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Plato 'Republic'
Plato, The Republic, Political Philosophy Quotes
... what we can be positive about is what we have just said,
namely that they must be given the right education, whatever that may be,
as the surest way to make them behave humanely to each other and the subjects
in their charge. (Plato)
... our purpose in founding our state was not to promote the happiness of
a single class, but, so far as possible, of the whole community. Our idea
was that we were most likely to justice in such a community, and so be able
to decide the question we are trying to answer. We are therefore at the
moment trying to construct what we think is a happy community by securing
the happiness not of a select minority, but of a whole. (Plato)
... the community suffers nothing very terrible if its cobblers are bad
and become degenerate and pretentious; but if the Guardians of its laws
and constitution, who alone have the opportunity to bring it good government
and prosperity, become a mere sham, then clearly it is completely ruined.
(Plato)
Their military training will ensure success in war, but they must maintain
unity by not allowing the state to grow to large, and by ensuring that the
measures for promotion and demotion from one class to another are carried
out. Above all they must maintain the educational system unchanged; for
on education everything else depends, and it is an illusion to imagine that
mere legislation without it can effect anything of consequence. (Plato)
'Both poverty and wealth, therefore, have a bad effect on the quality of
the work and the workman himself.'
'Wealth and poverty,' I answered. 'One produces luxury and idleness and
a passion for novelty, the other meanness and bad workmanship and revolution
into the bargain.' (Plato)
If they are well brought up, and become reasonable men, they can easily
see to all we have asked them to, and indeed a good many things we have
omitted, such as the position of women, marriage, and the production of
children, all of which ought so far as possible to be dealt with on the
proverbial basis of "all things in common between friends".
'Yes, they can deal with all these problems.'
'And once we have given our community a good start,' I pointed out, ' the
process will be cumulative. By maintaining a sound system of education you
produce citizens of good character, and citizens of sound character, with
the advantage of a good education, produce in turn children better than
themselves and better able to produce still better children in their turn,
as can be seen with animals.' (Plato)
The State which we have founded must possess the four cardinal virtues of wisdom, courage, discipline and justice ... Justice is the principle which has in fact been followed throughout, the principle of one man one job, of 'minding one's own business', in the sense of doing the job for which one is naturally fitted and not interfering with other people. (Plato)
And the quality of good judgement is clearly a form of knowledge
and skill, as it is because of knowledge and not because of ignorance that
we judge well. (Plato)
So the state founded on natural principles is wise as a whole in virtue
of the knowledge inherent in its smallest constituent class, which exercises
authority over the rest. And the smallest class is the one which naturally
possesses that form of knowledge which alone of all others deserves the
title of wisdom. (Plato)
'Assume, then,' I said, 'that this was the sort of result we were doing
our best to achieve in choosing our soldier-class, and in educating them
physically and mentally. Our whole object was to steep them in the spirit
of our laws like a dye, so that nature and nurture might combine to fix
them indelibly their convictions about what is dangerous, and about all
other topics, and prevent them being washed out by those most powerful solvents,
pleasure, so much more effective than soap and chemicals, and pain and fear
and desire, the most effective of all. This kind of ability to retain in
all circumstances a judgement about danger which is correct by established
standards is what I propose to call courage, unless you have any alternative
to suggest.' (Plato)
'What the expression is intended to mean, I think, is that there is a better
and a worse element in the character of each individual, and that when the
naturally better element controls the worse then the man is said to be "master
of himself", as a term of praise. But when (as a result of bad upbringing
or bad company) one's better element is overpowered by the numerical superiority
of one's worse impulses, then one is criticized for not being master of
oneself and for lack of self control.'(Plato)
'And, what is more, the greatest variety of desires and pleasures and pains
is generally to be found in children and women and slaves, and in the less
reputable majority of so called free men.'
'Certainly'
'While the simple and moderate desires, guided by reason and judgement and
reflection, you will find in a minority who have the advantages of natural
gifts and good education.'
'True'
'This feature too you can see in our state, where the desires of the less
reputable majority are controlled by the desires and the wisdom of the superior
minority.' (Plato)
'Because, unlike courage and wisdom, which made our state brave and wise
by being present in a particular part of it, discipline operates by being
diffused throughout the whole of it. It produces a concord between its strongest
and weakest and middle elements, whether you define them by the standard
of good sense, or of strength, or of numbers or money or the like. And so
we are quite justified in regarding discipline as this sort of natural harmony
and agreement between higher and lower about which of them is to rule in
state and individual.' (Plato)
'...that in our state one man was to do one job, and the
job he was naturally most suited for .. And further, we have often heard
and often said that justice consists of minding your own business and not
interfering with other people.' (Plato)
'Interference by the three classes with each other's jobs, and interchange
of jobs between them, therefore, does the greatest harm to our state, and
we are entirely justified in calling it the worst of evils.' (Plato)
Justice in the individual is now defined analogously to justice in the state. The individual is wise and brave in virtue of his reason and 'spirit' respectively: he is disciplined when 'spirit' and appetite are in proper subordination to reason. He is just in virtue of the harmony which exists when all three elements of the mind perform their proper function and so achieve their proper fulfillment; he is unjust when no such harmony exists. (Plato)
The principles are important. First, the interest of the state or society counts for everything, that of the individual for nothing. Second, the only difference between men and women is one of physical function- one begets, the other bears children. Apart from that, they both can and should perform the same functions (though men on a whole, perform them better) and should receive the same education to enable them to do so; for in this way society will get the best value from both. (Plato)
We must, if we are to be consistent, and if we're to have
a real pedigree herd, mate the best of our men with the best of our women
as often as possible, and the inferior men with the inferior women as seldom
as possible, and keep only the offspring of the best. (Plato)
And among the other honours and rewards our young men can win for distinguished
service in war and in other activities, will be more frequent opportunities
to sleep with a woman; this will give us a pretext for ensuring that most
of our children are born of that parent. (Plato)
'Is there anything worse for a state than to be split and disunited? or
anything better than cohesion and unity?' (Plato)
'Haven't you noticed how, in a trade like the potters', children serve a
long apprenticeship, watching how things are done, before they take a hand
in the work themselves?'
'Yes I have'
'Oughtn't the Guardians to take just as much care, when they are training
their children, to let them see what their duties are and get used to them?'
'It would be absurd if they didn't'
'And besides, any animal fights better in the presence of its young.' (Plato)
The society we have described can never grow into a reality
or see the light of day, and there will be no end to the troubles of states,
or indeed, my dear Glaucon, of humanity itself, till philosophers are kings
in this world, or till those we now call kings and rulers really and truly
become philosophers, and political power and philosophy thus come into the
same hands, while the many natures now content to follow either to the exclusion
of the other are forcibly debarred from doing so. This is what I have hesitated
to say so long, knowing what a paradox it would sound; for it is not easy
to see that there is no other road to happiness, either for society or the
individual.
(Plato, Republic)
The philosopher is in love with truth, that is, not with the changing world
of sensation, which is the object of opinion, but with the unchanging reality
which is the object of knowledge. (Plato)
...there are some who are naturally fitted for philosophy and political
leadership, while the rest should follow their lead and let philosophy alone.
(Plato)
'...we shan't be unfair to our philosophers, but shall be
quite justified in compelling them to have some care and responsibility
for others. We shall tell them that philosophers in other states can reasonably
refuse to take part in the hard work of politics; for society produces them
quite involuntary and unintentionally, and it is only just that anything
that grows up on its own should feel it has nothing to repay for an unbringing
which it owes to no one. "But you," we shall say, "have been
bred to rule to your advantage and that of the whole community, like king
bees in a hive; you are better educated than the rest and better qualified
to combine the practice of philosophy and politics. You must therefore each
descend in turn and live with your fellows in the cave and get used to seeing
in the dark; once you get used to it you will see a thousand times better
than they do and will recognise the various shadows, because you have seen
the truth about things right and just and good. And so our state and yours
will be really awake, and not merely dreaming like most societies today,
with their shadow battles and their struggles for political power, which
they treat as some great prize. The truth is quite different: the state
whose rulers come to their duties with least enthusiasm is bound to have
the best and most tranquil government, and the state whose rulers are eager
to rule the worst.' (Plato)
'If you get, in public affairs, men who are so morally impoverished that
they have nothing they can contribute themselves, but who hope to snatch
some compensation for their own inadequacy from a political career, there
can never be good government. They start fighting for power, and the consequent
internal and domestic conflicts ruin both them and society.'
'True indeed'
'Is there any other life except that of true philosophy which looks down
on political power?'
'None that I know of'
'And yet the only men to get power should be men who do not love it, otherwise
we shall have rivals' quarrels.'
'That is certain'
'Who else, then, are we to compel to undertake the responsibilities of ruling,
if it is not to be those who know most about good government and who yet
value other things more highly than politics and its rewards?'
'There is no one else'
(Plato)
'You must realise, I suppose,' I went on, ' that there must be as many types of individual as of society? Societies aren't made of sticks and stones, but of men whose individual characters, by turning the scale one way or another, determine the direction of the whole.' (Plato, Republic)
Help Humanity
"You must be the change you wish to see in the world."
(Mohandas Gandhi)
"When forced to summarize the general theory of relativity in one sentence:
Time and space and gravitation have no separate existence from matter. ... Physical objects are not in space, but these objects are spatially extended. In this way the concept 'empty space' loses its meaning. ... The particle can only appear as a limited region in space in which
the field strength or the energy density are particularly high. ...
The free, unhampered exchange of ideas and scientific conclusions is necessary for the sound development of science, as it is in all spheres
of cultural life. ... We must not conceal from ourselves that no improvement in the present depressing situation is possible without
a severe struggle; for the handful of those who are really determined to do something is minute in comparison with the mass of the lukewarm
and the misguided. ...
Humanity is going to need a substantially new way of thinking if it is to survive!" (Albert Einstein)
Our world is in great trouble due to human behaviour founded on myths and customs that are causing the destruction of Nature and climate change. We can now deduce the most simple science theory of reality - the wave structure of matter in space. By understanding how we and everything around us are interconnected
in Space we can then deduce solutions to the fundamental problems of human knowledge in physics, philosophy, metaphysics, theology, education, health, evolution and ecology, politics and society.
This is the profound new way of thinking that Einstein
realised, that we exist as spatially extended structures of the universe - the discrete and separate body an illusion. This simply confirms the
intuitions of the ancient philosophers and mystics.
Given the current censorship in physics / philosophy of science journals (based on the standard model of particle physics / big bang cosmology) the internet is the best hope for getting new knowledge
known to the world. But that depends on you, the people who care about science and society, realise the importance of truth and reality.
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Just click on the Social Network links below, or copy a nice image or quote you like and share it. We have a wonderful collection of knowledge from the greatest minds in human history, so people will appreciate your contributions. In doing this you will help a new generation of scientists see that there is a simple sensible explanation of physical reality - the source of truth and wisdom, the only cure for the madness of man! Thanks! Geoff Haselhurst (Updated September, 2018)
A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it. (Max Planck, 1920)
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