The Hedonism in Plato's "Protagoras"Author(s): J. P. SullivanReviewed work(s):Source: Phronesis, Vol. 6, No. 1 (1961), pp. 10-28Published by: BRILLStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4181679 .Accessed: 26/03/2012 17:40

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The Hedonism in Plato's Protagoras1 J. P. SULLIVAN

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THREE INTERPRETATIONS of the discussion of hedonism in the Prota- goras may be distinguished. Some have argued that the discussion represents the real views of the historical Socrates 2 or of Plato

himself at the time he was writing the dialogue.3 This is the view which at present seems to be most generally accepted.4 Others believe that the discussion is ad hominem, that Socrates in the dialogue is simply using the premiss that the only good is pleasure to prove his main thesis that Virtue is Knowledge, while not believing himself in that premiss. 5 There is also a third view, which is not incompatible with either of the above. Those who hold this deny that there is any real hedonism to be found in the dialogue.6 1 An earlier version of this paper was read to the Southern Association for Ancient Philosophy at Oxford, September 1958. I am grateful to Prof. G. Vlastos for some helpful criticism. 2 So J. Adam, Platonis Protagoras, 1893 p. xxxii ('the episode in question [is] intended to represent the views of the historical Socrates'). 3 Cf. e.g. R. Hackforth, C.Q. 22 (1928) 39-42 ('Plato ... is making a serious attempt to understand himself, and explain to his readers what the Socratic equation really meant ... he soon advanced beyond this view') and J. Tenkku, Acta Philosophica Fennica I I0(I956) 23-56 ('Hedonism. is probably the first conclusion at which anyone who begins to reflect on ethics naturally arrives... No wonder that Plato defends hedonism in the early period of his ethical reflection to which the Protagoras belongs.' op. cit. p. 58). 4 Cf. G. Vlastos in his excellent introduction to Plato's Protagoras, Jowett's translation revised by M. Ostwald (N.Y. I956), p. xl, n. and E. R. Dodds, Plato, Gorgias (i959) pp. 2I-2.

5 So G.M.A. Grube, C.Q: 27 (1933) 203ff., F. M. Cornford, C.A.H. VI, pp. 313-4. Grube's view does most justice to the dialogue as a whole. He sees the dialogue as an attack on the Sophists, part of its aim being to show that the hedonism implicit in ordinary moral beliefs is ultimately the Sophistic ethic also. The confused and qualified hedonism of the masses and the Sophists is reduced to pure hedonism - all and only pleasures are good. Yet even on this premiss Socrates can prove that Virtue is One and Knowledge of some sort. 6 T. D. Goodell, A.J.P. 42 (1921) 2sff. offers this interpretation at its most extreme: 'in fact he (Plato) never held any doctrine that we nowadays call hedonism. Only a superficial reader can find it in the Protagoras.' Goodell argues that to Plato 'whatever is morally good is intrinsically pleasant to normal human nature' and concludes: 'Taking a popular principle of action, a principle that may be applied ignobly, and is often so applied, by restricting the range of BovA to its lower meanings, Plato by bringing for-

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The second is the view I believe to be correct and in the following pages I shall try to rehabilitate it by offering some neglected arguments drawn from other dialogues, from the Protagoras itself and in particular from a close analysis of 3SI-359. This last is most important and in the course of it I shall try to settle certain minor disagreements about the interpretation. For these disagreements have led to the belief that Plato regards the hedonism there expounded with some degree of favour. In fact, even the belief in the ad hominem nature of the hedonistdiscussion has been sometimes reached by misinterpreting the drift of the argument.

II Some Features of the Earlier Discussion (3oga- 3 5 a)

Socrates' professed admiration of Protagoras (309cd) is immediately counter-balanced, its irony made clear,2 by his report of his conversation with Hippocrates, who wished to buy an education from the Sophist. The key-note of hostility is now struck: Hippocrates blushes, when asked if he would not be ashamed to become a Sophist, for the education he describes seems to entail that. Socrates describes the Sophists as wholesalers or retailers of spiritual food, whose wares through the lack of any standard market tests could be extremely dangerous to the cus- tomer (3I 3C). Some commentators underrate the hostility. Guthrie finds that 'the keynote is courtesy and forbearance,' but Vlastos is right when he comments on Socrates' clumsy, heavy-handed irony ('His hand- ling of Protagoras is merciless, if not cruel' op. cit. pp. xxiv-v). In the patently ironic compliments of Socrates, in the unflattering portraits of Hippias and Prodicus and to a lesser extent of Protagoras, in the insis- tence that Protagoras commit himself to the argument (33 ic), in the

ward that higher meaning and adding his doctrine of measurement, lifts the principle out of itself and transforms it'. One difficulty of course is that the higher pleasures of the soul are never mentioned, but simply the ordinary pleasures and pains of the average citizen. W. K. C. Guthrie, while holding that Plato does not subscribe to the hedonist position, says: 'The doctrine to which Socrates obtains Protagoras' consent... may be labelled hedonism, but it is something utterly different from this, and is indeed con- sistent with a morality as high as most people would aspire to ... 1 his is hardly hedonisnm in any accepted sense' (Plato, Protagoras and Meno, 1956, p. 22). 1 A. E. Taylor, e.g. states: 'Neither Socrates nor Plato is represented as adopting the hedonist equation of good with pleasure... it is carefully treated as one neither to be affirmed or denied.' (Plato, the Man and his Work, p. 260). 2 For a similar ironic compliment which is immediately nullified by devastating general criticism cf. Symp. ig8ff.

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criticism of long speeches and the contemptuous dismissal of the literary discussions which the Sophists practised,1 there is surely strong criticism, even though there is nothing like the attack on Callicles in the Gorgias. There is always some restraint in Plato's treatment of the great Sophists: in the Gorgias the protagonist is replaced by a pair of whipping boys; in our dialogue Protagoras is left on the hook, but the blows are laid on more lightly.

The conclusion of the opening discussion is that the possible spiritual dangers make it important that Hippocrates and a fortiori his teachers should know what sort of education is being sold. Socrates accompanies Hippocrates to elicit this. The discussion of the teachability of virtue soon makes it clear that the conceptions of virtue which Socrates and Protagoras have are diametrically opposed. Socrates now concentrates (as in other dialogues) on discovering what is Protagoras' conception of virtue. Is virtue many or one (32 8e)? Protagoras' conception of virtue has to some extent already emerged, but Socrates wishes to examine it more closely, hence the change of subject from its teachability to its nature. The virtue described by Protagoras closely resembles the 8?n1otx' &pe'rr of the Phaedo (82 ab), as is clear from the reasons Protagoras offers for its being teachable: (a) the myth symbolizes its actual or potential possession by every citizen (contrast Phaedo 69c vmpO)xo6popL oLp 7rXoL', poxxoL 8c Ire =7upOL); (b) the laws, family and social training and punishment are the methods whereby it is taught.

Socrates does not put forward any further negative arguments or any views he may himself hold; he lets the Protagorean reply go unchallenged without returning to the attack (as he does with Thrasymachus in Rep. I). He chooses instead to argue from Protagoras' demotic virtue to his required conclusions: the dialogue is ad hominem from the beginning. Whether some higher notion of virtue overshadows the discussion is doubtful. Is this the presupposition of Socrates' doubts or are Socrates' arguments against Protagoras' claim to teach virtue merely ad hoc arguments? The latter: his two arguments (that the Athenians by allowing everyone to speak up on moral and political questions recognise the impossibility or unpredictability of experts in them, and that fathers do not, because they cannot, teach their children virtue) bear no relation to the philosoph- ical virtue of other dialogues. Protagoras' reply is on its own level per- fectly adequate; he is talking about demotic virtue. l Cf. 309(d, I2a, 31 3c, 31' d, 328c-329b, 3 34(1, 33 Oa-c, 3 37c ft., 337c-348b, 36ode.

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Socrates is ironic when he expresses his gratitude to Hippocrates and his high opinion of Protagoras' speech (328 d ff.), as is clear from the subse- quent references to politicians and books. His remark, ey& yocp ev pdv Tt)j 9tpoAOv Xp6vc nyouvv o'ux elVoL &VOp6Y7rLV7)V ?7e=tL0LOXaV jj &yOo.L OL &cyxOoi yLyvovtv *wViv 8' 7rCLa,LoL. (328 e) is patently ambiguous. And the small difficulty he still has takes up the rest of the dialogue.

At 329 the elenchus begins, introduced by Socrates' compliment to Protagoras on his ability to give brief answers. Do the different names (justice, temperance etc) used by Protagoras in the myth denote different parts of the collective term virtue or are they synonyms for the same thing? Protagoras, accepting an analogy of Socrates, says that those qualities are parts of a single whole related to each other as parts of the face are, but different from each other in themselves and in their 8ivX4K 1 (33oab). The analogy is important and is constantly referred to by Socrates. The proposition to be submitted to the elenchus is stated (as often) in the form of a question to which assent is given: &p' oiv ov'xG xad T& yq &pPTq j6LOpt oiUx a-t5v - 9tepov OOV TOv rtepov, oute UtO 05 e -q, ,VC~t aur This use of questions is characteristic of the Socratic method in the

dialogues. It lends colour to Socrates' habitual profession of ignorance, for logically a question has no truth-value. Nevertheless in a conversa- tional context a question phrased in a certain way can and often is inten- ded to give the respondent the impression that the questioner believes the answer he invites (e.g. a leading question). Logical casuistry is now pos- sible. In the present case, although the entire wording of the proposition is Socrates' own, he dissociates himself from it at 33oe-33 Ia - 't7roL' xv gyoyse 6Xtr& [,v &haC opo0c, fxouaoc, OT6 &? xod e O'LeQel 7rCLV T05TO, 7apnxouaacq r1pwroy6paoc y&p 688 rai3koc OTrexpLvo'rO, eyx oe %pr . . . a6q 0&ro4 X6yoq ?artLv; This is a deliberate technique and a proper appreciation of it is essential to a correct view of the dialogue. The argu- ment beginning at 330 c runs as follows: there is such a thing as justice and such a thing as holiness. justice is just and holiness holy. But if Pro- tagoras' proposition that no part of virtue is like any other part is true, then it would follow that justice is not holy and holiness is not just, and thus that justice is something unholy and holiness is unjust. This is ab- surd. So justice must be the same as holiness or very similar or at least the one is like the other, which contradicts the original proposition. As usual in the elenchus it would be easier to give up this statement than accept the absurd conclusion reached by using it as a premiss. 1 i.e. the actions in which these virtues issue are different.

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There are a number of objections to this argument. There is the type- mistake of calling justice just (this confusion occurs elsewhere in Plato cp. Symposium 21 ia). It is unlikely at this time that Plato was aware of the mistake. Secondly, and following from this, there is the objection that even if justice were just and holiness holy and these were not like each other, all this entails is that the adjectives 'just' and 'holy' are not applicable to holiness and justice respectively, not that justice is not- holy and holiness not-just. It is generally said that Socrates here confuses the contrary with the contradictory and so proceeds to give a positive sense to not holy and not-just i.e. unholy and unjust; there are passages where a similar confusion is apparent and other passages where the dis- tinction is recognized. Some commentators like Adam 1 have tried to defend Plato on the ground that the Greek language naturally tends to give a positive significance to such negative concepts. Arguably P'lato was aware of the possibility of such logical confusions, but it is not to the point to say that in conversational contexts like the one under discussion (where concepts of common sense, accepted assumptions, and ordinary language with its informal implications are the instruments and objects of enquiry) that Socrates violates strict rules of logic. In fact, all moral discourse can use the contradictory as the contrary - in fact to make a contradictory assertion without its being assumed to be a contrary asser- tion, we generally have to say neither x nory; Diotima e.g. has to explain carefully to Socrates when he (quite naturally) assumes that her state- ment that 'Love is not beaut4Jul means that Love is ugly, that Love is some- thing between the two. Of course the contradictory can be distinguished from the contrary in such contexts by the tone of voice etc, but in the present discussion, it is not a logical mistake but a natural linguistic phenomenon that Socrates takes advantages of. The real objection is that the adjectives are not applicable at all, not even to the cognate nouns.

Protagoras does not see the question so simply: justice is not holy or holiness just - there seems to be some difference. But he is willing to let the point go by default, as he cannot quite put his finger on the error in Socrates' reasoning. Socrates will not have this - he forces Protagoras to state his position without ifs or buts. Protagoras' defence then is that justice is to some extent like holiness. He wrongly says that everything is like everything else, but does give some apparent "opposites" which belong to the same categories (black, white; hard, soft (which for certain purposes would be "opposites,' but which have much in common. He returns to the analogy: the parts of the face are different, and yet they 4 Op. cit. ad loc.

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are in certain ways like each other - so Socrates could by a similar argument argue for their resemblance. But points of similarity do not justify our calling things "like," when the likeness is very small. Prota- goras is accusing Socrates with justice of ignoratio elenchi. Socrates asks irrelevantly whether Protagoras thinks the likeness between justice and holiness is small. No, says Protagoras rightly, but then I do not agree with what I take to be your view that they are pretty well the same sort of thing.

Protagoras' annoyance (3 32 A) 1 makes Socrates drop the argument, yet later it is suggested that the point has gone to Socrates (349d). The next equation Socrates attempts is that a

dity of the arguments. In these cases at least the all-important Socratic thesis that Virtue is one is supported by false reasoning in an attempt to convince an interlocutor of its truth. But the larger context of the dia- logue might warn the perceptive reader, who is in all probability already familiar with earlier elenchtic dialogues and the procedures legitimate in the game. To be literal-minded except where the immediate context stresses the ironic or humorous intention is as mistaken as believing that Plato never makes a mistake.

Socrates now begins the equation of aoppoarv- and 8LxMatov-J, inci- dentally forcing Protagoras to defend a thesis which he is ashamed to affirm - the common view that one may exercise self-control in injustice. There is also the significant hint that it may be Socrates and Protagoras, not the thesis, who will be examined (333c). Protagoras however aban- dons his short answers and Socrates wishes to discontinue the discussion. '

There follows a lighter interlude with some humorous and malicious parody of the other Sophists present. The discussion is then renewed with Socrates answering Protagoras. The subject is the consistency of a poem by Simonides and it is generally agreed that Socrates is merely beat- ing the Sophists at one of their own games, the worthlessness of which he contemptuously dismisses at 347c. The interlude lowers the intellec- tual tension, but it would be wrong to overemphasize its separateness from the rest of the dialogue. It is not merely that the poem deals with virtue or that the whole discussion is parody of Sophistic methods and practice, its expressed content is firmly anchored to the rest of the work because Socrates uses the poem to argue for his two great beliefs that Virtue is knowledge and no one errs willingly. Offered in their most sophistical guise here, they are aired more dialectically in the last section of the work. Yet the difference between the two methods is not as great as one might think. Parody may explain the perversity and falsity of Socrates' literary exegesis: its lack of seriousness is heavily underscored with humour, irony and further parody, particularly at the expense of Prodicus (cf. e.g. the explanation of xoDeT6 and then the withdrawal 1 There are two possible ways the argument might have developed. As injustice is seen from the standpoint of public morality, Socrates might have played on the ambiguity of wktzLov as in the argument with Polus (Gorg. 474c-476a), where Dodds' comment ad loc. (op. cit. p. 249) is: 'it is not easy to believe. . . that Plato is wholly unconscious of the equivocation... It rather looks as if he was content at this stage to let Socrates repay the Sophists in their own coin, as no doubt Socrates often did.' Alternatively he might have used the ambiguity in eiv 7tpOTreLV (cf. Charm. 172, Euthyd. 28i, Rep. 353-4 Alc. 1, i i 6) and produced the paradox that the unjust man is doing good via the premiss iyaO& 7rp&trtteLv W(X LCX 7rp& trTLV.

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of that explanation at 34Ic). This motive does not however explain the perversity of the argumentation that precedes and follows this section: the false premisses and the faulty logic at which even Protagoras is allow- ed to protest. Here the discussion is in one sense serious, indeed it be- comes bad-tempered. Yet it is difficult to believe that Plato takes some of the arguments as serious logical support for the thesis that Virtue is one. I have argued from internal evidence that Plato is aware of the invalidity of at least one premiss in the earlier arguments and he is also aware of the shakiness of some of the succeeding arguments.'

The discussion is resumed: are the virtues one under different names or are they different from one another? Protagoras allows four of them to be assimilated, even though the relevant arguments had not at the time convinced him; he takes his stand on courage, as being very different from the others. It is nowv Socrates' task to show by Protagoras' own admissions that courage is identical with wisdom. This argument has been fully discussed by other commentators. Protagoras is clearly no match in logical subtlety for Socrates; his overconfident vehemence (note the tendency to superlatives on his part, especially at 349 de) leads him into a false admission at 3 So bc and his protest at what he alleges is an illegitimate conversion by Socrates is due to a misunderstanding of what Socrates says at 3Soc. Nevertheless Socrates does not complete a valid chain of reasoning here, nor does he re-examine the links after Protagoras protests. For Protagoras' valid objection is at 3 Si ab: Oo&pao; comes 6 TreXVIq xodL &lo Ouioi5 ye xOt 17ro 'iavLAOt - &Vape'O, a7ro cpyaeW4 XOCL eutpoypM; r&v +uCxv. An expert is always more confident in technical matters even where there is (for the uninitiated in particular) some ha- zard attached, but as Protagoras rightly sees he does not thereby qualify for the epithet brave. As Protagoras says at 3Soc, he at no time wished to admit (despite his slip at 3 gob) that the confident are brave (even when he was explicitly ruling out the fools and madmen). This larger objection disregards the formal steps and gives us what Protagoras really thinks.

On the other hand Protagoras' diagrammatic counter-example did not exactly follow the Socratic chain of reasoning (Protagoras is always less logically acute than Socrates). Commentators have tried to show either (a) that Socrates is guilty of the fallacy that Protagoras alleges or of a subtler one, or (b) that he is not guilty of it; or if he is, then the addition of a few extra premisses which are almost implicit would save the ar- gument, or (c) that Socrates is attacking Protagoras' own hasty admis- 1 A sign of this is given at 36ib: Socrates 1has not proved that all the virtues are sinmply knowledge but was trying to prove this (&ItLxmp7v &noejLiL).

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sions. This is not the place to go into the question in detail, for the inm- portant thing surely is that any but the most logically sophisticated readers naturally assume that there is some justice in Protagoras' allega- tion of unfairness, whatever that unfairness consists in. Plato may or may not have taken extreme precautions to ensure that there is no real mistake, but he wishes the reader to believe that there is - which is fturther evidence that the whole dialogue is to be taken as ad hominem andi that the rules of the elenchus allow such arguments and premisses. The impression the reader is to get is not that Socrates is a fallacious and dishonest reasoner and Protagoras isn't, but that Socrates may use such tactics against such confused and dangerous people as Protagoras; for Protagoras is a Sophist and our attitude to the Sophists has been given us at the beginning (31 2 if.).

III Analysis of 3SIb-3s9a

At 35I b Socrates begins afresh. This central passage is our main concern and needs closer examination. Its formal function (even though it seems an excessive length for the purpose) is just to provide premisses for the reduction of Bravery to Knowledge, thus completing the assimilation of all the virtues to this latter.

It runs as follows: pleasure is good, pain is evil. Knowledge always controls a man's actions. The popular belief that a man can be overcome by pleasure or pain and so act against his better knowledge is erroneous: obviously, because on analysis this is to be overcome by pleasure and so to choose pain, as being overcome means taking greater pain for less pleasure. This can only be due to a defect of knowledge - the knowledge of the correct choice of pains and pleasures, the rexv- 0?TpnTLX. Thus it follows that as what is honourable and good is also pleasant by defini- tion, then cowards by refusing to do the honourable thing are convicted of ignorance and all brave men are shown to have the wisdom which is the opposite of this ignorance. Knowledge of what is and what is not to be feared (i.e. what is and what is not evil) is bravery. The cycle of equations is now complete: justice = Piety; Wisdom = Self-control; Self-control, although it was not proved, was allowed by Protagoras to be like Justice, and now Bravery has been shown to be Wisdom.

The first question concerns the actual hedonism of the passage: is it, as Goodell and Guthrie have argued, scarcely hedonism at all in any proper sense, because it is compatible with a fine way of life? Is it pure hedonism

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or are other goods admitted in their own right to form a scale of values? Although Socrates begins by simply predicating good of pleasure, yet he

intends to identify them for the purposes of the argument because; (a) the list of conventional good things at 3 s4b like health, bodily well- being, safety of one's country, dominion over others, wealth, are imme- diately said to be good for no other reason than that their outcome is pleasure or prevention of pain;1 (b) it is stressed throughout for the purposes of the argument that the audience have no other telos whereby anything can be called good or bad except pleasure and pain. And at 3g4e-35S we find: &X' L xL vu3 &v(aOa(XL 9za-CLv, C' 7r-T ?X'X?t X axol VpOvL CTVML 'T6o &yOv T q'v rovh, I

ro XOaXOV &)tO TL T7 V &VLOXV' T' OpXeL 4LIV TO 41Ci)4 XMtuvsLCO)VcKL t Tov PLOV &VEU XU7t&V;

(c) Socrates indicates clearly that he sees each pair of words 'good' and 'pleasant,' 'bad' and 'painful' as synonymous - Cr.&ZC8j o epMv7 -rC5rcX,

uozv xocL OvO6CaTLv rpoaocyopEu (Ov sb); (d) it is essential for the argument that the only good and the only evil should be pleasure and pain or what produces these.

Good is therefore identified with pleasure and not predicated of it. Secondly we find that it is psychological as well as ethical hedonism. Not

only is pleasure the only good, but we needs must choose it. The follow- ing considerations make this clear: (a) at 3s6b Socrates says: eav [iev y&p aem npo6 8Ea Ly4, Tr PLCL OCL xocL trXe[o hir'xM. This would not be conclusive as there is an ambi- guity in Xt-rao_, but (b) the terms used in talking of human actions are psychological, e.g. being overcome by ('T-aOML 3s2e, 357C etc); (c) even when talking of knowledge (3 2c if.) Socrates says: COCWCep yLyvGCrAXj -r,; Ttyao& xxl TaC ,xcLx, pL &v xp oYlVn L v7o [rvo4 ()T? a?X MTTx 7rpXTTSLV V av r7rLa7ntLY XeXeU-[... This implies a man must take Nvhat he knows to be pleasant on the hedonistic calculus for no other spring of action can prevail. This is surely a psychological premiss, and a natural one for a man who believed in the paradox that no man errs I Knowledge is an obvious candidate for at least a second good thing apart from pleasure. It is initially described as xot),6v (3j2c), but this word is later analysed into &yaO6v t.X. (i4&X,[LOV (3 8b). The only function of knowledge mentioned in the discussion is as an instrument for making the right choice between pleasures and pains. It is nowlhere des- cribed as an end in itself; there is no mention of more disinterested uses. In fact all spiritual values (truth, care of the soul, etc) for which the philosopher might use it are never mentioned. The whole discussion appertains to a virtue strongly reminiscent of the 8-%uorrtxo 'pe r of the Phaedo.

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willingly. It will be remembered that the philosophical knowledge that leads to the philosopher's virtue also allows no psychological freedom in our sense (this is the hidden thesis in the Hippias Minor). We needs must love the highest when we see it; the difference lies simply in what we see as highest.

The hedonism is probably also egocentric. There is no mention of the greatest pleasure of anyone except oneself. It is stated at 3 S4 ab that such things as military service resulting in such goods as the safety of one's country and dominion over others are good for no other reason than that their outcome is pleasure or the prevention of pain. But this is not a utilitarian view, as is indicated by choice of examples of necessary evils, which all relate to an individual's welfare (e.g. xoc5ctn etc).

Like many theories of psychological hedonism it is put forward as an empirical theory (it claims to state facts about men's behaviour) whereas actually its bases are a priori. No evidence would be allowed to count against it. The popular view that reason can be swayed by passion to choose what is evil is analysed away, for this might count against it as a psychological thesis. The identification of good with pleasant is no more than a linguistic recommendation disguised as an analysis.

Such a rational hedonism may well issue in a conventionally refined and honourable life. Plato, typically Greek in this, argues later that the brave man gets more pleasure than the coward: he knows where real pleasure lies (36oa - Tf a' o &vapZo4; oix er:l x6 xa&XL6Ov -T xxL O.LLvov xoL 'LOV E`xptrL). And this is always Plato's way with the problem of pleasure in the moral dialogues. Despite the equation'pleasant' = 'good,' Plato would always take it that pleasure has to be analysed and identified with good and if necessary redefined to do so. This comes out in the Republic. Goodness is the criterion of pleasure (as Protagoras tried to say at 35Ic), not vice versa. There is an assumption that good men get pleasure from good actions (like dying for one's country). And later even when philosophical virtue and the independent standard of the Form of the Good are in question, the best life is also the pleasantest even on the hedonistic calculus, as the numerical values given to the different kinds of life prove. But the theory as here expounded holds for the pleasures of the many conventionally interpreted and even for baser pleasures like food, drink and sex, which are only to be avoided if they lead to pain. The Gorgias is its reductio ad absurdum. Many Greeks would find pleasure in honourable and energetic conduct and Socrates did not have to offend the susceptibilities of his audience by following the theory to its logical conclusion. Protagoras' disinclination to accept the equation shows that

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he was aware of the possibility and indicates that the audience in Callias' house were Greek gentlemen. Pleasure cannot be the criterion unless pleasures have already been approved by standards other than pleasure. Only if we accept the view that Socrates' conception of virtue exactly coincides with the conception of virtue held by Protagoras and the or- dinary man, can we believe that Plato approves of the hedonistically based life or indeed supports the hedonistic calculus. This of course is not proof of my thesis that the hedonistic calculus is an ad hominem assumption, but if the arguments that follow are accepted, we need not imagine that Plato's attitude to it here is much different from the attitude he has in the Gorgias and Phaedo: that at best it ; a CYXLXypa%pla r. The discussion in the Protagoras is more intellectual - to show that Virtue has to be Knowledge no matter what one's conception of virtue is. Plato does not have to expose all his moral attitudes in every dialogue, nor indeed in- troduce any religious views he might have. One cannot use the argumen- tum ex silentio to show that by the time of writing this dialogue Plato did not believe in the immortality of the soul or the viciousness of politicians or indeed the possibility of a virtue different from the virtue around which the discussion centres. The opposite assumption would be equally wrong unless supported by chronological or internal evidence.

The next problem is whether Socrates or Protagoras or the other Sophist or ordinary men are overtly committed to the hedonistic thesis. How far is the discussion based on hypothetical premisses? Whose basis of life is it?

First Socrates. It is implied, to clear Plato of the charge of hedonism, that as Socrates tends to speak in questions in this passage he does not at any point overtly accept the premisses or conclusions which emerge. This argument will not do (even though the uneasiness about Socrates' actual adherence to the principle may well be justified). The linguistic conventions of both Greek and English prevent this. At 35Ic Socrates asks whether to live pleasurably is good and to live painfully bad. Pro- tagoras replies: E'Vnp roZ xo.XoZ y', C4- 86p.?vo4. Socrates immedia- tely protests: T' L, J I`pcXoy6pm; iS X0xC aC, 6Waep OAL 7r0?XX, 8 C' &T-t xacx>z; xocx& xocl avLaa rcy6; &ycl) yap ?ey6, xocO' 8 ,a-v, &pX xar& T0oi7- o oix &yaOA, [r) si -t &M' xtircov &rcol3noaerxta &?Uo; Now here we

would say that Socrates is disagreeing with the view of the many and of Protagoras; he is implying by the tone and turn of the question, which expects an affirmative answer, that it is his view, at the moment, that pleasures qua pleasures are good and pains qua pains are bad. He is thus formally committing himself to the thesis, although covertly he may not

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sincerely hold it. This is part of the Socratic method. But although his audience may surmise that this is but a hypothesis, or a tentative view, they must assume that Socrates is for the moment serious about it (cf. 3Tie). Protagoras says that if after examination the proposition seems reasonable, he will agree with Socrates .The inference is that he is taking Socrates as committed to it and he may have to agree or disagree with him. Protagoras consents to adopt the thesis as a basis for argument; and with the aid of another premiss (the supremacy of knowledge) Socrates from now on takes Protagoras as his ally in arguing against the many (who like Protagoras think that some pleasures are good and some bad). What must be stressed is that the impression Socrates is trying to give the many (not to mention Protagoras and the Sophists) is that he is logically convinced of the validity of his view and that he is trying to convince the many and also Protagoras (who is willing to agree if the thesis is reason- able) that they too must hold the same belief. He does incidentally give the reader several indications that this is not his true view, but in the fictional context he is arguing for and by implication holding the pure hedonist position even though this arguing may be done by inviting re- plies to questions. Two further remarks by Socrates should clinch this - first (3S7ab) he savs: Etev, X vOpwnot t7re 0 On 8ov4 T? xxL XUcir- v OpV o6pOCp&t v %s

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a7pvx troi PLou oacx... and at 3g8a he asks the other Sophists whether they think what he says is true. Now although when taken rigorously, such remarks may be ambiguous - i.e. ironic and not com- mitting Socrates to the thesis - yet surely in the fictional context, the impression given to the fictional audience is that Socrates is committed. This whole conversation is skilfully done: the reader is given sufficient indications to realize (as he might anyway from his knowledge of Plato's methods) that Socrates is being 'ironic' (see below), but the Sophists and the ordinary man (were he present) are to be taken in and regard Socrates as committed to the thesis because that is the natural interpretation of the questions and general drift of the argument. He does not try to persuade the Sophists otherwise; thev are left to think that he too ac- cepts the cogency of his arguments. He does not retract them.

Now for Protagoras and the other Sophists. We have already seen that Protagoras, although he does not initially

agree with the thesis,1 is willing to accept it if he can be rationally con- 1 Dodds is right to stress that it is not an assumption of Protagoras' nor even of "the many" (op. cit. p. 2 i) but nor is the thesis that Virtue is One: the whole point, as Grube long ago pointed out (op. cit.) is that they are renmorselessly driven to confess that the one is the underlying assumption of their lives and that denial of the other is illogical. 22

vinced. In the argument with the many he accepts it therefore as an hypothesis (not an agreed premiss like the supremacy of knowledge as a controlling element in man). He is brought to accept it, we know, (a) because the argument in which it is used convinces him that he must either accept this or abandon his otherfirmly held belief about the supre- macy of reason, and (b) because he allows it to be used as part of the argument for iden- tifying courage with wisdom - had he not accepted this part, he would have protested as he did with regard to the earlier argument about cour- age (350 ff). I think this is made clear by Socrates' concluding remarks at 3s8ab - - 8 a' j?ro'r H1pwrcxy6pou ?pcwT7, 'I7rLO Ir xol H1p6a8mX (XOLV & y&p 89 E UT L V?v O ??6o) 7'y t?pOV 8oxJ V &?7lY ?y?LV n ?us8aocxt. - CO.uXOyzXre &pox, V 8' ?y, 'TO ' -V OyCYOOv lveXL, To 8?

0CVLOCpO'Vxaxov... IPEXaOc oi'v 'o Hpo6&xoq vc?o)Oy)aE, xOc ot &XoL. It will be seen from this acceptance of the whole argument that not only

must Protagoras accept the hedonistic premiss but so must all the other Sophists, contrary to Taylor's view. They have been the judges through- out of the rigour of the arguments.

Now for the mass of mankind. They were really confused. They ac- cepted neither the view that good = pleasure simpliciter (5 I c) nor the view that reason is the controlling element in man (3 52b). Yet for all that their lives are based on the first. This is partly the point of Socrates' fre- quent references to there being no other telos to which they can point in describing things as good or bad (cf. e.g. 354, 3ssa, 3s6c etc.) It is no trouble for Socrates to argue them into the first: it is merely a question of carrying their ordinary views to their logical conclusion in relation to surgery and sex. It is more difficult and requires a lengthy analysis of the concept of being overcome by something to convince them of the supremacv of reason. But that the arguments would convince them, that they are cogent and logically rigorous, is agreed by Protagoras and the other Sophists and so the mass of mankind too is taken to accept them. Thus the ethic of Protagoras and the Sophists and the ethic of the ordinary man are shown to be identical on close analysis as Grube poinited out. That is why Socrates can say (357e-358):

So that is what 'being mastered by pleasure' really is - ignorance, and most serious ignorance, the fault which Protagoras, Prodicus and Hippias profess to cure. You on the other hand believe it to be something else. You neither go nor send your children to these Sophists, who are experts in such matters. Holding that it is nothing

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that can be taught, you are careful with your money and withhold it from them - a bad policy for yourselves and the community.

There is something close to a reversal here (as there is at the end of the dialogue). Protagoras was happy about the supremacy of reason but less sure about the identity of pleasure and good: the many (3 s3c-3 S4) proved to be unconsciously holding the identity of pleasure and good but re- garding the supremacy of reason as absurd. They and the Sophists - their confusions and doubts cleared away - coincide in their views and way of life and are therefore suited to each other. The pupils and teachers get the teachers and pupils they deserve.

lV Does Socrates Sincerely Hold the Hedonist Position? 1

To decide this we must look at the features of the elenchus and the methods of the earlier dialogues, as well as the internal evidence already discussed of the Protagoras itself.

General considerations (i) Hackforth believed that one of the main purposes of the dialogue was to work out the meaning of the Socratic paradox: on this view one of its main conclusions would be that virtue was the knowledge of ple- asures and pains in order to make the right choices. And these pleasures and pains, to judge from the examples Socrates offers, were the conven- tional pleasures and pains of ordinary Greek life. But the ostensible conclusions of a dialogue are not always the real ones. The reversal of position alleged by Socrates at the end of our dialogue is not serious. Clearly Socrates does not believe that what he means by virtue can be taught by the Sophists. His advice to ordinary people to send their children to the Sophists is ironic. In the Hippias Minor and the Meno much the same happens: the conclusions that the good man errs delibera- tely, the bad man involuntarily, and that virtue is a divinely given in- stinct have, at very least, unexpressed qualifications (i.e. that the good man would not err, and that virtue is like this only in present circum- stances) . I i.e. the fictional Socrates. If so, then Plato at this time accepted it too. Failing external evidence, we have only the text from which to decide questions of sinccrity. Methodolo- gically we must identify this Socrates and Plato, except where internal evidence can be offered for dissociating them, as it sometimes can.

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(2) The elenchus is essentially ad hominem. As Robinson says:

In the earliest dialogues... there is no general reason for supposing that Plato was himself deceived by any fallacy by which he makes Socrates deceive another ... As the questioner has to find premisses that appeal to the answerer, so he has to find inferences that appeal to him; and provided that he really does convince him, he may sometimes use premisses that he does not himself believe, and even inferences that he himself considers fallacious (op. cit. pp. IOI-2).

The Euthydemus is the clearest case of this, although it might be felt that the circumstances were rather special. But even in a dialogue as serious as the Gorgias this may happen. Dodds's comment is again relevant: 'It looks rather as if he was content at this stage to let Socrates repay the Sophists in their own coin' (op. cit. p. 249). (3) As a special case of this, Socrates is willing to encourage his inter- locutors to believe or continue to believe a falsehood and even to pro- pagate it.1 For instance, his attitude to statesmen like Pericles is fully given in the Gorgias (5i Sb etc), but in the Protagoras ( i9e) and Afeno (93b ff.) he allows that they were good statesmen and wise men, but unable to pass on their wisdom to their sons. His doubts about this are clear in the Meno, but he encourages Meno to convince Anytus of it; in the Protagoras no doubts are expressed, exept for the mild sarcasm at 3 2 9. (4) It follows that signs of insincerity or irony are not always given in the immediate context. This applies both to defective logical chains of reasoning (see the comments on the first two arguments, pp. I I f.) and to moral premisses from which these depend. A distinction may be made between the fictional audience and the real audience or the reader. Hints of insincerity might be apparent to the latter, but not to the fic- tional respondent.2 Meno is particularly naive, but each dialogue need not assume that the reader is unfamiliar with earlier dialogues and the Socratic procedures exhibited in them. (j) The important thing is the substitution of better for worse opinions, not necessarily the absolute truth reached by impeccable logical means

I This becomles more excusable if it is realised that such opinions are already held or are implicit in other opinions already held. If the hedonism we are now discussing was already an unconscious moral assumption of the Sophists and the many, it might be better that they should know it. It was also a step to tlhe important belief that virtue is knowledge. 2 lf Professor Ryle's suggestion that the dialogues were intended for dramatic- recitation is correct, it would be easy enough to introduce ironic tones where appropriate.

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which indeed the interlocutor nmay be incapable of understanding, Opo0 86Ra e.g. has to be taken on trust and we know from the yevvaZov +68oq of the Republic that Plato believed that the end justified the means. The earlier Socratic dialectic (as seen in Plato) is distinguished from eristic not by its superior logic and deductive chains or by the superior truth- value of its premisses but by the purity of its motives (e.g. the removal of the conceit of knowledge) and the truth of its conclusions (generally that Virtue is Knowledge). This ad hominem technique may be repugnant to modern readers, just as the merciless Socratic elenchus of Protagoras may offend us, but it is a possible moral view which has even now its adherents.

When we turn to the dialogue itself in the light of the above considera- tions, we find that some of the objections to the ad hominem theory can now be met. Vlastos' main reason (loc. cit.) for taking the hedonist dis- cussion seriously was that it is most unlikely that Socrates would deli- berately offer a false proposition for establishing his great proposition that Virtue is Knowledge;

...it would have encouraged the reader to believe afalsehood, and this Socrates, being what he is, would never do unless he put in clear and sufficient warning signs.

We can see now that it is possible and morally defensible in Plato's eyes to give this encouragement, particularly to the fictional interlocutors. As for warning signs, the question can now be reduced to what signs may be regardedl as 'clear and sufficient.' We have already seen cases where no warning signls have been given except possibly the fact it comes fronm Socrates and the rea(ler may be familiar with his procedures. In the case of the hedonist discussion it would be dramatically inappropriate for Socrates to be underlining his doubts while forcing Protagoras to admit the thesis, partictularly as he was unwilling to make the key admission that good and pleasing were synonyms: he wished to say that sonme pleasuLres were good and some ba(l. We can therefore onlv look for- subtler indications. (i) The dialoglUe has been ad hominem from the beginning, working from Protagoras' conception of virtue, which is more or less the conventional one (the description of conventional good things [354abJ reminds us of this). Fallacious and humorous arguments have been used, including the blatant sophistry of the Sinionides interlUde, to prove the thesis that Virtuie is One and Knowledge. Protagoras is allowed to object to one argument and this dramatically indicates to the reader that Socrates is

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capable of disingenuousness in the interests of his paradox. He can even say to Socrates pLXovVtxeZv pot 8oxeZ4 (36oe). (2) As often the dialogue ends on a note of doubt. What virtue really is remains a question; this in turn throws some doubt on the hedonistic calculus as a positive conclusion. (3) The final references to Prometheus and Epimetheus (36icd) seem to take up the Protagorean conception of virtue as given in the myth. They may possibly hint that just as Epimetheus is short-sighted about human existence, so is the Sophistic way of life based upon the hedonistic cal- culus. Socrates like Prometheus wotuld take the longer view - he is concerned for the whole of his life, not with the everyday choices of greater and less pleasures. (4) In the discussion itself there seems a calculated stress on the word -6O?4; it becomes almost a refrain throughout the argument. There is no other T'XoQ to which the Sophists or the many can point when talking of good and evil. Now were Plato genuinely making the assertion that there really is no other 'rto4, this repetition would be pointless and laboured. And an examination of the actual instances of the use of the word or equivalents confirm this impression.

At 3e, Socrates asks the many: Ovcxoiuv (pOLvs'rTL, J &VOp(XtOL, 4LV, el poqtv 1yc 't x fl Hpcormxy6poq, 8L' ou'gv &Xo rociito xcxa 6va " at'

efc: sLacr, reCtO?rTua XCaL 6&?,V BOVCV &7roaGpeZ; At 3s4b we find: Toc,roc& &'YcO& Ea'CFrL 8 ' O TL ' 0 rLE 1ovaq Mo?rTu'ri xC'L ?iWtv aC7ra0,),OCay Tr xact &toTpotc&,; 9 -f dr XXOg XOyetv, ?L 'O 8 0o53Xev- t-rq o&ra ayaOCf xaheTe, (X?X' if> aov&c, rT xC\ U?ocq; This is followed by an almost similar remark (3 g4d): Esce s' xxT' Wo ll au'o xO ac'prtv xaxov XC1XOreCL et4 E" aXO TL TkO4 &7tOX 4CVTC4, 9XOLTC aV XOL f'LiV e9MELV aUuQ R're?. 3 SS drives the point home: &X' E&r xc\ vUv `XvaOvaOtL ReatLV, e t 31? 'XO TC 9CvaL EIVxCL 'TO 'ycO8v O TOV'V 8OV, i TO xCxov 'o TL 7 'nV aXVLOCV 7n MpxEz. U oPzV TO 7)O&(z) X uOVOLtV Pto OV 6vCU ?U7=oV); EL ce aRxeL XXL eLT e ?fL8V X?o cc aL oyaf3v X OXOV C LE TOCTo

TO?aTOUTO aXOUCT?.

There are some tenuous indications of the same sort at 3sSe-3S6b, but these are enotugh to make it clear (a) that it is theoretically possible to envisage another telos or standard of good than pleasure; (b) that the ordinary man cannot; (c) that the Sophists cannot either; 1 and (d) that Socrates, by carefully using second person plurals and leading questions, I It might seem that the Sophists are only saying that the ordinary man cannot envisage another tclos, but the impression that they cannot either is clinched at 3 8a, wheni all the Sophists are asked vhether they agree that thle pleasant is good and the painful bad.

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allows for this possibility although he makes no positive statement as to what this telos might be. To the Sophists he seems to be following the argument wherever it leads to, but the reader is presumably meant to pay attention to the form of the questions and see what Socrates is doing, that is, providing himself with another ad hominem premiss to assimilate courage and knowledge in the final argument, and incidentally revealing the basic conceptions of the Sophists and the mass of mankind. It is because of this double function that it occupies so much space. Their virtue is the product of the hedonistic calculus, which is at least some form of knowledge; 1 what real virtue is and to what telos it looks are not questions that can be answered in a dialogue as sophistic and intellec- tual as the Protagoras.

My doubts about the sincerity of the hedonism of the Protagoras arose not from a wish to plaster over cracks in the unity of Plato's thought (for Plato often changes his views) but because in a developing philosophy like Plato's and in the earlier period of his writing when he was pro- ducing moral Socratic dialogues fairly assiduously, it is strange that there should be a full-blown hedonistic theory of morals followed by two biting attacks on it in the Gorgias and Phaedo (however long the interval between them) without a single sign (rare in Platonic writings) of how he moved from one position to the other, only to revert eventually to a more moderate position in a late dialogue, the Philebus. The arguments against this view are of course the contextual arguments I have adduced, but if these are accepted, we are rid of a strange anomaly - not a con- tradiction in Platonism but a sudden volteface, the philosophical motives for which are completely unrecorded.

Lincoln College, Oxford.

I It seenms clear that Plato always thought this, whether he refers to technical virtue (cf. the medical and architectural analogies of the Simonides interlude), the popular virtue or the philosophical.

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Article Contentsp. 10p. 11p. 12p. 13p. 14p. 15p. 16p. 17p. 18p. 19p. 20p. 21p. 22p. 23p. 24p. 25p. 26p. 27p. 28

Issue Table of ContentsPhronesis, Vol. 6, No. 1 (1961), pp. 1-82Front MatterMelissus of Samos in a New Light: Aristotle's "Physics" 186a10-16 [pp. 1-9]The Hedonism in Plato's "Protagoras" [pp. 10-28]Plato's Apology: "Republic" I [pp. 29-36]Note on the Structure of the "Republic" [pp. 37-40]Father Kenny on False Pleasures [pp. 41-45]More on the Structure of the "Philebus" [pp. 46-52]On Aristotle's "Metaphysics" k 7, 1064a29: [pp. 53-58]The Development of Aristotle's Theory of the Classification of Animals [pp. 59-81]Epicurean Prolepsis [p. 82]