Pharmakon #4 - Plato's Republic - Book I - defect and perfection

the impartiality of art

Honoré Daumier, Two Lawyers, National Gallery of Art, Washington.

Plato’s Republic can be found here.

“What balderdash is this that you have been talking, and why do you Simple Simons truckle and give way to one another? But if you really wish, Socrates, to know what the just is, don't merely ask questions or plume yourself upon controverting any answer that anyone gives—since your acumen has perceived that it is easier to ask questions than to answer them, but do you yourself answer and tell what you say the just is. And don't you be telling me that it is that which ought to be, or the beneficial or the profitable or the gainful or the advantageous, but express clearly and precisely whatever you say. For I won't take from you any such drivel as that!”

With Thrasymachus’ introduction the discussion is no longer centered around equivalence. His dismissal of Socrates’ argument is the beginning of an argument about equivalence’s foundation in an asymmetry.

He begins by dismissing Socrates’ method and his provisional conclusions. Thus far, Socrates and his interlocutors have gathered together concepts from our ordinary language and attempted to understand their relationships to one another. I have tried to reflect this in my presentation. Reason and force, acting and doing well, the logic of equivalence and the logic of persons, and justice seem to connect systematically. We do not quite yet know how.

Thrasymachus rejects the holism of this study of interrelated concepts outright and demands a clear and precise definition. As we will come to see, by this he means an account of how justice is used. He wants to set up a contrast between how we talk about a concept and how it is actually deployed. This brings with it an implicit theory of error.

“What then,” he said, “if I show you another answer about justice differing from all these, a better one—what penalty do you think you deserve?”

Thrasymachus, the good sophist, here provides us with his method and his definition of justice in miniature. Argument is a conflict. The victors gain advantage, the losers are penalized. This suggests another iteration of the logic of equivalence. The newest amendment, we will see, is that on Thrasymachus’ account the best set the terms.

I affirm that the just is nothing else than the advantage of the stronger.

Justice is the particular interest of the stronger. We don’t need taking care or any of the distinctions we have set up. All that remains is figuring out who counts as the stronger. To think otherwise is to mistake the appearance of justice, our nice ordinary language accounts of doing what is right and rational, for its actuality, the establishment of a standard by the stronger.

I presume you don't intend to affirm this, that if Polydamas the pancratiast is stronger than we are and the flesh of beeves is advantageous for him, for his body, this viand is also for us who are weaker than he both advantageous and just.” “You're a buffoon, Socrates, and take my statement in the most detrimental sense.” “Not at all, my dear fellow” said I; “I only want you to make your meaning plainer.” “Don't you know then,” said he, “that some cities are governed by tyrants, in others democracy rules, in others aristocracy?” “Assuredly.” “And is not this the thing that is strong and has the mastery in each—the ruling party?” “Certainly.” And each form of government enacts the laws with a view to its own advantage, a democracy democratic laws and tyranny autocratic and the others likewise, and by so legislating they proclaim that the just for their subjects is that which is for their—the rulers'—advantage and the man who deviates from this law they chastise as a law-breaker and a wrongdoer.

Justice is what those in power establish as normal. A few implications of Thrasymachus’ provisional theory deserve further comment:

Conventionalism: Justice is identical with the particular interest of those with power as stipulated by the norms they have established. The norms only exist because they have been stipulated, but they do exist in a meaningful sense. They do not admit of further explanation.

Interpretivism: The city is an interpretable object that awaits interpretation by the laws of the stronger. If the democrats have power, justice in the city is identical to their stipulated convention. If the tyrant has power, justice in the city is identical to hers. The city remains the city under both regimes.

What was missing from our previous accounts of the logic of equivalence was that we were thinking about the logic of equivalence under the assumption that we agreed upon the same conventions of obligation. In this light, Cephalus’ problem was the implicit assumption that my good-natured friend and I had one another’s particular interests at heart. From the established convention, that we would act well towards one another, we could evaluate justice. When that failed, we said that the logic of equivalence had to give way to some kind of asymmetry. Polemarchus’ solution marked an advance because he partially recognized the role of particular interest, but he allowed Socrates to discriminate between our purported and actual particular interests. The last step that he needed to take was realizing that every equivalence is founded on an inequivalence; we can understand equivalence only in the terms set by someone’s particular interest. Here, Thrasymachus names the asymmetry: all equivalence must be understood in terms of someone’s particular interest, and this particular interest is establishing the stronger’s conventional advantage over another party in the city. Thrasymachus’ theory of error is that one assesses incorrectly insofar as they don’t judge according to this standard (this makes someone a mark). In order to arrive at his most sophisticated version of this position Thrasymachus first needs to tread familiar argumentative ground:

“May I ask whether the rulers in the various states are infallible or capable sometimes of error?” “Surely,” he said, “they are liable to err.” “Then in their attempts at legislation they enact some laws rightly and some not rightly, do they not?” “So I suppose.” “And by rightly we are to understand for their advantage, and by wrongly to their disadvantage? Do you mean that or not?” “That.” “But whatever they enact must be performed by their subjects and is justice?”

Here is Thrasymachus making Polemarchus’ error. In what follows Socrates walks him through his concession. Polemarchus spots his own mistake at work in Thrasymachus’ argument:

“What need is there of a witness?” Polemarchus said. “Thrasymachus himself admits that the rulers sometimes enjoin what is evil for themselves and yet says that it is just for the subjects to do this.”

If we are going to say that justice is simply conventional then all of our ordinary talk of mistakes of particular interest is rendered meaningless. If I can be wrong about what is in my interest, then it turns out that it being in my interest rests on a state of affairs independent of my evaluation of them. Then the question of pulling apart our real and apparent interests looms again:

“Do you suppose that I call one who is in error a superior when he errs?” “I certainly did suppose that you meant that,” I replied, “when you agreed that rulers are not infallible but sometimes make mistakes.” “That is because you argue like a pettifogger, Socrates. Why, to take the nearest example, do you call one who is mistaken about the sick a physician in respect of his mistake or one who goes wrong in a calculation a calculator when he goes wrong and in respect of this error? Yet that is what we say literally—we say that the physician erred and the calculator and the schoolmaster. But the truth, I take it, is, that each of these in so far as he is that which we entitle him never errs; so that, speaking precisely, since you are such a stickler for precision, no craftsman errs. For it is when his knowledge abandons him that he who goes wrong goes wrong—when he is not a craftsman. So that no craftsman, wise man, or ruler makes a mistake then when he is a ruler, though everybody would use the expression that the physician made a mistake and the ruler erred. It is in this loose way of speaking, then, that you must take the answer I gave you a little while ago. But the most precise statement is that other, that the ruler in so far forth as ruler does not err, and not erring he enacts what is best for himself, and this the subject must do, so that, even as I meant from the start, I say the just is to do what is for the advantage of the stronger.”

Here we have shrugged off the dead skin of Polemarchus’ argument and begun Thrasymachus’ argument in earnest. Thrasymachus reintroduces the idea of art; the practitioner is a practitioner only insofar as he actually acts in a manner appropriate to his art.

Let us pause for a moment here. Thrasymachus argues here that to be a practitioner is just to perform a characteristic activity. Insofar as one does not according to the standards of that activity, one is not a practitioner. Insofar as the ruler does not act in his own interest, he is not acting as a ruler. This will have far-reaching consequences.

So ruling is an art, the art of truly working one’s particular advantage, and thus, following the definition of art, acting to prevent the particular advantage of others insofar as, by the definition of advantage at work here, it is at one’s own expense.

However the introduction of rulership as art allows for the consequent reintroduction of taking care:

“But tell me, your physician in the precise sense of whom you were just now speaking, is he a moneymaker, an earner of fees, or a healer of the sick? And remember to speak of the physician who is really such.” “A healer of the sick,” he replied. “And what of the lot—the pilot rightly so called—is he a ruler of sailors or a sailor?” “A ruler of sailors.” “We don't, I fancy, have to take into account the fact that he actually sails in the ship, nor is he to be denominated a sailor. For it is not in respect of his sailing that he is called a pilot but in respect of his art and his ruling of the sailors.” “True,” he said. “Then for each of them is there not a something that is for his advantage?” “Quite so.” “And is it not also true,” said I, “that the art naturally exists for this, to discover and provide for each his advantage?” “Yes, for this.” “Is there, then, for each of the arts any other advantage than to be perfect as possible?” “What do you mean by that question?” “Just as if,” I said, “you should ask me whether it is enough for the body to be the body or whether it stands in need of something else, I would reply, 'By all means it stands in need. That is the reason why the art of medicine has now been invented, because the body is defective and such defect is unsatisfactory. To provide for this, then, what is advantageous, that is the end for which the art was devised.' Do you think that would be a correct answer, or not?”

So the aim of taking care is perfection. The healer heals to a particular standard set by the character of the patient. The pilot rules sailors according to a particular standard set by the character of the crew. Taking care involves bringing what is defective into perfection according to the standard appropriate to the art. As a result, an art can only be practiced where there is the possibility of defect, where something stands in need.

“But how about this? Is the medical art itself defective or faulty, or has any other art any need of some virtue, quality, or excellence—as the eyes of vision, the ears of hearing, and for this reason is there need of some art over them that will consider and provide what is advantageous for these very ends—does there exist in the art itself some defect and does each art require another art to consider its advantage and is there need of still another for the considering art and so on ad infinitum, or will the art look out for its own advantage?

The art itself is perfect; insofar as it is an art, it provides its own internal standard according to its objects and their defects. It does not need the additional supplement of its activity being in one's particular interest. The practice of an art has nothing to do with the proclivities or desires of the practitioner. To insist otherwise would be to just dissolve art into skill in achieving particular interest. We should worry that Thrasymachus’ account will reduce the former to the latter and thus flatten out our ordinary understanding of what it means to take care. There may be a real distinction between what is good for the horse as a horse, according to the needs of a horse, and what is to the advantage of the owner. There may be a real distinction between a good shoe and shoe that is profitable. There may be a real distinction between what is good for our friend and what is in our own interest, or even theirs. Losing this from our ordinary talk would be devastating.

And this brings us back to cash. To our old question, “What about the money?” Thrasymachus gives the sophisticated answer: “It is to cover the gaps in particular interest we have to overcome in pressing our advantage. When we cannot count on mutual advantage, money is a supplement that establishes an equivalence according to the standards of whoever has more of it and the needs of whoever has less. And where money fails, force will do. In fact, money, like argument, is just a species of force: both reduce to an asymmetry that establishes an equivalence.” This clearly marks an advance on our previous accounts. But the impartial character of art and its precise relationship to the equivalences of particular interest established by money remain pressing. We will have to deal at greater length with the idea of interpretation.