’s Phaedo: ‘If only we may take the Phaedo for what it professes to be, it surely stands quite by itself in European literature. It does not, indeed, claim to be a word for word report of all Socrates said to the inner circle of his followers on the day he drank the poison in prison. By letting us know incidentally (59b10) that he was not present, Plato seems to decline responsibility for the literal exactitude of every detail … We are certainly led to believe that it gives us a truthful record of the subjects on which Socrates discoursed on the last day of his life, and of his manner of treating them. No reader who made his first acquaintance with Socrates here could possibly suppose anything else … it is the likeness of a great philosopher in the supreme crisis of his life, drawn by a philosopher who was greater still, and was also one of the most consummate dramatic artists the world has known. It would not be easy to find the match of such a work.’ (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1911, reprinted 1977, pp. IX-X)

In his effort to give back to the reader the possibility of re-living the last day of Socrates with his disciples Burnet found it imperative to discredit Xenophon as an independent source of information about Socrates: ‘The interpretation which finds nothing in the Phaedo but the speculations of Plato himself is based on the belief that “the historical Socrates”, of whom we may get some idea from Xenophon, is quite a different person from “the Platonic Socrates”. What the latter is made to say is treated as evidence for the philosophy of Plato, but not for that of Socrates himself … The general acceptance of this in recent times is apparently due to the authority of Hegel. Speaking of Socrates, he lays down that “we must hold chiefly to Xenophon in regard to the content of his knowledge, and the degree in which his thought was developed” [Gesch. Der Phil. II. 69), and this dictum became a sort of dogma with the Hegelian and semi-Hegelian writers to whom we owe so much of the best nineteenth-century work in the history of Greek philosophy.’ (pp. XII-XIII)

Burnet protested against this view of the Phaedo: ‘I cannot bring myself to believe that Plato falsified the story of his master’s last hours on earth by using him as a mere mouthpiece for novel doctrines of his own.’ (p. XI)

Burnet’s attempt to give the Phaedo back to the reader failed miserably. A whole section of the Sixth International Congress of Philosophy, held in 1927 in New York, was devoted to the condemnation of his views. (See The Lost Plato on my website, ‘The Introduction’) What nevertheless prevailed was his discrediting of Xenophon as a source of information on the historical Socrates.

Monday, May 23, 2016

Bertrand Russell on Socrates

In the introductory paragraph of his Chapter entitled ‘Socrates’ Russell mentions that Socrates was unquestionably a well-known figure in Athens, since Aristophanes caricatured him in The Clouds. He says that two of his pupils, Xenophon and Plato ‘wrote voluminously about him, but they said very different things. Even where they agree, it has been suggested by Burnet that Xenophon is copying Plato. Where they disagree, some believe the one, some the other, some neither. In such a dangerous dispute, I shall not venture to take sides.’

The second paragraph he opens as follows: ‘Let us begin with Xenophon, a military man, not very liberally endowed with brains, and on the whole conventional in his outlook.’ (Bertrand Russell, History of Western Philosophy, Routledge Classics, 1996, p. 89). Reading Russell’s words, I can’t help thinking of Xenophon’s Memorabilia, Symposium, Cyropaedia, Hellenica, and Anabasis

Passing on to Plato, Russell concentrates his attention to Plato’s Apology. He says that Socrates points out ‘that he is not a man of science, that he is not a teacher, and does not make money for teaching. He goes on to make fun of the Sophists, and to disclaim knowledge that they profess to have.’ (p. 92)

Russell does not elaborate on ‘knowledge the Sophists profess to have’; he devoted to them the preceding chapter entitled ‘Protagoras’ in which he wrote that what the Sophists ‘had to teach was not, in their minds, connected with religion or virtue. They taught the art of arguing, and as much knowledge as would help in this art.’ The passage in the Apology, which Russell in ‘Socrates’ characterizes with the words ‘He goes on to make fun of the Sophists, and to disclaim knowledge that they profess to have’ is the following:

‘If a man were really able to instruct mankind (ei tis hoios t’ eiȇ paideuein anthrȏpous) … there is Gorgias of Leontium, and Prodicus of Ceos, and Hippias of Elis, who go the round of cities, and are able to persuade the young men to leave their own citizens by whom they might be taught for nothing, and come to them whom they not only pay, but are thankful if they may be allowed to pay them … I came across a man who has spent a world of money on the Sophists, Callias … I asked him … Is there any one who understands human and political virtue (tis tȇs toiautȇs aretȇs, tȇs anthrȏpinȇs te kai politikȇs, epistȇmȏn estin)? … “There is … Evenus the Parian … and his charge is five minae.” Happy is Evenus, I said to myself, if he really has this wisdom, and teaches at such a moderate charge.’ (19e2-20c1, tr. Jowett)

Russell writes: ‘The indictment had said that Socrates not only denied the gods of the State, but introduced other gods of his own; Meletus [Socrates’ official accuser], however, says that Socrates is a complete atheist, and adds: “He says that the sun is stone and the moon earth.” Socrates replies that Meletus seems to think he is prosecuting Anaxagoras, whose views may be heard in the theatre for one drachma (presumably in the plays of Euripides).’ (p. 93)

I wondered, how it happened to Russell that he understood Socrates as saying that ‘Anaxagoras’ views may be heard in the theatre for one drachma’, when in fact Socrates maintained that Anaxagoras’ books could be bought for one drachma. Luckily, I have got Jowett’s original translation of Plato, published in Hutchins’ Great Books of the Western World, which explains Russell’s mistake. Jowett’s original translation is as follows: ‘Friend Meletus (ȏ phile Melȇte), you think that you are accusing Anaxagoras (Anaxagorou oiei katȇgorein): and you have but a bad opinion of the judges (kai houtȏ kataphroneis tȏnde), if you fancy them illiterate to such a degree (kai oieis autous apeirous grammatȏn einai) as not to know (hȏste ouk eidenai) that these doctrines are found in the books of Anaxagoras the Clazomenian (hoti ta Anaxagorou biblia tou Klazomeniou gemei toutȏn tȏn logȏn) … when there are not unfrequently exhibitions of them at the theatre (price of admission one drachma at the most) (ha exestin eniote ei panu pollou drachmȇs ek tȇs orchȇstras priamenois).’ (26d6-e1)

In Jowett’s translation published by Jowett Copyright Trustees in 1970 the relevant words are given as follows: ‘when they can be bought in the book-market for one drachma at most’. J. Burnet in his edition of the Apology explains in his note on ek tȇs orchȇstras at 26e1 that the name orchȇstra was given ‘not only to the orchestra in the Dionysiac theatre, but also to the part of the Agora where the statues of Harmodius and Aristogeiton stood … There is no evidence that the book-market was there, but it is hardly possible to understand the words of the text otherwise.’ (Plato, Euthyphro, Apology of Socrates, Crito, edited with notes by John Burnet, Oxford University Press, 1924)

Russell writes in the ‘Socrates’: ‘Dialectic, that is to say, the method of seeking knowledge by question and answer, was not invented by Socrates. It seems to have been first practised systematically by Zeno, the disciple of Parmenides; in Plato’s dialogue Parmenides, Zeno subjects Socrates to the same kind of treatment to which, elsewhere in Plato, Socrates subjects others.’ (p. 97)

Diogenes Laertius says in his ‘Life of Zeno’ that ‘Aristotle says that Zeno was the inventor of dialectic’ (IX. 25). But in Plato’s Parmenides it is Parmenides who subjects Socrates to questioning, not Zeno. Zeno is subjected to questioning by the young Socrates and Parmenides chastises the latter for getting engaged in such activities before being properly trained (Pl. Parm. 135c-d).

Sunday, May 22, 2016

2 Bertrand Russell on Sophists

In the ‘Preface’ to his History of Western Philosophy Russell writes: ‘This book owes its existence to Dr Albert C. Barnes, having been originally designed and partly delivered as lectures at the Barnes Foundation in Pennsylvania.’ In his Autobiography, in Chapter 13, ‘America 1938-1944’, he writes: ‘My duties with Dr Barnes began at the New Year of 1941 … I was warned before accepting his offer that he always tired of people before long, so I exacted a five-year contract from him. On December 28th, 1942, I got a letter from him informing me that my appointment was terminated as from January 1st … When my case came into court, Dr Barnes complained that I had done insufficient work for my lectures. So far as they had gone, they consisted of the first two-thirds of my History of Western Philosophy, of which I submitted the manuscript to the judge, though I scarcely suppose he read it. Dr Barnes complained of my treatment of the men whom he called Pither-gawras and Empi-Dokkles. I observed the judge taking notice, and I won my case.’ (Published in the Routledge Classics in 2010, pp. 442-443)

Russell does not explain who Pither-gawras and Empi-Dokkles were meant to be, but if Ctesippus was one of these, Dr Barnes had a point. Russell wrote in his History: ‘Take the following passage from the Euthydemus, in which two Sophists, Dionysodorus and Euthydemus, set to work to puzzle a simple-minded person named Ctesippus.’ For Ctesippus depicted by Plato in his dialogue is anything but simple-minded. In my post on ‘The royal logos in Plato’s Sophist and the royal art in his Euthydemus’ I included a passage in which Ctesippus enters the dialogue:

Socrates was eager to see ‘where the sophists would start in their exhortation to the young man [Cleinias] that he should practice wisdom and virtue (283a3-4). Dionysosorus, the elder of the two brothers, began as follows: ‘Tell me, Socrates and the rest of you who say that you want this young man to become wise, are you in jest or in real earnest?’ When Socrates answered that they were all in profound earnest, Dionysodorus resumed his questioning of Socrates: ‘And so you say that you wish Cleinias to become wise … And he is not wise yet … you wish him to become wise and not ignorant … You wish him to be what he is not, and no longer to be what he is? … You wish him no longer to be what he is, which can only mean that you wish him to perish. Pretty lovers and friends they must be who want their favourite not to be, or to perish.’ Ctesippus angrily interposed: ‘What can make you tell such a lie about me and the others, which I hardly like to repeat, as that I wish Cleinias to perish?’ Euthydemus stepped in: ‘And do you think, Ctesippus, that it is possible to tell a lie?’ – Ctesippus: ‘I should be mad to say anything else.’ – Euthydemus: ‘And in telling a lie, do you tell the thing of which you speak or not? … And he who tells, tells that thing which he tells, and no other? … And that is a distinct thing apart from other things? … And he who says that thing says that which is? … And he who says that which is, says the truth. And therefore Dionysodorus, if he says that which is, says the truth of you and no lie.’ – Ctesippus: ‘But he is saying what is not.’ Euthydemus: ‘And that which is not is not? … And that which is not is nowhere? … And can anyone do anything about that which has no existence, or do to Cleinias that which is not and is nowhere? … Then no one says that which is not, for in saying what is not he would be doing something; and you have already acknowledged that no one can do what is not. And therefore, upon your own showing (hȏste kata ton son logon), no one says what is false (oudeis pseudȇ legei); but if Dionysodorus says anything (all’ eiper legei Dionusodȏros), he says what is true and what is (t’alȇthȇ te kai ta onta legei).’ (283b4-284c6, tr. Jowett)

It is thus in the discussion with Ctesippus that Euthydemus raises the question ‘And do you think, Ctesippus, that it is possible to tell a lie (ȇ dokei soi hoion t’ einai pseudesthai)?’ which becomes the philosophical crux of the dialogue, supported as it is by Euthydemus’ claim – which goes back to Parmenides – that not being is not, which, thus linked, lie in the centre of Plato’s Sophist.

I quoted the given passage in my post before reading Russell’s chapter on ‘Protagoras’; Russell’s verdict on Ctesippus compels me to bring in some more. Ctesippus responded to Euthydemus’ last words as follows: ‘Yes, Euthydemus; but he speaks of things in a certain way and manner (alla ta onta men tropon tina legei), and not as they really are (ou mentoi hȏs echei).’ (284c7-8, tr. Jowett)

***
I can’t help breaking the flow of the passage, for I must comment on the problem of translation. Jowett translated ta onta at 284c6 – Euthydemus’ last words – as ‘what is’, but in Ctesippus’ response he translates ta onta as ‘things’. To Euthydemus’ ‘but if Dionysodorus says anything (all’ eiper legei Dionusodȏros), he says what is true and what is (t’alȇthȇ te kai ta onta legei)’ Ctesippus replies: ‘But he says “which is” in a certain manner (alla ta onta men tropon tina legei), but not as it is (ou mentoi hȏs echei).’ Of course there is a problem; ta onta is in the plural, ‘what is’ is in the singular.

I can’t help reflecting on ‘Russel’s struggles with certainty’, which I discussed in one of my earlier posts: Russel opened The Problems of Philosophy with a question: ‘Is there any knowledge in the world which is so certain that no reasonable man can doubt it?’ … Russel wrote in the ‘Postscript’ to his Autobiography that up to the age of thirty-eight he gave most of his energies to finding out whether anything could be known: ‘I wanted certainty in the kind of way in which people want religious faith. I thought that certainty is more likely to be found in mathematics than elsewhere. But I discovered that many mathematical demonstrations, which my teachers expected me to accept, were full of fallacies, and that, if certainty was indeed discoverable in mathematics, it would be in a new kind of mathematics, with more solid foundations than those that had hitherto been thought secure. But as the work proceeded, I was continually reminded of the fable about the elephant and the tortoise. Having constructed an elephant upon which the mathematical world could rest, I found the elephant tottering, and proceeded to construct a tortoise to keep the elephant from falling. But the tortoise was no more secure than the elephant.’

The quest for ‘certainty’ is not alien to the study of the history of philosophy. This quest led me inevitably to my learning English, German, French, Latin, and, most importantly, Ancient Greek. I put ‘certainty’ in quotation marks, for when one is doing one’s best in this field, one is always aware of the uncertainties involved.

***
Dionysodorus stepped in: ‘Why, Ctesippus, do you mean to say that any one speaks of things as they are?’ – Ct.: ‘Yes, all gentlemen and truth-speaking persons.’ – Dion.: ‘And are not good things good, and evil things evil?’ – Ctesippus assented. – Dion.: ‘And you say that gentlemen speak of things as they are?’ – Ct.: ‘Yes.’ – Dion.: ‘Then the good speak evil (Kakȏs ara legousin hoi agathoi) of evil things (ta kaka), if they speak of them as they are (eiper hȏs echei legousi)?’ [Again a point of translation. Jowett’s ‘Then the good speak evil of evil things’ misses the point, if I get the English right. When Dionysodorus says Kakȏs ara legousin hoi agathoi ta kaka, he means that the ‘good people speak badly’, i.e. incorrectly, ‘of bad things’.] – Ct.: ‘Yes, indeed, and they speak evil of evil men. And if I may give you a piece of advice, you had better take care that they do not speak evil of you, since I can tell you that the evil speak evil of the evil … I love you and am giving you my friendly advice, and, if I could, would persuade you not like a boor to say in my presence that I desire my beloved, whom I value above all men, to perish.’ (284c9-285a1, tr. Jowett)

When later on Socrates showed to the two sophists that their argument denying the possibility of error was self-refuting, Ctesippus was elated: ‘Men of Chios, Thurii, or however and whatever you call yourselves, I wonder at you, for you seem to have no objection to talking nonsense.’ (288a8-b2, tr. Jowett)

Let me end my defence of Ctesippus with the following passage. Socrates: ‘O heavens, Dionysodorus, I see now that you are in earnest; hardly have I got you to that point. And do you really and truly know all things, including carpentering and leather-cutting?’ – Dion.: ‘Certainly.’ – Soc.: ‘And do you know stitching?’ – Dion.: ‘Yes, by the gods, we do, and cobbling too.’ – Soc.: ‘And do you know such things as the number of the stars and of the sand?’ – Dion.: ‘Certainly; did you think we should say no to that?’ – At that point Ctesippus stepped in: ‘By Zeus, I only wish that you would give me some proof which would enable me to know whether you speak truly.’ – Dion.: ‘What proof shall I give you?’ – Ct.: ‘Will you tell me how many teeth Euthydemus has? And Euthydemus shall tell how many teeth you have.’ – Dion.: ’Will you not take our word that we know all things?’ – Ct.: ‘Certainly not, you must further tell us this one thing, and then we shall know that you are speaking the truth; if you tell us the number, and we count them, and you are found to be right, we shall believe the rest.’ (294b1-c10, tr. Jowett)

Saturday, May 21, 2016

1 Bertrand Russell on Sophists

Russell in the History of Western Philosophy discusses the Sophists in the Chapter entitled ‘Protagoras’. He says that ‘Plato devoted himself to caricaturing and vilifying them’, but that ‘they must not be judged by his polemics.’ He characterizes the Sophists with the help of two passages from Plato’s dialogues: ‘In his lighter vein, take the following passage from the Euthydemus, in which two Sophists, Dionysodorus and Euthydemus, set to work to puzzle a simple-minded person named Ctesippus. Dionysodorus begins: “You say that you have a dog? – Yes, a villain of a one, said Ctesippus. – And he has puppies? – Yes, and they are very like himself.’ – And the dog is the father of them? – Yes, he said, I certainly saw him and the mother of the puppies come together. –  And is he not yours? – To be sure he is. – Then he is a father, and he is yours; ergo, he is your father, and the puppies are your brothers.” In a more serious vein, take the dialogue called the Sophist … the only thing I want to mention … is the final conclusion: “The art of contradiction-making … that presents a shadow-play of words – such is the blood and lineage which can, with truth, be assigned to the authentic Sophist.”’

Russell maintains that what the Sophists ‘had to teach was not, in their minds, connected with religion or virtue. They taught the art of arguing, and as much knowledge as would help in this art.’

In the Euthydemus the two Sophists present themselves as follows: ‘The teaching of virtue is our principle occupation, and we believe that we can impart it better and quicker than any man.’ (273d8-9, tr. Jowett). In the Sophist the Eleatic Stranger defines the Sophist as ‘that sort, which professes to make acquaintances only for the sake of virtue, and demands a reward in the shape of money’ (223a3-4, tr. Jowett).

Protagoras says in Plato’s Protagoras: ‘I acknowledge that I am a sophist and educate men’ (homologȏ te sophistȇs einai kai paideuein anthrȏpous, 317b4-5) He tells Hippocrates who wants to becomes his disciple: ‘Young man, if you associate with me, on the very first day you will return home a better man than you came, and better on the second day than on the first, and better every day than you were on the day before.’ (318a6-9, tr. Jowett) When Socrates says that any teacher of any art could say the same, Protagoras specifies his art as follows: ‘If he comes to me, he will learn that which he comes to learn. And this is prudence in affairs private as well as public; he will learn to order his own house in the best manner, and he will be able to speak and act the best in the affairs of state.’ – Socrates: ‘Do I understand you, and is your meaning that you teach the art of politics, and that you promise to make men good citizens?’ – Protagoras: ‘That is exactly the profession which I make.’ (318e5-319a7, tr. Jowett)

Gorgias was an exception, to whom Russell’s characterization applies. Socrates asks Meno: ‘These Sophists (hoi sophistai soi houtoi) who are the only ones to profess [to teach virtue] (hoiper monoi epangellontai), do they seem to you to be teachers of virtue (dokousi didaskaloi einai aretȇs)?’ – Meno: ‘And this is what I admire most about Gorgias (Kai Gorgiou malista tauta agamai); you would never hear him promise this (hoti ouk an pote autou touto akousais hupischnoumenou), but he even laughs at those others (alla kai tȏn allȏn katagelai), when he hears that they promise it (hotan akousȇi hupischnoumenȏn); but he thinks that men should be taught to speak powerfully (alla legein oietai dein poiein deinous).’ (Pl. Meno 95b9-c4) 

Friday, May 20, 2016

The royal logos in Plato’s Sophist and the royal art in his Euthydemus

Having located the Sophist in the art of Image-making, the Eleatic Stranger proceeds: ‘Agreed then that we should at once quarter the ground by dividing the art of Image-making (Dedoktai toinun hoti tachista diairein tȇn eidȏlopoikȇn technȇn), and if, as soon as we descend into that enclosure (kai katabantas eis autȇn), we meet with the Sophist at bay (ean men hȇmas euthus ho sophistȇs hupomeinȇi), we should arrest him (sullabein auton) on the royal warrant of reason (kata ta epestalmena hupo tou basilikou logou), report the capture, and hand him over to the sovereign (k’akeinȏi paradontas apophȇnai tȇn agran).’ (Soph. 235b8-c2, tr. F. M. Cornford) Cornford notes: ‘Apelt illustrates the illusion to the Persian method (called ‘draw-netting’, sagȇneia) of sweeping up the whole population of a district by means of a line of soldiers holding hands and marching across it. It is several times mentioned by Herodotus (e. g. vi. 31) and Plato (Laws 698d) says that Datis, ten years before Salamis, sent word to Athens that he had captured all the Eritreans by this method, under Darius’ orders (the ‘royal warrant’) to transport all Eritreans and Athenians to Persia. The method is an admirable image for the procedure of the last section which has drawn the notion of Image-making or Imitation like a net round all the types called ‘Sophists’ collected for review. The net also includes other ‘imitators’, all the varieties of artists.’ (F. M. Cornford, Plato’s Theory of Knowledge, London 1935, p. 196)

In the Laws Plato says in the given passage: ‘Now Datis and his myriads soon became complete masters of Eretria, and he sent a fearful report to Athens that no Eretrian had escaped him; for the soldiers of Datis had joined hands (sunapsantes gar ara tas cheiras) and netted the whole of Eretria (sagȇneusaien pasan tȇn Eretrikȇn). And this report, whether well or ill founded, was terrible to all the Hellenes, and above all to the Athenians.’ (Tr. Jowett) This passage is part of Plato’s praise of the ancient constitution of Athens ‘when reverence was our queen and mistress (despotis enȇn tis aidȏs), and made us willing to live in obedience to the laws which then prevailed (di hȇn douleuontes tois tote nomois zȇn ȇthelomen, 698b5-6, tr. Jowett). It was because of this willingness to be guided by aidȏs (Liddell and Scott: ‘as a moral feeling, reverence, awe, respect for the feeling or opinion of others or of one’s own conscience, and so shame, self-respect, sense of honour’) that the Athenians escaped the fate of the Eritreans.

I find it difficult to imagine that Plato wanted to evoke this picture in the mind of his readers – the Eleatic Stranger in the mind of his Athenian audience – at the point of raising the expectation that he and Theaetetus were about to capture the Sophist.

Plato’s Second Letter can help us find the clue to the Stranger’s kata ta epestalmena hupo tou basilikou logou, which Cornford translates ‘on the royal warrant of reason’, but which may simply mean ‘according to the royal word sent to us’. For in that letter Plato discusses the sophists with which Dionysius was surrounded: ‘You were surprised at my sending you Polyxenus [a sophist credited with formulating some form of the ‘Third Man Argument’ against the Forms] to you; but now as of old I repeat the same statement about Lycophron also and the others you have with you, that, as respects dialectic, you are far superior to them all both in natural intelligence and in argumentative ability; and I maintain that if anyone of them is beaten in argument, this defeat is not voluntary (kai oudeis autȏn hekȏn exelenchetai), as some imagine, but involuntary. All the same, it appears that you treat them with the greatest consideration and make them presents. So much, then, about these men: too much, indeed, about such as they.’ (314c7-d7, tr. R. G. Bury)

Dionysius wanted to know what Plato thought about the sophists, and it is not difficult to imagine that Plato thought that Dionysius deserved a more thorough answer than the one he gave him in the Second Letter.

The royal logos in the Sophist required that the Sophist should be captured (sullabein auton) and handed over to him (ekeinȏi paradontas, 235b10-c1). These words point to the Euthydemus where Socrates maintains that all arts and branches of knowledge must hand their findings and products over to the royal art: ‘The kingly art was identified by us with the political (edoxe gar dȇ hȇmin hȇ politikȇ kai hȇ basilikȇ technȇ hȇ autȇ einai) … To this royal or political art (Tautȇi tȇi technȇi) all the arts, including the art of the general (kai hȇ stratȇgikȇ kai hai allai), render up the supremacy over the works (products or deeds) (paradidonai archein tȏn ergȏn) which they themselves produce (hȏn autai dȇmiourgoi eisin), that being the only art which knew how to use them (hȏs monȇi epistamenȇi chrȇsthai).’ (291c4-9). Seen in the light of the royal art depicted in the Euthydemus, the reference to the royal logos commanding the Eleatic Stranger [i.e. Plato] to capture the Sophist in the Sophist responds to Dionysius’ inquisitiveness as to what Plato’s business was in his coming to Syracuse, and seeks to allay all his mistrust of him, referred to in the Second Letter (312a); the supremacy belongs to the king, the philosopher with his findings enlightens him.

In the Second Letter Plato wrote to Dionysius: ‘You have done right now in sending Archedemus; and in the future also, after he returns to you and reports to you my suggestions (kai apangellȇi ta par emou), you will probably be beset by other perplexities. Then, if you are rightly advised, you will send Archedemus back to me, and he with his cargo will return to you again. And if you do this twice or thrice, and fully test what I send you (kai basanisȇis ta par emou pemphthenta hikanȏs), I shall be surprised if your present difficulties do not assume quite a new aspect.’ (313d4-e2) When Plato was sending the Second Letter to Dionysius, it may be presumed that the Euthydemus was part of the cargo; for although it was written more than a quarter of a century prior to Plato’s involvement with Dionysius, it was written as if in response to what this involvement demanded.

Apart from Socrates and the young aristocrat Cleinias, the main interlocutors in the Euthedemus are two brothers, sophists (sophistai, 271c1), Euthydemus and Dionysodorus, who profess to teach virtue (aretȇn) and to impart it better and quicker than any man (273d8-9). Socrates: ‘But are you quite sure about this, Dionysodorus and Euthydemus? The promise is so vast, that a feeling of incredulity steals over me.’ – Euthydemus: ‘You may take our word for the fact.’ – Socrates: ‘Then I think you happier in having such a treasure than the Great King (ȇ megan basilea) is in the possession of his kingdom.’ (274a1-7, tr. Jowett) In the Sophist the Stranger refers to the Great King as follows: ‘We must admit that refutation is the greatest and chiefest of purifications, and he who has not been refuted, though he be the Great King (basileus ho megas) himself, is in an awful state of impurity; he is uninstructed and deformed in those things in which he who would be truly blessed ought to be fairest and purest.’ (230d6-e3, tr. Jowett) Speaking of the Great King in the Sophist, Plato speaks to Dionysius, as I believe, for Dionysius had pretended to know the nature of the First, ‘the King of All, for whose sake all things are, and which is the cause of all things that are beautiful’ (Second Letter 312e1-3), which if he knew he would be truly blessed, but in fact his ‘view of the truth sways now this way, now that, round about the apparent object; whereas the true object is totally different.’ (S. L. 313b7-c1, tr. Bury)

When the two sophists in the Euthydemus maintained that ‘of all men who are now living’ they are most likely to stimulate the young Cleinias to philosophy and to the study of virtue, Socrates implored them ‘to persuade the youth whom you see here that he ought to be a philosopher and study virtue’ (274e-275a). Euthydemus began by asking Cleinias: ‘Are those who learn the wise or the ignorant?’ Dionysodorus whispered into Socrates’ ear: ‘Whichever the youngster answers, I prophesy that he will be refuted.’ (275d-e) The whole subsequent performance of the two sophists consists in eliciting a statement from their interlocutor, be it Cleinias, Socrates or Ctesippus (Cleinias’ admirer), and then refuting it.

In the Sophist the Stranger begins by defining the Sophist as man who ‘professes to form acquaintances only for the sake of virtue, and demands reward in the shape of money’ (223a3-4, tr. Jowett), and on that basis he goes on to define him firstly as ‘a paid hunter after wealth and youth’, secondly ‘as a merchant in the goods of the soul’, thirdly as ‘a retailer of the same wares’, fourthly as a ‘manufacturer of the wares he sold’, and fifthly as ‘an athlete, a fighter in arguments, who appropriated to himself the art of eristic’, the sixth is ‘the purifier of the soul of opinions that stand in the way of learning’ (231d-e). What runs as a common thread through all these six provisional definitions is antilogikȇ, the art of pitting arguments against arguments (232b); in the Euthydemus it is exemplified by the performance of the two sophists.

There are telling correspondences between the Euthydemus and the Sophist.

In the Euthydemus Socrates presents the two sophists with an example of ‘the hortatory philosophy’, as Jowett translates Plato’s tȇn protreptikȇn sophian (278c5). He begins by asking Cleinias: ‘Don’t all men (Ara ge pantes anthrȏpoi), don’t we all want to do well (boulometha eu prattein, 278e3)?’ He ends with the words: ‘Now (nun oun), as you think that wisdom can be taught (epeidȇ soi kai didakton dokei), and that wisdom only can make a man happy and fortunate (kai monon tȏn ontȏn eudaimona kai eutuchȇ poiein ton anthrȏpon), will you not acknowledge that all of us ought to love wisdom (allo ti ȇ phaiȇs an anankaion einai philosophein), and you individually will try to love her (kai autos en nȏi echeis auto poiein)?’ – Cleinias answers: ‘Certainly (Panu men oun), Socrates (ȏ Sȏkrates), I will do my best (hȏs hoion te malista).’ (282c8-d3, tr. Jowett)

Socrates was eager to see ‘where the sophists would start in their exhortation to the young man that he should practice wisdom and virtue (283a3-4). Dionysosorus, the elder of the two brothers, began as follows: ‘Tell me, Socrates and the rest of you who say that you want this young man to become wise, are you in jest or in real earnest?’ When Socrates answered that they were all in profound earnest, Dionysodorus resumed his questioning of Socrates: ‘And so you say that you wish Cleiniss to become wise … And he is not wise yet … you wish him to become wise and not ignorant … You wish him to be what he is not, and no longer to be what he is? … You wish him no longer to be what he is, which can only mean that you wish him to perish. Pretty lovers and friends they must be who want their favourite not to be, or to perish.’ Ctesippus angrily interposed: ‘What can make you tell such a lie about me and the others, which I hardly like to repeat, as that I wish Cleinias to perish?’ Euthydemus stepped in: ‘And do you think, Ctesippus, that it is possible to tell a lie?’ – Ctesippus: ‘I should be mad to say anything else.’ – Euthydemus: ‘And in telling a lie, do you tell the thing of which you speak or not? … And he who tells, tells that thing which he tells, and no other? … And that is a distinct thing apart from other things? … And he who says that thing says that which is? … And he who says that which is, says the truth. And therefore Dionysodorus, if he says that which is, says the truth of you and no lie.’ – Ctesippus: ‘But he is saying what is not.’ Euthydemus: ‘And that which is not is not? … And that which is not is nowhere? … And can anyone do anything about that which has no existence, or do to Cleinias that which is not and is nowhere? … Then no one says that which is not, for in saying what is not he would be doing something; and you have already acknowledged that no one can do what is not. And therefore, upon your own showing (hȏste kata ton son logon), no one says what is false (oudeis pseudȇ legei); but if Dionysodorus says anything (all’ eiper legei Dionusodȏros), he says what is true and what is (t’alȇthȇ te kai ta onta legei).’ (283b4-284c6, tr. Jowett)

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On the margin of my Oxford text of Plato I noted Gifford’s remark: ‘Plato is referring throughout the passage 283e7-284c6 to the doctrine of Parmenides, “Only that which can be can be thought”, as stated in Proem 33-40, and more briefly in 43 chrȇ to legein te noein t’ eon emmenai [which I would translate: ‘speaking and thinking must be being’, J.T.].’

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In the Sophists, just when the Stranger was going to divide the art of Image-making (diairein tȇn eidȏlopoiikȇn technȇn) and capture the Sophist, as the royal logos enjoined (sullabein auton kata ta epestalmena hupo tou basilikou logou, 235b8-c1), he realized that ‘this “appearing” or “seeming” without really “being”, and the saying of something which yet is not true – all these expressions have always been and still are deeply involved in perplexity … The audacity of the statement lies in its implication (Tetolmȇken ho logos houtos hupothesthai) that “what is not” has being (to mȇ on einai); for in no other way could a falsehood come to have being (pseudos gar ouk an allȏs egigneto on) … Parmenides from beginning to end testified against this, constantly telling us what he also says in his poem: “Never shall this be proved – that things that are not are; but do thou, in thy inquiry, hold back thy thought from this way.” (236e1-237a9, tr. Cornford). And so, to capture the Sophist in the region of Image-making, the Stranger must commit an act, for which he fears he might be accused of parricide (patraloian); he must subject Parmenides’ thesis to examination and ‘establish by main force that what is not (biazesthai to te mȇ on), in some respect has being (hȏs esti kata ti), and that what is (kai to on au palin), in a way is not (hȏs ouk esti pȇi)’ (241d3-7, tr. Cornford)

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Let me end this post by pointing to a correspondence between the Euthydemus and the Parmenides. In the Parmenides all arguments against the Forms raised by the historical Parmenides – the ‘greatest difficulty’ is raised by Parmenides who steps out of his historical role and predicts the coming of a man who will discover the Forms that can’t be refuted by any objections raised against them –  impugn Socrates’ theory of participation of sensible things in the Forms. In the Euthydemus the problem of participation comes to the fore in the following passage:

Dionysodorus: ‘Socrates, did you ever see a beautiful thing (Su gar ȇdȇ ti pȏpot’ eides kalon pragma)?’ – Socrates: ‘Yes, I have seen many (Egȏge, kai polla ge).’ – Dionysodorus: ‘Were they other than the beautiful (Ara hetera onta tou kalou), or the same as the beautiful (ȇ t’auta tȏi kalȏi)?’ – Socrates: ‘Now I was in a great quandary at having to answer this question (K’agȏ en panti egenomȇn hupo aporias), and I thought that I was rightly served for having opened my mouth at all (kai hȇgoumȇn dikaia peponthenai hoti egruxa); I said however, “They are not the same as absolute beauty (homȏs de hetera ephȇn autou ge tou kalou), but they have beauty present with each of them (parestin mentoi hekastȏi autȏn kallos ti)”.’ – Dionysodorus: ‘And are you an ox because an ox is present with you (Ean oun paragenȇtai soi bous, bous ei), or are you Dionysodorus, because Dionysodorus is present with you (kai hoti nun egȏ soi pareimi, Dionusodȏros ei)?’ – Socrates: ‘God forbid (Euphȇmei touto ge).’ – Dionysodorus: ‘But how (Alla tina tropon) by reason of one thing being present with another (heterou heterȏi paragenomenou), will one thing be another (to heteron heteron an eiȇi)?’ – Socrates: ‘Is that your difficulty (Ara touto aporeis)? I said (ephȇn egȏ).’ – Dionysodorus: ‘Of course (Pȏs gar ouk aporȏ), I and all the world are in a difficulty about the non-existent (kai egȏ kai hoi alloi hapantes anthrȏpoi ho mȇ esti).’ (300e3-301b4, tr. Jowett)

At the time when Plato wrote the Euthydemus – and I believe it can be dated as written in the late 390s B.C., prior to Plato’s first journey to Sicily – his Socrates was contemplating the participation of many beautiful things in Beauty itself, i.e. of sensible things in the Forms, which Dionysodorus ‘with all the world’ dismissed as non-existent.

Tuesday, May 17, 2016

The Sophist and the Parmenides

In 366 B.C. Plato returned to Athens after a year in Syracuse where he attempted to turn the tyrant Dionysius II to philosophy; he was to return to Sicily in a year to resume his instruction of Dionysius. During his year in Athens he wrote the Parmenides for his disciples in the Academy to protect his theory of Forms. When his stay in Athens became protracted, the Parmenides was to fulfil its protective function in relation to Dionysius. In the Second Letter Plato exhorted Dionysius to compare and examine his thought and work with that of the sophists surrounding him, looking at them side by side (paratheȏmenos, 313c8), ‘if the examination is going to be true, my things will grow on you’ (prosphusetai). In ‘Plato’s involvement with Dionysius’, on which I work at present, I have argued that after the Parmenides Plato wrote the Symposium, presenting Dionysius with a gem that could not be matched by anything the sophists could offer him. As Plato’s stay in Athens protracted further, he decided to take on his detractors in the Sophist. The definition of the sophist with which he ends the dialogue corresponds to this purpose: The sophist’s art consists of contradiction-making (enantiopoiologikȇ), which is a kind of insincere conceited mimicry (eirȏnikou merous tȇs doxastikȇs mimȇtikon, 268c8-9), for the sophist appears to know everything, because he has mastered the art of contradicting experts in every field of human knowledge (232e-233c). On the way to this definition Plato made points which have little to do with his arriving at it.

In ‘Plato’s involvement with Dionysius’ I argue that Plato wrote four dialogues in between his return to Athens from Sicily in 366 B.C. and his departure to Sicily in 361 B.C.: Parmenides, Symposium, Sophist, and Statesman. The Parmenides with its defence of Plato’s theory of Forms is the basis to which the subsequent dialogues are all linked. The whole point of the Parmenides is to show that the arguments Parmenides had raised against the Forms were falsities (Parm. 133b7), and what he was offering to Socrates was not conducive to philosophy. Parmenides ends his criticism of the theory of Forms in the Parmenides by suggesting to the young Socrates that he should train himself in what is regarded as adoleschia, ‘idle talk.’ (Parm. 135d) The Eleatic Stranger opens his task of defining the sophist with a series of definitions in the last but one of which adoleschia comes to the fore as part of the art of eristic; the sophist differs from the adoleschikos, the man of ‘idle talk’, only in so far as he earns his money by his disputations, whereas the adoleschikos neglects his own affairs and gets impoverished because of his delight in disputations (Soph. 225c-d). The negative light in which adoleschia is presented in the Sophist sheds negative light over Parmenides’ advice to Socrates in the Parmenides. This aspect of the Sophist comes even more prominently to the fore in the Stranger’s next and last provisional definition, where he defines the sophistic art as the art of purifying:

‘Some appear to have arrived at the conclusion that all ignorance is involuntary, and that no one who thinks himself wise is willing to learn any of those things in which he is conscious of his own cleverness … They cross-examine a man’s words, when he thinks he is saying something and is really saying nothing, and easily convict him of inconsistencies in his opinions; these they then collect by the dialectical process, and placing them side by side, show that they contradict one another about the same things, in relation to the same things, and in the same respect.’ (Soph. 230a5-b8, tr. Jowett)

Jowett’s ‘these they then collect by the dialectical process’ stands for Plato’s sunagontes tois logois; i.e. bringing together by means of logoi, that is ‘in discussion’. There is no reference to ‘the dialectical process’ in Plato’s text; Plato in the dialogue reserves the term ‘dialectical’ for knowledge of the Philosopher (253c8) who ‘necessarily proceeds with knowledge (met’ epistȇmȇs) in the path of argument (Jowett’s fine translation of Plato’s dia tȏn logȏn, 253b9-10); the Philosopher has dialektikȇ epistȇmȇ ‘dialectical knowledge’ (253d2-3).’

The Stranger’s reference to adoleschia in the preceding definition of the sophist pointed to the Parmenides, and so does his characterization of the sophist’s art as the art of purification, consisting of refutation, elenchus. The Stranger elaborates: ‘The purifier of the soul is conscious that his patient will receive no benefit from the application of knowledge until he is refuted, and from refutation learns modesty (prin an elenchȏn tis ton elenchomenon eis aischunȇn katastȇsas)’ (230c-d, tr. Jowett). In the preamble to the Sophist, when Theodorus introduces the Eleatic Stranger to Socrates as ‘a disciple of Parmenides and Zeno’, Socrates is apprehensive: ‘May not your companion be one of those higher powers, a cross-examining deity (theos ȏn tis elenktikos), who has come to spy out our weakness in argument (phaulous ontas en tois logois epopsomenos), and to cross-examine us (te kai elenxȏn)?’ (216b3-6, tr. Jowett)

Parmenides subjected the young Socrates to severe elenchus, which he never succeeded to fully overcome, although he succeeded in transforming adoleschia suggested by Parmenides into something specifically Socratic. Parmenides told Socrates that he must examine the consequences that follow from any given hypothesis, ‘not only if each thing is hypothesized to be, but also if that same thing is hypothesized not to be’ (135e9-136a2). Socrates perfected this into the art of elenchus, eliciting a thesis from his interlocutor and then leading him in discussion (tois logois) to negate the very same thesis.

Although the Stranger classifies elenchus as a sophistic art, he emphasizes its benefit: ‘We must admit that refutation is the greatest and chiefest of purifications, and he who has not been refuted, though he be the Great King (basileus ho megas) himself, is in an awful state of impurity; he is uninstructed and deformed in those things in which he who would be truly blessed ought to be fairest and purest.’ (230d6-e3, tr. Jowett) Speaking of the Great King, i.e. the King of Persia, Plato in my view speaks to Dionysius. For in the Second Letter he refers to Dionysius’ complaint that he did not explain to him ‘the nature of the First’. He reminds him how it was when he tried to explain it to him ‘in the garden under the laurels’. For when he revealed to him the nature of the First, ‘the King of All, for whose sake all things are, and which is the cause of all things that are beautiful’, Dionysius declared that he had formed this notion himself and that it was the discovery of his own (313a6-b1): ‘So then, after you had either, as is probable, got the true solution from someone else – [the King of All is identical with the Good of the Republic] – or had possibly (by Heaven’s favour) hit on it yourself, you fancied you had a firm grip on the proofs of it, and so you omitted to make them fast; thus  your view of the truth sways now this way, now that, round about the apparent object; whereas the true object is totally different.’ (313b3-c1, tr. Bury)

In the Sophist, the Stranger is chary of ascribing elenchus to the sophists ‘Lest we should assign to them too high a prerogative’ (231a3, tr. Jowett). But he marks it as such, for the purifier of the soul moves with his elenchus within the realm of not-knowing, and thus in the darkness of not being (tou mȇ einai skoteinotȇs, 254a4-5). Elenchus as such does not lead to the realm of light, to knowledge of truth, to the Forms; at his trial, in the Apology Socrates associates his art of elenchus with his philosophic not-knowing (Ap. 20c4-24b2). In the Symposium Diotima takes recourse to elenchus at the beginning of her intercourse with Socrates; she must remove from his soul his mistaken notion of Eros. But after that, elenchus plays no part in the ascent to the Form of Beauty, which she outlines. The ascent culminates in a sudden vision of Beauty (210e). Diotima doubts whether Socrates would ever attain this stage (209e5-210a2).