Legislatura de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires
MINISTERIO DE SALUD
Theaetetus’ first definition, ‘knowledge is perception’, receives extended criticism at various stages. The first stage revises the general account of ‘knowledge is perception centred around the “Cold Wind” Argument and the Theory of Flux (152a- 160e), which groups together Protagoras’ relativism and Heraclitus’ Flux doctrine. The second stage (161c-179d) specifically targets Protagoras’ Measure doctrine, according to which all appearances are true.130
It is in this context that Socrates introduces the objection of the sophōteros man. The objection states that if we all are the measure of truth, then no one is sophōteros than anyone else (161d-162a). This, indeed, seems to be perceived to be the strongest argument against Protagoras’ relativism, as it is invoked in three different contexts through the argument and never successfully refuted.131
It arises at 161d7, then after Protagoras’ defence at 170a8 and at 171d6 and after the digression at 179b1.132
The argument is particularly appealing because it offers conflicting notions of
sophia: one from Protagoras, one from public opinion, and one from Socrates. Of
course, the rhetoric of appropriation of sophia is nothing extraordinary in the context of competition. Protagoras legitimises his argument by offering an ad hoc
129 In the Apology it is established that to possess knowledge about something is to be sophos about
such matters (19c6), and it is by applying this principle that politicians, poets and craftsmen are ruled out as sophoi. Also in the Sophist, after the interlocutors have shown that sophists have no real knowledge, it is concluded that he cannot be called a sophos: ‘We can’t call him sophos, since we took him not to know anything [οὐκ εἰδότα]’ (268b11).
130 Most scholars agree that, at this point of the argument, ‘appearance’ involves perception and belief.
This is what Fine (1996 p. 107) calls ‘broader’ Protagoreanism on the grounds that appearance is both perceptual and cognitive. Bostock, on the equation of perception with appearance, says: ‘[t]he relevant sense of ‘perception’, then, is one which entails a belief or judgment, at least in so far as I am not said to perceive a so-and-so unless I judge that it is a so-and-so and I am not said to perceive that P unless I believe that P’(1991, p. 43). See also Burnyeat (1990, p. 21) and Sedley (2004, p. 49).
131 It is also presented as the only argument in the Crat. 385e4, although the favorite word there is phronēsis instead of sophia.
132 According to the claim that every appearance is true, the appearance that not every appearance is
true would be enough to contradict the theory. This is the peritropē argument that goes from170c to 171c. A detailed analysis of the problem and its consequences is offered by Chappell (1995; 2006).
conception of sophia in terms of better and worse, benefit and harm. The consensual conception of sophōteros, i.e. the one from public opinion, is based on a criterion of expertise. Socrates’ own notion of sophia is about the realisation of the limits of human knowledge and ability.
Let us starts with Protagoras’ sophia. It is noteworthy that the first formulation of the argument picks up on the authoritative status of sophos credited to both Protagoras and Theodorus. Socrates uses Protagoras’ reputation of sophia to make the problem explicit. The problem is that while it is obvious that Protagoras is thought (and considers himself) sophos, according to his thesis, he would not be sophōteros than anyone else. So as long as there is no way to assert the superiority of his knowledge over others’, there are no good reasons to call him sophos at all, as his sophia does not stand out from anyone else’s. This should concern Theodorus, who surely considers himself an expert mathematician.
It is striking to see the way Socrates makes the case for Protagoras. ‘I certainly do not deny the existence of both sophia and the sophos man [σοφίαν καὶ σοφὸν ἄνδρα]: far from it. But the man whom I call sophos is the man who can change the appearances—the man who in any case where bad things both appear and are for one of us, works a change and makes good things appear and be for him [μεταβάλλων ποιήσῃ ἀγαθὰ φαίνεσθαί τε καὶ εἶναι]’ (166d4-8). Protagoras offers a conception of sophia that adjusts to his relativism and, at the same time, secures his status (and others’) of sophos. According to his doctrine, a sophos is able to turn or transform others’ perception from bad to good, where good is relativised into ‘what appears or is believed to be good’.133
By means of appearances, the sophos doctor makes a patient healthy, the sophos politician makes a city just, and a sophos teacher makes a pupil better. ‘The “wisdom” of an educator like Protagoras lies in the fact that he can change for the better how things appear to other people’ (Sedley 2004, p. 56).134
133 Bostock (1991, p. 93) claims the distinction is objective. Against this view, see Sedley (2004, p.
56).
134 Protagoras’ argument comprises two common trademarks of sophists found elsewhere in Plato,
namely, the claim of making others better, which is regarded as super-human wisdom, and the use of appearances to achieve their purposes.
Socrates’ assessment of Protagoras’ argument targets two related statements: (i) ‘every man is self-sufficient in wisdom [αὐτάρκη ἕκαστον εἰς φρόνησιν ἐποίει]’ (169d5); and (ii) some men are superior to others in questions of better and worse [περί τε τοῦ ἀμείνονος καὶ χείρονος], these being ‘the sophoi’ [σοφούς]’ (169d6- 8). It is interesting that, at this point, Socrates reformulates the argument by bringing
phronēsis to the discussion, a word that has only a few (but significant) appearances
in the dialogue.135
Resorting to popular consensus, Socrates holds that ‘there is no one in the world who doesn’t believe that in some matters [τὰ μὲν] he is sophōteros than other men; while in other matters [τὰ δὲ], they are sophōteroi than he’ (170a7-9). For argumentative purposes, the main claim is that ‘people believe that there are false beliefs’; this, according to Protagoras’ relativism, should count as a standard of truth.136 Socrates re-introduces a conception of sophia in terms of specialised knowledge, mostly because it provides a relevant criterion of comparison to declare that some men are
sophōteroi than other men in a non-relativistic way.137
Hence sophōteros is a term of comparison between an expert and a non-expert. Socrates picks up some of the examples offered by Protagoras, e.g. doctors and teachers.138
These people are regarded as experts because they know (eidenai; 170b1) the matters specific to their expertise and thereby can assist others with their knowledge. Concerning matters of bodily health, the doctor judges more truly than a non-expert in the same matters, and as a result what appears to him is truer than what appears to a non-expert. To the extent that some men are more sophoi in some matters, it is fair to say that some other men are more ignorant in these matters: ‘In all these cases [of expert knowledge], what else can we say but that men do believe in the existence of both
sophia and ignorance [σοφίαν καὶ ἀμαθίαν] among themselves?’ (170b5-6). It is
important to understand that the opposition between amathia and sophia is not drawn in terms of possession and non-possession of knowledge whereby sophia
135 Cf. 161c8, 169d5, 176b2.
136 The validity of Socrates’ argument is not my angle. Many critics think that Socrates does not
successfully refute Protagoras’ relativism because he seems to dismiss the qualifier in the form ‘true
for x’, taking whatever is true for the person as true simpliciter. Burnyeat (1990, p. 30) claims that he
successfully refutes relativism, and so does Bostock (1991, p. 94). Fine (1996; 1998), on the other hand, claims that Protagoras is not being attacked as a relativist, but as an infallibilist.
137 At this point animals and gods have been excluded.
designates maximum and ignorance minimum degree, with the sophōteros being somewhere in between. As is made clear, the opposition is relevant in terms of true and false, i.e. the sophos judges what is true, and the amathēs what is false. Protagoras’ position, according to which sophia (or lack of it) is not a matter of true or false judgment, is thus challenged. Socrates continues: ‘and they believe that
sophia is true thinking [σοφίαν ἀληθῆ διάνοιαν]? While ignorance is a matter of
false judgment? [ἀμαθίαν ψευδῆ δόξαν;] (170b8-9). Although it is not made explicit yet, Socrates’ position aims to reconcile those aspects that in Protagoras’ conception of sophia are divorced, namely the production of benefit and a non- relativistic conception of truth. It should be noticed that thus far the argument of the
sophōteros man allows Socrates to establish a comparative and not an absolute
criterion of expertise, i.e. someone is more sophos in relation to some matters. This will play an important part in the analysis of the Apology, where although craftsmen are asserted as sophōteroi on account of their craft-knowledge, they prove to be no ‘real’ sophoi (cf. 3.3.2).
After laying out the peritropē objection, Socrates restates the argument of the
sophōteros man: ‘mustn’t we maintain that any man would admit at least this, that
some men are more sophoi than their fellows and others more ignorant [τὸ εἶναι σοφώτερον ἕτερον ἑτέρου, εἶναι δὲ καὶ ἀμαθέστερον]?’ (171d5-7). This time Socrates explicitly tackles Protagoras’ conception of sophia that divorces better and worse from true and false judgment. Socrates tests his theory for matters that involve the production of a benefit, and the theory stands. This is clear in the case of the doctor (171e4). When it comes to political matters, however, the theory finds less support. While most people would be ready to admit that some men are better prepared than others to guarantee what is in the best interest of the state, most of them would deny that this is also the case regarding virtues, particularly justice and piety. Most people, even those who are not completely convinced by Protagoras, will ‘take such view of sophia [τὴν σοφίαν ἄγουσι]’ (172b7), namely that ‘in respect of these [justice and piety], they say, what seems to people collectively to be so is true, at the time when it seems that way and for just as long as it so seems [ὅταν δόξῃ καὶ ὅσον ἂν δοκῇ χρόνον]’ (172b5-6). As a consequence, what seems just is just. The thread of the conversation is interrupted by the digression about the philosopher,
which leaves the issue open. Socrates resumes the argument at 177b8.
In the course of the digression (172c3-177b8), Socrates and Theodorus assert the superiority of the philosopher over the man accustomed to law courts.139 Socrates seals the conversation by saying that the only way to escape from the evil of the world is to become god-like, ‘and a man becomes like god when he becomes just and pious, with understanding [μετὰ φρονήσεως]’ (176b2-3).140 This time Socrates drops the mask of public consensus and reveals his own position: justice has an absolute and divine measure. Under this concept, Socrates rules out Protagoras’ relativism, but he also seems to suspend (at least for a moment) the commonsensical notion of sophia as expert knowledge thus far advocated. According to him, what counts as real sophia and good is ‘to recognise’ god as the absolute measure of justice: ‘for it is the realisation of this that is genuine sophia and goodness [ἡ μὲν γὰρ τούτου γνῶσις σοφία καὶ ἀρετὴ ἀληθινή], while the failure to realise it is manifest folly and wickedness [ἡ δὲ ἄγνοια ἀμαθία καὶ κακία ἐναργής·]’ (176c4- 5). In this context, sophia is the apprehension of some truth that starts by assuming the gap between human and divine. To be sure, in this context sophia rescues its prudential component, rendering something closer to ‘understanding’ or ‘wisdom’, a meaning which is reinforced by phronēsis, invoked a few lines above.141
Of course, this view would be hardly shared by a skeptic like Protagoras, who has already dismissed one of Socrates objections because it assumed the existence of gods (162d6). But Socrates still has the notion of expert knowledge up his sleeve. Legislation aims at making laws that are most useful and beneficial to a community. But what is most beneficial requires the ability to predict how things will be in the future, which is a characteristic of expert knowledge.142 Thus Socrates advises Theodorus: ‘Then we shall be giving your master fair measure if we tell him that he has now got to admit that one man is sophōteron than another [σοφώτερόν τε ἄλλον ἄλλου εἶναι], and that it is such a man who is ‘the measure [τοιοῦτον
139 The digression offers an interesting parallel to compare Plato’s and Isocrates’ model of philosophia. See Nightingale (1995, p. 29).
140 According to Sedley (2004, p. 75) the form ‘with phronēsis’ reflects the Socratic value system
whereby wisdom (either sophia or phronēsis) is the only underivatively good. We shall see this below with the Euthydemus.
141 As we shall see, both the apprehension of some truth and the prudential element are at the heart of
Socrates’ anthropinē sophia in the Apology.
μέτρον εἶναι]’’ (179b1-2). Although in a rather hesitant note, this is how the argument against Protagoras concludes.
The theory of the sophōteros man presented in the Theaetetus is significant because it projects the scope and limitations of a notion of sophia conceptualised in terms of expert knowledge. This is crystallised in the fact that most people would admit that some men are sophōteroi than other men on account of their knowledge in all areas of expertise, but not all of them would be ready to admit that this applies to questions of moral nature. In what follows, we will see how this ambiguity plays out in the context of the discussion of the unity of virtue.