Protagoras and Meno

by Plato

  ANYTUS: No, they're far from being crazy, Socrates. I'll tell you who's crazy: the young men who give these people money. And their families are even crazier for letting them. And [b] craziest of all are the cities that let them in instead of sending them packing – and that goes for anyone who tries that sort of thing, whether he's a foreigner or a local.58

  SOCRATES: Have any of the sophists ever personally done you any harm, Anytus? Why are you so hard on them?

  ANYTUS: Certainly not. I've never had any dealings with any sophist, and I'd never let anyone else in my family associate with one, either.

  SOCRATES: So, in fact, you have absolutely no first-hand experience of them whatsoever?

  ANYTUS: And I hope it stays that way.

  [c] SOCRATES: But in that case – I'm a little puzzled – how can you be so sure about something you've got absolutely no experience of? How can you know what's good or bad about it?

  ANYTUS: Easily! I certainly know what those people are, whether I've had first-hand experience or not.

  SOCRATES: Perhaps you're a soothsayer, Anytus. How else you manage to know about these men, from what you say yourself, is a mystery. But it really doesn't matter, because in any case we weren't trying to find out who Meno should go [d] to for lessons in depravity. (Let's say that's the sophists, if you like.) No, tell us about the right people: help out your old family friend59 here by explaining who he should go and see, in this great city of ours, to become a man renowned for being good in the sense I outlined a moment ago.

  ANYTUS: Why don't you just tell him yourself?

  SOCRATES: I did. I just said who I thought could teach that kind of thing; but it turns out I'm talking nonsense – according to [e] you, and you're probably right. So it's your turn. You tell him which people in Athens he should go and see. Give him a name – any name.

  ANYTUS: I don't see why we need to name anyone in particular. The fact is, any decent60 Athenian he meets, every single one, will make him a better man than sophists ever could, as long as he follows his advice.

  SOCRATES: And how did these ‘decent’ people get to be decent? All on their own? Without learning anything from anyone? How can they teach people something they never learned [93 a] themselves?

  ANYTUS: I expect they learned from the generation before them, who were equally decent men. Or don't you think this city has had plenty of good men in its time?

  SOCRATES: Oh, yes, I do, Anytus, I do. I think there are good men in Athens today – good on civic and ethical matters – and yes, there've been good men in the past as well. But here's the thing: Were they also good at teaching what it was that made them good? Because that's what we're talking about here. The question isn't whether or not there are any good men in Athens, or whether there've been any good men in the past, but whether being good is something that can be [b] taught – that's what we've spent all this time looking into. And that means that what we're really asking is this: Is it the case that good men, today, or in the past, knew how to pass on to other people what it was that made them good? Or is it something that can't be passed on or handed over from one person to another? That's what Meno and I have spent so long trying to figure out.

  So think about it like this, going on what you just said yourself: Do you think Themistocles61 was a good man? [c]

  ANYTUS: Yes. Outstandingly.

  SOCRATES: And do you also think he was good at teaching what it was that made him a good man? If anyone could, he could, right?

  ANYTUS: Yes, I assume so – if he wanted to.

  SOCRATES: Well, wouldn't he have wanted to? Wouldn't he have wanted his own son – to give only the most obvious example – to become a decent man? Or do you think he was a stingy father and deliberately refused to pass on what it was that made him good? Haven't you heard the stories [d] about Themistocles and his son, Cleophantus? He certainly had him taught to be a good horseman. Apparently the boy could ride a horse standing up – stand upright and throw javelins as he rode – and do all sorts of other amazing things that his father had him taught and made him expert at: everything that called for good teachers. Or haven't you heard those stories from your grandparents?

  ANYTUS: Yes, I have.

  SOCRATES: So no one could have accused his son of lacking natural ability?62

  ANYTUS: Maybe not. [e]

  SOCRATES: What about this, then: Have you ever heard anyone, young or old, say that Cleophantus, Themistocles' son, was a good man, like his father, with the kind of knowledge his father had?

  ANYTUS: Hardly.

  SOCRATES: So what are we to think – that he was keen to teach him those other things, yet when it came to his own kind of knowledge, didn't want to make his own son any better than the next man (assuming, that is, that being a good man was something teachable) ?

  ANYTUS: It certainly doesn't seem likely.

  SOCRATES: So that's Themistocles for you, then: hopeless at teaching people how to be good – and yet you agree he was one of the very best men there's been. So let's take a look at [94 a] another one: Aristides.63 You agree he was a good man?

  ANYTUS: Yes, absolutely.

  SOCRATES: Right; and isn't it the same story? In all the areas that called for teachers, he gave his son, Lysimachus, 64 the finest education in Athens; but did he make him a better man than anyone else? What do you think? You must have met him; you've seen what he's like. Or how about Pericles – a [b] man Of such abundant wisdom! – you know that he raised two sons, Paralus and Xanthippus?

  ANYTUS: Yes.

  SOCRATES: Well, as you know yourself, he trained those boys to be the best horsemen in Athens; and he had them trained to be second to none in music, and athletics, and everything that calls for professional teaching. So it's hardly likely that he didn't also want to make them good men. No, I think he wanted to, all right; the problem, I suspect, is that it just can't be taught. And consider the case of Thucydides65 – because I wouldn't want you to think it's only these few, very unimpressive, Athenians who've been incompetent in this respect! [c] Thucydides brought up two sons as well, Stephanus and Melesias, and apart from him giving them a good all-round education, they could wrestle better than anyone in Athens (he sent one of them to Xanthias and the other one to Eudorus, and those two were known as the finest wrestlers of their day) – remember?

  ANYTUS: Yes, so I've heard.

  SOCRATES: Right; and obviously there's no way he'd have spent so much money on those expensive forms of teaching for his [d] boys, and yet not bothered to turn them into good men, when he could have taught them that at no expense at all – that is, if it was teachable. Or was Thucydides just some ordinary man? Didn't he have loads of friends, both in Athens and among the allies?66 He was from a leading aristocratic family and a very influential man, here and in the rest of Greece. So if it was something teachable at all, he'd surely have found someone who could turn his boys into good men – either someone here in Athens or a foreigner – even if he didn't have time to do it himself because he was too busy taking [e] care of the city's affairs. No, Anytus, my friend, it looks like being good simply can't be taught.

  ANYTUS: Socrates, it seems to me you're rather casual about badmouthing people. Personally, I'd advise you to watch your back, 67 if you know what's good for you. I don't know if it's the same in other cities, but it's certainly the case in this one that it's easier to do people harm than it is to do them good. But I assume you already know that. [95 a]

  [Anytus leaves the conversation, but stays within sight of

  Socrates and Meno.]

  SOCRATES: I get the feeling Anytus is a bit angry with me,

  Meno; and I'm not surprised. It's because he thinks I'm being rude about those men – plus the fact that he sees himself as one of them. Well, one day he may find out what it really means to badmouth a man, 68 and then he'll stop being angry. For now, he has no idea.

  Now tell me; don't you have good, decent men up there in Thessaly, as well?

  MENO: Absolutely.

  SOC
RATES: So are they prepared to offer themselves as teachers [b] to the young? Do they all agree that being good is something teachable, and that they're the ones to teach it?

  MENO: No, not at all, Socrates. Sometimes you'll hear them claim it's teachable, and then sometimes they'll claim it isn't teachable.

  SOCRATES: Well, if they can't even agree about that, we can hardly say that this is something that they teach, can we?

  MENO: No, I suppose not, Socrates.

  SOCRATES: Well, what about these ‘sophists’, then – the only people who make it their profession? What's your view? Do you think they can teach us about being good?

  [c] MENO: That's what most impresses me about Gorgias, 69 Socrates – the fact that you'll never hear him claiming to make people good. In fact, he even scoffs at other sophists when he hears them make that sort of claim. He thinks their job is just to make people skilled at public speaking.

  SOCRATES: So in other words you don't think sophists can teach it either?

  MENO: I can't quite decide, Socrates. I feel the same way about it as most people do. Sometimes I think they can, sometimes I think they can't.

  SOCRATES: You know that you political men aren't the only ones who can't make up your minds about whether or not [d] it's teachable? You know the poet Theognis70 says exactly the same?

  MENO: Really? Where?

  SOCRATES: In that elegiac poem where first he says,

  Always wine with, and dine with, and try to get in with

  the people with plenty of power.

  From good men you'll be taught what a decent man ought.

  Never mingle with men who are bad.

  If you're in the wrong crowd, you will rapidly lose

  [e] every single good notion you had.

  You realize that here he's talking as if being good is something that can be taught?

  MENO: He certainly seems to be.

  SOCRATES: But then in a different bit of the poem, he's rather changed his tune:

  You know, if it were true, that good sense could be made,

  and then simply installed in a man…

  he says (or something like that), then the people who could

  ‘install’ it…

  would be rich; they'd be raking it in…

  and what's more, if that were so…

  Then explain how the child of a man who was good

  ever came to be worse than his dad.

  He got plenty of solid advice. It's not so: [96 a]

  teaching won't turn you good, if you're bad.

  You see? He's talking about exactly the same thing, and contradicting himself.

  MENO: Apparently.

  SOCRATES: So can you name any other thing where the people who claim to teach it, 71 so far from being acknowledged as capable of teaching anyone else, aren't even recognized as knowing anything about it themselves – they're actually thought to be especially bad at the very thing they claim to [b] teach!72 – meanwhile, the people who are acknowledged as decent men themselves can't make up their minds about whether or not it can be taught? And if they're so confused about it, do you think they could possibly be teaching it properly?

  MENO: Absolutely not.

  SOCRATES: So if sophists can't teach it, and people who are decent men themselves can't teach it, clearly nobody else could be teaching it?

  MENO: No. I don't think so.

  SOCRATES: And if nobody's teaching it, then nobody's learning [c]

  it, either?

  MENO: That's right.

  SOCRATES: And we already agreed that if there's something that nobody teaches, and nobody learns, then it's something that can't be taught?

  MENO: Yes, we did.

  SOCRATES: And there's no trace, anywhere, of anyone teaching people how to be good?

  MENO: Right.

  SOCRATES: And if there's no one teaching it, there's no one learning it?

  MENO: Apparently not.

  SOCRATES: So it looks like being good is something that can't be taught?

  [d] MENO: It looks that way – if we've thought it through correctly; which makes me wonder, Socrates, if maybe there aren't even any good men at all! Or, how on earth do people become good, if and when they do?

  SOCRATES: Chances are, Meno, you and I are a couple of rather ordinary men. I'm afraid our teachers – Gorgias in your case, and in my case, Prodicus73 – haven't educated us well enough. So we've definitely got to take a good look at ourselves and find out who's going to make us better, somehow or other. [e] And I'm saying that with this search of ours in mind: what idiots we've been! How silly of us not to realize that it isn't always knowledge that's guiding people when they do things well and succeed in their affairs. That's probably why the answer keeps getting away from us – I mean, the discovery of how exactly good men become good.

  MENO: How do you mean, Socrates?

  SOCRATES: Here's what I mean. We were right to agree that [97a] men who are good also always do good – weren't we?74 That's got to be right?

  MENO: Yes.

  SOCRATES: And we were also right to agree that good men will do us good if they guide us in our affairs and ‘show us the way’?75

  MENO: Yes.

  SOCRATES: But the claim that you can only show people the way if you have wisdom – it looks like we were wrong to agree on that.

  MENO: What makes you say that?

  SOCRATES: Well, I'll tell you. Look – suppose someone knew the way to Larissa (or wherever) and was on his way there, and showing other people how to get there; obviously he'd be good at showing them the right way?

  MENO: Of course.

  SOCRATES: And what about someone who had an opinion on [b] how to get there – a correct opinion – but who'd never actually been there, and didn't know how to get there; wouldn't he be able to show them the way as well?

  MENO: Of course.

  SOCRATES: And presumably as long as he has his correct opinion (about the same thing the other man has knowledge of), he'll be every bit as good at showing people the way? With his true belief, but without knowledge, he'll be just as good a guide as the man with the knowledge?

  MENO: Yes, he'll be just as good.

  SOCRATES: In other words, true opinion is just as good a guide to right action as knowledge. There's the key fact that we kept leaving out, just now, when we were looking into the nature of being good. We said that wisdom was the only thing that can show us how to do things the right way. But [c] that's not so. There's also true opinion.

  MENO: Yes, it certainly looks like it.

  SOCRATES: So in other words, a correct opinion does just as much good as knowledge?

  MENO: Except in one respect, Socrates. If you have knowledge, then you'll always be dead on target; but if you only have a correct opinion, sometimes you'll hit, and sometimes you'll miss.

  SOCRATES: What makes you say that? If you've always got the correct opinion, won't you always be ‘on target’ as long as you've got your correct opinion?

  MENO: Yes, good point… it seems that must be right; which leaves me wondering, Socrates: If that's the case, why on earth is knowledge so much more valuable than correct [d] opinion, and why are they treated as two different things?

  SOCRATES: Well, you know why it is you're wondering about it? Shall I tell you?

  MENO: Go ahead.

  SOCRATES: It's because you haven't pondered Daedalus' statues.76 Maybe you haven't even got any up there in Thessaly.

  MENO: What have they got to do with it?

  SOCRATES: Well, they're the same: if they aren't shackled, they escape – they scamper away. But if they're shackled, they stay put.

  [e] MENO: What are you getting at?

  SOCRATES: If you own an original Daedalus, unshackled, it's not worth all that much – like a slave who keeps running away – because it doesn't stay put. But if you've got one that's shackled, it's very valuable. Because they're really lovely pieces of work. What am I getting at? My point is, it's the same with true opinions. True opinions,
as long as they stay put, are a fine thing and do us a whole lot of good. [98 a] Only, they tend not to stay put for very long. They're always scampering away from a person's soul. So they're not very valuable until you shackle them by figuring out what makes them true.77 (And that, my dear Meno, is a matter of remembering, as we agreed earlier.) And then, once they're shackled, they turn into knowledge, and become stable and fixed. So that's why knowledge is a more valuable thing than correct opinion, and that's how knowledge differs from a correct opinion: by a shackle.

  MENO: You know, I bet that's pretty much right, Socrates.

  [b] SOCRATES: Of course, I'm speaking as someone who doesn't have knowledge myself. I'm just guessing. But I certainly don't think it's only a guess that correct opinion and knowledge are two very different things. If there's anything at all – I'd claim to know – and I wouldn't claim to know a lot – I'd certainly count that as one of the things I know for sure.

  MENO: And you're quite right to, Socrates.

  SOCRATES: So tell me: Am I also right in saying that if true opinion is guiding you, it's just as good as knowledge at achieving the goal of any sort of action?

  MENO: Yes, I think that's right as well.