What they neglect to tell you in school is that Plato is straight up funny. Example:

Callicles (to Socrates): By the gods! You simply don't let up on your continual talk of shoemakers and cleaners, cooks and doctors, as if our discussion were about them!

Also if you haven't read this and you have a test on it tomorrow, here's the summary:

Socrates: ...a person who wants to be happy must evidently pursue and practice self-control (507d).

Gorgias by Plato
Gorgeous Gorgias in some parts, but not overwhelming in others

Plato and Socrates are two titans of human thought, thinkers that have had an enormous impact and contribution to the development of mankind, with brilliant ideas that have shaped the Western democracy.

Nevertheless, I was not all that happy with Gorgias.

First of all, I have been on the wrong side of the arguments, if not throughout, at least to begin with and for large parts.
Socrates appeared to be too belligerent, maybe in the audio version that I heard he appears more violent.
Granted, his interlocutors made me think that dialectical dialogue as I knew it may have given way to a locker room exchange of rude words.

Of course this is just the view of a dilettante, with inclination to sophism that actually proves that Socrates is right.

The vehement crucifixion of the rhetoric and then sophist occupations are too virulent for my taste and ultimately wrong

-tYes I get the picture
-tRhetoric can be and is used by malevolent men to evil purpose
-tTrump comes to mind

But still, even if that can be the case, to dismiss a useful skill is not worthy of the wisest man of the ancient world...

-tSure, the argument that philosophy is worthier than rhetoric is powerful, but to annihilate the latter is wrong


The ethics and morality of Socrates are impeccable

-tHe argues that it is better to suffer injustice than to inflict it
-tBetter die than do something wrong

Many years ago, I have first read some of the ideas of Plato, once in a while as presented by Socrates in the dialogues.
The issue of death stayed in my mind

-tYou are not afraid of death Socrates?
-tNo
-tWhat is the reason
-tI do not know about it
-tSo
-tNobody has come back from the other side to inform us about it
-tYes, it is true
-tTherefore, to be afraid of it would be to pretend to know something about death
-tContinue…
-tAnd I never say that I know something that I do not know

And indeed, Socrates came to the conclusion that he was declared the wisest man of the Ancient world because he never claimed to know anything

-t“I know that I know nothing”

Taking his quote, I know nothing about Gorgias.
At least I did not take it the “right, good” way and I have sided with the bad, ugly aspect of the heated argument.

callicles just keeps talking

Wonderful dialogue on why we should do the right thing, the dangers of oratory, and other things. Got distracted from reading, but I'm back on my grind.

Quotes

“This conclusion alone stands firm: that one should avoid doing wrong with more care than being wronged, and that the supreme object of a man’s efforts, in public and in private life, must be the reality rather than the appearance of goodness."

“I am one of those people who are glad to have their own mistakes pointed out and glad to point out the mistakes of others, but who would just as soon have the first experience as the second; in fact I consider being refuted a greater good, inasmuch as it is better to be relieved of a very bad evil oneself than to relieve another. ”

لا استشعر وجود سقراط الحقيقي في هذه المحاورة ، ربما لم يحالف أفلاطون الحظ في تصويره هنا .. و معتقدش برده ان جورجياس نفسه كان بالسذاجة ديه اللي افلاطون صوره بيها ... المحاورة تشعبت موضوعاتها لدرجة التشتيت و انا شخصيا تهت اكتر من مرة ... التحليل المرفق مع نص المحاورة المترجم سيء و الهوامش بالكاد ترقى لدرجة المقبولة.. في المجمل الكتاب لا يفيد بشيء غير بعض المعلومات عن المعتقدات اليونانية اللي بنستشفها من النص بالاضافة لتوضيح موقف افلاطون من السفسطائيين

The Greek edition with commentaries by E. R. Dodds is the must-have for any student of Plato who would like to take the dialogue to the sheer extreme, even though you are just a dilettante of the Attic Greek language.

Well, if one was to sum up, it would be hard to go past Plato’s own summary:

“And of all that has been said, nothing remains unshaken but the saying, that to do injustice is more to be avoided than to suffer injustice, and that the reality and not the appearance of virtue is to be followed above all things, as well in public as in private life; and that when any one has been wrong in anything, he is to be chastised, and that the next best thing to a man being just is that he should become just, and be chastised and punished; also that he should avoid all flattery of himself as well as of others, of the few or of the many: and rhetoric and any other art should be used by him, and all his actions should be done always, with a view to justice.”

I’ve read this book as someone who is an atheist and therefore someone who can place little concern on the rewards or punishments of the afterlife. Much of Plato’s argument is supported by the idea that we should be moral in this life to avoid punishment in the next life. I would like to think that his conclusions still stand for an atheist, even if his arguments do not.

I’m not sure how well Socrates answers Callicles’ arguments – or rather attack. Nietzsche later says much the same things about Socrates and his arguments – his denial of life and how ugly Socrates is and how lacking in taste and common sense. It seems clear for much of the text that Callicles is bored by Socrates’ arguments and only agrees to continue listening to Socrates because Gorgias asks to hear the rest of what Socrates has to say – he abandons participation in the argument, which is not the same as him being silenced by Socrates’ argument. I would very much doubt that Callicles came away from this encounter feeling that Socrates was right and that one should prefer to suffer harm than to do harm.

The myth at the end was all very Christian – and it is easy to see why Plato was so easy to be used by the Church. I found it very interesting that at least two of what are taken to be standard Christian messages are clearly put forward by Socrates – turn the other cheek (literally in those terms, too) and the problem the rich and powerful will have in getting into paradise. The import of this dialogue seem to me to be an even clearer statement of the golden rule than that contained in the Christian message – (surely the idea that we must avoid doing ill, even prefering bad things to be done to us, is more virtuous than merely treating others as we would like to be treated ourselves).

So, the question for me is whether it is possible to establish this as a conclusion an atheist could follow. And, to be honest, I don’t know. I can’t see what an atheist could base the ‘good’ that is necessary to sustain this argument on. Socrates is more than willing to be prepared to die for his truth because he knows there is an afterlife in which the pleasures and sufferings of this life are as nothing.

His argument is that doing wrong harms the wrong-doer’s soul – I think this is true, even if I don’t believe in a ‘soul’ as such. If we know we have done wrong there is nothing worse than feeling we have been ‘rewarded’ for it.

When I was a child my mother caught me cheating at patience (or solitaire for my American cousins). I must have been old enough for her merely saying, “Are you cheating?” to not really count for much. But what did count was when she said, “You are only cheating yourself.”

I’ve often wondered if that is a good lesson or not. I still don’t cheat and try to avoid situations where I can cheat myself or others – but it does often seem that those who do cheat (perhaps both themselves and others) do end up better off. And people do seem to have a near infinite capacity to rationalise away their actions so that they always do tend to see themselves in the end as entirely justified. Plato’s myth at the end of this dialogue where the wrong souls are being sent to the wrong places because they were being judged in their worldly finery just before they die seems relevant here.

Perhaps a means of attack on this is that the benefits of doing wrong are generally short lived – you cheat and the benefit is rather fleeting – but the knowledge that you cheated, that you are the sort of person who would cheat, that can be something that lasts with you all of your life. Perhaps then this is the ground to support Plato’s conclusions without resorting to his arguments – that in the end one needs to be able to live with one’s self – and that is easier to do if we have been wronged, than if we have wronged others. That the punishments we inflict upon ourselves for wronging others are often worse than the punishments others would give us if they were to punish us.

I enjoyed this more than the last time I read it – the last time I read it I was much more concerned that Socrates did not really answer Callicles’s argument – I still don’t think he answers it, but I’m not as concerned now.

It’s hard to say exactly which of Plato’s dialogues is the most relevant to the modern reader, but I think Gorgias would be a major contender. This Platonic dialogue takes place between Socrates and a small group of sophists as well as some other guests at a dinner party. What starts off as a defining of what rhetoric is and what its purpose is turns into a philosophical discourse on the Socratic view of natural morality, absolute truth, and self-control as opposed to relative morality, relative truth, and the pursuit of pleasure and excess as the ultimate good as held by the Sophists.

Socrates begins by comparing the techne versus what he calls a knack in rhetoric. He uses the example of medicine versus cookery to demonstrate this idea. The doctor uses pleasant and unpleasant means to bring about health in a person. Surgery is generally unpleasant and painful but brings about health. It is not about the gratification of one’s desires, but rather about one’s health. The Baker on the other hand makes cakes and sweet breads to fulfill personal gratification and desire, but does nothing for the health of the person. Socrates in this Dialogue is the doctor. He is the true politician and philosopher who is ready to use both pleasant and unpleasant means to bring about a healthy soul.

Socrates denies that pleasure can be equated directly to good. He argues that this is demonstrated by the natural world. There are good and pleasant things that can kill us, and there are unpleasant and painful things that can save our lives. In saying so Socrates is claiming that there is a natural morality at play here. That when something is good and pleasurable there is a point when that good and pleasurable thing reaches an excessive point where it becomes bad or harmful. A little bit of alcohol once in a while for example, gladdens the heart and is pleasurable to the body, but the excess of alcohol intake leads to alcoholism and destroys our body, life, and soul. A little bit of sugar here and there is good and pleasurable for the body, but excess causes obesity and disease. Socrates says that the one who places pleasure and desire as the end all goal is harming his own soul and other souls around him. He likens the person to a man with a bucket that has holes in it. That the more the man fills the bucket the more he becomes a slave to keeping it full, and the more he fills it the more holes appear and the faster he has to fill it. This is like the soul of the carnal or hedonistic man.

These two views battling it out here in this seemingly inconspicuous platonic dialogue have massive philosophical implications in the real world. Especially in the political sphere. In many ways this argument has echoed through the ages and continues to be an argument of great importance to anyone and everyone whether they know which side of it they’re on or not. It portrays two views of freedom. One, being freedom as liberty, and the other freedom as autonomy. The sophist view is that of freedom as liberty, that any restriction whatsoever on a person creates repression and unhappiness because true happiness is found in the accumulation and satiation of desires, (this view is represented by many thinkers responsible for the modern mentality in the west, Freud, Nietzsche, etc.) and the Socratic view of freedom as autonomy that argues that true freedom is man’s ability to know restraint and govern himself based on man’s ability to reason and seek virtue.

It portrays two views of truth and ethics. That of the sophist’s relative idea of truth and morality. That you can make an argument for anything by appealing to human emotion and desire. That you can persuade people to whichever view you want as a rhetorician because no view has actual truth. All truth is only perspective. Or the Socratic view of a truth that is true apart from rhetoric, and a moral law that can be found in nature by use of man’s ability to reason.

Plato’s dialogue asks us to consider then, which side of this argument are we on?
Will we take the side of Socrates and pursue knowledge and virtue?
Or will we take the side of the Sophists and pursue the accumulation and satiation of our personal desires?

the book was incredible. it is so so complex and wonderful and yes. the summary mr. dickerson made us write, on the other hand, was a 13th reason if i’ve ever heard one.

"It is better to suffer injustice than to be unjust" - a moving exploration of rhetoric and persuasion, the nature of governance, and the goal of human action.

Kallikles'in sözleri Marquis de Sade'ı anımsattı fazlasıyla.

Men do bad when they do what they merely think best, rather than what they most deeply desire.

That seems to be the central point of this long dialogue.

The age-old question is: how to get men to follow their true Will (i.e. Self, rather than ego).

Does the dialogue answer it?

The answer it gives appears to be: Engage in the combat of life, live as well as you can, and then, after death, you will attain the Islands of the Blessed, and not the realm of the wretched, Tartarus.

n  But that doesn’t answer the question of how to distinguish between the desires of ego, and the true Will!!!n