Abstract
In this paper I argue that Plato’s notion of the care of the self is his remedy to the psychological malady he refers to as ‘wandering’. The wandering self requires care, and a close reading of the Platonic corpus indicates self-cultivation means stabilizing the soul in accordance with its intelligent nature. I then argue that Plato appropriates the ethical injunction to care for the soul and draws from it an important epistemological consequence. Specifically, his view is that a wandering soul’s instability renders it incapable of philosophical cognition. To engender a healthy soul, one must participate in dialectic.
Highlights
In this paper I argue for a set of distinct but interrelated theses; first, I argue that Plato’s notion of the care of the self is his remedy to the psychological malady he refers to as ‘wandering’
The elenchus has a ‘steadying’ or ‘firming’ effect, and its consequence is a soul aware of its own wandering, ready to become more stable through the work of dialectic
Plato insisted that students at his own school train in dialectic, not merely as an exercise in logical reasoning, but because he demanded they undergo an ἄσκησις, or spiritual transformation.[57]
Summary
Just before referring to himself as a gadfly in the Apology, Socrates claims that his task is to chide those who care for anything other than their souls. There are various kinds of pleasures, some pure, others impure, and others a hybrid, not entirely pure, but necessary (Philebus 35d850e4).[13] Plato often depicts those who equate the life of goodness exclusively with the life of bodily pleasure as those who are the most psychically unstable Socrates clearly shows this in his representation of the tyrant, who, wholly focused on the pleasures of food, drink, sex, and the like, wanders throughout his life (πλανῶνται διὰ βίου), incapable of grasping what is ‘higher up’ (Republic IX.585d1ff).[14] The condition of such a soul is like a vessel full of holes, entirely insatiable because it can never be filled up (Gorgias 492e7ff). As over and against this wandering, the soul that cares for itself achieves a healthy condition synonymous with organization and order (Gorgias 504b4ff, Phaedrus 247a8-b3, 256a7-b7, Republic IV.443c9-444a2, Laws X.898a8-c8)
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