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Bryant
Windham
Blog 3
What is most striking about Book III is how
Socrates manages to take Glaucon and Adeimantus through
their previous arguments step by step, and convince them to refuse their own
previous requests and demands of the city. In a way of moving the veil aside
and stepping outside the dialogue to view it as a whole and a work to be read,
one can find many a flaw in the character (that is to say the character as
role, not character as it has to do with personality) of Socrates.
What sticks out most troubling with the role of
Socrates in this part of the dialogue is the extent to which Plato pampers him.
Many of his arguments which go quite uncontested by the two brothers with whom
Socrates is discussing have fatal flaws or draw tenuous connections. For
example, to compare gymnastics to music at such a functional level as Socrates
does simply does not follow (unless he were to be discussing the amount of time
and practice necessary to maintain proficiency), yet neither brother raises so
much as an eyebrow to this or the many other flawed arguments unless he is
stating that he does not understand.
While Socrates’ overarching argument that the
luxuries of a city can be its downfall do carry credence, the way in which
Plato allows his assertions to go untested or unrefuted is to an extent
troubling for the philosophy that Socrates tends to espouse. He is, after all,
the one who stands as such a high supporter of questioning everything that he
can in his search for wisdom, and yet he is not truly questioned here. Whereas
Socrates is the gadfly of Athens, there is not even a mayfly to the founding
rules of this new republic. So while he argument does not suffer from the lack
of refutation, his example seems to fall short of what Plato is encouraging, unless
Socrates is to be the only practitioner of philosophy in the dialogue. So while
Socrates’ points still remain, the point of Socrates is more vague.
