The Republic by Plato [Book 6]

This book continues the discussion of book 5 and discusses the philosophy of government by philosophers who are guardians with two main traits: love for true being and truthfulness. Love for true being is a very generous thing and can be expected of the highest class of a state but truthfulness in what sense? Truthfulness to the public? or to the cabinet? or towards oneself? or in everything? Truthfulness in everything might make the things rough on his side. Well, Socrates makes it clear that love of knowledge and non-acceptance of falsehood in one's mind is what is desirable to be a good guardian. I accept that. Corruption of mind lead towards the corruption of environment and eventually in the corruption of the people of weaker willpower and weaker memory. Talking about the nature of majority of people, Socrates points out that most of the people are of weak nature; they can't do neither very good nor very bad which makes them unsuitable for leadership position. Agreed. But throughout his discussion, he emphasis on a guardian to be a hardcore philosopher which I do not understand. Yes, a philosopher understands the nature of life better but as Socrates said before, "focus on one thing makes us weak in other directions", which means that focus on war will make a guardian weak in other areas, for e.g., the philosophical approach towards state. A counter argument can be made that a guardian is a perfect blend of philosophy and war tactics but I want to know whether this perfection is practically possible? If it is possible, then why need a cabinet at all? You will just need some officers to implement what you command and that's all.

The second most important and one of toughest things to understand in The Republic is the philosophy of goodness and the example of the line that is used to simplify that philosophy. When Socrates is asked whether goodness is a knowledge or pleasure, he gives an example of sun where all the life on earth is generated because of the sun rays that fall on earth but there is no life on sun. Which means that the essence of goodness is nothing but the essence of knowledge and pleasure that generates from goodness, which in this case is sun. To clarify more, he given an example of a line of two unequal parts where these to unequal parts go further division in the same proportion making four subdivisions of those two parts. Now, the first section of division is the visible section that we see through our eyes and other section is the intelligible section that we perceive as shadows and make our opinions with. Now, what we imagine comes from the images we see and then we idealize it with the eyes of our mind and use hypothesis to prove it in the real world but start and end in ideas which lies beyond hypotheses which shows that reason comes first, understanding second, faith third and perception of shadows to the last. Well, my understanding says that everything comes from that one thing (line in this case) and divides up into many things out of which we could sense only some things. If I am right in getting the point then I think it goes perfectly fine with the Upanishads too where they talk about the the shapeless conscious element which originates every other thing.

Animals

They use all of their limbs to walk,
their head is close to the ground,
so they have problem in raising themselves,
they prey kill eat,
but they are animals,
you need hunter to teach them,
you need stick to tame them,
they can only be tamed,
domesticated,
they may live in groups,
they can show emotions,
but they can't befriend,
they might be star-gazers,
but can't go to stars,
and if given a chance,
they will resist,
an outcry will be there,
they will be chocked,
they will feel the heat,
but they won't reason it,
oh! they can't reason it,
as it will degrade them,
to their definition of degradation,
their definition of animals,
the animals who are animals.

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The Republic by Plato [Book 5]

The fifth book is concerned about the matrimony aspects of human beings focusing on women; talking about war ethics and at last, philosophical importance.

Socrates talks about the nature of men and women and the pursuits accordingly. Same education is supported for both genders which I totally agree with. There are many women who won't be able to wear the heavy armor and ride the horse for long but we cannot deny their right to opportunity just based on their gender. There are lots of men who won't be able to carry the same armor but that doesn't make them eunuch. Its true that the biological natures of women and men are different comparatively strength and character but making women a laughing stock is totally ridiculous which Socrates terms as 'plucking a fruit of unripe wisdom'.

The second portion of matrimony talks about the rearing of child by parents from the point of view of state where all strong children, be it male or female, are kept together in a state operated community center and all other children are kept in other center. This concept sounds totally absurd to me as taking a child away from parents to make them property of state is totally a selfish move to save the king(dom) (the same concept is discussed in Shiva Trilogy by Amish Tripathi). I am not so impressed by this concept. Also, the weaker one are kept aloof and considered inferior; that may be the case for selecting the best soldier but considering them inferior is what I oppose because, for example, a physician may not be the best one to become a soldier but he certainly is not of low status. Socrates was very much into the Guardian thing. Same disintegration is done from the point of view of intercourse. The inferiors are allowed less sexual activity than the so-called superior one as, according to Socrates, it preserves the first rated flock. Another major point is that the ruler has to sanction the marriage and all other marriages are illegal. Well, who decides who the ruler has sex with?

When Socrates talks about administration, as discussed in previous book, guardians are given highest importance in the state and individualism is discouraged at every cost. Well, its true that governments need people who put government above their own needs and expenses, so I will take this argument partially as I believe that individualism is an important aspect of society that keeps the growth on track and that we will discuss in detail when I post about Ayn Rand's objectivism. Also, a just code of conduct by the government is elaborated during the war that includes no spoiling of corpses and proper burial of enemy soldiers along-with no burning of the houses of acquired state as revenge and only taking a part of annual produce. I think this is very important for future perspectives so that people remain loyal to the new king.

Socrates also throws broad light on the inclusion of philosophy with power and political correctness by taking a firm stand that only philosophers should lead and others remain followers. I don't get it. Philosophy means the study of human existence and cosmos relating each other with realities. Well, this is something that needs total attention 24 hours a day and a guardian cannot do it at that level which, in turn, means that philosophers are higher in rank than guardians? Does Socrates means that guardians should not lead? I am unable to get it right now but I might get some guidance from some philosopher one day.

The ending of this book gets interesting when Socrates explains the difference between knowledge, opinion and ignorance in terms of absolute beauty and different views of beauty; the idea of which shan't be replaced with the object and vice versa. Beauty of idea is greater than the beauty of the object. For example, the idea of 4 is representing 4, but I can call it half of 8 or double of 2, but 4 is 4. The idea of travelling is moving from one place to another, but I can move in a camel cart or in a BMW, but travelling is travelling. The idea of marriage is to get a partner for mating and procreation in a social way, he/she may look beautiful/ugly, but the idea of marriage is greater than the objects involved.