Final Review
Cultural Relativism: The Midterm Review
Core Definition: Cultural Relativism posits that "everyone is correct" and asks the rhetorical question, "who are you to disagree?" It suggests that all groups do things differently based on their specific culture.
The Risk of Tolerance: While it promotes understanding, cultural relativism can lead people to accept too much. When tolerance becomes absolute, "bad things can happen," such as genocide.
The Three Questions Applied to Cultural Relativism: 1. What human problem is it trying to solve? * It addresses the persistent problem of things that matter, specifically the risk of material conflict (killing one another) and the fear of domination through judging others. * It acknowledges the fact that societies differ and that there is inherent disagreement. 2. What kind of human being does this political order assume and/or produce? * The assumed/produced individual is reflective, tolerant, self-aware, and "bound." * Individuals should view their own beliefs as a function of contingency—acknowledging that things could be radically otherwise. * One's beliefs about right and wrong are seen as "just as right and wrong as anyone else's." * The system demands tolerance of every way people live simply because they live that way. * The Core Paradox: Can one be truly bound by beliefs believed to be completely contingent? The answer provided is "No"; if beliefs are merely contingent, they cannot be the fundamental way one navigates the world, essentially rendering the individual "nothing." 3. What must politics do to make the world livable? * Politics must lower the stakes, deflate conflict, and "keep things moving." * Conflicts are reframed as mere differences in taste. Individuals who insist on a singular truth are labeled as "making a fuss" and are considered the problem. * It requires people to keep their beliefs to themselves and discourages philosophical inquiry into truth, labeling it a "waste of time." * This creates a "totalizing" surface where cracks are ignored.
John Locke: The Foundations of Constitutional Liberalism
Central Problem: How can people live together if everyone is naturally free and equal?
Human Nature: Humans are naturally free, equal, and reason-capable. They are essentially property-owners.
Goal of Politics: To secure property, establish known standing laws, provide impartial judges, and maintain constitutional power.
Signature Claim: People enter society specifically to protect property; therefore, government must be limited.
Key Concepts: Property, Consent, State of Nature.
Locke: Chapter
State of Nature: A condition where human beings are naturally free and equal. No one is born with inherent political authority over others.
State of Perfect Freedom: Individuals can act and dispose of their possessions as they see fit, provided they do not conflict with the Law of Nature.
State of Perfect Equality: No one has a clear decree from the divine to rule; everyone can act as they want.
Law of Nature: This is the only constraint on the use of power. It is taught by reason and dictates that because humans are the property of God, we must not harm others' life, liberty, health, or possessions (collectively called "Property").
Preservation: The primary aim is self-preservation. Secondarily, one should preserve others when their own preservation is not at stake.
Universal Executive Power: In the state of nature, everyone has the right to enforce the law of nature to restrain others and protect the innocent. Everyone acts as a judge in their own case.
The Violator: Someone who breaks the law of nature has rejected the rule of reason and cannot be part of the community. Locke notes you cannot punish someone using specific national laws (like "English laws") if they are not from that nation; you can only punish them according to the law of nature.
Locke: Chapter (On Property)
Labor Theory of Value: Value is created when a human puts their energy into a resource. Labor is what gives a thing value and makes it one’s own.
The America Example: Locke states, "at the beginning, the entire world was America." He argues that a king of a large territory in America (unimproved land) lives worse than a day laborer in England because the land in England is cultivated.
The Invention of Money: Money transforms the state of nature. It allows value to become abstract and storable.
Inequality: Money naturally creates inequality because it "freezes" value and allows for accumulation beyond immediate need. It is not just about "gold," but anything deemed valuable.
Nature's Value: Nature is essentially worthless without labor acting upon it.
Locke: Chapter (The Origin of Political Societies)
Foundation of Authority: Authority arises through use, such as early monarchies evolving from family dynamics. However, legitimate government only derives from consent.
The Body Politic: By joining a community, individuals incorporate (making a body) and take on obligations. This is an engagement (entering into a pledge).
The Rule of the Majority: Consenting to join a community implies consenting to the rule of the majority.
Logic vs. History: This is not a description of historical fact but a logical argument: what must be true for authority to be legitimate? Unlike those who claim authority is "natural" or "born into," Locke argues political authority is made and engaged.
Forms of Consent: 1. Express: A literal, verbal, or written commitment to join the society and the body politic. 2. Tacit: Using property that is secured by the laws of a territory (e.g., traveling on a highway).
Locke: Chapter (The Ends of Political Society)
The Problem of the State of Nature: Despite its freedom, the state of nature is a condition characterized by fear, danger, and death. It provides a freedom one cannot live in.
Three Key Deficiencies: 1. Want of Established Law: The state of nature lacks an established, settled, known law received by common consent as the standard of right and wrong. It must be independent of mood (established), unchanging (settled), and public (known), rather than a "battle of meanings." 2. Want of an Impartial Judge: Humans are poor judges in their own cases; they are partial, vindictive, and lazy. 3. Want of Executive Power: There is often no reliable force to back a right sentence.
The Sacrifice: To join society, individuals give up their Legislative power (the power to direct themselves) and Executive power (the power to punish). These are transferred to the community to create liberal constitutionalism.
Locke: Three Questions Summary
Problem: Insecurity resulting from equal freedom (everyone interprets the law), the problem of accumulation/inequality introduced by money, and the difficulty of collective agency without destroying the individual.
Human Type: Assumes a self-owning, future-oriented, reason-capable individual motivated by property. Produces a "rights-bearer" and "property owner" split between public and private life who views the world as improvable.
Politics' Task: Stabilize a shared world by converting fragile individual powers into durable public structures (laws, judges, police) to preserve "property" (life, liberty, and estate).
Thomas Hobbes: The Sovereignty of Security
Central Problem: Radical insecurity produced by natural equality.
Human Nature: Driven by the fear of violent death; individuals are free, equal, and self-interested.
Goal of Politics: Create an absolute common power to define laws, enforce contracts, and eliminate competition.
Signature Claim: The state of nature is a state of war; therefore, we must surrender nearly all power to an absolute sovereign.
Hobbes: Chapter
Radical Equality: We are equal because even the weakest has the ability to kill the strongest. Equality also extends to intellectual abilities, as most people think they are smarter than average and learn via experience.
The State of War: Equality combined with scarcity produces Enmity (hostility). This leads to Diffidence (mistrust).
Three Causes of Quarrel: 1. Scarcity and Competition (for gain). 2. Diffidence (for safety/security). 3. Glory (for reputation).
Right of Nature: In the state of nature, there is no law; there is only the power to do what is necessary to survive. Justice and private property do not exist until there is a common power and law.
Motivations for Peace: Fear of violent death, desire for necessities, and the hope that labor will be secured.
Hobbes: Chapters and
Right vs. Law: * Liberty (Right): The absence of external impediments to action. * Law: A constraint that binds action (obligation).
The First Fundamental Law of Nature: Seek peace and follow it; when peace is unobtainable, use all advantages of war for self-defense.
The Second Law of Nature: Be willing to lay down your natural rights to all things, keeping only as much liberty against others as you would allow them against you (a version of the Golden Rule). If others won't reciprocate, you have no obligation.
Inalienable Rights: You cannot lay down the right to resist someone trying to kill or harm you.
Contracts and Covenants: * Contract: A mutual transfer of rights. * Covenant (Pact): A contract where performance is delayed on one or both sides, relying on trust. * The Problem of Words: In the state of nature, words alone are insufficient to guarantee a covenant; there must be a coercive power to enforce them.
The Third Law of Nature (Justice): Individuals must perform the covenants they have made. Justice is not a virtue of the soul but the creation of stability through externalized expectations of violence (punishment must exceed the gain of breaking the law).
Hobbes: Chapters and
The Leviathan: To stabilize the natural inclination of people toward liberty and dominion, an "invisible power" must keep them in "awe."
The Covenant: Individuals confer all their power upon one man or one assembly of men. The sovereign does not enter the covenant; the covenant is between the subjects to obey the sovereign.
Consequences of Sovereignty: 1. Subjects cannot change the form of government or change sovereigns. 2. Sovereign power cannot be forfeited or breached. 3. No subject can protest the sovereign's decision (due to majority rule). 4. The sovereign cannot injure a subject because the subject authorized the sovereign's actions (punishing the sovereign is punishing oneself). 5. The sovereign is the sole judge of what is necessary for peace, the meaning of laws, and the distribution of "property." 6. The sovereign controls the military, all officials, and the designation of honor.
Hobbes: Three Questions Summary
Problem: Radical insecurity produced by natural equality and the resulting state of war.
Human Type: Assumes calculating, fearful, glory-seeking individuals. Produces subjects who obey out of rational self-preservation.
Politics' Task: Create a common power, centralize force, control doctrines, and eliminate competing centers of power.
Niccolò Machiavelli: Realism and the New Prince
Central Problem: Radical instability in the world (Fortuna).
Human Nature: Ambitious, unreliable, and self-interested. Some wish to dominate; others just want to be left alone.
Goal of Politics: Found a new order and institute stability over chaos.
Signature Claim: The ends justify the means; virtue (Virtù) is the effectiveness of action, which may include "cruelty well-used."
Machiavelli: Chapter (The Effectual Truth)
The Effectual Truth: Machiavelli focuses on the actual causes and effects of decisions ("what is") rather than the "imagination" of how things "ought to be."
Learning to be "Not Good": A prince must learn how to be "not good" depending on the necessity of the circumstances to avoid ruin.
Prudence: Knowing when to use virtue or vice to maintain the state. Vice is redefined as sometimes necessary for the sake of the goal.
Machiavelli: Chapters and
Virtù vs. Virtue: Virtù signifies capacity, strength, initiative, and force—the ability to act effectively. It is self-generated, unlike Fortuna, which is unstable.
The People vs. The Nobles: The prince should rely on the people rather than the nobles. The nobles want to dominate (and are harder to satisfy), whereas the people only wish to not be oppressed and are more numerous. If the people are friendly, the prince has security in adversity.
Teacher of Evil: Machiavelli is often called this because he suggests the prince should keep people dependent and utilize the ambitions of the nobles for his own power.
Machiavelli: Chapters and (Borgia and Sforza)
Francesco Sforza: Rose through his own virtù and laid proper foundations.
Cesare Borgia: Rose through the good fortune of his father (Pope Alexander ). Despite having great virtù and laying foundations, he ultimately failed because of "extreme malignity of fortune" (getting sick when his father died).
Cruelty Well-Used: Borgia’s use of Ramiro d’Orco in Romagna is a prime example. D’Orco was cruel and efficient at bringing order. Once order was established, Borgia had D’Orco killed and displayed in a public square to satisfy and "stupefy" the people, shifting the blame for cruelty away from himself.
Escaping Fortune: Virtù is the constant effort to build foundations (shores and dikes) to resist the unpredictable flow of Fortuna.
Machiavelli: Chapters and
The Fox and the Lion: A prince must know how to fight by law (human) and by force (beast). Like the centaur Chiron, a leader must be both. * The Fox: Cunning to detect traps. * The Lion: Strength to intimidate wolves.
Keeping Faith: A prince is not bound to keep his word if it hurts him, especially since humans are naturally "bad" and wouldn't keep their word to him.
Perception: It is not necessary to be virtuous, but it is essential to appear merciful, faithful, humane, upright, and religious. People judge by what they see.
Love vs. Fear: It is better to be feared than loved if one must choose. Love is held by a chain of obligation that men break at their convenience, but fear is maintained by a dread of punishment which never fails. However, the prince must avoid being hated, primarily by not touching the property or women of his subjects.
Machiavelli: Three Questions Summary
Problem: Radical instability and the unreliability of human nature.
Human Type: Ambitious and fearful. Produces individuals who depend on the prince.
Politics' Task: Found a new order, establish laws and institutions, and shape civic character through the strategic use of force and law.
Thomas Aquinas: The Scholastic Synthesis
Context: Aquinas (-) lived during the "Aristotle Shock," when ancient texts returned to the West via Arabic and Jewish scholars.
The Scholastic Method: A structured argument involving a Question, Objections, Counter-statements (Sed Contra), the Main Argument (Respondeo), and Replies to Objections.
Definition of Law (Question ): Law is "an ordinance of reason for the common good, made by him who has care of the community, and promulgated." * Ordinance of Reason: Law is not just a whim; it must be rational. * Common Good: The end of law is the happiness of the entire community. * Promulgated: A law is not binding unless it is made public.
Aquinas: Question (The Five Kinds of Law)
Eternal Law: The rational guidance of all things that exists in the mind of God. Since God is outside of time, this law is eternal. It is the "Supreme Reason."
Natural Law: The participation of the eternal law in the rational creature. Humans use their reason to discern the natural order and their orientation toward the good. Unlike plants or animals, humans participate by understanding and self-direction.
Human Law: The particular determinations of the natural law devised by human reason. It is necessary because natural law is general (e.g., "do no harm"), but human life requires specific rules (e.g., "drive on the right side of the road").
Divine Law: Revealed law (Old and New Testaments) needed for four reasons: * Man's end is eternal happiness, which exceeds natural reason. * Human judgment is uncertain and unreliable. * Human law cannot judge internal thoughts and intentions. * Human law cannot punish or forbid all evil without destroying the common good.
The Law of Sin (Fomes Peccati): The "tinder of sin" or the disorderly inclination of the sensual appetite (passion) that deviates from the law of reason. It is a consequence of the Fall.
Augustine of Hippo: The Two Cities
Context: Written after the sacking of Rome in AD to answer claims that Christianity caused the empire’s decline.
Linear History: History moves from Creation to Fall to Redemption to Final Judgment. This differs from the cyclical view of the ancients.
The Two Cities: 1. City of God: Founded on the love of God to the point of contempt for self. 2. City of Man (Earthly City): Founded on the love of self to the point of contempt for God.
Happiness: Augustine critiques philosophers (Stoics, Epicureans, etc.) for thinking happiness is possible in this life. True happiness is unattainable on earth due to the inherent misery of the mortal condition and the struggle against vice.
The Limits of Politics: Politics solve the problem of Sin. They cannot provide true justice or ultimate happiness; they can only provide "earthly peace" (tranquility of order) so that life is manageable while the City of God is on pilgrimage.
Commonwealth: A community defined by shared love. If the shared love is flawed (self-love), the commonwealth is flawed. True justice only exists in the City of God.
Augustine: Three Questions Summary
Problem: Human sin and disordered affections.
Human Type: Fallen yet rational beings.
Politics' Task: Sustain a limited, fragile earthly peace to allow the "pilgrimage" of the faithful toward eternal life.
Aristotle (384-322 BCE)
Born in northern Greece
Aristotle tutored Alexander the Great
Returned to Athens and founded his own school, the Lyceum
He was the first real systematic thinker
He is the anchor of the Western canon
His writings were burned in the library of Alexandria, his were also saved by the Jewish and Arab scholars, this led to the creation of modernity
He was a teleological thinker, the idea that everything has an “end” a “purpose”
Book One
The world is not that bad because everyone is aiming towards some good.
Well what is the good?
Aristotle says it is evident that all of society is aiming towards some good, and guides human action.
If we want to understand our purpose, we have to understand the thing towards which we aim.
What is the best good?
We’re aiming towards the city, and the city is aiming towards a good.
The city contains the highest good
The city is ultimately natural because we naturally join together
Some are by nature superior and some are by nature inferior (slaves)
There is a difference between male and female, and a difference between female and slave.
Barbarians are lesser than us because they are confused on who is a slave, and do not have formed cities.
Aristotle is saying that we should be ruled by kings because the gods are ruled by kings, that’s what the barbarians think.
So, the inverse of this teaching that Aristotle believes that we need to live happily. Not to survive, to thrive.
A good knife is the one that always does what it’s supposed to do, and one that never stops doing that.
We’re aiming for a perfect state, so a city is a natural production, and man is a political being.
Whatever is naturally unfit for society must be inferior to man
The best thing is the gift of speech, logos is what proves human beings are social
We develop language for another being
Our speech makes us different
If someone were to come down and know more than us, we would be slaves.
The one end for humans for Aristotle is happiness
We can disagree about what happiness is
Politics is about getting you as happy as you can be
We don’t create cities just to survive, they are created so we can be happy.
They may fall at doing this, but there are good and bad cities
We fully complete ourselves as humans in a city, otherwise we struggle and there is an emptiness within us.
We should praise founders, because they give us the greatest good, the greatest chance to be happy
What regimes they make
What laws they make
The city is the “regime” or just people being together
1.3
Aristotle is speaking to wealthy slave owners in class, he speaks in terms they can understand
There might be natural slaves, those that cannot be reasonable, so they decide to follow a master
But, he says slavery is just by force then
He asks why do we even have slaves? If it’s not because one person has more knowledge then why do we have it?
He agrees it’s by slavery, but asks what happens if the story of Daedalus happens, basically talking about robots
Once we have that, what’s the value in slavery?
He says that then slavery would be gone, because we would find a better way to get materials
Technology can eliminate slavery
Natural slavery’s closest analogy is reason and your desires
Your soul over your body
The only way you can justify slavery now is by force
“I’m doing this because I’m stronger than them”
The fact that slavery is based on force makes it automatically bad
There is a moral objective to treating the master and slave relationship as a political one.
This is because you have to use force, which is unbecoming of a human.
Book 3, 1-5
All cities are not the same
A city is a collective body composed of many parts
Not the walls or borders, it is the nature of it’s citizens
There is nothing that more characterizes a complete citizen than someone who can meaningfully participate in the judicial and executive parts of government.
Not someone who resides in the city or has access to courts, it’s someone who actively engages.
Who participates is not the same everywhere
A regime is the politics
There are different regimes because there are different logics
He is criticizing the way his students think about birthright citizenship
What about the founders? How can they be the first citizens?
Aristotle thinks: if someone shares in the office they are a citizen
Each city produces a different type of citizen
A change in leaders is not a change of regime
If America suddenly became a monarchy, then the regime would change
The regime is what establishes the continuity
The form is what dictates what a good and bad citizen actually is
Good and bad means something different depending on the regime they’re in
Best case scenario is a good regime that makes you a good person and be a good citizen, you don’t have to choose
In some regimes, good people will be considered bad citizens
The best regime is a politics where you learn to command and obey
A politics that lets you do both is the best politics
To Aristotle, you having to work is not good for being a good citizen, because you’re dependent on something else
So you’re not a full citizen
Human beings are by nature social
You cannot be happy if you live in the wrong regime
Human beings are willingly to live through really bad things because we like living
Power
The people who want to have power and usually the ones who want it for their private goods
People who want to be in politics are suspicious
You can be in power, but if you believe that politics looks like the household/master-slave relationship, you’ll break it down.
If someone shows that they could be doing something else, but they choose to be in politics, in democracy in particular, that person is the best option
People who think that the position “is for them” will not be elected
The best politically are those who are already self sufficient
The regime can be just or unjust whether it aims for the common good or the private good
The question is not “who rules” but “for whom they rule”
6 types of regimes
Kingdom: those ruled by one person for the common good
Aristocracy: governed by more than one, but by a few only
State: citizens at large govern for common good
Bad regimes (public good to private good)
Kingdom to tyranny
Aristocracy to oligarchy
State to democracy
Oligarchies think: If we are unequal in one thing, the law should maintain that inequality in all things
Democracies think: We’re all equal, so we should be equal in all things
Oligarchs argue that if you have more, you deserve more, laws should respect that inequality
Democrats argue that simply by being free you are equal, and the law should respect that equality
The solution: justice is giving equal to equals and unequal to unequals
The book is about Happiness
For Aristotle, happiness is about living well, thriving, and flourishing.
He’s sad for us because we just “don’t believe that”
Everything has a purpose and is aiming toward a particular thing
Book 1.1 The Ends
Every action is unintelligible through its ends, what is it aiming for, etc.?
Some ends are just the activity itself
Some ends aim at a product beyond the activity itself
“Young” people are just not ready to fully understand politics
The end of politics is the highest end for human beings: happiness
There are a lot of opinions about it
Pleasure
Wealth
Honor
Health
We have to sift through these opinions to find out what happiness is, and that requires a distinction between reasoning to and reasoning from principles
Induction: reason to
Deductive: from reason (looking at evidence and seeing what’s holding it together)
Candidates for the best definition of happiness:
Pleasure: position held by “the many” and it is very low, because it treats human life as brutish
Honor: position held by the elite, it is “higher” than pleasure. Honor comes from someone else, which means it can easily be taken away
Wealth: people think that making money is the proper end of ends for human life. But, money is used to get something else
Happiness is self sufficient
A good happy life is one where nothing essential is lacking
This is where politics and ethics meet
Happiness is a lofty goal and extends over a complete life, we are moving towards principles not from them
It doesn’t matter who you are, bad things will befall you and you will become unhappy.
Where do you get happiness?
Aristotle says it’s most likely through education and habituation
This goes back to the city, what are you teaching the children?
The best we can hope for is that we’re in a regime in a city that is at least trying to produce happiness
The highest human good is derived from our nature
Book 10
We are aiming for something that does not change, that’s what happiness is\
What is most you is actually your intellect
That is the highest part of your soul, this is the highest part of our lives which is above political life
The city is needed to produce the best souls/human beings within us
For Aristotle, God is self sufficient
If you understand divinity, it cannot be something that is concerned with action
Virtues alone might be important for humans, but you can’t project that onto the gods
Gods are unrelated to morality
We still need a society even though we are aiming toward the divine
We need laws, because laws create structure
Education, training, habits, all of that requires good laws
Plato
427-327 BCE
Born in an aristocratic Athenian family
Saw Socrates execution
Athens at the time was the leading democratic city
Socrates
470-399 BCE
Massive influence on Athens
Executed by Athenians
Wanted to bring more nature into politics
He was iffy on writing, it can help but also hurt
The Republic asks the question, “What is justice”
“The city in speech”
The Republic
The dialogue takes place in the Piraeus, the port of Athens
Socrates is returning from a religious festival
He is detained and drawn into the house of Cephalus
Opening question: “What is justice?”
Plato (via Socrates) quickly shows this is not an easy question to answer
Cephalus (old rich man)
Justice is telling the truth and paying what one owes
Socrates: Would you return a weapon to a madman?
Polemarchus (son of Cephalus)
Justice is helping friends and hurting enemies
Socrates: we can be mistaken about who our real friends and enemies are; justice should not make someone worse; harming people makes them worse
Thraymachus (well known sophist)
Bursts into conversation to say that justice is the advantage of the stronger
Justice is what rulers declare to serve their own interest and morality is basically political domination dressed up as legitimacy
Socrates brings up an analogy of the good shepherd, ruling for the sake of the sheep
Book II
Plato’s brothers Glaucon and Adeimantus come in and ask Socrates what justice is
They want him to prove that justice is good in itself
Socrates says it is best to see the good of justice by looking at the city as a whole
Republic 376-383
Justice in a city emerges from education
Socrates asks if we should teach the children the true or false literature
Little kids are not ready to know the full truth, they also will repeat what you say
S: And shall we just casually allow children to hear anything? Should they believe things any random person can put in their minds?
The first thing we’ll do when we build the new city is to censor writers, specifically the writers of fiction
We do this because we care about children’s character
If I have to talk about the gods I’d do it in a very secret way where less people would hear
We can’t walk around letting our guardians think that the gods are fighting
God cannot be represented any other way than what he truly is, god must be represented as good. No good thing can be hurtful
What is the god according to Plato?
He thinks it’s crazy if you believe god is the creator of all bad things
Then we cannot listen to Homer or Hesoid Socrates argues, because they write poems of how gods do good and bad things
Such a fiction that the gods crated both good and bad is suicidal, ruinous, and impious
God is not the author of all things but only the creator of all good things
God would not come down and shape shift, that would be bad
The worst thing that you fear is being lied to
Lying can be useful and could be good depending on the situation, but none of these reasons can apply to god
The city depends on poetry before it depends on law
Plato cont.
“You owe everything to your country”
Your country raised you
You have a place inside a city based on who you are and where you’re from
You owe your city loyalty
The city makes sure that inappropriate mingling doesn’t happen; classism
“Noble lie”
This is a noble lie because it makes people want to care about the city
The reason why people follow laws and cities is because they answer questions about what we are
The noble lie is the “founding myth”, the city rests on a philosophy
We follow the law not just on the basis of punishment, but it give us a good story for our lives.
Doesn’t have to be true, just good
Socrates argues today what we have is vessels, but sailors that are mutineers. The true pilot today is going to look like a star-gazer, aka they look useless
The city is consumed with the question of who gets to rule
We tell the pilot, person who’s considered with where we’re going, that they’re useless because they cannot help us win
There’s a certain power in people who are like-minded, but there’s a greater necessity
The philosopher who stands up and says that group is wrong can grab you off the street, take your time, and maybe kill you
Teach nothing but the opinion of the many, Sophists
If you want to know a Sophist, someone who leads people astray, it’s like people who study people and politics and learn how to approach people.
They find out how to “tame” them
They are trying to tame you, they make a system of their knowledge of wisdom, but he has no clue what he’s actually talking about
Their job, good = what city says
The philosopher is like someone stuck in a desert storm, they just hope you won’t try to kill them
Unless we can find the best regime
The only solution is the “philosopher rule”
We can instill the thought in not kings but princes to make this happen
So, then philosophers become kings
Plato’s Divided Line
The levels of knowledge and understanding
We move from opinion (doxa) to episteme (genuine knowledge)
The objects move from that which mosts changes to that which endures eternally
For Plato, the idea of a democracy is better than a real one, because it participates in the eternal
Plato wants us to see reality is not what's in front of us
The city does not want to be ruled by philosophy
The Apology
The trial in 399 BCE
Socrates walks in and talks about his manner of speaking
He says he’ll talk to everyone in a very simple and plain way, so that he can tell the whole truth
He is making clear he will not flatter the masses, and it is something that is foreign by the city
The gods think there is no one wiser than Socrates
Socrates admits he went to go talk with very smart people to prove the gods wrong
It is revealed the hatred for Socrates is coming from him revealing the truth, by showing people who think they are very wise that they’re not that wise
Socrates says that the difference between him and the famous politicians is that they think they’re wise and know everything, and Socrates does not
They say he misleads the youth but no one actually knows what he’s done
There is nothing that one can be afraid of if we don’t know what will happen
He says he is not wise, he just says he doesn’t know
Socrates says that they’ll just have to kill him because he will not stop
Virtue is not given by money, but that with virtue comes money and every other good of man
On the Charge of Impiety
He says you guys are mad about my spirit, but that’s just a little voice
It doesn’t tell me what to do, it just tells me no
He says all you need is a conscious
That is what is most scary to the city, since the gov should tell you what to do
He ends up being convicted on all counts
The prosecution rules to kill him
Socrates says that he expected this decision, and he’s more surprised it was a close vote
He says he thinks he should be honored, because they ask him what his punishment should be
Olympians get nice treatment for riding a horse fast, but he just tried to make people better
“The unexamined life is not worth living”
He says he thinks they should build him a statue, pay him to educate his children, but they’ll never listen so he says his friends will give him money so he doesn’t get killed
They choose to kill Socrates
They were upset that he didn’t beg for his life, he didn’t respect their authority as the city
He says that he is being killed because they want to escape their accuser; they don’t want to have an account of how they live
They killed the messenger
Athens will go down in history, not just for how great the empire is, but how their democracy is remembered, they’ll be remembered for killing Socrates
History will judge them
On his way out he wishes for his children to be treated the same way he was treated, that would be justice
“I to die, you to live. God only knows.”
The Apology is not just Socrates defense of his life, ultimately it is the proof of the premise of The Republic. The proof that politics is always in tension with philosophy.
Understanding politics means you have to understand it is not about truth
Philosophy is not that you possess knowledge, it is simply having to lie in the sou, a refusal to live within an unexamined illusion.
The people who run the city think they’re wise, they think they know the truth
The city needs confidence and shared meanings; but the city is still the cave
We’re all prisoners
The truth will not persuade the city
Philosophers are not afraid of violent death, prisoners fear it