The Cambridge Companion to Early Greek Philosophy

by A. A. Long

  Teaching without knowledge

  Plato thinks most sophists value persuasion over truth. He blames them for presenting themselves as moral teachers when their knowledge amounts (in his view) to little more than an ability to mimic experts. Plato’s standards are too high to be met by any normal human (as he himself would admit), but we cannot save Protagoras and Gorgias from this charge simply by applying a gentler standard, since we have reason to believe that both of them taught views that would make it impossible to satisfy any reasonable standard of knowledge. How can Protagoras teach if relativism means he knows no more than his pupils? How can Gorgias teach if he is right in On not being? If they are coherent in thought and practice, then they must believe they could be teachers without having knowledge.

  A Gorgian answer

  Gorgias claims to teach only rhetoric, and if Plato is right about this, Gorgias teaches the art of speaking in total abstraction from any subject matter. On not being raises difficulties for knowing or communicating the way things are, but it implies nothing directly about the mastery and transmission of skills. So, for example, if Gorgias taught carpentry, and we agreed he could do this without pretending to know or say what wood or furniture actually is, he would be safe from his own arguments (if not from Socrates’). But Gorgias teaches rhetoric, and that is uniquely vulnerable. The third argument of On not being concludes: “If anything is knowable, no one could make it evident to another both because things are not words and because no one has the same thing in mind as another.”22

  If the aim of rhetoric were to put what the speaker wants into the minds of an audience, effective rhetoric would be impossible on this argument. Yet Gorgias teaches rhetoric. Perhaps he takes a different view of this, one by which an orator would succeed if he gets the votes he wants, regardless of what occurs to the minds of his audience – if, that is, his aim is purely behavioural. If so, Gorgias’ argument is not against the power of words but against understanding their meanings as referential or ideational, and his argument does not threaten his career. The aim of rhetoric would be to influence action, nothing more.23

  A Protagorean answer

  Protagoras’ human-measure implies that, since my judgments would be true for me and yours for you, neither of us would have anything to gain from a teacher – not, at least, in point of truth (Plato Tht. 161c-162c). Everyone would have from private resources such knowledge as is possible for anyone to have, and no one could know more than another on any subject.

  If the aim of teaching were the transmission of knowledge, then teaching would be impossible in Protagoras’ view. Yet Protagoras teaches. Perhaps this is because he would separate teaching from knowledge altogether. The main subject he claims to teach is good judgment in practical affairs, euboulia, along with the ability to speak on either side of an issue – an ability Aristotle connects with the use of eikos (Rhet. II.24). Good judgment in the area of reasonable expectation depends not on knowing more of the truth than others do, but on having the good sense to ask pertinent questions and to recognize what information is most relevant. Eikos is conceptually parasitic on truth, but the route to eikos (unlike the route to truth) does not require special knowledge of the matter at hand, since all parties to a dispute about eikos start with the same information. Therefore, in order for Protagoras to be a teacher, he does not need more information or better grounded information than what his pupils have. He can instead teach from only this advantage – good judgment.

  Gorgias and Protagoras would give similar answers because both turn away from earlier philosophers’ fascination with knowing the hidden natures of things. They have not, however, dispensed with nature altogether. It is nature that sets conditions on human survival and makes predictable the effects of words and passions on our actions, but this is not the Nature sought by scientists or metaphysicians behind the surface of conflicting appearances. Nature for the sophists is the complex reality that marks our experience of being human and enables us to entertain reasonable expectations towards one another. Although never stable enough to be the object of Platonic knowledge, this reality is accessible to anyone’s opinion through honesty and good judgment. And although the art of words is not suited to proving one opinion or another beyond doubt, it can carry us to see which are the most reasonable opinions to hold in view of what we do know. For the arena of human action and decision, where knowledge cannot obtain a grip, teaching good judgment and the art of words takes the highest practical value. This is the main teaching of the sophists. Its unexpected legacy has been the enduring challenge it has provided to philosophers.

  NOTES

  1 The Helen is in DK as 82 B11; translations are in Sprague [431] and Gagarin/Woodruff [429].

  2 The main thesis of Cole [440], on which see the review by W. W. Fortenbaugh, Gnomon 65 (1993) 385–89.

  3 Evidence for Protagoras’ interest in the correctness of words: Plato, Crat. 391c, Phaedrus 267c6, Prot. 338e-339a; Plutarch, Pericles 36.3; Aristotle, SE 14 173b17.

  4 Imitated in Plato, Prot. 337a-c.

  5 Guthrie [17] 205.

  6 Attributed by Aristotle to Protagoras (Rhetoric II.24 1402a23).

  7 Woodruff [448]. See also Vegetti in this volume p. 278.

  8 For a detailed analysis, see Long [464].

  9 Bett [470], Fine [473]. For Protagoras in relation to Democritus, see Taylor in this volume p. 193.

  10 For an elegant summary of the main issues in interpreting the fragment, and the scholarly consensus on these, see Mansfeld [475] 43.

  11 Burnyeat [471].

  12 For the second, see Burnyeat [471]; for the third, Fine [473].

  13 This reconstruction, usually called the objective interpretation, is cautiously favoured by many recent scholars: Kerferd [433] 87; Mansfeld [475] 43; and Schiappa [476] 130. For a review of scholarly opinion, see Kerferd [433] 87 n.3.

  14 Aristotle, SE 14 173b17.

  15 On Nietzsche’s naturalism and perspectivism, see B. Leiter, “Perspectivism in Nietzsche’s Genealogy of Morals,” in R. Schacht, ed., Nietzsche, Genealogy, Morality: Essays on Nietzsche’s Genealogy of Morals. (Berkeley/Los Angeles, 1994) 334–57.

  16 For example, de Romilly [435] 95–103.

  17 Gorgias’ On not being survives in two paraphrases; one, by Sextus Empiricus (M. VII.65-87), has evidently been adapted to serve the sceptical purposes of Gorgias’ sources; the other, by the author of pseudo-Aristotle, Melissus, Xenophanes, and Gorgias (also defective) is preferred by many scholars and is translated in Gagarin/Woodruff [429]. Sextus’ paraphrase is translated in Sprague [431] as B3.

  18 Kerferd [433] 97.

  19 On the interpretation of On not being, see Kerferd [433] 93–100; Mourelatos [465]; and Newiger [466]. Victor Caston argues, in a brilliant paper that will be part of the festschrift for A.P.D. Mourelatos that he is editing, that Gorgias’ opponent in On not being cannot be Eleatic, and conjectures that it is Protagoras.

  20 On the implications of B4 for interpreting the human-measure fragment, see Mansfeld [475].

  21 Aristotle Metaph. IX.3 1047a4-7: “nothing is perceptible [as F] unless it is being perceived [as F],” cf. DK 29 A29. Protagoras is also said to assert that a circle and a tangent meet not at a point (as geometers say) but, presumably, as we see them – over a distance (Aristotle, Metaph. III.2 997b35-998a4). A possible fragment from Didymus the Blind bears on this (Woodruff [479]), as does the dialogue of Zeno and Protagoras on the millet (DK 29 A29 = Simplicius, In phys. 1108.18ff.). For related views, see Antiphon 6 and 37 in Gagarin/Woodruff [429].

  22 Gagarin/Woodruff [429] 209.

  23 Mourelatos [465].

  FERNANDA DECLEVA CAIZZI

  15 Protagoras and Antiphon: Sophistic debates on justice

  INTRODUCTION

  Justice was a major topic of debate at Athens during the period that extends from Aeschylus’ Eumenides (456 B.C.), with its celebration of the inauguration of the court of the Areopagus, down to the trial and death of Socrates (399 B.C.), memoria
lized in Plato’s Apology.1 Historians, dramatists, orators, and philosophers provide a range of perspectives and evidence on one of the crucial issues of the age. In the earliest Greek literature human justice had been very closely linked to divine justice and power, but in the fifth century, the time of tribunals and popular assemblies, what chiefly attracts attention is justice purely in the human sphere. Questions are raised about its origin, its connection with nature and truth, its performance, the conditions that can guarantee its development, and the forces that generate its opposite – coercive power, violence, and injustice.

  In order to acquire a general idea of the terms in which these issues were explored at the end of the fifth century, it is enough to read the speeches Plato puts into the mouths of Glaucon and Adeimantus at the beginning of book two of his Republic. These speeches provide the best introduction to our theme because they exemplify the cultural background against which Plato develops his great project in this dialogue. Before turning to details, a few words are necessary on some of the questions that emerge in the preceding book.

  At the beginning of the Republic, Socrates accepts the invitation to enter the house of the elderly Cephalus, father of the orator Lysias and of Polemarchus. It is Cephalus who, in the course of talking to Socrates about the advantages and disadvantages of old age and wealth, introduces the theme of justice: one who is near the end of life begins to be take seriously the stories (which he has previously ignored or ridiculed) about the punishments meted out in Hades to those who have committed injustice. From what Cephalus says, a definition of justice emerges (“to tell the truth and to give back what one has received”) which leaves Socrates doubtful but which Pole-marchus defends, drawing support from the poet Simonides (331cd), who takes justice to be “rendering to each what is due.” In the course of the ensuing discussion, Socrates also refutes this definition and its implications (“doing good to friends and harm to enemies”). This angers Thrasymachus, and after restraining himself with difficulty, he intervenes (336c), eager to propose a definition of justice he finds incontestable: “Justice is nothing else than the interest of the stronger.”

  When Socrates invites him to elaborate, Thrasymachus observes that justice is identical in all communities, however they are governed, and coincides with the interest of the established power, whether its constitutional form is tyranny, oligarchy, or democracy.2 Scholars have wrestled greatly over trying to work out the precise details of Thrasymachus’ position,3 but for our purpose it is sufficient to point out that, when pressed by Socrates, he says (343cd):

  Justice and right are in reality another’s good, the interest of the one who is superior and ruling but a harm accruing to the one who obeys and serves. Injustice is the opposite, and it rules over the real simpletons and just persons. Those who are ruled serve the interest of the one who is superior, and by serving him they make him happy but do nothing of the kind for themselves.

  According to Thrasymachus, just and advantageous behaviour does not coincide in the same person. Whoever respects the laws and does no injury to his neighbour, that is, the just person, gives room to the one who behaves in the opposite way and always receives back less than the unjust person. This is a general rule, but its results are maximally evident in the case of tyranny. There force and power allow a single individual to pursue his own interest systematically, and this can only happen by committing injustice against other individuals who, unless they commit it in their turn, allow the one who is unjust to achieve his interest to the full. Not only are the misdeeds of the tyrant not punished, thus sanctioning the principle that the interest of the one with power coincides with justice, but they also have the further effect of giving him, thanks to his success at wrong-doing, the reputation of being the happiest of men.4 Hence, persons who reproach injustice do so entirely out of fear that if they commit unjust actions they will suffer them in their turn. An individual’s just behaviour does not coincide with his own interest and therefore does not make him happy, but it guarantees the interest and happiness of his neighbours because it does not expose them to the risk of undergoing injustice. This holds true both in interpersonal relations and particularly in the relations between subject and government, because power guarantees impunity or establishes laws that are useful to those in power.

  In his response to Thrasymachus Socrates declares he does not believe:

  That injustice is more advantageous than justice, not even if it allows and does not prevent itself from doing what it wants to do. Let us imagine … someone who is unjust, and let him have the capability of doing injustice either by escaping notice or by recourse to open conflict. Even so, I at least am not convinced that his situation is more advantageous than that of justice; and that is not perhaps only my reaction but also one shared by someone else among us. (345a)

  Those who do not believe that injustice is better than justice certainly include Glaucon, who soon maintains (347e) that he finds the just man’s life more advantageous than the life of one who is unjust. But this statement is ambiguous and needs further clarification: it could be accepted by someone who holds that, while the advantageous and the good do not coincide completely, justice though not a good is the lesser evil, and useful solely because it avoids greater evils. Here we encounter a widely accepted position that was, of course, the exact opposite of Socrates’ convictions. Glaucon repeats his point at the beginning of the next book when he expresses the wish to hear Socrates prove, once and for all, what no one has done hitherto, that justice is a good in itself for its possessor, irrespective of its consequences or whatever advantages it may produce. Only thus will it be possible to dispel the ambiguity embedded in the claim that the life of the just man is more advantageous than that of the unjust and to show that being just is good and coincides with one’s interest. There is a need, then, to explain the current opinions on the origin and nature of justice (cf. 358a3-4; 358c; 358e-359b) in order to persuade Socrates to discuss the issue in a full and proper way.

  As I have already mentioned, Glaucon’s discourse (358e-362c) and the one by Adeimantus that follows it (362c-367a) provide a most suitable introduction to the theme of this chapter. The two brothers do not refer to any thinker by name, and what they say is certainly Plato’s invention; but any reader familiar with Athenian life in the fifth century and with sophistic discussions cannot fail to take Plato to be evoking familiar arguments, even if those actually advanced (of which we have little direct evidence) were not formulated in terms so explicit and so brutally clear. Plato evidently alludes to theories of justice elaborated by persons who were intellectually gifted and culturally influential,5 and also to the common opinion reflected in or conditioning the behaviour of citizens in their daily lives, thereby providing confirmation for the theories themselves.

  The main lines of Glaucon’s position, which is presented as a eulogy of injustice, are as follows. Speaking absolutely, or rather (to use the contemporary language), speaking with reference to “nature” (physis), to do injustice is something good (agathon), whereas to suffer it is something bad (kakon), in the sense that the first action is advantageous, the second disadvantageous. However, since the disadvantages that result from suffering injustice outweigh the advantages that accrue from doing it, those who are not in a position to do injustice and avoid suffering it find it profitable to make an agreement with one another not to do injustice. This is why human beings began to set up laws and make compacts. The name of legality and justice (nomimon kai dikaion) was given to law, which thus appears as a compromise between what is best (to do injustice without suffering the consequences) and what is worst (to suffer it without the possibility of retaliation). It follows that one who practises justice does it under constraint, to avoid a greater evil, and not voluntarily, as would be the case if justice were a good in itself.

  Being just, as thus construed, can certainly be called advantageous, but it is so solely because of the agreement that prevents one from suffering injustice in one’s turn. Under
this conception justice turns out to be a second-best advantage. In reality, nature impels people to pursue self-aggrandizement (pleonexia) as their good, while law together with force (bia) induces them to respect equality (359c5-6). This means that as soon as conditions are favourable, nature regains the upper hand over the rules forcibly imposed by law, and that whoever can commit injustice with impunity does so. People think that, from their private and personal perspective, being unjust benefits them far more than being just (360d) – so much so, that if someone who could do injustice did not do so he would be regarded as insane (acting contrary to his true nature and real advantage) even though he would be insincerely praised by those who are afraid of having injustice done to them.

  If we took the lives of two men, one completely and truly just and the other completely and truly unjust, and gave the former the semblance or reputation of being completely unjust and the latter the opposite, the just man’s life would be generally regarded as the paradigm of unhappiness and the unjust man’s the opposite. Justice, then, pertains to the sphere of doxa, appearance and opinion, injustice to that of truth and reality (alêtheia, 362a). Injustice, personal advantage, and happiness are strictly linked, according to this view.