Socrates Nature Of Evil

Socrates’ take on justice was a rather controversial viewpoint for his era, in that he opined about virtues men should possess and strive for that they might otherwise have no desire to obtain. A just man strives to promote justice for the sake of justice in itself. He, as one who is good, seeks to further justice because it fulfills his daimon, or nature. The nature of man is therefore, naturally, to do the right and proper thing. Good, as the nature of man, is what man desires, needs, and yet also lacks. This can be attributed to a lack of knowledge, because only one who is ignorant can commit evil. A man with knowledge would never willingly commit evil, because it would hurt both those around him and his own soul. Therefore, to Socrates, knowledge, as a pathway to good, it is good. An ignorant man is also prone to vice. Because he does not know any better about his actions and the effect they may have on himself and others around him, an ignorant man will continue to do evil. Concordantly, a knowledgeable man is a courageous man who rejects vice and does the right and proper thing, even if it may be a more difficult choice. This requires quite a bit of temperance, but a knowledgeable man knows that by forgoing vice, he is in fact keeping
his soul pure, which is the end goal. It is better for a man to never fall prey to vice than to commit evil and then later ask for forgiveness. Socrates illustrates this by comparing the example of a sick patient who recovers from his ills versus a healthy man who never falls prey to sickness. Obviously, the healthy man will be the happier man, having never had to recover from any disease. Evil, he says, affects the soul in the same way that illness affects the body. Asking for justice is like asking for medicine from a doctor. It is better than not asking for a cure, that is to be sure, but it is best to have never needed it in the first place. Following with the sick patient analogy, Socrates says that just as one goes to the doctor to heal him when he is sick, one should go to a judge or law court, to heal one’s self if one has committed evil. Again, this requires a great deal of courage that many men do not possess. It is argued that because they do not know the damage they are doing themselves, they lack the courage it takes to make up for their sins. Knowledge, again, illuminates the right path to justice. A good man would never attempt to make another man fall ill as it would cause harm to both parties. Similarly, a just man would never intentionally lay any harm on another man because, by definition, harming another is injustice. This is a radical thought process, as Socrates is putting forward that any form of harm from one man to another is unjust, which includes war. War, for the record, happened quite often during Socrates’ time. All of these traits are very difficult to obtain and even harder for many of Socrates’ contemporaries to grasp, let alone care for. Because the life of a just man is so difficult to obtain, and because it is so easy to fall into the temptations of evil and unjustness, many would go with the latter. On a superficial level, it makes sense to preserve one’s own self-wealth, even if it means doing unjust things. Yet, Socrates, like Jesus would later preach, puts forward that it is better to be a poor man that has a good and pure soul than a rich man who has fallen to vice and tarnished his soul. Socrates describes a hypothetical society, a utopia, which is Greek for “a place that does not exist”, where he divides society into three tiers: the peasants that do all the actual work, such as agriculture and production of goods, the warriors who protect the society from harm, and the philosopher kings that guide the society. Each tier has a distinct role and provides value that they can best provide and that members of the other two tiers would be unsuited for. A warrior must not be concerned with feeding himself, obtaining shelter, or any other basic human need. Rather, he should be concerned with protecting the people, who will provide him the basic necessities of life. In this way, there is a symbiotic relationship between the solider and the people, who rely on each and shall not turn on each other. In the same way, the peasant need not concern himself with defending himself. He simply has to do what he needs to do, and his production will help himself and the community at large. The philosopher kings, those knowledgeable men who guide the society, need both the peasants to create and the warriors to defend. In turn, they will lead the society to prosperity and austerity. The ideal society is a moderate society. Too much luxury breeds greed and mistrust between classes and members within the same class. Everyone fighting for resources will only lead to a guaranteed destruction of the society. This utopian society illustrates Socrates’ view of justice in that, by striving for moderation, everyone can do the most good for society and themselves. Each individual doing his own job furthers society by providing value into the society. And because there are other individuals to take care of other needs, everyone is looked after in a mutually beneficial way. Because there is no greed, there is no vice. Ergo, there is no evil. This society is of course illusory.
The very meaning of the word utopia proves this to be the case. However, we can and have taken Socratic approaches to our own societies that are still existent today. Division of labor, as we can note, is very real. Each individual in our society specializes in work that allows him or her to then trade the output for other goods in a mutually beneficial relationship with the rest of society. Taxpayers provide for our soldiers, thereby allowing our warriors to, at least in theory, focus on protecting the public. And on paper, our elected officials are learned men whose role it is to guide society in a manner that is in everyone’s interest, even if it is not in their own personal
interest. Except there is one flaw in all of this: there is no moderation. It can be argued that society is wholly ignorant and we do not know of the ill effects of the overall greed that is possessed by society. Or, perhaps worse, we are cognizant of this, yet still want more anyway. In any case, modern society is run, on large part, through greed. Capitalism, which has paved the way for modern society, is founded entirely on greed, which it does not regard as necessarily good or evil. It remains to be seen whether our society can last in its current form. History and Socrates say that all great societies eventually grow to greedy and fall. If that is indeed the case for us, then we might be wise to educate ourselves on the virtues of Socratic justice, and rein in our appetites before it dooms us all.