If you want to join in, do your best to make it textual. That's gonna hold for everyone. — fdrake

Thank you for quick response :sparkle:

I realise this is a multipost, but considering that "going off topic" isn't generally against the rules, I cleared the mod queue for the thread. I will leave up the exchanges that you used to summon me.

considering that "going off topic" isn't generally against the rules, I cleared the mod queue for the thread. I will leave up the exchanges that you used to summon me. — fdrake

I agree that going off-topic to a certain extent can be a valuable and further exploration.
However, this appears to be more a continual pattern of dishonest and disruptive behaviour, even if it seems to be, at first glance, genuine questions or concerns.
Thanks.

'You're right, Simmias,' said Cebes. 'It seems that half, as it were, of what is needed has been shown-that our soul existed before we were born; it must also be shown that it will exist after we've died, no less than before we were born, if the demonstration is going to be complete. (77b)

Cebes does not remember what went before, the cyclical claim about life and death he had agreed to. Socrates reminds them that it has been demonstrated, but is willing to go through it again. Their fears, he says, are childish. (77e) We might then wonder whether Socrates will attempt to persuade them the way one might persuade a child. And sure enough, that is exactly what Cebes asks him to do:

'Try to reassure us, Socrates, as if we were afraid; or rather, not as if we were afraid ourselves-but maybe there's a child inside us, who has fears of that sort. Try to
persuade him, then, to stop being afraid of death, as if it were a bogey-man.' (77e)

Cebes is too manly to admit that he is afraid of death.

What you should do,’ said Socrates, ‘is to sing him incantations each day until you sing away his fears.’
Then where, Socrates,’ he said, ‘are we to get hold of a good singer of such incantations, since you,’ he said, ‘are abandoning us?’ (77e-78a)

There are a few things here to note. First, Socrates tells him to sing his own incantations to sing away his fears. Second, Cebes sounds like a child when he accuses Socrates of abandoning them. Third, it appears that he really does not want proofs and demonstrations but incantations to charm away his fears. I think this is why they are so ready to accept what really are weak arguments. It may be why some readers are so ready to accept them as well.

'Greece is a large country, Cebes, which has good men in it, I suppose; and there are many foreign races too. You must ransack all of them in search of such a singer, sparing neither money nor toil, because there isn’t anything more necessary on which to spend your money. And you yourselves must search too, along with one another; you may not easily find anyone more capable of doing this than yourselves.' (78a)

Socrates says they could search both Greece and foreign cultures to find a singer of incantations to spend their money on. In the earlier passage on purification he also abruptly talks in terms of monetary exchange, but suggests that thoughtfulness is the genuine coin for which and with which all things must be bought and sold. The incantational songs are the Greek and foreign mysteries and mythologies.

But Socrates says that they are not needed, that there is no one and no song more capable of preparing them for death than themselves by their own thoughtfulness, courage, moderation, justice, and true virtue.

At Cebes urging they return to the point they left off. Socrates uses an argument that Descartes will borrow:

'Then is it true that what has been put together and is naturally composite is liable to undergo this, to break up at the point at which it was put together; whereas if there be anything incomposite, it alone is liable, if anything is, to escape this?' (78c)

Cebes agrees.

Then aren’t those very things that are always self-same and keep to the same condition most likely to be non-composites; and aren’t those that vary from one moment to another and are never in the self-same condition likely to be composites? (78c)

Cebes forgets about “the child inside us”. Their fear of death and turmoil at Socrates’ impending death are at odds with something that is always self-same and keeps to the same condition.

Socrates now returns to the discussion of Being, the Equal itself, the Beautiful itself, what is invariant and constant, and contrasts them with the many beautiful things and equal objects, that is, things that change. (78d-e)

'Now these things you could actually touch and see and sense with the other senses, couldn't you, whereas those that are constant you could lay hold of only by reasoning of the intellect; aren't such things, rather, invisible and not seen?'
'What you say is perfectly true.'
'Then would you like us to posit two forms of things that are - the Visible and the Unseen?'
'Let's posit them.'
'And the unseen is always constant, whereas the seen is never constant?' (79a)

Cebes agrees, no doubt he has heard Socrates talk about the Forms. But the distinction between the visible and intelligible realm in the Republic is not the same as the distinction between the visible and unseen. Obviously, not everything that is unseen is unchangeable.

In accord with this distinction Socrates divides body and soul, here and There, the senses and thoughtfulness, master and slave, divine and mortal.

'Whereas whenever it studies alone by itself, the soul departs yonder towards that which is pure and always existent and immortal and unvarying, and in virtue of its kinship with it, enters always into its company, whenever it has come to be alone by itself, and whenever it may do so; then it has ceased from its wandering and, when it is about those objects, it is always constant and unvarying, because of its contact with things of a similar kind; and this condition of it is called "phronesis", is it not?' (79d)

I left the Greek term phronesis untranslated here. The online translation uses ‘wisdom’, Brann uses ‘thoughtfulness’. It is commonly translated as ‘practical wisdom’ or ‘prudence’. Brann’s choice is intended to distinguish phronesis from sophia, that is, wisdom and to emphasize thatphronesis, “ … in spite of its strong connotation with the heights of intellectual vision in this dialogue, refer in its most basic meaning to a thoroughly healthy state of mind - to good sense and sound judgment”.


What Socrates here calls ‘ phronesis’ is instead the state of the soul separated from the body. The condition Socrates elsewhere calls death. The attempted division does not hold. Practical wisdom is about living, the union of body and soul. The soul alone has no use for phronesis or thoughtfulness. We should recall that Socrates previously said that knowledge of things themselves, the Forms, is only possible, if possible at all, in death. Despite the high flown language, Socrates’ feet remain firmly on the ground, tethered byphronesis.

Don't you think the divine is naturally adapted for ruling and domination, whereas the mortal is adapted for being ruled and for service?'
'I do.'(80a)

It is instructive to compare this with the divisions of the soul in the Republic. A tripartite soul undermines the argument for a unitary soul. The problem of self-rule in the Republic is not a matter of competition between the body and soul, but takes place within the soul itself and introduces an element that is absent here: thumos or spiritedness, the love of honor and recognition, loyalty, anger, defensiveness, and so on. With the split between body and soul desire, eros, is atopos, without a place. Socrates has tied it to the body, but philosophy, the love of wisdom is described in the Symposium as eros and is not a bodily desire. Is eros then an in between, between body and soul?


The assertion of separation and the unchangeable nature of soul now becomes more doubtful:

'Whereas, I imagine, if it is separated from the body when it has been polluted and made impure, because it has always been with the body, has served and loved it, and been so bewitched by it, by its passions and pleasures, that it thinks nothing else real save what is corporeal-what can be touched and seen, drunk and eaten, or used for sexual enjoyment-yet it has been accustomed to hate and shun and tremble before what is obscure to the eyes and invisible, but
intelligible and grasped by philosophy; do you think a soul in that condition will be released herself all by herself and unadulterated ?' (81b)

Cebes agrees. Previously he agreed that the soul is unchangeable but he has changed his unseen mind.

What happens next seems to undo what has been done. The immutable human soul can become the soul of donkeys and other animals of this sort, or wolves and falcons and hawks, or bees or wasps or ants. (82a -b)

The problem is obvious. What happens to the human soul? The soul of these animals is not a human soul. Such transformation is contrary to the claim of an immutable human soul. But Socrates does not stop there. The soul of the philosopher may enter the class of the gods (82c)

But that raises the difficulty as to what constitutes non-anachronistic, necessary and helpful terminology. Are we going to start using Plato's own Greek terms? — Apollodorus

A translation is being read here, not the original text. Anyway I don't want to derail this thread any further. I don't have time to read along with the text at the moment, so I already feel somewhat like an interloper. But reading just the thread I have found very interesting.



:up:

A reading:

Phaedo librivox



It varies moderately from the text being used here, but I found it useful.

Thanks, if I find some more time I will check it out...

Odd, that the poor old Donkey rates lower than bees and wasps in Socrates' esteem. (82b)

'Then is it true that what has been put together and is naturally composite is liable to undergo this, to break up at the point at which it was put together; whereas if there be anything incomposite, it alone is liable, if anything is, to escape this?

The reputed last words of the Buddha were 'all compound things are subject to decay. Ardently seek your own salvation'.

The immutable human soul can become the soul of donkeys and other animals of this sort, or wolves and falcons and hawks, or bees or wasps or ants. ( — Fooloso4

viz. the Indo-European myth of Saṃsāra.

The focus you bring to what Cebes agrees to despite the inconsistencies between the particular arguments is interesting. Cebes also changes the subject when pressed beyond his willingness to just agree. His mention of "knowledge as recollection" in response to Socrates at 72a is a dodge:

If there were not perpetual reciprocity in coming to be, between one set of things and another,
revolving in a circle, as it were-if, instead, coming-to-be were a linear
process from one thing into its opposite only, without any bending
back in the other direction or reversal, do you realize that all things
would ultimately have the same form: the same fate would overtake
them, and they would cease from coming to be?'

It is fair enough to say that Cebes' reference to what Socrates argued for before is germane to the discussion but it is not a response to Socrates' statement in the moment.

The Argument from Opposites

I'd like to see what others make of the 'argument from opposites' (70c-72e).

It seems to operate on the presumption that 'the opposites' - those given include larger and smaller, weaker and stronger, faster and slower, the beatitful and the ugly, and of course the living and the dead - are intrinsic to the whole process of generation and decay. Also there's a correlative relationship, in that one gives rise to the other - what was smaller becomes larger, what is weaker becomes stronger, and so on.

There are some problems that I think are easy to see with this argument - firstly that whilst weaker and stronger are comparative - things can be weaker or stronger - being alive or dead is not a comparative, as something can't be more or less dead. So there's something of an equivocation going on. Furthermore, there's a counter-argument that the living are simply the natural descendants of other living creatures, that they've since died is immaterial to the nature of their origination. And that it's not hard to envisage that the process could come to end with complete extinction.

I'm also interested in the provenance of this type of argument. I can think of one example from the pre-socratics, and another, even more alike, from completely different culture setting roughly contemporaneous to Socrates. (Any guesses?) But I'm surprised that Cebes seems to so willingly accept the premisses of the argument without voicing any of the above kinds of objections.

I'm also intrigued by the argument that if things didn't arise from their opposites, then everything would end up dead, or asleep (like Endymion, the legendary sleeping ruler.) I've read elsewhere of a later argument, I think from Islamic philosophy, that says that if the universe was of infinite duration, then everything that could happen, being of finite duration, would already have happened.

Phaedo librivox

It varies moderately from the text being used here, but I found it useful. — Banno

Thanks. It is useful. Especially if suffering from eye strain.
I downloaded the 8 audio files of Jowett's translation.
Listening to the 1st one (17mins) late at night I fell asleep before the end.
I hear that is one way of absorbing material in to the subconscious - well, for language learning anyway.
For philosophy, methinks tis better to time it for daylight hours...
Then again...

Progress report: *struggling *
Reading from beginning to end, as in a novel, is fine.
However, this text is nested and includes sets of philosophical arguments.
I need to see how everything fits in. Also to look outside the text for help.

So, I looked for an overview and found this helpful
https://iep.utm.edu/phaedo/

Outline of the Dialogue

• The Philosopher and Death (59c-69e)
• Three Arguments for the Soul’s Immortality (69e-84b)
• The Cyclical Argument (70c-72e)
• The Argument from Recollection (72e-78b)
• The Affinity Argument (78b-84b)
• Objections from Simmias and Cebes, and Socrates’ Response (84c-107b)
• The Objections (85c-88c)
• Interlude on Misology (89b-91c)
• Response to Simmias (91e-95a)
• Response to Cebes (95a-107b)
• Socrates’ Intellectual History (96a-102a)
• The Final Argument (102b-107b)
• The Myth about the Afterlife (107c-115a)
• Socrates’ Death (115a-118a)

References and Further Reading
General Commentaries
The Philosopher and Death (59c-69e)
Three Arguments for the Soul’s Immortality (69e-84b)
Objections from Simmias and Cebes, and Socrates’ Response (84c-107b)
The Myth about the Afterlife (107c-115a)
Socrates’ Death (115a-118a)

The idea of opposites not being mutually exclusive will come up several times. — Fooloso4

Death might be seen as a welcome release from the physical body with all its discomforts.
The pain of life v the joy of the afterlife ?*
There is a separation. Not here a mingling as felt by Phaedo. — Amity

the 'argument from opposites' (70c-72e).
It seems to operate on the presumption that 'the opposites' - those given include larger and smaller, weaker and stronger, faster and slower, the beautiful and the ugly, and of course the living and the dead - are intrinsic to the whole process of generation and decay. Also there's a correlative relationship, in that one gives rise to the other - what was smaller becomes larger, what is weaker becomes stronger, and so on. — Wayfarer

Plato gets much justifiable but undeserved grief for setting up formal and informal pairs as opposites and for being illogical in their resolution. But back in antiquity Parmenidean proto-logic was a huge advance over hand waving and its details fall far short of our modern elementary logic. Much that is obvious to us was a work in progress for Plato.

The question at issue in the contrast between upward and downward [~transcendental] models is this: whether the unity of opposites exists in the opposites or whether it transcends them. Plato in the Sophist tries [~correctly] to have both [~one for intermingling of Forms and one for participation of particulars in Forms]: the forms remain transcendent while now being the abode of opposites. Aristotle sees in this an opening for a revised, dynamic notion of species and genera. Hegel, it could be argued, tries to join sameness and difference in his own [~i.e. illogical] way. — Scott Austin (2010)

Heraclitean pairs of contraries are different than strictly formal Parmenidean contradictions. Parmenidean negation and Socratic elenchus don't work for informal overlapping interacting pairs. Plato was well aware of the logical difficulties, and for the most part presents them to the reader as a challenge for better suggestions of resolution. We haven't advanced quite enough yet to fully do that. Just try a few and see.

This got me thinking about why Plato chose Cebes to be a major participant in this dialogue. I will be trying to tie some things together in an upcoming post.

Furthermore, there's a counter-argument that the living are simply the natural descendants of other living creatures — Wayfarer

Right. I pointed this out. The opposite of soul is body, which would mean that the soul comes from body.

Socrates is well aware of the weakness of his arguments:

Certainly, in many ways it’s still open to suspicions and counterattacks - if, that is, somebody’s going to go through it sufficiently. (84c)

This kind of hint should not be overlooked. Plato is well aware that the arguments will not persuade somebody who is going to go through it sufficiently. We see here that he is writing to two different audiences: those who in one way or another will benefit from hearing his “songs” and those who will not be charmed. Socrates will himself make this distinction.

Instead of another argument Socrates says:

… you must, it seems, think I have a poorer power of prophecy than the swans, who when they realize they must die, then sing more fully and sweetly than they've ever sung before, for joy that they are departing into the presence of the god whose servants they are. (84e-85a)

This is Socrates’ swan song. Interlaced with all his arguments are his songs, his music.

I believe, because, belonging as they do to Apollo, they are prophetic birds with foreknowledge of the blessings of Hades, and therefore sing and rejoice more greatly on that day than ever before. Now I hold that I myself am a fellow-servant of the swans, consecrated to the same god, that I possess prophetic power from my master no less than theirs, and that I'm departing this life with as good a cheer as they do. No; so far as that goes, you should say and ask whatever you wish, for as long as eleven Athenian gentlemen allow.' (85b)

There is something comical about Socrates’ likening himself to the swans. He is, by all descriptions, not at all like a swan in appearance.

It seems to me, Socrates, as perhaps you do too, that in these matters certain knowledge is either impossible or very hard to come by in this life; but that even so, not to test what is said about them in every possible way, without leaving off till one has examined them exhaustively from every aspect, shows a very feeble spirit; on these questions one must achieve one of two things: either learn or find out how things are; or, if that's impossible, he must sail through life in the midst of danger, seizing on the best and the least refutable of human accounts, at any rate, and letting himself be carried upon it as on a raft - unless, that is, he could journey more safely and less dangerously on a more stable carrier, some divine account. (85c-d)

Later Socrates will talk about his “second sailing”. For the moment I will note only a few things. There is pilot in control of the raft. It goes wherever it is takes. Short of knowledge, what is sought is the best and least refutable “human accounts”. He is fully aware that these accounts may not bring them safely to where they want to go. As an alternative he proposes “some divine account”. This safe account is one that is accepted, but does not stand up to exhaustive examination. They are stories that calm men’s fears and give them courage. Like Socrates’ prophetic swan song.

Simmas:

...'one could surely use the same argument about the attunement of a lyre and its strings, and say that the attunement is something unseen and incorporeal and very lovely and divine in the tuned lyre, while the lyre itself and its strings are corporeal bodies and composite and earthy and akin to the mortal. Now, if someone smashed the lyre, or severed and snapped its strings, suppose it were maintained, by the same argument as yours, that the attunement must still exist and not have perished-because it would be inconceivable that when the strings had been snapped, the lyre and the strings themselves, which are of mortal nature, should still exist, and yet that the attunement, which has affinity and kinship to the divine and the immortal, should have perished … (86a-b)

This is an argument that deserves closer attention, but rather than respond immediately Socrates gives Cebes a chance to voice his objection to Socrates’ argument. Cebes says that he too, like Simmias, must make use of “some sort of likeness” (87b) The making of a likeness or image, the use of the imagination, eikasia, plays an important but often overlooked role in the dialogues. The reoccurring play of images operates throughout the dialogues on many levels.

Cebes draws the likeness: the soul is to the body as a weaver is to his cloak.

'The relation of soul to body would, I think, admit of the same comparison: anyone making the same points about them, that the soul is long-lived, while the body is weaker and shorter-lived, would in my view argue reasonably; true indeed, he might say, every soul wears out many bodies, especially in a life of many years-because, though the body may decay and perish while the man is still alive, still the soul will always weave afresh what's being worn out; nevertheless, when the soul does perish, it will have to be wearing its last garment, and must perish before that one alone; and when the soul has perished, then at last the body will reveal its natural weakness,moulder away quickly, and be gone. (88d-e)

Simmias’ and Cebes’ arguments have shaken the confidence of the others.

Phaedo:

Who knows, we might be worthless judges, or these matters themselves might even be beyond trust. (88c)

Echecrates:

'What argument shall we ever trust now? (88d)

Simmias’ likeness of a raft in dangerous waters was prophetic. Can Socrates restore their trust in arguments? This is an issue of grave concern. Socrates suggests they should be in mourning if the argument cannot be brought back to life. (89b) Socrates makes the problem explicit:

“So that we don’t become haters of argument (misologic), as some become haters of human beings (misanthropic); for it is not possible for anyone to experience a greater evil than hating arguments. Hatred of arguments and hatred of human beings comes about in the same way, For hatred of human beings arises from artlessly trusting somebody to excess, and believing that human being to be in every way true and sound and trustworthy, and then a little later discovering that this person is wicked and untrustworthy - and then having this experience again with another. And whenever someone experiences this many times, and especially in the hands of just those he might regard as his most intimate friends and comrades, he then ends up taking offense all the time and hates all human beings and believes there’s nothing at all sound in anybody. (89d)

… when someone trusts some argument to be true without the art of arguments, and then a little later the argument seems to him to be false, as it sometimes is and sometimes isn’t, and this happens again and again with one argument after another. And, as you know, those especially who’ve spent their days in debate-arguments end up thinking the’ve become the wisest of men and that they alone have detected that there’s nothing sound or stable - not in the realm of either practical matter or arguments - but all the things that are simply toss to and fro, as happens in the Euripus, and don’t stay put anywhere for any length of time. (90b-c)

I think that this is a remarkable demonstration of the power of Plato’s insight into human psychology.

The danger here is that they may come to believe that philosophy has failed them. Socrates is about to die because he practiced philosophy and nothing he has said has convinced them that he will be better off for having practiced it. It is because of Socrates that they came to love philosophy, but it may be that philosophy cannot do what they expect of it. They are in danger of misologic, hating what they once loved.

I possess prophetic power from my master.

His 'daemon'?

One reason the role of Cebes is odd is because Plato is not there. Which is pretty strange given that we would not know Socrates without Plato.

In the first section of my reading I discussed Plato's absence. I will have a bit more to say toward the end.

We might still know of Socrates through Xenophon and Aristophanes, but although Xenophon had his admirers, including Machiavelli, he is not held in the same high esteem or enjoy the same popularity as Plato. From Xenophon we know of Socrates as a comic figure hanging from a basket in the Clouds.

I've read elsewhere of a later argument, I think from Islamic philosophy, that says that if the universe was of infinite duration, then everything that could happen, being of finite duration, would already have happened. — Wayfarer

As a side note, Nietzsche argued for a version of this in his doctrine of Eternal Recurrence. So, arguing for the infinity rejected by others. Also a part of rejecting what he saw as "Socratic"

Plato brings an intimacy that is special to the dialogues. A chance to be there when they were.

I possess prophetic power from my master.

His 'daemon'? — Wayfarer

In the works of Plato Socrates daemon only warned him away when from doing things. One argument he made is that if death were bad he would have been warned.

So - who is the reference to?

Plato brings an intimacy that is special to the dialogues. A chance to be there when they were. — Valentinus

Many who are taught to read philosophy are taught to pay attention only to the arguments. With Plato the setting, characters, and action are all essential elements.

Plato's own Greek terms were often varied and indeterminate. Plato deliberately did not employ precise or just consistent meanings throughout his works or even within the same dialogue.

Why? Perhaps his philosophy was a work in progress with many problems and hypothesized solutions still open in his mind. He suggested many alternatives for discussion or debate but certainly not for fixed single-minded interpretation. Although Plato's philosophy can be partially reconstituted for a single dialogue as implied by the setting, events, and characters portrayed. — magritte

I agree. This openness is a reflection of his zetetic skepticism. Knowing that he does not know he inquires. The other half of his openness may at first seem to be its opposite. The dialogues frequently end in aporia.

Heraclitean pairs of contraries are different than strictly formal Parmenidean contradictions. Parmenidean negation and Socratic elenchus don't work for informal overlapping interacting pairs. Plato was well aware of the logical difficulties, and for the most part presents them to the reader as a challenge for better suggestions of resolution. We haven't advanced quite enough yet to fully do that. Just try a few and see. — magritte

That is a very interesting comment. Thanks for opening up that perspective. I guess what caught my attention was the way that the interdependent nature of opposites is assumed as more or less self-evident in those passages. I wonder how or if this sense is preserved in modern philosophy and science.

I possess prophetic power from my master."

His 'daemon'? — Wayfarer

Socrates means Apollo, his master and god of prophecy.

Fooloso4 So - who is the reference to? — Wayfarer

The swans owe their prophetic power to Apollo. Socrates says: "I hold that I myself am a fellow-servant of the swans, consecrated to the same god ..." which would seem to indicate that his master was Apollo. But (and with Plato there is always more to it) he goes on to say: "... that I possess prophetic power from my master no less than theirs" Which indicates that it is not Apollo.

Short answer: I don't know.

that I possess prophetic power from my master no less than theirs" Which indicates that it is not Apollo. — Fooloso4

How does it indicate that? To me it is clear that he means Apollo.