Philosophy
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Recall that Plato named himself, not a seeker or a finder, but a lover of wisdom. Love plays an important role in inspiring one towards the good life. We must fall in love with wisdom, and we can use our worldly experience with falling in love as a model. Plato writes poetically about how your lover can lead you to recollect the Forms:
Now when the charioteer beholds the vision of love, and has his whole soul warmed through sense, and is full of the prickings and ticklings of desire, the obedient steed, then as always under the government of shame, refrains from leaping on the beloved; but the other, heedless of the pricks and of the blows of the whip, plunges and runs away, giving all manner of trouble to his companion and the charioteer, whom he forces to approach the beloved and to remember the joys of love. […] And now they are at the spot and behold the flashing beauty of the beloved; which when the charioteer sees, his memory is carried to the true beauty, whom he beholds in company with Modesty like an image placed upon a holy pedestal. He sees her, but he is afraid and falls backwards in adoration, and by his fall is compelled to pull back the reins with such violence as to bring both the steeds on their haunches, the one willing and unresisting, the unruly one very unwilling.
Plato, Phaedrus, trans. Benjamin Jowett (http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/phaedrus.html)
For Plato, the crucial point is that reason stays in control, taking you ever further away from this world into a state of perpetual spiritual connection with the transcendent realm. To this extent, Plato’s philosophy has a strongly mystical side. Perhaps this is why so many elements of Platonism were incorporated into Christianity during its development in the Middle Ages.
Spotlight
The term ‘platonic love’ today refers to a strong, non-sexual bond. Plato recommended purely spiritual relationships as the highest form of love, though he also recommended starting with a lot of hot and sweaty gay sex.
Justice?
In The Republic, Plato undertakes to find out what justice is. Thrasymachus insists that there is no such thing as justice and Socrates sets out to prove him wrong. His investigation, however, brings him full circle – back to Thrasymachus, in a way. For he discovers that justice is a concept that arises only in dysfunctional circumstances. The ideal state, just like the ideal soul, is perfectly ordered. Therefore it has no need for justice. Obeying reason, everyone knows their place, and there is no conflict.
No wonder there are so many competing definitions of justice, and no wonder none of them is adequate. The very spectre of justice indicates deep structural flaws. Once proper order is established, questions about justice should no longer arise.
Plato’s vision in The Republic is beautiful and yet also terrifying. On the one hand, it would be wonderful to live in an orderly society where everyone does as they should. On the other hand, achieving this order may require the most tyrannical of totalitarian regimes. In fact, totalitarian leaders such as Joseph Stalin have been greatly inspired by Plato. Plato’s critics crystallize its greatest challenge in a single, disturbing question: Who will guard the guardians?
Key ideas
Allegory of the Cave: The story Plato tells to illustrate the difficulty of philosophical inquiry
Forms: Perfect exemplars of everything we imperfectly experience in this world
Idealism: The view that the material world around us is not real
Philosopher-kings: The rulers of Plato’s republic
Realism: The view that the material world is real and knowable without recourse to transcendent Forms
Relativism: The view that every opinion is equally valid
Ring of Gyges: A mythical ring that makes you invisible
Fact-check
1 The Socratic Method is to teach by…
a Example
b Promise of reward
c Threat of punishment
d Asking questions
2 The word ‘philosophy’ comes from the Greek words for…
a Reality, existence
b Love, wisdom
c Thought, experiment
d Beauty, truth
3 Idealism is the view that true reality is…
a Unknowable
b Immaterial
c Experiential
d Unjust
4 How do we know the Forms exist, according to Plato?
a We recollect them
b We experience them
c We create them
d We acquire them
5 What does Plato call the eternal constants that unify our fragmented experience?
a Forms
b Experiments
c Thoughts
d Laws
6 What does Thrasymachus think the Ring of Gyges thought experiment proves?
a That so-called justice is the fear of getting caught
b That no one has the courage to challenge the law
c That the government cannot be trusted
d That only the material world is real
7 What does the Ring of Gyges do?
a It makes you happy
b It makes you invisible
c It makes you rich
d It makes you powerful
8 How does Plato propose to keep the citizens of his republic from changing caste?
a By propagating a noble lie
b By wielding an invincible police force
c By keeping the other castes secret
d By promising irresistible rewards
9 Why do the prisoners in Plato’s Allegory of the Cave think the escapee is corrupted?
a Because he tries to keep his escape a secret
b Because he tells them a noble lie
c Because he wants to put his chains back on
d Because he no longer appreciates the puppet show
10 What do the two horses stand for in Plato’s charioteer analogy?
a The world around us and the transcendent realm
b Just and unjust rulers
c Noble and base passions
d The individual and the state
Dig deeper
Thomas C. Brickhouse and Nicholas D. Smith, Plato's Socrates (Oxford University Press, 1994)
Russell Dancy, Plato's Introduction of Forms (Cambridge University Press, 2004)
Alfred Edward Taylor, Plato: The Man and His Work (Courier Dover Publications, 2001)
2
Aristotle and friendship
‘A friend is a second self.’
Aristotle
In this chapter you will learn:
• about Aristotle’s doctrine of the four causes
• the meaning of teleology
• why not all friendships are equally valuable
• the doctrine of the golden mean
• how logic improves our reasoning
• how empiricists support their conclusions
• why Aristotle rejects Plato’s idealism in favour of realism.
Thought experiment: last wishes
You walk into a dimly lit room. Quiet music is playing. People are standing around in small groups, speaking in low voices with grave looks on their faces. You know a number of them; in fact, you know them all. It is surprising to see so many familiar faces, both relatives and friends, gathered in one place. They are wearing their nicest clothes, as are you. You look to the far end of the room. In the midst of several flower arrangements lies a casket.
Oh no, you think, someone I know has died. You walk reluctantly over to the casket and peer inside.
It’s you!
‘Hey!’ you shout, moving towards the nearest group. No one turns to acknowledge you and you soon realize that they cannot see or hear you.
The music fades out and chimes sound. People begin shuffling into rows of chairs facing the casket. A man you don’t recognize steps on to a podium. He thanks everyone for coming and announces that someone would now like to say a few words about the deceased.
You close your eyes in disbelief. Although half of you wants to run from the room, the other ha
lf wants to know what will be said.
Before you can decide what to do, the man introduces your best friend: the person who knew and loved you best. You freeze and can’t help but listen. Your best friend begins by relating how you met. Then they tell some of the things you liked to do together and some of the things you accomplished together.
Hearing all of this makes you feel a warm glow inside.
After pausing for a sip of water, your best friend begins to tell a series of stories to illustrate the following:
• What made them look forward to seeing you
• What they admired most about you
• Why you were a good friend
• How you made their life, and the lives of others, better
• What they are going to miss most now that you are gone.
Your best friend stops, choking up a bit, and shuffles back into the audience.
While deeply honoured by the tribute, you also feel strangely disappointed. Are there some other accolades you know you did not earn but wish you had?
Seize the day
The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle (384–322 BC) was Plato’s most illustrious student. Although the philosophical dialogues he wrote do not survive, his last will and testament has. It paints a rare portrait of excellence. While modestly acknowledging his accomplishments, Aristotle shows tenderness and generosity towards his loved ones. It would be interesting to know what his best friend said about him at his funeral.
It’s fitting that Aristotle achieved such excellence, considering that he spent a great deal of time thinking about how to attain it. Aristotle’s ideas about the good life are recorded in a work known as the Nicomachean Ethics, which, like most of the works attributed to Aristotle, was probably a compilation of lecture notes. In it, Aristotle investigates the question of what makes for an excellent human being. He resists the temptation to make facile suggestions like those you might find in today’s ‘self-help’ books. Ever the consummate philosopher, Aristotle grounds his investigation in metaphysics.
Spotlight
According to legend, Aristotle was the tutor of Alexander the Great, who went on to conquer the Persian Empire. Being infinitely interested in the exotic flora and fauna of the East, Aristotle is said to have asked Alexander to send him samples. One can only imagine the stench of the crates that would have arrived, having travelled up to 10,000 miles over tropical terrain.
The four causes
At the heart of Aristotle’s metaphysics is the doctrine of the four causes, according to which true knowledge of something requires a fourfold explanation of its existence.
Suppose you are hosting some aliens from outer space, who are visiting earth for the first time. They have never seen a house before. ‘What is a house?’ they ask you. Aristotle would say that a proper explanation requires answering the following questions:
1 What is it made of? (the material cause)
2 Who made it? (the efficient cause)
3 What is its essence? (the formal cause)
4 Why does it exist? (the final cause)
The material cause of a house is the stone and wood from which it is made. Its efficient cause is the person who built it. Its final cause, or purpose, is to provide shelter. But what is the essence of a house?
The essence of a thing is its sine qua non, and it is closely related to its purpose. What features enable a house to provide shelter? They are not its particular colour or shape or size but, rather, the fact that it has four walls and a roof that enclose a space. Without enclosing space, a house would not be able to provide shelter – the wind and the rain would blow in. Enclosing space (in the manner planned out in the architect’s drawing) is therefore the formal cause of the house.
Spotlight
Aristotle famously asserted that men have more teeth than women. His detractors have always found this quite hilarious because he claimed to base his science on observation, and anyone who actually bothered to count would see that men and women have exactly the same number of teeth. Recent studies, however, indicate that Aristotle may get the last laugh. It turns out that ancient Greek females routinely suffered from a vitamin deficiency that may have caused them to have fewer teeth.
Applying the doctrine of the four causes to the human being is surprisingly insightful. The material and efficient causes are easy – human beings are made of flesh and blood and made by their parents. But what are the formal and final causes of a human being?
Case study: the birth of science
Aristotle was a student-teacher at Plato’s Academy when Plato died. Rather than taking over the Academy, Aristotle established his own school in Athens, called the Lyceum.
While the Academy was devoted to the abstract – even mystical – speculation that Plato had promoted, the Lyceum concerned itself with hands-on, scientific studies. Aristotle was insatiably curious about rocks, plants and animals. In fact, he collected specimens and made a careful study of their similarities, thereby inventing the species–genus classification system that became so important in the development of science.
Aristotle was also interested in the sky. Ancient Greek philosophers disprove the popular myth that, before Columbus discovered America, everyone believed the earth was flat. Plato speculated that the earth was round based on the idea that the circle is the perfect shape. If the divine maker of the earth is perfect, then he would certainly have made it the perfect shape. While rejecting Plato’s mystical reasoning, Aristotle argued that the earth is round based on his observation of the lunar eclipse, in which the earth casts a curved shadow upon the moon.
Plato’s mystical approach relies on controversial presuppositions – such as the notion of the divine and the notion of perfection. Plato considered these presuppositions justified on the grounds that they were born within (or innate to) the human mind, as discussed in the last chapter. Aristotle rejects these innate ideas, arguing instead that all knowledge comes from observation of the physical world around us. This view, which is the foundation of modern science, is known as empiricism.
Teleology
For Aristotle, the answer to this question of formal and final causes lies in teleology, the view that everything in the universe has a special function. For example, the function of oak trees is to produce acorns. An oak tree that fails to produce acorns is defective, and one that produces many good acorns is an excellent tree.
What do human beings contribute to the natural world? What makes us different from everything else in the universe?
Like rocks, we have mass. Like plants, we grow and reproduce. Like animals, we move ourselves around. But there is one thing we do that nothing else does – namely, we think. More specifically, we use our rational capacities to strive for happiness.
Ask anyone on the street what their ultimate goal is and they will be hard pressed to deny that everything they do is some small step in the quest for happiness. Aristotle’s word for human happiness is eudaimonia, which literally means the state of having ‘a good indwelling spirit’, signifiying a deeper sense of happiness than a dog or even a chimpanzee can achieve.
Aristotle famously defines the human being as the rational animal, making rationality our formal cause and happiness our final cause. The excellent human being is one who is good at reasoning about the good life.
Spotlight
An avid student of biology, Aristotle came to the carefully considered conclusion that the heart is the organ of thinking and the brain exists to cool the blood. Of course, it is true that the folded surface of the brain acts just like a radiator by increasing surface area. Aristotle was unwilling to perform lobotomies on prisoners, so how could he have known what the tiny cells on those surfaces were doing? Perhaps, though, we should all try harder to think with our hearts.
The golden mean
What constitutes good reasoning? Aristotle argued that, whenever we are faced with a situation that demands a choice, we should realize that there is a wide variety of possible responses, rangi
ng from deficient through to excessive. The right response will always fall in the middle between those two extremes.
Both excessive and defective exercise destroys the strength … while that which is proportionate both produces and increases and preserves it. So too is it, then, in the case of temperance and courage and the other virtues. For the man who flies from and fears everything and does not stand his ground against anything becomes a coward, and the man who fears nothing at all but goes to meet every danger becomes rash; and similarly the man who indulges in every pleasure and abstains from none becomes self-indulgent, while the man who shuns every pleasure, as boors do, becomes in a way insensible; temperance and courage, then, are destroyed by excess and defect, and preserved by the mean.
Nicomachean Ethics, Book II, Ch. 2 (http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/nicomachaen.2.ii.html)
This is the doctrine of the golden mean – that the virtuous person avoids extremes, aiming always to act in a moderate fashion.
Consistent with his empirical approach, Aristotle would ask you to observe the people you admire most. Do they act in extreme ways? Extreme behaviour is often the result of emotional reactions. As rational animals, we are at our best when we use reason to control emotion and guide us towards a moderate response.
When you imagine your best friend speaking about you at your funeral, do you imagine them saying that you were level-headed during crises? That you knew just what to say or do to cheer them up? That you showed them how to have fun without getting into trouble? These are all examples of the Aristotelian golden mean. Clearly, there is much to be said for this doctrine.