The Republic by Plato - 2 - The Case for Immorality
Books Two and Three
Quote
"What I hear is people telling me that, unless I also gain a reputation for morality, my actually being moral will do me no good, but will be a source of private troubles and public punishments. On the other hand, an immoral person who has managed to get a reputation for morality is said to have a wonderful life."
Notes
Socrates' two friends, Glaucon and Adeimantus, are still not convinced by his arguments from Book One. They're still struggling to see how morality can be better than immorality.
In particular, the trouble is to see how morality is intrinsically better than immorality. If you say that living morally wins you a good reputation, that's not saying enough for morality in and of itself. Someone could be immoral and simply lie to get a good reputation, thus getting the best of both worlds. If it's all about reputation, then it is only important to appear good.
Glaucon raises an idea of a ring that makes the wearer invisible and allows you to get away with whatever you wanted. In that scenario, no one would choose to be moral. What is the benefit of it, especially if you can get away with acting immorally and doing whatever you want?
No one, they argue, acts morally because it is intrinsically good or beneficial. They only do it because they're forced to, or because they're not smart or courageous enough to be immoral: "Morality is only ever practiced reluctantly by people who lack the ability to do wrong."
As for the gods, they either don't exist, don't care, or can be bought off. That is, if you're immoral, you can still gain wealth and then offer sacrifices to make up for any wrongdoing you committed.
Glaucon and Adeimantus raise these arguments to Socrates, not because they believe them, they are in fact troubled by the strength of this argument for immorality and they want Socrates to defeat it.
Socrates is very impressed. He proposes to look at morality at the level of the community first, instead of at the individual level, as a way of understanding how morality is intrinsically good. Glaucon and Adeimantus agree to this idea.
Socrates sets about developing an imaginary community from the ground up. Communities form because as individuals we are not self-sufficient. There are things we can't get on our own. People come together and specialize in the thing they are good at so that the community can provide for everything that they need.
They begin with basic needs such as food, clothes, and shelter, and then expand further to a marketplace, coinage, merchants, ships, etc. And they will want luxury goods as well, such as "savouries, perfumes, incense, prostitutes, and pastries."
Finally, they will need a way to defend themselves against invaders and other hostile communities. As everyone else devotes themselves to a particular specialty, they will need people to devote themselves entirely to this need — ie. a professional army, or guardians, as Socrates calls them.
The subject of these guardians quickly becomes very important because of the requirements of the role. They must be bold and strong when it comes to facing an enemy, but also gentle and kind to citizens of the community. And they also need a "philosopher's love of knowledge" in order to recognize who is a friend and who is a threat.
The question about how to develop and train these guardians is a very important subject for imagining how this community will work, and, ultimately, how to get at the question of why morality is intrinsically good.
Key Takeaways
Glaucon and Adeimantus are very admirable in their ability to steel-man the case for immorality. To steel-man is to make the strongest case you can for the argument you wish to argue against. To straw-man, on the other hand, is to create a much weaker representation of the argument so that it's easier to look like you can defeat it. Steel-manning shows you have a strong understanding of your opponent and that you are truly interested in seeing which side is true.
Socrates sees they are really intent on getting to the bottom of this and he warns them that this will take a lot of work (ie the entire rest of the book), but they are ready and want to continue.
Interesting how prostitutes are included together with pastries and incense in the list of luxury goods. And this won't be the only instance in The Republic of Plato's low view of women in Ancient Greece either.