Theaetetus (167-171)

SOC.Now neither of these two is to be made wiser than he is—that is not possible— nor should the claim be made that the sick man is ignorant because his opinions are ignorant, or the healthy man wise because his are different; but a change must be made from the one condition to the other, for the other is better. So, too, in education a change has to be made from a worse to a better condition; but the physician causes the change by means of drugs, and the teacher of wisdom by means of words. And yet, in fact, no one ever made anyone think truly who previously thought falsely, since it is impossible to think that which is not or to think any other things than those which one feels; and these are always true. But I believe that a man who, on account of a bad condition of soul, thinks thoughts akin to that condition, is made by a good condition of soul to think correspondingly good thoughts; and some men, through inexperience, call these appearances true, whereas I call them better than the others, but in no wise truer. And the wise, my dear Socrates, I do not by any means call tadpoles when they have to do with the human body, I call them physicians, and when they have to do with plants, husbandmen; for I assert that these latter, when plants are sickly, instil into them good and healthy sensations, and true ones instead of bad sensations, and that the wise and good orators make the good, instead of the evil, seem to be right to their states. For I claim that whatever seems right and honorable to a state is really right and honorable to it, so long as it believes it to be so; but the wise man causes the good, instead of that which is evil to them in each instance, to be and seem right and honorable. And on the same principle the teacher who is able to train his pupils in this manner is not only wise but is also entitled to receive high pay from them when their education is finished. And in this sense it is true that some men are wiser than others, and that no one thinks falsely, and that you, whether you will or no, must endure to be a measure. Upon these positions my doctrine stands firm; and if you can dispute it in principle, dispute it by bringing an opposing doctrine against it; or if you prefer the method of questions, ask questions; for an intelligent person ought not to reject this method, on the contrary, he should choose it before all others. However, let me make a suggestion: do not be unfair in your questioning; it is very inconsistent for a man who asserts that he cares for virtue to be constantly unfair in discussion; and it is unfair in discussion when a man makes no distinction between merely trying to make points and carrying on a real argument.

SOC.In the former he may jest and try to trip up his opponent as much as he can, but in real argument he must be in earnest and must set his interlocutor on his feet, pointing out to him those slips only which are due to himself and his previous associations. For if you act in this way, those who debate with you will cast the blame for their confusion and perplexity upon themselves, not upon you; they will run after you and love you, and they will hate themselves and run away from themselves, taking refuge in philosophy, that they may escape from their former selves by becoming different. But if you act in the opposite way, as most teachers do, you will produce the opposite result, and instead of making your young associates philosophers, you will make them hate philosophy when they grow older. If therefore, you will accept the suggestion which I made before, you will avoid a hostile and combative attitude and in a gracious spirit will enter the lists with me and inquire what we really mean when we declare that all things are in motion and that whatever seems is to each individual, whether man or state. And on the basis of that you will consider the question whether knowledge and perception are the same or different, instead of doing as you did a while ago, using as your basis the ordinary meaning of names and words, which most people pervert in haphazard ways and thereby cause all sorts of perplexity in one another. Such, Theodorus, is the help I have furnished your friend to the best of my ability—not much, for my resources are small; but if he were living himself he would have helped his offspring in a fashion more magnificent.

THEO. You are joking, Socrates, for you have come to the man’s assistance with all the valor of youth.

SOC. Thank you, my friend. Tell me, did you observe just now that Protagoras reproached us for addressing our words to a boy, and said that we made the boy’s timidity aid us in our argument against his doctrine, and that he called our procedure a mere display of wit, solemnly insisting upon the importance of the measure of all things, and urging us to treat his doctrine seriously?

THEO. Of course I observed it, Socrates.

SOC. Well then, shall we do as he says?

THEO. By all means.

SOC. Now you see that all those present, except you and myself are boys. So if we are to do as the man asks, you and I must question each other and make reply in order to show our serious attitude towards his doctrine; then he cannot, at any rate, find fault with us on the ground that we examined his doctrine in a spirit of levity with mere boys.

THEO. Why is this? Would not Theaetetus follow an investigation better than many a man with a long beard?

SOC. Yes, but not better than you, Theodorus. So you must not imagine that I have to defend your deceased friend by any and every means, while you do nothing at all; but come, my good man, follow the discussion a little way, just until we can see whether, after all, you must be a measure in respect to diagrams, or whether all men are as sufficient unto themselves as you are in astronomy and the other sciences in which you are alleged to be superior.

THEO. It is not easy, Socrates, for anyone to sit beside you and not be forced to give an account of himself and it was foolish of me just now to say you would excuse me and would not oblige me, as the Lacedaemonians do, to strip; you seem to me to take rather after Sciron. [*] For the Lacedaemonians tell people to go away or else strip, but you seem to me to play rather the role of Antaeus; for you do not let anyone go who approaches you until you have forced him to strip and wrestle with you in argument.

SOC. Your comparison with Sciron and Antaeus pictures my complaint admirably; only I am a more stubborn combatant than they; for many a Heracles and many a Theseus, strong men of words, have fallen in with me and belabored me mightily, but still I do not desist, such a terrible love of this kind of exercise has taken hold on me. So, now that it is your turn, do not refuse to try a bout with me; it will be good for both of us.

THEO. I say no more. Lead on as you like. Most assuredly I must endure whatsoever fate you spin for me, and submit to interrogation. However, I shall not be able to leave myself in your hands beyond the point you propose.

SOC. Even that is enough. And please be especially careful that we do not inadvertently give a playful turn to our argument and somebody reproach us again for it.

THEO. Rest assured that I will try so far as in me lies.

SOC. Let us, therefore, first take up the same question as before, and let us see whether we were right or wrong in being displeased and finding fault with the doctrine because it made each individual self-sufficient in wisdom. Protagoras granted that some persons excelled others in respect to the better and the worse, and these he said were wise, did he not?

THEO. Yes.

SOC. Now if he himself were present and could agree to this, instead of our making the concession for him in our effort to help him, there would be no need of taking up the question again or of reinforcing his argument. But, as it is, perhaps it might be said that we have no authority to make the agreement for him; therefore it is better to make the agreement still clearer on this particular point; for it makes a good deal of difference whether it is so or not.

THEO. That is true.

SOC. Let us then get the agreement in as concise a form as possible, not through others, but from his own statement.

THEO. How?

SOC. In this way: He says, does he not? that which appears to each person really is to him to whom it appears.

THEO. Yes, that is what he says.

SOC. Well then, Protagoras, we also utter the opinions of a man, or rather, of all men, and we say that there is no one who does not think himself wiser than others in some respects and others wiser than himself in other respects; for instance, in times of greatest danger, when people are distressed in war or by diseases or at sea, they regard their commanders as gods and expect them to be their saviors, though they excel them in nothing except knowledge. And all the world of men is, I dare say, full of people seeking teachers and rulers for themselves and the animals and for human activities, and, on the other hand, of people who consider themselves qualified to teach and qualified to rule. And in all these instances we must say that men themselves believe that wisdom and ignorance exist in the world of men, must we not?

THEO. Yes, we must.

SOC. And therefore they think that wisdom is true thinking and ignorance false opinion, do they not?

THEO. Of course.

SOC. Well then, Protagoras, what shall we do about the doctrine? Shall we say that the opinions which men have are always true, or sometimes true and sometimes false? For the result of either statement is that their opinions are not always true, but may be either true or false. Just think, Theodorus, would any follower of Protagoras, or you yourself care to contend that no person thinks that another is ignorant and has false opinions?

THEO. No, that is incredible, Socrates.

SOC. And yet this is the predicament to which the doctrine that man is the measure of all things inevitably leads.

THEO. How so?

SOC. When you have come to a decision in your own mind about something, and declare your opinion to me, this opinion is, according to his doctrine, true to you; let us grant that; but may not the rest of us sit in judgement on your decision, or do we always judge that your opinion is true? Do not myriads of men on each occasion oppose their opinions to yours, believing that your judgement and belief are false?

THEO. Yes, by Zeus, Socrates, countless myriads in truth, as Homer [*] says, and they give me all the trouble in the world.

SOC. Well then, shall we say that in such a case your opinion is true to you but false to the myriads?

THEO. That seems to be the inevitable deduction.

SOC. And what of Protagoras himself? If neither he himself thought, nor people in general think, as indeed they do not, that man is the measure of all things, is it not inevitable that the truth which he wrote is true to no one? But if he himself thought it was true, and people in general do not agree with him, in the first place you know that it is just so much more false than true as the number of those who do not believe it is greater than the number of those who do.

THEO. Necessarily, if it is to be true or false according to each individual opinion.

SOC. Secondly, it involves this, which is a very pretty result; he concedes about his own opinion the truth of the opinion of those who disagree with him and think that his opinion is false, since he grants that the opinions of all men are true.

THEO. Certainly.

SOC. Then would he not be conceding that his own opinion is false, if he grants that the opinion of those who think he is in error is true?

THEO. Necessarily.

SOC. But the others do not concede that they are in error, do they?

THEO. No, they do not.

SOC. And he, in turn, according to his writings, grants that this opinion also is true.

THEO. Evidently.

SOC. Then all men, beginning with Protagoras, will dispute—or rather, he will grant, after he once concedes that the opinion of the man who holds the opposite view is true—even Protagoras himself, I say, will concede that neither a dog nor any casual man is a measure of anything whatsoever that he has not learned. Is not that the case?

THEO. Yes.

SOC. Then since the truth of Protagoras is disputed by all, it would be true to nobody, neither to anyone else nor to him.

THEO. I think, Socrates, we are running my friend too hard.

SOC. But, my dear man, I do not see that we are running beyond what is right. Most likely, though, he, being older, is wiser than we, and if, for example, he should emerge from the ground, here at our feet, if only as far as the neck, he would prove abundantly that I was making a fool of myself by my talk, in all probability, and you by agreeing with me; then he would sink down and be off at a run. But we, I suppose, must depend on ourselves, such as we are, and must say just what we think. And so now must we not say that everybody would agree that some men are wiser and some more ignorant than others?

THEO. Yes, I think at least we must.

SOC. And do you think his doctrine might stand most firmly in the form in which we sketched it when defending Protagoras, that most things—hot, dry, sweet, and everything of that sort—are to each person as they appear to him, and if Protagoras is to concede that there are cases in which one person excels another, he might be willing to say that in matters of health and disease not every woman or child—or beast, for that matter—knows what is wholesome for it and is able to cure itself, but in this point, if in any, one person excels another?

THEO. Yes, I think that is correct.