Plato at the Googleplex

by Rebecca Goldstein

  So it’s just as I thought, I said. There’s something creepy going on here.

  Bullshit, Marcus said. Google is gathering knowledge and, as Plato here will tell you, knowledge is, in itself, a good thing.

  Google is gathering information, Plato said very softly. It’s not clear it’s gathering knowledge.

  And also, I said, whatever it’s gathering, whether you call it information or knowledge, it’s not necessarily a good thing, at least not according to what Siva Vaidhyanathan wrote in his book. According to him, Google is not only using us, but selling us.

  Yeah, well, frankly Siva doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Google doesn’t sell its information to its advertisers.

  Because that would be evil? I asked sarcastically, because I’d been forced to hear on all those countless Google tours that their corporate motto is “Don’t be evil.”

  Maybe that, too, but mainly because if the users caught on they’d probably start a protest which would take the form of using another search engine. As we like to remind ourselves here, choosing another engine is only a click away. Anyway, we’re getting off-track. The point I’m trying to make to Plato is that the knowledge about Web pages that Google is using here is crowd-sourced. That’s the important concept I’m trying to get to here. There’s knowledge without a knower. The idea is that sometimes the crowd, each individual registering its own response, can come up with an answer that’s better than any single individual in the crowd, no matter how smart or expert, could come up with. Sometimes the aggregate is superior to any single member and the only way to get at the right answer is by letting each member have a vote. Think of it as a rolling plebiscite. That’s the general idea behind democracy, after all. Who should be the ruler? Whoever the voters end up voting for is the answer, and you can’t ask them whether they got it right or wrong. Given the rules of democracy, the answer is the one delivered by the crowd, end of story.

  Ah, yes, I had a student who liked to make a similar point, Plato said.

  That one you liked so much? I asked him. Dion?

  No, another, also quite talented in his own way.

  Aristotle? Marcus asked him.

  Yes, Plato said, Aristotle. He said that it is possible that the many, no one of whom taken singly is a sound man, may yet, taken all together, be better than the few, not individually but collectively, in the same way that a feast to which all contribute is better than one supplied at one man’s expense (Politics, Book 3.11, 1281a39–b17).31

  Yeah, well, I’d say Aristotle put his finger right on it. Crowd-sourcing is the way to get a lot of the answers you guys are looking for.

  Guys and gals, I said, earning a nod of approval from Plato and a glare from Marcus. Don’t distract me with trivia, he said. I’m taking on Plato here.

  Then who are you to decree that Cheryl’s objection is trivial? Plato asked. Shouldn’t you crowd-source that opinion?

  Okay, Marcus laughed, I see that you’ve already jumped ahead to the conclusion I was about to draw.

  Draw it anyway, said Plato. It will make it dialectically cleaner.

  Okay, said Marcus, though with a little of the air let out of his tires. Where I was heading was that the kind of knowledge you think belongs in the domain of philosophical experts belongs in the hands of the crowd. There are facts of the matter, okay, about what’s right and wrong, but no individual can get at them in isolation just because everybody is so invested in his own life and is biased to see things from his own point of view. That’s what makes ethical knowledge so tricky: Everybody’s view is warped by their commitment to their own life. There’s just no way to abstract sufficiently from your own circumstances, you can’t help but skew the vantage point because of who you are and where you’re standing. In some sense, Cheryl touched on this when she said that you valorize intelligence because that’s your most valued personal characteristic, just like the model feels about her beauty and the football player about his talent for using his body weight to mow down other human bodies. You kind of seemed to be getting at that in the Myth of the Cave. I mean, the people are all chained to their own points of view so they can’t share their knowledge, but then you just make an entirely wrong turn, at least in my humble opinion, because you have it all depend on the one guy, the one who singly manages to make it out of the cave.

  Well, said Plato, that’s not entirely the case. He’s pulled along at the first stage of his trip.

  Yeah, but the suggestion is that it’s by some other smart guy—or gal, Cheryl. The point you’re making is that it’s only superior reason that can get a person out of the cave. But what you don’t consider is that the only way to get out of the cave is to crowd-source, which is the only way of canceling out the peculiarities of the individual members, the way they’re skewed toward their own vantage points, including the smart guy who thinks his smarts are all that matters. There’s some ideal algorithm for working it out, for assigning weights to different opinions. Maybe we should give more weight to people who have lived lives that they find gratifying and that others find admirable. And, of course, for this to work the crowd has to be huge; it has to contain all these disparate vantage points, everybody who’s staring from their own chained-up position in the cave. It has to contain, in principle, everybody. I mean, if you’re including just men, or just landowners, or just people above a certain IQ, then the results aren’t going to be robust. Including only philosophers, a very peculiar group of people, is definitely going to skew the results. The crowd knows what no individual—not even Plato himself—can know.

  Marcus was talking at the rate of about a hundred words a minute, and by the time he had finished, he was dripping with sweat, and Plato, in contrast, looked, I don’t know how to describe it, he looked more than ever like he was carved in marble, sitting so still and staring so intently at Marcus that I was surprised that Marcus wasn’t at all nonplussed. I was, frankly, worried about Plato. I’m supposed to make sure that my author is at the top of his game when he talks to audiences, and let’s face it, I had failed. I mean I’m not blaming myself, because what was I supposed to do? I was sabotaged every step of the way. But still the guy looked barely alive. This was the very beginning of his book tour, his publisher had obviously put some money into him, which, believe me, publishing houses are doing less and less these days, and he looked like he had been, I don’t know, stung by a stingray and was simply paralyzed (Meno 80b).32 I figured it was overload. First, he sees his long-dead friend Socrates up there on the screen, and then he has Marcus coming at him like a steam engine, or maybe like Google’s search engine. Overload.

  Plato, I said gently, I’m afraid we’ve got to get going. He immediately stood up, but then he just stood there, stock-still, and I swear to God, standing there in that toga, he really did look like a statue, one which was about to be toppled over by the barbarian hordes, which Marcus, who was really buzzed, looked like he could play the part of to perfection. Plato, I said again. It’s time to start moving over to the auditorium. And that’s when I got the surprise of my life. Plato hadn’t been numbed by Marcus’s harangue. He had been invigorated. He wanted to keep going.

  Couldn’t we three simply continue our dialogue in front of the audience? he asked me. It would be like the old days, Socrates in the agora, in discussion with one or another of the citizens, while a crowd gathered to listen. It would be much truer to the spirit of philosophy than my standing before an audience and lecturing. Nobody can learn anything of importance by assuming such a passive stance. But if we were to continue our dialogue, then the lived conversation of our actively thinking would have a better chance of drawing others in.

  Your publisher isn’t sending you on tour to promote the true spirit of philosophy, I told him firmly. I noticed that a little contingent of Googlers were approaching us, no doubt wondering why Plato wasn’t already standing at the podium.

  You are performing your difficult job, with a very difficult subject, very well, he said to me, and this ti
me there was no denying the twinkle in his eyes. But allow me, please, to perform my job, which is also with a difficult subject, as well as I can, at least for just a few moments more.

  But there’s a conflict here, I said to him. Maybe it’s even an ethical conflict.

  Yes? said Plato, and now his eyes were twinkling for all they were worth.

  You and I can’t both do our jobs responsibly. You have a responsibility to do yours, just like I have a responsibility to do mine. It’s a dilemma! I have to confess, Rhonda, that I felt kind of psyched. Whatever this philosophy game is, I was playing it with a pro.

  It is a dilemma, said Plato. And since you are bound to feel your responsibilities just as keenly as I feel mine, perhaps we ought to crowd-source here. We know how you will vote, and we know how I will vote. So it is up to Marcus to decide what is the right thing to do.

  Let’s keep talking, said Marcus.

  Do you have a principle on the basis of which you made your decision?

  I need a principle? Marcus asked.

  Oh, yes, Plato said. It doesn’t count as an ethical decision unless there’s a principle behind it. Otherwise it is arbitrary.

  You want a logos, Marcus said, grinning. I don’t buy that either. Not if morality is a matter of crowd-sourcing, but okay, you want a principle, I’ll give you a principle. The philosophical worth of our continuing the discussion outweighs the inconvenience of keeping people waiting a few extra minutes to hear you address them. They’ve waited a long time, they can wait a little longer.

  Plato turned to me with a smile and asked, Does Marcus’s principle apply some balm to your smarting moral scruples?

  Okay by me, I said, although these people who have come to collect you for your talk—and there were about six or seven of them who were standing there waiting for us to come with them—may disagree. But you know what, Rhonda? They stood there, insanely smiling, happy to eavesdrop, as if even they could appreciate that this isn’t something you get to see every day, not even at the Googleplex. The three of us sat down again, with the little cloud of Googlers hovering over us.

  So, Plato said to Marcus, you have explained the concept of crowd-sourcing to me very well, so well that I think I grasp it. Your idea is that the answers to ethical questions—including the question of what it is to be living a life worth living, what are the kinds of actions that such a life demands, and what are the kinds of actions that such a life prohibits—are to be answered not by any ethical experts but rather by something like the Google search engine. Only this will be an ethical search engine. Have I understood you reasonably well?

  Yes, Marcus said, grinning. Reasonably well.

  And just as the Google search engine has an algorithm that accords different weights to different votes, so, too, will your ethical search engine. So, for example, even if the majority of people think that a life of sensual indulgence is supremely worth the living, and so commended all acts which led to such indulgence, if these people ranked low on either satisfaction with their own lives or low in the esteem with which they were regarded by others, their votes would be given a proportionately lower weight. Is that right? he asked Marcus.

  Yes, basically, Marcus agreed. Of course, I’d have to work out the math.

  Of course, agreed Plato. But mathematics would be the only expertise required. The mathematics, applied to the data of crowd-sourcing, would settle all ethical questions, eliminating any need for experts. Because to both of you the entire idea of ethical expertise is suspect.

  Exactly, Marcus said.

  Exactly, I agreed.

  In fact, let me amend that. I’d say it’s even worse than suspect, Marcus said. I’d say—and I’d back this up by crowd-sourcing—that it’s flat-out ethically wrong. You saw the moral outrage with which Cheryl reacted to your proposing moral experts? I’d say that’s the wholesale reaction you’d get.

  Even though, I said to Marcus, ruling out moral experts would prematurely end your reign as philosopher-king?

  I didn’t know I was in the running, he said.

  Yeah, I said. Plato fingered you early on as a possible candidate for the slot.

  Well, I can’t say I’m not honored to be considered, but frankly I don’t think I’m quite right for the job.

  I’m with you there, I agreed.

  Mainly for the reason that I don’t think anybody is. My ethical search engine can do a better job than any one person in arriving at ethical answers. There’s no one person I would trust more—not even myself—than I would my Ethical Answers Search Engine, or EASE.

  Cheryl spelled it out for me, and asked me if I got it, and I gave her a nod to show her that I wasn’t a total idiot.

  I had to hand it to Marcus, she said. EASE is pretty clever, and Marcus couldn’t have looked more pleased with himself. EASE sounded to me like the kind of VOOM that might get Marcus a nice fat book advance. He was just beaming, and you couldn’t really blame him, since Plato didn’t seem to have a reply ready for him. He continued to sit there, staring down at his folded hands. I took this as a sign that the conversation was finally over, and it was time to reassert myself, so I stood up, and Marcus did, too, but Plato just continued to sit there.

  Plato, I said, gently, but in a voice that would brook no dissent, just the way I do with my kids, it’s time to get going. You’re not here to tête-à-tête with me and Marcus. You’re here to sell books.

  Indeed, he said, though he just continued to sit there. I started gathering up all my stuff in a very no-nonsense way, then he said, in that soft way of his, I have just one more question I would like to ask about EASE.

  Okay, I said, but we simply have to start walking. You can ask your question while you walk, can’t you?

  Of course, he said. In fact, I highly recommend walking while thinking. The grounds of the Academy are lined with pathways, and I always encourage ambulatory cerebration.

  Okay, I said. Then let’s get this ambulatory cerebration on the road.

  So, Plato said the moment we got outside, the contingent of Googlers trailing after us, I have a problem with getting all ethical answers with EASE.

  I thought you would, said Marcus, grinning.

  You have equipped EASE, just like Google’s search engine, with a preferential ordering system, have you not?

  Yes, Marcus said, just like with Google’s search engine.

  Well, there are substantive philosophical presuppositions that are slipped into that ordering system. For example, EASE is presupposing that the lives most worth the living are lives that both bestow a sense of worthiness to those who are living them and also, simultaneously, command admiration from others.

  No, said Marcus. I didn’t say that. I just said that we’d give heavy weights to the opinions of those who rate their own lives the most satisfactory and also were judged by others as living well. I didn’t say that such people were necessarily living the most worthwhile lives.

  Well, it seems to me hard to avoid that conclusion. How can we preferentially weight their opinions about the worthwhile life without presupposing some such substantive claim? What you’re presupposing is that if enough other people think you’re living a worthwhile life, then you are living a worthwhile life, with the opinions of those other people counting all the more if still other people think that those people are living a worthwhile life. That claim is implicit in your weighting system. You’re building in the claim that worthwhile lives are like desirable search results. Perhaps that is so. Perhaps it is not so. Either way, it is an ethical claim implicit in the preferential ordering you’ve built into EASE.

  So you’re saying that in programming EASE in this way I’m acting as the moral expert? Marcus asked, still grinning. You’re saying that I am, after all, taking on the job of philosopher-king?

  Precisely, said Plato.

  But wait a minute, I said. Why do you have to order the various opinions like that, weighting some opinions more heavily than others? That doesn’t even seem fair to me. Why don�
�t you just make it completely democratic, since everybody has just as much right to their opinion of what makes life worthwhile as everybody else? So then it would just be a matter of counting up votes, nobody’s vote counting more. I think that’s how you should do it with EASE.

  No, that’s not going to work, Marcus said. Plato’s just going to come right back at you and say that what you’ve just said, that everybody has just as much right to their opinion of what makes life worthwhile as anybody else, is itself an ethical statement. You’ve even put it in ethical terms, talking about fairness.