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Conclusion
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Conclusion We examine Plato in order to immerse ourselves in the first, basic articulation of the core elements of human thought and action. This articulation points to the importance of the life devoted to the continuing attempt to understand. Our several explorations in the preceding chapters, therefore, are truer to Plato, and to the phenomena he studies, than any inevitably arbitrary summary is able to be. An elaborate conclusion about an ongoing activity would be misleading. Nevertheless, it is useful to recall the major directions that we have taken. The configuration that Plato uncovers orients human understanding, not because he imposes it arbitrarily but because it is how everyday matters present themselves once we begin to explore the problems that lie on their surface. These problems are normally veiled, sometimes thinly, sometimes powerfully. The questions of the best way of life and best form of government, to take the central ones, become visible once we can no longer take for granted usual or traditional practices. From this standpoint, we began by addressing the immediate impetus for Socrates’ conversations, the reasons that occasion his discussions, and the 270 Plato’s Political Philosophy usual arguments, evidence, and knowledge on which he relies. Our purpose was to clarify the elements of the mostly co-philosophical world as they point to, but also as they restrict, political philosophy, the unbridled exploration of human affairs. Socrates’ conversations arise from fathers’ concerns about sons, young men’s political ambitions, compulsion, hopes for love, and pleasure in conversation. They remind us of men’s basic goals and motives, then and now. At the same time, Socrates’ conversations also remind us of our uncertainty about these goals, and our wish for knowledge about them. Knowledge is not an abstract or academic phenomenon but belongs to the everyday world. We therefore discussed Socrates’ use of the arts as his ordinary examples of knowledge, and we looked at the standards of clarity, sufficiency, precision, and noncontradiction that he and his interlocutors employ. We discussed as well the presence and authority of sophists, for once one’s world is so freed from its traditional ways that the need for guidance and advice becomes pressing, the fraudulent teacher may seem more worthy than the genuine one. We then turned to Socrates’ principle explorations of virtue—of wisdom, piety, courage, moderation, justice, and their unity—because Socrates often makes clear that his interlocutors’ goals depend on, or should be transformed into, virtues of character. “Virtue,” understood as Plato (or Aristotle) sees it, and freed from much of its contemporary residue of weakness and naiveté, remains the most compelling guideline for happiness. Some of Socrates’ discussions of the virtues in chapter 2 appeared inconclusive and some did not. In each case, however, Plato uncovered the phenomenon he addressed in its major dimensions and its major uncertainties. We continued to develop throughout the book our view of Plato’s judgments about the virtues’ specific qualities and possible unity, ending with the discussion that concluded chapter 9. One goal of Plato’s prescriptions for politics involves protecting and advancing ethical virtue. This goal is elaborated most fully in the Laws. There, he develops the institutions and practices of a regime devoted to virtue, while being practically mindful of the restrictions that the need for popular consent places on political excellence and good legislation. He also explores the standpoint of piety and ritual on which happiness at first, and to some degree always , rests. This standpoint, indeed, is the ground of the powerful securing of the veil that may cover but never eliminate the natural problems that are rooted in ordinary actions and things. The Laws’ explicit orientation to virtue, indeed, makes visible those natural features whose shape law and piety must [18.213.110.162] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 22:22 GMT) Conclusion 271 at once follow (and in that sense clarify) and modestly cover up (and in that sense occlude). Study of the Laws in chapter 3 also offered an opportunity to observe the contrast and continuities between ancient and modern politics and freedom. It is not possible to understand Plato’s presentation of the central elements of human thought and action, and their possible combinations and differences , without considering the phenomena from which philosophy begins directly and which provide its continuing impulse. Plato mentions and discusses these phenomena throughout his works, of course, and he clarifies several of the most important among them without devoting dialogues to them. We...