Monsters

The Myth of Philosophy Part 2 of 7

A guest post by WD James of The Philosopher's Holler.

Heroes fight monsters.

The protagonist of Beowulf must defeat Grendel and then his mother who threaten the mead-hall of a Danish king. The mead-hall essentially represents homeliness and the monsters are those who threaten that. Further, monsters are unnatural; this is reflected in their physiology but also in their perverse values and threat to natural human happiness. Ultimately, Beowulf becomes a king himself. His homeland is besieged by a dragon seeking its treasure and Beowulf engages in mortal combat with the creature, slaying it, but also succumbing to the wounds he receives.

In his Apology, Plato set out to interpret his mentor Socrates as a new kind of hero and, in the process, set philosophy within its mythological context. Socrates fights his own kind of monsters which have beset him in the legal proceedings they have initiated against him.

Truth and power

A key to reading Platonic dialogues is to notice that in the opening sentences Plato will usually present a slightly disguised clue as to what the overarching theme of the dialogue is. The Apology opens with Socrates addressing the jury thus:

“What effect my accusers have had upon you, gentlemen, I do not know, but for my own part I was almost carried away by them; their arguments were so convincing. On the other hand, scarcely a word of what they said was true” (17a). Socrates’ sharp humor highlights the distinction between what is persuasive and what is true.

He is pointing to two different ways in which we might use words and employ arguments. As a philosopher, Socrates will be interested in discovering the truth. He is suggesting that his accusers are more interested in persuading the jurors than in discovering the truth. In a future essay we will look in detail at the proceedings of trials in classical Athens. For now, let’s just note that in a democracy one can wield power through the ability to persuade the citizenry in assemblies and juries. So, the fundamental issue comes down to: what end are we using our words toward – truth or power?

At a personal level, we know the difference between when someone is trying to tell us the truth and when they are just trying to get us to see things the way they would like us to see them, whether it be a parent, a teacher, a lover, or a salesperson.

At a social level, the same basic distinction holds, it is just that it is very rare for anyone to be committed to truth telling. In his 1928 classic, Propaganda, the father of ‘public relations’ held forth: “The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country” (Bernays, 37). Propaganda, lying, spin, or at best beclouding jargon are the order of the day.

Socrates held that the nature of language was to allow us to put into words what the world was like and to truthfully and sincerely communicate that with one another. This is also a requirement of any respectful relationship: manipulation or persuasion attempt to reduce the other to an instrument of our will. Socrates is accusing his accusers of this and trying to tip off the jury to what is going on. Those who use language thus unnaturally are a sort of monster whom Socrates had spent his life warring against and in his trial it is a mortal combat.

Political monsters

Though her greatest critic, Socrates loved his hometown of Athens. He fought in her wars to defend her, never left her otherwise (even when accepting exile was probably his only way to escape with his life), and, in his way, always served her faithfully, even if that was not necessarily how she wanted him to serve: she was his mead-hall.

In his defense of himself, he talks about the various groups of people whose business it was to know the truth about living together in the polis and how he questioned them to see if they possessed this truth. First, he takes on the politicians. He says he entered into dialogue with a politician with a reputation for wisdom. He recounts that as he began to show the man that he lacked the wisdom he claimed to have, he only earned his anger and the anger of many of his followers. Socrates came to the conclusion: “Well, I am certainly wiser than this man. It is only too likely that neither of us has any knowledge to boast of; but he thinks that he knows something which he does not know, whereas I am conscious of my ignorance” (21d).

The next group he mentions are the poets. We are probably used to thinking of poets as rather marginal social actors hanging out in coffee houses and academic lit departments. In ancient Greece though they were the key social teachers. They wrote the epic poems in which the myths were recounted and the plays which served as moral education for the populus. The problem with the poets, for Socrates, is not that they always tell falsehoods, for they often (though not always) communicate profound truths. The problem is they work by “instinct or inspiration, such as you find in seers and prophets” (22c). Elsewhere he proclaims they are possessed by a ‘divine madness.’ That is, though they may tell the truth, they don’t know, rationally, the truth they proclaim. If they never erred, that might be ok, but they do err.

Let’s note that Plato (or Socrates) had, according to the usual story, initiated a perpetual war between the philosophers and the poets. In his Republic, he notoriously banishes the poets from his imaginary political society. Yet, Plato also tells us that he had nearly become a poet. Further, in his role as philosopher, he retells or creates many myths. Also, if my interpretation in these essays holds, Plato is consciously mythologizing Socrates and, with him, philosophy. I, in fact, think Plato was always trying to hold the two together. The traditional myths had become hard to believe literally, but I think Plato was always trying to recover and refashion them in ‘up to date’ ways – just as he is the poet of Socrates, redefining heroism.

Finally, Socrates tells us he went to his own class, the skilled craftspeople. He admits they actually knew stuff he did not know (the skills of their specific trade). However, their characteristic weakness was that “on the strength of their technical proficiency they claimed a perfect understanding of every other subject” (22d); they mistook technê (technical skill) for episteme (knowledge) or Sophia (wisdom). So, they know things of one order, but mistake that as competence in things of another order.

We can see how Socrates might have made a nuisance of himself and made many enemies along the way. Socrates concludes: “There you have the causes which led to the attack upon me by Meletus and Anytus and Lycon, Meletus being aggrieved on behalf of the poets, Anytus on behalf of the professional men and politicians, and Lycon on behalf of the orators” (23e). He is presenting the prosecution as essentially a political prosecution with the various elite or at least powerful elements of society joining against him.

This last group, the orators, we had not encountered before. However, they are Socrates’ most deadly enemies and they both know it. They cannot coexist. He says some have said that he can “make the weaker argument defeat the stronger” (18b). In fact, this is an ‘I’ll accuse you of doing what in fact I am doing’ sort of slander we are all too familiar with in our own day. It was the orators, or sophists, who did this. For a fee they would teach young pupils how to speak persuasively in the assemblies and law courts. From Socrates’ perspective, they were the epitome of using words to seek power and influence, not truth. They were the monsters threatening the mead-hall of Athens and he would do battle with them.

The charges

What were the charges these powerful representatives had brought against Socrates? He recounts them: “Socrates is guilty of corrupting the minds of the young, and of believing in supernatural things of his own invention instead of the gods recognized by the State” (24b). As we will see, there is a perspective from which Socrates is in fact guilty, and another from which he is not. The real question, if we wish to know if Socrates is actually guilty, not just if the powers that be have the ability to get him convicted, is what constitutes the corruption or health of the mind (the soul) and what is the truth about our relationship with the gods?

What becomes clear is that not only Socrates’ fate lies in the answers. The fate of his hometown does as well, if they believe the wrong things about the soul or about the gods. This is a matter of truth, not of power. Socrates’ real task is not just to defend himself and the life he has chosen to live, but to convince his fellow Athenians that they should care about the truth of these matters, not just what custom or utility says. As always, he is serving Athens (which we should note, is serving Athena, goddess of truth).

Bernays, Edward, Propaganda, with an introduction by Mark Crispin Miller, IG Publishing, 2005.

Plato, The Last Days of Socrates: Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Phaedo, translated by Hugh Tredennick and Harold Tarrant, Penguin, 2003.