Tuesday, November 02, 2004
Good, evil and knowledge
Knowing what is good and what is evil is an important step in choosing to do what is right. If we are to concede, by Socrates’ way of thinking, that the only real power is the power to do good, there are certain presuppositions that we must accept, some of which are defensible, and some that raise more questions and that would require a leap of faith in order to accept.
Socrates takes a long-term view on the notion of power, as well as one that is highly influenced by the effects on one’s own soul. By the long-term, I mean that Socrates focuses on the consequences ones own actions have in the long run, categorising short-term pains and pleasure as respectively, either conducive to, or detrimental to eudaimoneia. Therefore, suffering pains in the knowledge that this will lead to good is a form of power, whereas living hedonistically and not building upon the virtues (arête), as Aristotle prescribes, is not power, as it can only lead to demise of one’s own soul. Socrates’ views here can be described as practically karmic. There seems to be an underlying belief that whatever goes around must come around, and what is done with evil intent shall not go unpunished.
Here, Socrates claims that even though the rhetorician would perhaps be able to argue his way out of punishment, if ever caught for doing an injustice, this still does not mean he has real power. The rhetorician has not taken into account that even though he has escaped immediate punishment, his own conscience will eat away at his soul. This guilt that follows from having done wrong, which Socrates claims will happen, entails that one would have a sense of what is right and what is wrong to begin with. Otherwise, it would appear that there is no punishment for doing wrong. This is inconsistent with the pet thesis that Socrates later nurtures – that one who has knowledge of good and evil will always choose to do good. The just person will not have acted unjustly. The person with no sense of justice will not feel any guilt when he has done wrong.
Socrates implies, nonetheless, that there will be retribution at some point in time – if not in this lifetime, then in the afterlife. It is, however, a rather large claim that the soul longs for that which is good. Firstly, we must accept that there is a soul, and that it does carry on it a record of what evil deeds we have performed. We must accept that there is an objective ground of good that this soul is aware of and will seek to follow, and that it will turn evil and be punished if this path of good is not followed.
Socrates’ argument steers away from the concept of power to the ability to achieve good, implying this to be the only type of power worth considering. His analogy of the cook aiming to please compared with the doctor knowing what is good for the health illustrate this, but do nothing to convince that this knowledge of what is good is the true power.
Thus, in claiming that the rhetorician has no real power, Socrates refers to his belief that only the power to do good is real power. What, then, is power? As defined in the Concise Oxford Dictionary, power is “the ability to do or act”. Socrates would add to that the word “well” or “good”. This, however, is not implicit in our notion of power. Another definition is “a. Government, influence, or authority. b. Political or social ascendance or control.”
Socrates’ views betray a naïve theoretical view of the world. Whilst it is hard to disagree with Socrates on a theoretical level, I find it hard to practically endorse his views. One would be hard-put to argue that the green political party was doing anything wrong – after all, it is not easy to state that saving the environment is a bad thing. However, they are not a political party that does not have a history of power or large-scale influence. It would seem that a tendency to act in accordance to a notion of what is good does not, in fact, promote power. Socrates calls for an ideal world where people would act fee of any conflict of interest towards a better society. This invokes a feeling of respect for the advocate of what is right, but does not practically have the power to change society. What is needed is an appeal to the self-gratifying nature of mankind
Nonetheless, the influence that Socratic thought has had over the course of time suggests that doing good does make an impact, at lease in theory. However, can one truly say that the political scene has changed since time days of ancient Greece? Political spiels that aim to please as many uninformed voters as possible are the basis of the campaigns run by would be presidents and their parties. Perhaps Socrates is saying that this undermines the power of democracy. Here, I would agree with him. The power of the rhetorician is not a power within the ideal of democracy, which relies on a nation of informed citizens making an informed choice. Rhetoric does not operate within this framework, but rather works counterproductively to it, promoting the masking of truth, and spewing forth notions that appeal to the majority. Indeed, if we are willing to accept the notion of democracy, and the presuppositions linked to this, we can reject rhetoric as having no power. After all, a city populated by the wise and the knowledgeable needs not advocates of popular opinion.
Even conceding, however, that there should be a nation where the citizens proactively choose to discover what is right and what is wrong is no guarantee that people will act in accordance to this. The pet thesis of Socrates - that a person, once fully cognoscente of the meaning of justice, will act in accordance to this is not a reasonable presupposition. Perhaps a master dietician will be able to prescribe a fully nutritious diet to anyone that comes for his services, but it does not mean that he himself will not ever indulge in a luxurious slice of cake once in a while. There is a presupposition that just action will always have priority over all other actions.
I would say that the rhetorician has power. It may not be the power that Socrates’ strongly advocates – the power to do good, but a power to wreak havoc. The cake maker may not have the power to make you healthy, but he does have the power to make you fat. The rhetorician’s power does not lie in improving society – other than by sheer coincidence, but he does have power to mobilise society. There is no implicit meaning to ‘power’ that implies that it is to be deployed only with the intention of good in mind. Examples abound in history of men and women who have used their power of rhetoric to achieve ghastly outcomes, e.g. Adolf Hitler. The great men in history, who have achieved what can be deemed as righteous and applaudable, such as Martin Luther King Jr., Mohandas Ghandi, Nelson Mandela, did not achieve what they did by virtue of knowing what was virtuous. Without the art of rhetoric to help them, perhaps South African and American black people would still be living in substandard conditions, and perhaps the people of India would still be unliberated.
Bibliography
1. The Concise Oxford Dictionary Ninth Edition CD-ROM, Oxford University Press 1997 – 1999, Licensed to Focus Multimedia Press, United Kingdom
2. Plato, ‘Gorgias’, translated by Chris Emlyn-Jones, 2004, Penguin Books Ltd., England
3. ‘The Greeks and the Good Life’ study guide and readings, Semester 2, 2004, Monash University Arts.
fon @ 6:17 AM link to post * *