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The Phaedo's Final Argument*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Kenneth Dorter
Kenneth Dorter*
Affiliation:
University of Guelph
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Extract

If one includes the methodological preface the final argument of the Phaedo is by far the longest, as well as the one Socrates’ audience and Plato's readers are most ready to accept, and is often regarded as the one argument in the Phaedo that Plato himself accepted. Nevertheless it is also the most obscure, elusive, and frustrating of the arguments, whose intention as well as validity are in continual dispute. It has aptly been compared to an intricate maze, and while it is perhaps appropriate that Socrates, who is portrayed in the dialogue as a kind of Theseus battling the Minotaur of fear of death, should finally pick his way through a labyrinth of distinctions, it is exceptionally difficult for the reader to find the thread and follow it.

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Footnotes

*

An earlier version of this paper was read at the 1974-5 meeting of the Society for the Study of Ancient Philosophy, at McMaster University.

References

1 Klein, Jacob, A Commentary on Plato's Meno (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. 1965). p. 136.Google Scholar

2 See my “The Dramatic Aspect of Plato's Phaedo“', Dialogue 8 (1970) 564-580.

3 Burnet's, (Plato's, Phaedo, London: Oxford, U.P., 1911)CrossRefGoogle Scholar .and Hackforth's, (Plato's Phaedo, New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1955)Google Scholar, translation of ἐπιφέρει in its military sense of “bring up“(one's reserves) is ill advised: since the victim of the attack here retreats or perishes because it ἐπιφέρει an opposite. the military metaphor would suggest that the victim retreats or perishes because it brings up its reserves. The military metaphor, therefore, clearly does not parallel the present case and is better not introduced into the translation since ἐπιφέρει need not have a military connotation at all.

4 See Burnet's note.

5 Taking ὥσπερ ἐν τοῖς πρὁσϑεν ἐλἑγομεν in this sense avoids the “formal inaccuracy” charged by Hackforth, p.149 n.3.

6 Ct. Bluck, R.S.. Phlato's phaedo (New York: Bobbs-Merrill. 1955) pp. 191-4.Google Scholar

7 Taylor, A.E.. Plato (Cleveland: World (Meridian). 1956) p. 206.Google Scholar

8 Cf. D. O'Brien. “The Last Argument of Plato's Pheado” (C.Q. 17 (1967) 198-231. 18 (1968) 95-106). p. 98.

9 They are not necessary conditions. as Hackforth claims and his, translation misleadingly implies: “what must come to be present in a thing's body to make it hot …?“”. etc. Socrates asks only “what is there. if it becomes present in something's body. the body will be hot…?“”. etc. (ᾧ ἂὺ τὶ ἐυ τῶ σὠμα τι ἐγγἐνεται ϑερμὀν ἔσται 105B9). This form of question permits more than one answer (in the case of oddness Socrates mentions three such bearers: three. five. and one) and Hackforth's criticism does not apply (p. 161). Cf. also Burnet and O’Brien pp. 223-4 and 224 n.1.

10 Archer-Hind, R.D.(The Phaedo of Plato. London: Macmillan. 1894)Google Scholar similarly takes Cebes’ answer to mean “that energy cannot be annihilated” (p. 119).

11 See Guthrie, W.K.C., A History of Greek Philosophy, vol. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge U.P. 1962). pp. 355-6.Google Scholar

12 See n. 8 of the article mentioned in n. 2. above.

13 Unfortunately Gallop's, David excellent book on the Pheado (Oxford, 1975)Google Scholar appeared too late to be taken into account here. For some further remarks on this section of the Phaedo. in the light of Gallop's discussion. see my review of his book in the Journal of value inquiry (forthcoming).