Plato lived from 427BC to 347BC and was an aristocratic Athenian. He probably served in the military, and traveled extensively. He founded the Academy at about 40 years of age. Socrates objected to written philosophy, because it freezes thoughts into the definite form of written text. Plato tried to overcome this objection by using the dialogue format, and he never stated ideas in his own name. His technique of inquiry used a form of dialectic: skillfully directed questioning which elicits the knowledge presumably already residing within the participant. He believed the world was intelligible, and reason, as governing principle, can detect the basic structures.
I have collected this information from various sources. For readers interested to understand the dialogues and the thought of Socrates better, I recommend to start with Taylor, C. C. W. (2001). Socrates: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford ; New York: Oxford University Press. There is an overview of the dialogues on Wikipedia, and a good summary of Plato and Socrates at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
The following overview of the dialogues will briefly characterize them and group them in relation to Plato's overall work. We can roughly distinguish three periods:
Early (presenting Socrates' views; they are more dramatic and shorter): Apology, Crito, Euthyphro, Ion, Lesser Hippias, Greater Hippias, Laches, Lysis, Menexenus, Protagoras, Euthydemus, Charmides, [Lovers, Hipparchus, First Alcibiades]),
Middle (containing more of Plato's own ideas): Gorgias, Meno, Phaedo, Symposium, Republic, Phaedrus, Cratylus, Timeaus and Critias,
Late (they are more didactic, longer, less dramatic): Theaetetus, Parmenides, Sophist, Statesman, Philebus, and Laws.
Heraclitus
Aristotle and Diogenes agree that Plato had some early association with either the philosophy of Heraclitus of Ephesus, or with one or more of that philosopher's followers (see Aristotle Metaph. 987a32, D.L. 3.4-3.5). The effects of this influence can perhaps be seen in the older Plato's conception of the sensible world as ceaselessly changing.
Parmenides and Zeno
There can be no doubt that Plato was also strongly influenced by Parmenides and Zeno (both of Elea). Plato's theory of Forms are intended to satisfy the Parmenidean requirement of metaphysical unity and stability in the knowable reality. Parmenides and Zeno also appear as characters in his dialogue, the Parmenides. Diogenes Laertius, the Greek historian,[ref]Diogenes Laertius, native of Laerte in Cilicia, was a biographer of ancient Greek philosophers. His Lives of the Philosophers(Philosophoi Biol), in ten books, is still extant and is an important source of information on the development of Greek philosophy.[/ref] says about Plato: "He mixed together in his works the arguments of Heracleitus, the Pythagoreans, and Socrates. Regarding the sensibles, he borrows from Heraclitus; regarding the intelligibles, from Pythagoras; and regarding politics, from Socrates." (D.L. 3.8)
In the same text, Diogenes makes a series of comparisons intended to show how much Plato owed to the comic poet, Epicharmus (3.9-3.17).
The Pythagoreans
Diogenes Laertius (3.6) claims that Plato visited several Pythagoreans in Southern Italy (one of whom, Theodorus, is also mentioned as a friend to Socrates in Plato's Theaetetus). In the Seventh Letter, we learn that Plato was a friend of Archytas of Tarentum, a well-known Pythagorean statesman and thinker (see 339d-e), and in the Phaedo, Plato has Echecrates, another Pythagorean, in the group around Socrates on his final day in prison. Plato's Pythagorean influences seem especially evident in his fascination with mathematics, and in some of his political ideals (see Plato's political philosophy), expressed in several dialogues.
Socrates
Nobody had more influence on Plato than Socrates. This is evident not only in many of the doctrines and arguments we find in Plato's dialogues, but most obviously in Plato's choice of Socrates as the main character in most of his works. According to the Seventh Letter, Plato considered Socrates to be "the most just man alive" (324e). According to Diogenes Laertius, the respect was mutual (3.5).
Plato's dialogues and the historical Socrates
According to Diogenes, Plato began his career as a writer of tragedies, but hearing Socrates talk, he abandoned that path, and even burned a tragedy he had written for a dramatic competition (D.L. 3.5). Whether or not any of these stories are true, Plato was a master of dialogue, characterization, and dramatic context. He also may have written some epigrams; some of the surviving epigrams attributed to him in antiquity may be genuine.
Plato was not the only writer of dialogues in which Socrates appears as a principal character and speaker. Other writers, known as "Socratics," also composed such works. They include Alexamenos of Teos, Aeschines, Antisthenes, Aristippus, Phaedo, and Xenophon. [ref] Sources: Alexamenos of Teos (Aristotle Poetics 1447b11; De Poetis), Aeschines (D.L. 2.60-63, 3.36, Plato Apology 33e), Antisthenes (D.L. 3.35, 6; Plato, Phaedo 59b; Xenophon, Memorabilia 2.4.5, 3.2.17), Aristippus (D.L. 2.65-104, 3.36, Plato Phaedo 59c), Eucleides (D.L. 2.106-112), Phaedo (D.L. 2.105; Plato, Phaedo passim), Simon (D.L. 122-124), and especially Xenophon (see D.L. 2.48-59, 3.34)[/ref] A recent study of these by Charles H. Kahn (1996, 1-35), concludes that the very existence of the "Socratic" literary genre, and all of the conflicting images of Socrates we find given by the various authors, shows that we cannot trust as historically reliable any of the accounts of Socrates given in antiquity, including those given by Plato.
It is one thing to claim that Plato was not the only one to write Socratic dialogues, and quite another to hold that Plato was only following the rules of a particular writing genre in his own work. We can still ask whether Plato's own use of Socrates as his main character has anything to do with the historical Socrates. The question has led to a number of seemingly irresolvable scholarly disputes. One important ancient source, Aristotle himself, suggests that at least some of the doctrines Plato puts into the mouth of "Socrates," especially from the early dialogues, are the ones espoused by the historical Socrates. Because Aristotle has no reason not to be truthful about this issue, many scholars believe that his testimony provides a solid basis for distinguishing the Socrates of the early dialogues from the character by that name in Plato's later works, whose views and arguments Aristotle suggests are Plato's own.
Dating Plato's dialogues
If we can establish a relative chronology for when Plato wrote each of the dialogues, we can provide some objective test for the claim that Plato represents Socrates more accurately in the earlier dialogues, and less accurately in the later dialogues.
In antiquity, Plato's dialogues were ordered along thematic lines. The best reports of these orderings[ref]See Diogenes Laertius' discussion at 3.56-62[/ref] included many works whose authenticity is now either disputed or unanimously rejected. The uncontroversial internal and external historical evidence for a chronological ordering is relatively clear: Aristotle (Politics 2.6.1264 b24 - 27), Diogenes Laertius, and Olympiodorus (Prol. 6.24) state that Plato wrote the Laws after the Republic. Internal references in the Sophist (217a) and the Statesman[ref]Also known as the Politicus; 257a, 258b[/ref] show the Statesman to come after the Sophist. The Timaeus (17b-19b) may refer to Republic as coming before it, and more clearly mentions the Critias as following it (27a). Similarly, internal references in the Sophist (216a, 217c) and the Theaetetus (183e) may be thought to show the intended order of three dialogues: Parmenides, Theaetetus, and Sophist. Even so, it does not follow that these dialogues were actually written in that order. In the Theaetetus (143c,) Plato announces through his characters that he will abandon the somewhat cumbersome dialogue form that he uses in his other writings. Since the form does not appear in a number of other writings, it is reasonable to infer that those in which it does not appear were written after the Theaetetus.
Scholars have augmented this evidence by employing different methods of ordering the remaining dialogues. One such method is that of stylometry, by which various aspects of Plato's language in each dialogue are measured against their uses and frequencies in other dialogues. Originally done in laborious studies, stylometry can now be employed more efficiently with computer assistance. Another, even more popular, way to sort and group the dialogues is what is called "content analysis," which works by finding and enumerating apparent commonalities or differences in the philosophical style and content of the various dialogues. Neither of these general approaches will give us conclusive answers, and the questions will remain somewhat undecided unless more information is found.
Nonetheless, most recent scholarship seems to assume that Plato's dialogues can be sorted into different groups, and it is not unusual for books and articles on the philosophy of Socrates to state that by "Socrates" they mean to refer to the character in Plato's "early" or Socratic dialogues, as if this Socrates was as close to the historical Socrates as we are likely to get. (More on this subject in the next section.) Perhaps the most thorough examination can be found in Gregory Vlastos: Socrates. Ironist and Moral Philosopher, where ten significant differences between the "Socrates" of Plato's early dialogues and the character by that name in the later dialogues are noted. A common view of the probable dates and groups of dialogues, which combines the results of stylometry and content analysis, is as follows (all lists but the last in alphabetical order):
Early (All after the death of Socrates, but before Plato's first trip to Sicily in 387 B.C.E.):
Apology, Charmides, Crito, Euthydemus, Euthyphro, Gorgias, Hippias Major, Hippias Minor, Ion, Laches, Lysis, Protagoras, Republic Bk. I.
Early-Transitional (Either at the end of the early group or at the beginning of the middle group, c. 387-380 B.C.E.):
Cratylus, Menexenus, Meno
Middle (c. 380-360 B.C.E.)
Phaedo, Republic Bks. II-X, Symposium
Late-Transitional (Either at the end of the middle group, or the beginning of the late group, c. 360-355 B.C.E.)
Parmenides, Theaetetus, Phaedrus
Late (c. 355-347 B.C.E.; possibly in chronological order)
Sophist, Statesman, Philebus, Timaeus, Critias, Laws
Socrates at the age of 70 (in 339 BCE) defends himself in his one day trial in the court of one of the major officials of Athens, the "King Archon", who presided over court cases involving religion. The dialogue consists of statements made by him in his own defense, his comments about the penalty soon to be decided, and his comments following the announcement that he will be executed.
Pre-Conviction Speech
He first recalls the false charges that have been made earlier against him over many years, that he "has theories about the heavens and has investigated everything below the earth, and can make the weaker argument defeat the stronger". He denies being an atheist, and alludes to Aristophanes' play "The Clouds" which satirized him. He notes that these opponents are invisible and that it is hard to defend himself against them or cross-examine them. [ref]Meletus (with Anytus and Lycon) brought charges of "criminal meddling, in that he inquires of things below the earth and in the sky, and makes the weaker argument defeat the stronger". This was depicted in "The Clouds" [423 BCE].[/ref]
He compares himself to the Sophists, who unlike Socrates charge for their services - he has never asked to be paid for his discussions, speeches, or dialogs. The priestess at Delphi declared to Chaerephon (a good democrat who was exiled during the oligarchy), that there was no man wiser than Socrates, and yet he confessed his own ignorance, unlike others with pretensions of wisdom. As a result of the oracle, he declares that he took upon himself "a sort of pilgrimage," to interview those professing knowledge, and found most of them to be deficient: politicians, poets ("who were inspired with a message they often did not understand"), and craftsmen.
Plato comments: "Real wisdom is the property of God, and this oracle is his way of telling us that human wisdom has little or no value... The wisest of you men is he who has realized, like Socrates, that in respect of wisdom he is really worthless." Socrates' efforts to deflate the pretensions of those claiming wisdom, which he does to help the cause of God, has reduced him to extreme poverty and made him unpopular and resented. The resentment against him also arises form the attachments of noble young men to him, who emulate his ways. Socrates asks who influences the young for the better? He educated them not for money, but for the love of wisdom.
He names his current accusers Meletus, Anytus and Lycon and cites their current charges: he is "guilty of corrupting the minds of the young[ref]Most notably Alcibiades c. 450-404 and Critias, one of the tyrants[/ref], and of believing in deities of his own invention instead of the gods recognized by the state". He questions Meletus as to who influences the young for the better, and proves that Meletus has taken no interest in this in the past.
He defends his belief in gods such as the sun and the moon and in other supernatural beings: "for how could one believe in supernatural activities and not in supernatural beings?
He states his heroic dedication to the philosophical life even in the face of criticism and hostility: "Once a man has taken up his stand,.. I believe he is bound to remain and face the danger, taking no account of death or anything else before dishonor." Citing his Peloponnesian war valor at Potidaea, he states it would be shocking inconsistency if he were to desert the post assigned to him by God. He questions the fear of death, since it could be the greatest blessing that can happen to man. He refuses to disobey God: "I owe a greater obedience to God than to you." He will continue to question and examine everyone he meets, believing that "goodness brings wealth and every other blessing" and that "no greater good has ever befallen you in this city than my service to my God....I am not going to alter my conduct, not even if I have to die a hundred deaths."
He claims that by executing him, "...you will harm yourselves more than me....I do not believe that the law of God permits a better man to be harmed by a worse... So far from pleading on my behalf, as might be supposed, I am really pleading on yours, to save you from misusing the gift of God by condemning me....You will not easily find anyone to take my place." God has sent him as if he were a stinging fly (horsefly or gadfly) sent to rouse a drowsing horse (the citizens of Athens), to waken them from their complacency. He predicts they will soon slap him just like a fly and return to their complacent slumbers.
He has neglected his own affairs in helping others and lives in poverty. He has conducted himself in the pursuit of justice in private and not as a politician (which would have quickly led to losing his life). He recounts a proposed trial of 10 naval commanders in which he alone opposed trying them as a group. (They were accused of abandoning the survivors and the dead during the battle of Arguinusae in 406). Later, during the Oligarchy of the Thirty (in 404-402), he disobeyed a tyrannical order to bring Leon to be executed. He values doing good over living.
He is open to all who will argue with him and answers questions of rich and poor alike. He is entertaining. He names some of his many students: Crito, Antiphon, Plato, etc. He mentions his three sons but rejects making an emotional appeal or bringing in his family to appeal for mercy. He leaves his fate in the hands of the jury and God.
Post-Conviction Statement
It was a close vote to convict him: 501 people voted, and the result was 281 to 220 in favor of a guilty verdict. Meletus is demanding death. Socrates plays with the jury regarding his punishment - he should be rewarded for his actions with free meals by the state. He chastises them because his trial has taken only one day. He has no money for a fine and says he would be just as irritating to those in another country to which he might be exiled, since he cannot change his ways. "This is the hardest thing of all to make some of you understand. If I say that this would be disobedience to God, and that is why I cannot 'mind my own business', you will not believe that I am serious. If on the other hand I tell you that to let no day pass without discussing goodness and all the other subjects about which you hear me talking and examining both myself and others is really the very best thing that a man can do, and that life without this sort of examination is not worth living, you will be even less inclined to believe me. Nevertheless that is how it is, gentlemen, as I maintain, though it is not easy to convince you of it." He finally suggests a fine of one mina for himself (circa one pound of silver), then revises this to 30, after getting support from Plato, Apollodorus, and others.
Post-Sentencing Remarks
He is defiant after he is condemned to die. He states that his execution will damage the reputation of Athens. It will shorten his life only slightly. He is condemned not because of a lack of an adequate defense, but because of his lack of impudence and refusal to grovel. He is resolved to uphold the law and not attempt to escape death, which would be wrong. Those who voted against him are depraved and wicked, and will be punished. His execution will not stop the criticism that has previously been suppressed. He admonishes them to make themselves as good as they can be. He speaks warmly to those who voted to acquit him. He welcomes death, and notes that his execution was not divinely opposed. He reflects on death, which is either an annihilation or a change, a transmigration of souls and removal to Hades. He looks forward to being with Homer, Hesiod, Musaeus, Orpheus, Ajax, and others, and looks forward to debate in a place "where one cannot be further put to death for such conduct."
"You too, gentlemen of the jury, must look forward to death with confidence, and fix your minds on this one belief, which is certain--that nothing can harm a good man either in life or after death, and his fortunes are not a matter of indifference to the gods...For my own part I bear no grudge at all against those who condemned me and accused me, although it was not with this kind intention that they did so, but because they thought that they were hurting me; and that is culpable of them." He hopes his sons will be properly taken care of and directed toward goodness. "Now it is time that we were going, I to die and you to live, but which of us has the happier prospect is unknown to anyone but God."
In this dialogue, Socrates explores the meaning of temperance or self-control (sophrosyne) with a handsome young man. It is an ideal embodied in the Delphic inscriptions "Know thyself" and "Never too much."
Speculation on the origin and etymology of the Greek language.
"Then let us seek the true beauty, not asking whether a face is fair,... for all such things appear to be in a flux, but let us ask whether the true beauty is not always beautiful." There are eternal truths.
This is only a dialogue fragment.
The morning of his execution, Crito tries unsuccessfully to persuade Socrates to escape, but Socrates wants "not to live but to live well." "One must not even do wrong when one is wronged." He insists on obeying the law "since God points out the way". A wrong can never be justified; a citizen must uphold the law.
In this dialogue Socrates tries to persuade his friend Crito that it is better for him (Socrates) to accept the death penalty levied by the jury rather than escaping from the prison. He says that he had been wronged by certain people and not by the society or the laws and hence escaping from the prison will then make him a traitor in the eyes of the people who trust him. This, he argues, would prove the politicians and jury correct in their decision to execute him. This dialogue contains an ancient statement of the social contract theory of government. The entire dialogue is a discourse on justice and injustice between Crito and Socrates; it is a timeless classic text that is beautiful to read.
Discusses verbal trickery and how to express truth in words. The Euthydemus contrasts Socratic argumentation and education with the methods of Sophism, to the detriment of the latter. Throughout this satirical dialogue, the two sophists[ref]Greek sophists were the lawyers or journalist of ancient times.[/ref] Euthydemus and Dionysodorus continually attempt to ensnare Socrates with deceptive and meaningless arguments, primarily to demonstrate their professed philosophical superiority.
As in many of the Socratic dialogues, the two Sophists against whom Socrates argues were real people. Euthydemus was somewhat famous at the time the dialogue was written, and is mentioned several times by both Plato and Aristotle. Likewise, Dionysodorus is mentioned by Xenophon.
The dialogue explores the meaning of piety or holiness. In the weeks before his trial, Socrates has to go to court, and there he meets a young lawyer who intends to prosecute his own father.
He was charged by some politicians for not believing in Athenian Gods and for corrupting the youth. He was tried before the Athenian jury who were keen to execute him as soon as possible to favor a particular political group who were hunting for Socrates’s head. This first dialogue in the book represents the verbal confrontation in the Athenian court between Euthyphro, a priest and an advocate and Socrates. Euthyphro possesses great advocacy skills but still he proves no match for the witty, wise and discerning Socrates. Socrates questions Euthyphro and asks him to explain the meaning of piety and impiety. The dialogue that unfolds between both of them thereafter is just exemplary.
Socrates argues with the famous rhetorician and Sophist Gorgias and his pupil Polus that rhetoric, though possibly giving power and persuasion, produces belief without knowledge.
Socrates maintains that it is worse to do wrong than to suffer it. "The man and woman who are noble and good I call happy, but the evil and base I call wretched." Injustice is the greatest evil. Callicles asserts a philosophy of might is right, saying that philosophy is suitable only for youth, and that the better and wiser man should rule and have more. They that can succeed indulge their appetites, whil others are forced to praise moderation and temperance. But Socrates argues that some pleasures are not good and that pleasure and good are not the same.
After the judgement at the crossroads, the man "who has led a godly and righteous life departs after death to the Isles of the Blessed and there lives in all happiness exempt from ill, but the godless and unrighteous man departs to a prison of vengeance and punishment which they call Tartarus." A man "should study not to seem but to be good.... And you may let anyone despise you as a fool and do you outrage, if he wishes, yes, and you may cheerfully let him strike you with that humiliating blow, for you will suffer no harm thereby.... This is the best way of life-- to live and die in the pursuit of righteousness and all other virtues."
Socrates discusses art (techne) with the Homeric rhapsodist Ion. Unlike the knowledge acquired in other arts, Socrates asserts that the poetic art is not an art at all but a divine gift like magnetism. Poets are possessed by the gods like bacchants and "it is the god himself who speaks, and through them becomes articulate to us."
Socrates explores the meaning of courage or virtue (aretë) with generals Laches and Nicias, the former having led Socrates in battle at Delium.
Plato attempts to present laws for real life; is said to include the golden rule.
The Lesser Hippias is an inferior dialogue in which Socrates argues with Hippias the Sophist about voluntary vs involuntary wrongdoing. Greater Hippias is on the beautiful. The authenticity of both has been questioned.
Explores friendship (filia) through two young friends Lysis and Menexenus.
Of questionable authorship, it appears to be a satire on patriotic speeches.
Again ask what virtue is and if it can be taught. Discusses immortality of the soul and its multiple rebirths and demonstrates that we have knowledge that can be recalled by questioning a slave boy about triangles etc. Virtue is not learned but is a divine dispensation, and its possessors are to others as Tiresias was to the flitting shades of the underworld. Anytus warns Socrates against slander.
In this dialogue, Socrates counters with some very persuasive arguments against Meno. The main theme of this dialogue consists of the explanation of real virtue by Socrates using brilliant epistemology. At a particular juncture in this dialogue when Meno says that virtue is knowledge and it can be taught, Socrates objects to it by saying that until now he hasn’t met anyone in his entire life who practices genuine virtue and hence no one qualifies for teaching it and it’s in fact a gift of God that cannot be taught to anyone. The arguments that then subsequently follow between Meno and Socrates and the geometrical demonstrations used by Socrates for explaining the true essence of virtue are outstanding.
Debates the validity and existence of Platonic Ideals or Forms, but remains inconclusive. A very difficult but rewarding text.
Phaedo recounts to Echecrates the last hours of Socrates sometime after his death, a day to which he was a witness (along with Apollodorus, Menexenus, etc.) The execution had been delayed awaiting the return of the ship which was sent to Delos on an annual religious mission. Phaedo recalls how happy Socrates seemed, how cheerfully he looked forward to death.
Xanthippe appears and is hysterical, and Socrates sends her away (Plato seems quite unsympathetic to her).
Socrates notes the similarity of pleasure and pain, and that they are often experienced together--he suggests that they are like two bodies attached to the same head, as in some imagined Aesop fable. He recalls a recurring dream he has had, in which he is exhorted: "Socrates, practice and cultivate the arts." He has interpreted this to mean that philosophy is the highest art, but recently has been working on lyrics to a poem honoring Apollo.
He argues against suicide to Cebes, saying we are put in a sort of guard post and that the gods are our keepers and we their possessions, and we will be punished if we destroy ourselves. "A man who has really devoted his life to philosophy should be cheerful in the face of death, and confident of finding the greatest blessing in the next world..." Death is simply "the release of the soul from the body." Philosophers should be concerned with the soul and not with bodily pleasures--"the philosopher frees his soul from association with the body, so far as is possible..."
The senses are inaccurate. The soul finds truth, not with the senses, but through pure thought and reflection divorced from the senses. The intellect can contemplate absolute truths such as "absolute uprightness." Bodily urges are simply a distraction, and we are filled with nonsense about love, desire, fear, war and revolution, etc. We must separate ourselves from these urges to attain pure knowledge. Pure knowledge may only come from the purification of death.
Philosophers make their occupation the freeing and separation of soul from body. "True philosophers make dying their profession." Lovers and philosophers choose to pursue their loves into the afterlife. The courage and self-control non-philosophers display are based merely on fear of losing pleasures. Wisdom must be the ultimate goal of life--it makes possible true courage, self-control, and integrity.
Socrates looks forward to being dead, as his soul will be able to mix with past rulers and great thinkers. But Cebes is skeptical about the afterlife and the persistence of the soul--he wonders if the soul does not merely disperse at death and no longer exists.
Socrates considers the question whether souls transmigrate, and recounts the legend that they do in fact return from the dead. He provides an elaborate argument about opposites begetting opposites, that death and life are opposites, and that death must therefore beget life (rebirth or palligenesia--this argument seems to be based on a fallacious assumption!)
He believes souls return from the world of the dead and that "what we recollect now we must have learned at some time before," and that "learning is recollection" or recovery of knowledge formerly known but temporarily forgotten after birth. This recollection or anamnesis occurs when questions are asked in just the right way. For example, we have a built-in knowledge of absolute equality.
Cebes remains unconvinced, arguing that we may indeed recall previously forgotten knowledge, but that does not prove the soul lives on after death. Socrates presents another elaborate argument based on composite objects, and that which is invisible being invariant, etc. The body confuses the soul. Upon death, "it [the soul] passes into the realm of the pure and everlasting and immortal and changeless...", a condition which we call wisdom. The soul is like that which is divine, indissoluble, invariable. The soul of a good man who has led a pure life goes "... into the presence of the good and wise God"--this is where he hopes to go. It is a happy fate, released from uncertainty and fears.
But the souls of the wicked or impure are "compelled to wander about these places [on earth] as punishment..."--partly visible as shadowy apparitions. Or because of their craving for the corporeal, they may be reincarnated as base animals such as the donkey. wolf, etc.
No soul which has not practiced philosophy, and is not absolutely pure when it leaves the body, may attain to the divine nature; that is only for the lover of wisdom." You must follow philosophy wherever it leads you. Philosophy sets the soul free, rid of human ills. Pleasure and pain are impure, corporeal, and bind the soul like rivets to the body.
Socrates compares his expression of joy at his impending death to that shown by the dying swan [the swan song], which sings most loudly and sweetly then in anticipation of going into the presence of the gods, and not as an expression of grief.
But Simmias is still unconvinced of the immortality of the soul. He addresses several concerns. (1) Is the soul merely a property of the body like an attunement? (a Pythagorean belief). (2) Do souls eventually wear out after repeated use?
Socrates loves to argue. "No greater misfortune could happen to anyone than that of developing a dislike for argument [misology]." "We must not let it enter our minds that there may be no validity in argument." He presents additional arguments against the attunement concept (such a soul could not precede the body, and could not control the body...) He also refutes the concept of souls wearing out...
He acknowledges he in unsuited to pursue natural science. He does not "understand how things becomes one, nor, in short, why anything else comes or ceases or continues to be, according to this method of inquiry." He refers to Anaxagoras's contention that mind produces order and is the cause of everything, but on reading what Anaxogoras said, his hopes were disappointed... He distrusts observational sciences: "I was afraid that by observing objects with my eyes and trying to comprehend them with each of my senses I might blind my soul altogether" as can occur by watching an eclipse.
He gives his own theory of causation: "I am assuming the existence of absolute beauty and goodness.... Whatever else is beautiful apart from absolute beauty is beautiful because it partakes of that absolute beauty... The one thing that makes that object beautiful is the presence in it or association with in it, in whatever way the relation comes about, of absolute beauty." "You know of no other way in which any given object can come into being except by participation in the reality peculiar to its appropriate universal..." He arrives at his concept of Forms or Ideas (Eidos), in which tangible things participate, and asserts that absolute forms do not coexist with opposites... "If anything is accompanied by a form which has an opposite, and meets that opposite, then the thing which is accompanied never admits the opposite of the form by which it is accompanied."
Socrates proves the immortality of the soul by claiming that absolute forms do not coexist with their opposites: the soul confers life, the opposite of life is death, thus the soul will not admit death and is therefore immortal. Souls are imperishable, but nonetheless must be cared for in life and for all time--the only escape from evil is becoming good. "Every soul that has lived throughout its life in purity and soberness enjoys divine company and guidance."
Socrates describes his theory of the earth. The earth, if spherical, is in the middle of the heavens (aether), and being suspended in equilibrium requires no force to keep it from falling. It is vast, and there are many hollow places in which water, mist, and air collect and in which we ordinary humans actually live, though we incorrectly believe we live on the surface and that the air we see about us is the true heavens. The earth and stones we are surrounded by are corroded, not like the true earth and heaven, which are out of sight. The idealized real earth has more vivid and extensive colors than what we experience, and the trees, flowers, mountains, stones, etc. are more lovely because they have not been damaged by decay or corrosion. Rich metals are abundant. Idealized humans live in the air (beyond our sight), free from disease and superior in their senses to us. They have temples inhabited by gods and see the true sun, moon and stars as they really are.
The hollows that we live in are interconnected by underground channels, subterranean rivers of water, mud, and lava, and these flows have a natural oscillation. The largest cavity in the earth is Tartarus, into which all the great rivers flow and reemerge again in a type of oscillation accompanied by great winds. The great streams include: (1) the mightiest, Oceanus, (2) Acheron (which arrives at the Acherusian Lake where the souls of the dead come), (3) Pryriphlegethon (which belches forth jets of lava), and (4) the Cocytus river which forms the lake Styx in the Stygian region.
The newly dead are submitted to judgement. Those who lived a neutral life go to Acheron for purification and absolution from sins. The very wicked receive eternal punishment in Tartarus and never reemerge. Redeemable sinners stay in Tartarus for a year, then are borne by the river to the Acherusian Lake etc. where they must beg forgiveness of those whom they have wronged if they hope ever to resurface. But those who have lived holy lives "are released and set free from confinement in these regions of the earth, and passing upward to their pure abode, make their dwelling upon the earth's surface [i.e., not in the hollows where ordinary humans live]." From there the most worthy philosophers live without bodies in even more beautiful habitations.
Living a life of self-control and goodness, courage, and liberality and truth is the way a man can be free from all anxiety about the fate of the soul. He should devote himself to the pleasures of acquiring knowledge.
Crito asks if he has any words for his children, but he has no new advice. He is indifferent to whether his body is buried or burned, since his soul will have departed it to a state of heavenly happiness. His 3 sons come in with the women of his household, and after speaking to them a short while asks them to go away.
His kindly jailer gives him praise, apologizes for having to carry out his orders, and leaves weeping. Crito wants him to delay as long as possible, but Socrates insists on proceeding with the execution. A servant fetches the cup of hemlock, which Socrates calmly and cheerfully drinks. He urges Apollodorus to cease his weeping and be brave, since he wishes to die in tranquility. He tells Crito they should offer a cock to the divine healer Asclepius (as if he were recovering from an illness by dying). Soon he dies.
Socrates and Phaedrus walk in the country and discuss love.
Socrates dismisses scientific inquiry and modern skepticism about the gods, preferring self-exploration and dialectic: "I can't as yet `know thyself' ... and so long as that ignorance remains it seems to me ridiculous to inquire into extraneous matters.... I am a lover of learning, and trees and open country won't teach me anything, whereas men in the town do."
Phaedrus reads Lysias' speech, which describes how a handsome young man is tempted, not by the entreaty of a lover but by one who professes not to be in love, arguing that "a lover more often than not wants to possess you...." Socrates discusses the conflict of the pursuit of pleasure versus the good: "Within each one of us there are two sorts of ruling or guiding principle that we follow. One is the innate desire for pleasure, the other an acquired judgment that aims us at what is best. Sometimes these internal guides are in accord, sometimes at variance.... When judgment guides us rationally toward what is best, and has the mastery, that mastery is called temperance.... A man dominated by desire and enslaved to pleasure is of course bound to aim at getting the greatest possible pleasure out of his beloved.... He must aim at making the boy totally ignorant and totally dependent on his lover, by way of securing the maximum pleasure for himself, and the maximum of damage to the other."
But Socrates then maintains that love (eros) is a god or divine being and cannot therefore be evil. He cites Stesichorus' belief that love "is a gift of the gods," a heaven-sent form of madness or possession.
He argues that the soul is immortal and is like a chariot drawn by two differing steeds: "one of them is noble and good, ... while the other has the opposite character.... When it is perfect and winged it journeys on high and controls the whole world, but one that has shed its wings sinks down until it can fasten on something solid, and settling there it takes itself an earthly body...." The successful souls ascend to the "summit of the arch that supports the heavens.... It is there that true being dwells, without color or shape, that cannot be touched; reason alone, the soul's pilot, can behold it, and all true knowledge is knowledge thereof.... Contemplating truth she is nourished and prospers... And while she is borne round she discerns justice ... and likewise temperance ... and knowledge, not the knowledge that is neighbor to becoming and varies with the various objects to which we commonly ascribe being, but the veritable knowledge of being that veritably is."
A soul which falls away from truth becomes forgetful, sheds its wings, and falls back to earth. "The soul that hath seen the most of being shall enter into the human babe that shall grow into a seeker after wisdom and beauty, a follower of the Muses and a lover." A progressively lower cycle of reincarnations, each lasting 1000 years (up to 10,000 years total), may follow unless the soul seeks wisdom through philosophy, in which case the wings can be regained and the soul again ascends to the eternal realm. "Therefore it is meet and right that the soul of the philosopher alone should recover her wings, for she, as far as may be, is ever near in memory to those things a god's nearness whereunto makes him truly god.... He and he alone becomes truly perfect. Standing aside from the busy doings of mankind, and drawing nigh to the divine, he is rebuked by the multitude as being out of his wits.... When he that loves beauty is touched by such madness he is called a lover.... Beauty it was ours to see in all its brightness in those days....and in this world below we apprehend it through the clearest of our senses...."
Souls of sullied purity see little of true beauty and seek only physical pleasure. When a beloved causes desire in a lover, the driver of the chariot reins in the base horse "until the evil steed casts off his wantonness.... And so, if the victory be won by the higher elements of mind ... the power of evil in the soul has been subjected, and the power of goodness liberated.... These then, my boy, are the blessings great and glorious which will come too from the friendship of a lover."
Socrates notes that ideas reduced to writing are imperfectly represented: "[Writing] is no true wisdom ... but only its semblance.... Written words seem to talk to you as though they were intelligent, but if you ask them anything about what they say ... they go on telling you just the same forever."
His closing prayer to Pan and other divinities: "...Grant that I may become fair within, and that such outward things as I have may not war against the spirit within me. May I count him rich who is wise, and as for gold, may I possess so much of it as only a temperate man might bear and carry with him."
Argues that wisdom and intelligence (things of the mind) are superior to enjoyments of the senses (pleasures). True understanding entails discerning a limited number of manifestations or presentations of a class of objects instead of a bewilderingly infinite number of possibilities. Argues the existence of a supreme intelligence governing the universe.
Socrates meets his equal in the great Sophist Protagoras, discussing whether virtue can be taught and whether pleasure is good. P. tells of Prometheus' gifts to mankind of skill in the arts and of fire and Zeus' gifts of justice and respect for others.
Exploration of justice. Thrasymachus argues that "justice" is used to justify the actions of the strong, to take advantage of others. Socrates holds the just are happy, the unjust miserable. Glaucon argues men will be unjust if they can get away with it (e.g., by being invisible). Adimantus argues that the most profitable strategy is to do injustice but to ask forgiveness of the gods and keep up the appearance of justice. Socrates describes the ideal city, rules by trained guardians who love wisdom. He rejects evil acts of the gods as portrayed in Homer and Hesiod, or their changeability. God is simple and benevolent. Learn courage, self-control, avoid evil images and tales, be temperate, love the beautiful, eat simply, love modestly. Laws won't be necessary. Describes our conflict between reason and desires (or feelings). Describes communal marriages, eugenics, infanticide, conduct of war. The kings will be philosophers who seek true beauty and justice, the true objects of true knowledge illuminated by the Good. Men are like cave dwellers seeing only shadows of reality. True knowledge must be shared. The good is reached thru dialectic. Discusses inferior forms of government--democracy, tyranny, etc. The soul is like a chimera, with 3 parts: man (learning), lion (anger), and many-headed beast (appetites). Opposes authority of poetry--art is imitation of life, itself an imitation of ultimate reality. The soul is immortal. Er, son of Armenius, sees the sorting of souls to go either to heaven or to punishment underground. Souls choose their future lives, good or evil. Pursue righteousness and wisdom.
This dialog illustrates the gradual dimming of the vividness and frequency of the interaction with the gods (compared, say, to Samuel's frequent contact with God), and Plato's skepticism regarding Homer's authoritativeness about the gods (similarly in Timaeus)
[595:] I must speak out, I said, though a certain love and reverence for Homer that has possessed me from a boy would stay me from speaking. For he appears to have been the first teacher and beginner of all these beauties of tragedy. Yet all the same we must not honor a man above truth, but, as I say speak our minds...
[599]: "...surely it is fair to ask, 'Friend Homer, if you are not at the third remove from truth and reality in human excellence, being merely tht creator of phantoms whom we defined as the imitator, but if you are even in the second place and were capable of knowing what pursuits make men better or worse in private or public life, tell us what city was better governed owing to you..."
[606d]: "And so in regard to the emotions of sex and anger, and all the appetites and pains and pleasures of the soul which we say accompany all our actions, the effect of poetic imitation is the same. For it waters and fosters these feelings when what we ought to do is to dry them up, and it establishes them as our rulers when they ought to be ruled, to the end that we may be better and happier men instead of worse and more miserable ... Then, Glaucon, said I, when you meet encomiasts of Homer who tell us that this poet has been the educator of Hellas, and that for the conduct and refinement of human life he is worthy of our study and devotion, and that we should order our entire lives by the guidance of this poet, we must love and salute them as doing the best they can, and concede to them that Homer is the most poetic of poets and the first of tragedians, but we must know the truth, that we can admit no poetry into our city save only hymns to the gods and the praises of good men. For if you grant admission to the honeyed muse in lyric or epic, pleasure and pain will be lords of your city instead of law and that which shall from time to time have approved itself to the general reason as the best."
A negative portrayal of Sophists. It establishes that false statements are possible.
Asks what is an ideal statesman. Concludes the ideal state is governed by a wise and flexible statesman, that laws are only an inferior second choice. The myth of universe rotation reversal. Types of government. The web of state blends the courageous and the moderate.
Apollodorus (a late disciple of Socrates) repeats to his friend(s) the story he previously told to his friend Glaucon (Plato's brother?), a story that he had heard from Aristodemus (an early disciple of Socrates). A symposium (symposion = drinking party or entertainment) was held in 416 BCE at the house of Agathon, a poet and playwright who studied under Gorgias and Prodicus. The guests also included Phaedrus (Socrates' friend and a disciple of Hippias), Pausanius (a disciple of Prodicus), Erixymachus (a physician of the Asclepiadae), Aristophanes (comic poet), and Alcibiades (one year before his ill-fated Sicilian expedition).
Eryximachus counsels against heavy drinking and all agree it is not to be a drunken party. (This goal is adhered to until late in the evening.) He dismisses the flute girl (αὐλητρίς) and proposes an evening devoted to discussion of love (Eros =ἔρως).
Pausanius contrasts sacred v. profane Love (sacred is associated with heavenly Aphrodite Urania=Οὐρανοῦ and earthly with Aphrodite Pandemus=πάνδημος, resp.).
Aristophanes describes the original 3 sexes of 4-legged man, split in half and always seeking our primaeval wholeness. Socrates says Love is half-mortal, is always needy but resourceful, longs for and seeks the good, and wisdom. With love we seek immortality, first with children, then with fame, then with spiritual creations. We seek beauty first in people, and ultimately in the vision of eternal beauty, becoming the friend of god. Alcibiades' eulogy of Socrates' teaching, courage and valor, self-control, etc.
Socrates asks of the geometer Theodorus and his pupil Theaetetus "what is knowledge"? It is not just what is perceived or sensed from the material worod or correct opinion. Socrates celebrates a sense of wonder, philosophy vs. oratory, the leisurely search for wisdom. Some knowledge is sensed by the mind alone, by reflection. Memory is like imprints in a block of wax.
Critias tells a tale from Solon, told to Critias' grandfather, said to have come from the Egyptians. Ancient Athens saved the Meditteranean world from invaders from Atlantis, which disappeared into the sea. Describes God's creation of the physical universe. A good, nonjealous benevolent God. The world is formed as a great shperical organism with a soul at the center and with inner and outer circles. Time is a property of motion, the "moving image of the eternal". Man's is made by the gods in imitation of their creation by God. The 4 elements , earth, air, fire, water. Man's shape, senses. Form (eternal) plus raw material yields physical objects (being, space, and generation). Triangles as building blocks. A "chemistry". Our senses and organs. Heart as seat of passions, etc. Opposes experimental verification. Disease mechanisms. Women and animals are formed from recycled inferior souls.
Expresses skepticism about and unknowability of the gods:
"But the father and maker of all this universe is past finding out, and even if we found him, to tell of him to all men would be impossible. [28:d]
"To know or tell the origin of the other divinities is beyond us, and we must accept the traditions of the men of old time who affirm themselves to be the offspring of the gods--that is what that say--and they must surely have known their own ancestors. How can we doubt the word of the children of the gods? Although they give no probable or certain proofs, still, as they declare that they are speaking of what took place in their own family, we must conform to custom and believe them. In this manner, then, according to them, the genealogy of these gods is to be received and set forth." [40d]
http://www.iep.utm.edu/plato/