Whereas ethics and epistemology are typically treated by philosophers as separate areas of study, leave it to Plato to talk about virtue and knowledge in the same dialogue. What is virtue?Can it be taught or is it in some way innate? Can we ever know anything for certain? How might we know when we know? These and many more questions await our further investigation.
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I cannot help but keep thinking of the original Jurassic Park movie as I read Meno. Please allow me to explain this rather bizarre correlation. The Jurassic Park is a world of wonder, where the surreal has become reality. It is a land where the impossible is possible through manipulation of man, or so it was thought to be possible. As the movie progresses, we see that man can error in thought and ethics. While the idea of dinosaurs coexisting with humans in present day is exciting and fascinating, there must of have been a reason why it is not the actuality of our lives. This reason comes somewhere in the form of evolution, in the way things in nature are supposed to be. In Meno, Socrates is the reason that the definitions of virtue presented by Meno are naturally incorrect. In the beginning of the movie, we see the creator of the park trying to justify that he and the paleontologist have similar lines of work, but different methods of going about them, just as Meno tries to convince Socrates there are different kinds of ethics for different people. The paleontologist argues that there is no truth in that argument because the creator is trying to play God, much like Socrates includes the concept of the ruler and the ruled with slaves, which cannot be virtuous. The creator of the fantastic park imagines its potential, and thinks he has thought all scenarios out. What he did not account for was the aptitude of the dinosaurs to develop and capacity for disloyalty of his employees. The founder of the park is much like Meno, not fully thinking through all possibilities of his theoretical concept, before it is actualized into words and the park respectively. The employee who sold out to steal some embryos and disables the security system is eventually killed by the end of the movie clearly lacks any concept of virtue. He is an example of Meno’s “virtuous” man desiring something he thought would be good for him and he literally has the power to steal and try to escape by turning off the power. For stealing the embryos, he was being paid a hefty sum, which seems quite rewarding. However, through the plot, we see he gets, what many would say, he deserves. He unjustly took the embryos for his own good, but unjustly took them, which unravels the idea that virtue is in the idea of obtaining what seems good for oneself. When Socrates calls the boy over to illustrate the concept of recollecting what he knew, we can see a similar situation in Jurassic Park. The creator of the movie is asking the inner child in the adults, and the viewers, to resurface and remember the fascination we felt as children. He is asking us to apply what we knew to what we could imagine, creating a new world that we could comprehend through our own experiences, much like Socrates allows the boy to come to the solution on his own with only the guidance of Socrates. Ultimately, the question of virtue in Plato’s Meno and the possibility of dinosaurs existing in the present, as they have been freed from captivity, is revisited and left unanswered.
In asking what virtue is, and whether it can be taught, Plato delivers a rather depressing conclusion: virtue is nothing more than an arbitrary gift of deities, not something we are able to control one way or the other. After Socrates methodically rebukes each of Meno’s definitions of virtue, he ponders the possibility that all knowledge is innate. Socrates demonstrates this theory by posing a mathematical problem to one of Meno’s slaves. In proving that someone as “weak” as a slave can unearth the answer to a geometry problem, Socrates is able to support his notion that knowledge is merely a form or recollection. But, if this were the case, wouldn’t Meno be able to come up with a legitimate definition of virtue? This is what leads me to the conclusion that the “form” of virtue is ever-changing, and it can be defined cross-generationally according to the views of each particular time. As is the case with most of the Platonic dialogues, Meno convolutes definitions of ideals we once thought to be concrete and unchanging. Socrates systematically breaks down Meno's definitions of virtue to the point where it becomes all too plauisble for the word's true meaning to perpetually elude us. First, Meno claims that virtues differ for men, women, elderly, children and even slaves. Socrates points out that these appear to be examples of virtue rather than an actual definition. Next, Meno suggests that virtue is the ability to rule. Socrates, yet again, strikes this defintion down, noting that it is not particularly virtuous for slaves and children to "rule" over others. After many attempts, Meno and Socrates come to the conclusion that virtue is a kind of wisdom.
So if virtue is neither instilled in man through nature nor through knowledge, then how is it that a man can be virtuous? Socrates, following reason of course, states that it is “present in those of us who may possess it as a gift from the gods”. Is this not a roll of the dice then. Is there any favoritism from the gods, or is it random? Either way, how do we know that it is actual virtue given by the gods? This may be looking back on the conversation of last weeks lecture of Euthyprho, but it ties into Meno as well, where Socrates tells us that the gods can never agree on anything, so how would we or Socrates possibly know if virtue can be bestowed upon someone by the gods? Socrates and Meno are never able to come up with the definition of virtue in Meno, yet he can “prove” (whether through pure sophistry or logic) what virtue is not. But if the gods bestow virtue upon man, how is he to know that Meno’s descriptions of virtue are not accurate, since only the gods can decide. This is seemingly a contradiction of his earlier statements, even after he said that he “will not contradict himself” to Meno. I am not sure whether I am scrutinizing Socrates’ arguments too greatly or not, for most of the logic he uses in all of the texts I have read are sound and make a lot of sense, but it just seems at this point to leave the answer as open-ended (“a gift from the gods”) and contradictory as he did, left me in great question of the dialogue and the definition of virtue.
Plato's Meno is a Socratic dialog that attempts to acquire a definition of what human virtue is and from where it is that it stems. Meno asks Socrates whether virtue is acquired by teaching or by practice and Socrates immediately begins the questioning by arguing that he has never known anyone who knew what virtue was, let alone where it may come from. Already, I believe, we have reached the crux of the argument. Plato has always seemed to me to be attempting to reconcile one question, and this text is no different. He is concerned with the human ability known as abstraction. Why is it that human beings can attach meaning and value to concepts that have no physical manifestation? Virtue is undoubtedly one of these concepts. Upon further investigation, virtue, like all of these ideas, has no firm definition, that is to say we cannot qualify what exactly it is that virtue consists of. Yet, regardless of language, society, or any other external factor, these concepts seem to be innate in all men. Men may not be virtuous but they know when another man is. It is the question of why these principles which we cannot define; and yet we still develop language for them, are an integral part of the human experience that plaques Plato. Even more intriguing, is it these very abstractions that our minds are capable of that defines our humanity and separates us from the beasts?
Plato's Meno is basically a long drawn out question and answer. The question being is virtue able to be defined? And as we progress through the reading Socrates explains, through various tests, that virtue can not have one basic definition. While reading Meno it began to remind me of a discussion about hermeneutics. Which is basically the science of interpretation. Now although Socrates and Meno are not trying to interpret a text, they are trying to interpret virtue itself to arrive at a definition. Now in the field of hermeneutics there are many different interpretations for any single writing, whether it be religious or philosophical. And all of these interpretations are based upon the interpreter's understanding of the subject. However, his/her understanding of the subject is not objective, it is relative to the time and society that the interpreter lived in. This ties in with the question of what virtue is because, there is no way for one man to give an unbiased definition of it, only his or her interpretation. This leads us to the conclusion that there is no way we can ever know anything for certain because any definition to made by an individual is relative to that individual thus making it a subjective conclusion. For example, even if the table's were turned and somehow Socrates gave a definition of virtue, it would not be an incorruptible answer for Socrates' definition would have to be founded in whatever idea Athenians had of virtue.
I know, I know. It's all in the Meno!
My GPS is down! How do you get to Larissa?
Despite my confusion with the syllabus, Dr. Condella has kindly allowed me to include my thoughts.
Comparing the passage in which Socrates questions the slave boy about geometry in order to prove his theories on recollection with the modern educational system leads to some interesting results, in the landscape of my mind. Socrates proposes, for one reason or another, that man is born with innate knowledge and education is simply recalling this information from the depths of his memory. He goes on to argue virtue and similar topics cannot be taught by teachers.
In our modern United States of America, the understanding of education is very different. What interested me most about the contrast between these two educational forms is the subject of virtue. I believe we have a very developed opinion of what virtue is and what it should look like. It is considered absolutely necessary for children to be instructed in this “virtue” from a young age as their parents begin to quote at them commonly heard phrases such as “Do unto others as you would have them do to you.” It appears to me our American parents and educators have such a strong opinion of right and wrong that every day children are given fewer and fewer opportunities to explore what is morally right or wrong, as Socrates might hope they would. I draw these conclusions from children who are constantly forced, through school, games, and sports, into a highly structured environment which judges harshly any deviation. Conversely, Socrates takes his “children” (the men he debates with and in the Meno the slave boy) and gives them ample opportunity for them to make mistakes. When they make mistakes, he follows their mistake through to conclusion so they see the error. Of course this is not a perfect system. Some seem incapable of recognizing their own mistakes, Meno being a prime example. Of course in every class you will have a+ students and dunces. We can only assume Socrates might have had a few A+’s, perhaps Plato, for example.
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