Tuesday, December 23, 2003
JUST FINISHED: Plato's Republic, translated and annotated by Desmond Lee. It's been said that the Western literary tradition is in essence a conversation that's over 2,000 years long. In the conversation of Western philosophy (the non-religious variety), Plato can be considered the man who set up the most attractive chatroom. Clifton Fadiman (who, if you'll remember, is the man from which I'm taking my initial cues in this exploration of greater things) said that there are so many key ideas of Western tradition in Plato that "knowing nothing of him is to know less about yourself." That, my friends, is a powerful hook, and I couldn't help but bite down.
This branch of study started a bit haphazardly earlier in the year, when I found a copy of Thus Spake Zarathustra at my favorite secondhand store. After I got about 20 pages deep, somebody got wind of this situation and was nice enough to point out that Nietzsche was a very dangerous thing to read as a starting point in philosophy. It was for my own protection that he recommended starting with Plato. It took way too long to finish, but that was my own fault. My pace dropped off the map in the homestretch, maybe because the last month of my job was an assault on my higher functions. If you haven't heard my story about that, you might not want to know. I have my doubts I'll be telling about it here.
Plato called what he did "dialectic", which to us means the systematic use of discussion for intellectual investigation, the so-called "Socratic dialogue". All of Plato's extant works are cast in this mold, using his teacher Socrates (who apparently was too busy teaching and discovering to write for himself) as the mouthpiece for his ideas of truth and rightness. There's quite a bit of Plato that's come down to us, including the longest and most ambitious work, The Republic, where he asks a basic question (what is justice?) and, among other explorations, builds his version of a model society to prove his point.
There's a lot I could cover here, and a lot I'm still sorting out, but let's get this out of the way first: there are going to be a lot of ideas accepted out of hand by the narrators of The Republic with which you won't agree at all. The "ideal government" itself, the core of the entire piece, is a prime example. I don't know anybody whose idea of "utopia" is a heavily-regimented, highly controlled state where marriage is abolished and sex is run only through mating festivals, and personal property is abolished in the higher hierarchical strata. There are also a lot of fascinating ideas about education, but then we get to the part that states since kids are going to end up in the army eventually (fair assumption in those days), they should be taken to the battlefield to see what it's like as soon as they're able to get on a horse. In other words, he's suggesting "Take Your Daughter To Work Day" with swords and entrails. The Greeks had a word for it, I'm sure, but I'm not convinced I want to know it.
Having said all that, the ideas I didn't agree with kept my attention, even if it was of the head-shaking variety, and as I pushed on I hit several passages that felt like a light switching on. The simile of the Cave put into words a lot of things I'd suspected about the nature of perceptions. The concept of the "philosopher king" becomes more and more appealing the more we see what happens when a leader doesn't seem to think much at all. Then there's the idea that being a ruler should be more like serving on a jury, a civic duty that you're compelled to do at some point, rather than something that can be manipulated to turn a nice profit and give you a control jones, since (in Plato's view) lust for power is a debasing lust like any other. It's such a startlingly sensible concept that it's no wonder nobody ever tried it.
It's really interesting that Plato doesn't think that people should be taught philosophy/dialectic until they're at least 30 years old. Desmond Lee very helpfully explains in the notes to my edition that one of the "corruption of youth" charges leading to the death of Socrates was teaching young guys the dialectic process, and the unfortunate result was that kids were picking up on the technique without actually using it for anything but sport. No wonder the old man drove them all nuts; I'd give him the hemlock, too. As I read this account, I couldn't help but think of the old Python line: "You didn't come here for a proper arguement, you came here for an arguement." Damn you, John Cleese, for messing with my mind yet again.
Unfortunately, the part of the 20th century we've lived through wasn't the best time for new deep thinkers, and we're still feeling the anti-intellectual backlash today. The very word "philosophy" has been diluted in the past century by people who fob off warmed-over homilies designed to make you feel better, and (even worse) self-help gurus. As I was writing this, VH1 was running a block of shows on "The Fabulous Life", where a sub-Robin Leach narrator rattles off a laundry list of pop star extravagances with huge price tags, as if purchasing power was all it took to make you a superior human being. Plato stated his view of this approach to life very plainly: blindly following your desires and impulses down every side road and alley they steer you through is the road to soul-deep decay. His approach to self-discipline was extreme to the point of impossibility, but our man in Athens believed that the quest for truth--the unchanging, eternal core truths--actually makes you a better person. It's something to think about, and making you think is really the whole point.
Although thanks to Project Gutenberg (among others), it's very easy to find a version of this text for free, I went with the Penguin Classics edition translated and annotated by Mr. Lee, which not only gives you valuable background of Plato and his times but also a section-by-section breakdown of of the major ideas and themes.
This branch of study started a bit haphazardly earlier in the year, when I found a copy of Thus Spake Zarathustra at my favorite secondhand store. After I got about 20 pages deep, somebody got wind of this situation and was nice enough to point out that Nietzsche was a very dangerous thing to read as a starting point in philosophy. It was for my own protection that he recommended starting with Plato. It took way too long to finish, but that was my own fault. My pace dropped off the map in the homestretch, maybe because the last month of my job was an assault on my higher functions. If you haven't heard my story about that, you might not want to know. I have my doubts I'll be telling about it here.
Plato called what he did "dialectic", which to us means the systematic use of discussion for intellectual investigation, the so-called "Socratic dialogue". All of Plato's extant works are cast in this mold, using his teacher Socrates (who apparently was too busy teaching and discovering to write for himself) as the mouthpiece for his ideas of truth and rightness. There's quite a bit of Plato that's come down to us, including the longest and most ambitious work, The Republic, where he asks a basic question (what is justice?) and, among other explorations, builds his version of a model society to prove his point.
There's a lot I could cover here, and a lot I'm still sorting out, but let's get this out of the way first: there are going to be a lot of ideas accepted out of hand by the narrators of The Republic with which you won't agree at all. The "ideal government" itself, the core of the entire piece, is a prime example. I don't know anybody whose idea of "utopia" is a heavily-regimented, highly controlled state where marriage is abolished and sex is run only through mating festivals, and personal property is abolished in the higher hierarchical strata. There are also a lot of fascinating ideas about education, but then we get to the part that states since kids are going to end up in the army eventually (fair assumption in those days), they should be taken to the battlefield to see what it's like as soon as they're able to get on a horse. In other words, he's suggesting "Take Your Daughter To Work Day" with swords and entrails. The Greeks had a word for it, I'm sure, but I'm not convinced I want to know it.
Having said all that, the ideas I didn't agree with kept my attention, even if it was of the head-shaking variety, and as I pushed on I hit several passages that felt like a light switching on. The simile of the Cave put into words a lot of things I'd suspected about the nature of perceptions. The concept of the "philosopher king" becomes more and more appealing the more we see what happens when a leader doesn't seem to think much at all. Then there's the idea that being a ruler should be more like serving on a jury, a civic duty that you're compelled to do at some point, rather than something that can be manipulated to turn a nice profit and give you a control jones, since (in Plato's view) lust for power is a debasing lust like any other. It's such a startlingly sensible concept that it's no wonder nobody ever tried it.
It's really interesting that Plato doesn't think that people should be taught philosophy/dialectic until they're at least 30 years old. Desmond Lee very helpfully explains in the notes to my edition that one of the "corruption of youth" charges leading to the death of Socrates was teaching young guys the dialectic process, and the unfortunate result was that kids were picking up on the technique without actually using it for anything but sport. No wonder the old man drove them all nuts; I'd give him the hemlock, too. As I read this account, I couldn't help but think of the old Python line: "You didn't come here for a proper arguement, you came here for an arguement." Damn you, John Cleese, for messing with my mind yet again.
Unfortunately, the part of the 20th century we've lived through wasn't the best time for new deep thinkers, and we're still feeling the anti-intellectual backlash today. The very word "philosophy" has been diluted in the past century by people who fob off warmed-over homilies designed to make you feel better, and (even worse) self-help gurus. As I was writing this, VH1 was running a block of shows on "The Fabulous Life", where a sub-Robin Leach narrator rattles off a laundry list of pop star extravagances with huge price tags, as if purchasing power was all it took to make you a superior human being. Plato stated his view of this approach to life very plainly: blindly following your desires and impulses down every side road and alley they steer you through is the road to soul-deep decay. His approach to self-discipline was extreme to the point of impossibility, but our man in Athens believed that the quest for truth--the unchanging, eternal core truths--actually makes you a better person. It's something to think about, and making you think is really the whole point.
Although thanks to Project Gutenberg (among others), it's very easy to find a version of this text for free, I went with the Penguin Classics edition translated and annotated by Mr. Lee, which not only gives you valuable background of Plato and his times but also a section-by-section breakdown of of the major ideas and themes.
|| Eric 7:14 AM#
