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SECOND PUBLIC EXAMINATION

Honour School of Literae Humaniores Honour School of Philosophy, Politics, and Economics

Honour School of Philosophy and Modern Languages (Four-year Course) Honour School of Philosophy and Theology

Honour School of Mathematics and Philosophy

115 PLATO: REPUBLIC

(in translation)

TRINITY TERM 2012

Tuesday 29 May, 9.30am – 12.30pm

This paper contains 13 questions.

Answer FOUR questions, of which QUESTION 13 must be one.

Marking scheme: 25% of overall mark for each question.

Do not turn over until told that you may do so.

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1. Why is the notion of a ruler ‘in the strict sense’ important in Republic I? Is the use that is made of this notion defensible?

2. Why is early education in music and gymnastics important for future guardians? Is this view of education plausible? 3. Is the tripartite division of the soul useful for explaining human behaviour? 4. Does Socrates, in the Republic, think it is possible to have any one of the virtues without having the others? Should he think this? 5. Does Plato have any good reason for supposing that justice in the individual must resemble justice in the city? 6. Does Plato think it possible to have knowledge of the many beautifuls? Is he right? 7. In the divided line, what is ‘thought’ (dianoia)? Does Plato present a plausible view about the importance of its role in intellectual progress? 8. ‘Even if there is a form of the good, it cannot have any relevance to practical matters.’ How might Plato respond? 9. Does the Republic offer any good argument against the view that a calm and self-controlled criminal could be happy? 10. If I’m not a philosopher, is there any reason why I should prefer to live in Plato’s ideal city, as opposed to a city of some other type? 11. ‘In modern Greece and Italy, governments of unelected economic experts are imposing austerity.’ If so, would Plato approve? 12. Does Plato’s attack on imitation (mimesis) apply equally well to both poetry and painting?

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13. Comment briefly on THREE of the following passages: (a) Therefore, a good and clever person doesn’t want to outdo those like himself but those who are unlike him and his opposite. So it seems. But a bad and ignorant person wants to outdo both his like and his opposite.

(I.350b) (b) Suppose, then, that someone came up to us while we were painting a statue and objected that, because we had painted the eyes (which are the most beautiful part) black rather than purple, we had not applied the most beautiful colours to the most beautiful parts of the statue. We’d think it reasonable to offer the following defence: ‘You mustn’t expect us to paint the eyes so beautifully that they no longer appear to be eyes at all, and the same with the other parts. Rather you must look to see whether by dealing with each part appropriately, we are making the whole statue beautiful’.

(IV.420c-d) (c) If that’s true, then here’s what we must think about these matters: Education isn’t what some people declare it to be, namely putting knowledge into souls that lack it, like putting sight into blind eyes. They do say that. But our present discussion, on the other hand, shows that the power to learn is present in everyone’s soul and that the instrument with which each learns is like an eye that cannot be turned around from darkness to light without turning the whole body.

(VII.518b-c)

(d) He makes the rational and spirited parts sit on the ground beneath appetite, one on either side, reducing them to slaves. He won’t allow the first to reason about or examine anything except how a little money can be made into great wealth. And he won’t allow the second to value or admire anything but wealth and wealthy people or to have any ambition other than the acquisition of wealth or whatever might contribute to getting it.

(VIII.553c-d)

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(e) Therefore, if being filled with what is appropriate to our nature is pleasure, that which is more filled with things that are more enjoys more really and truly a more true pleasure, while that which partakes of things that are less is less truly and surely filled and partakes of a less trustworthy and less true pleasure.

(IX.585d-e) (f) “Here is the message of Lachesis, the maiden daughter of Necessity: ‘Ephemeral souls, this is the beginning of another cycle that will end in death. Your daemon or guardian spirit will not be assigned to you by lot; you will choose him. The one who has the first lot will be the first to choose a life to which he will then be bound by necessity. Virtue knows no master; each will possess it to a greater or less degree, depending on whether he values or disdains it. The responsibility lies with the one who makes the choice;; the god has none.’”

(X.617d-e)