Hume's Empiricism

A/ Why does Hume think that there is no evidence of real causal power or "necessary connection"?



The reason why Hume think that there is no evidence or necessary connection between two events comes from the idea that sensory experiences or matters of fact account for the cause and effects. Hume has an idea to classify the objects for human reason into two kinds: Relation of Ideas and Matters of Fact. The example of the first kind is the sciences of mathematics that use reasoning to support, but for the second kind, Hume says: "Matters of fact, which are the second objects of human reason, are not ascertained in the same manner;" and "all reasonings concerning matter of fact seem to be founded on the relation of Cause and Effect." In addition, Hume writes: "the knowledge of this relation is not, in any instance, attained by reasoning a priori; but arises entirely from experience." (An Enquiry, Section IV, part I). What he means is that reason solely cannot guarantee what will happen in an event. For example, in the billiard game, if ball A hits a cluster of other balls, the tracks that other balls move will be different each time ball A hits them. There may be a repetition of some tracks but not all will happen in the same manner. Only by observation or using sensory experience, one can predict what will happen next or will happen in the future. Moreover, Hume emphasizes on the connection between the events, for example, ball A strikes ball B, and ball B moves. Now, can we say that ball B would not have moved if ball A had not struck it? The answer is no because may be another ball, for example, ball C, can hit ball B and causes ball B to move. So, it is not necessary that ball A must push ball B in order for ball B to move because it could be that another ball, or ball C, would push ball B. So, by only reasoning, we cannot determine the cause and effect relation. Rather, this relation is a result of our impression that is our own belief based on our experience that previously showed that relation.

Hume's idea is different from Descartes' idea that reasoning can guarantee for checking the truth. Descartes thinks that relations of ideas which form mathematical or scientific laws are the true method because there are proofs for the involment of logically plausible reasoning. But Hume thinks that only sensory experience or matters of fact can account for any cause-and-effect relation. He says: "Let an object be presented to a man of ever so strong natural reason and abilities; if that object be entirely new to him, he will not be able, by the most accurate examination of its sensible qualities, to discover any of its causes or effects. Adam though his rational faculties be supposed, at the very first, entirely perfect, could not have inferred from the fluidity and transparency of water that it would suffocate him, or from the light and warmth of fire that it would consume him. No object ever discovers, by the qualities which appear to the sense, either the causes which produced it, or the effects which will arise from it; nor can our reason, unassisted by experience, ever draw any inference concerning real existence and matter of fact." ( An Enquiry, Sction IV, paragraph 6, part 1). In some cases, according to Hume, we are reasoning about the future based on our observations about the past. To convince us that conclusions of causal reasoning are not relations of ideas, but are merely matters of fact, Hume asks that whether we can predict about the result of an event as the effect that is caused by another event by just reasoning? Probably, we will answer yes, but that is because we have seen things that happened that way before, and when presented with new objects or circumstances, we do not really know what to expect. For example, we can predict that any object will fall to the ground because we have seen those event happen all the times, but if we had never seen objects fall, we would not have been able to tell that they would fall if we dropped them. Hume writes:

"We are apt to imagine that we could discover these effects by the mere operation of our reason, without experience. We fancy, that were we brought on a sudden into this world, we could at first have inferred that one Billiard-ball would communicate motion to another upon impulse; and that we needed not to have waited for the event, in order to pronounce with certainty concerning it. Such is the influence of custom, that, where it is strongest, it not only covers our natural ignorant, but even conceals itself, and seems not to take place, merely because it is found in the highest degree." ( An Enquiry, Section IV, part 1, paragraph 8). Now, Hume develops a new concept; that is custom. It is by custom that we draw conclusions, but not by reasoning or idea that certain effect is to be followed by certain cause. Even if we can use reasoning and invention to predict the effect, but these reasoning and invention are not always trusted, not saying that they may be queer, or fictional, or unrealistic. By Hume's language, they may be arbitrary as he wrote: "Were any object presented to us, and were we required to pronounce concerning the effect, which will result from it, without consulting past observation; after what manner, I beseech you, must the mind proceed in this operation? It must invent or imagine some event, which it ascribes to the object as its effect; and it is plain that this invention must be entirely arbitrary. The mind can never possibly find the effect in the supposed cause by the most accurate scrutiny and examination. For the effect is totally different from the cause, and consequently can never be discovered in it. Motion in the second billiard-ball is a quite distinct event from motion in the first; nor is there anything in the one to suggest the smallest hint of the other. Stone or piece of metal raised into the air, and left without any support, immediately falls: but to consider the matter of priori, is there anything we discover in this situation which can beget the idea of a downward, rather than an upward, or any other motion, in the stone or metal?" ( An Enquiry, Section IV, part 1, paragraph 9). However, the strongest persuation saying that in the relation of Cause and Effect, there is no necessary connection or no evidence that can be evoked in the reasoning process. Finally, Hume concludes:

In a word, then, every effect is a distinct event from its cause. It could not, therefore, be discovered in the cause, and the first invention or conception of it, a priori, must be entirely arbitrary. And even after it is suggested, the conjunction of it with the cause must appear equally arbitrary; since there are always many other effects, which, to reason, must seem fully as consistent and natural. In vain, therefore should we pretend to determine any single event, or infer any cause and effect, without the assistance of observation and experience." (An Enquiry, section IV, paragraph 11, part I)

Another example that Hume gave was the case of eating bread by looking at the following sentences of a cause and effect:
Phrase A: The bread I eat nourished me yesterday
Phrase B: Today If I eat the bread, it will nourish me
But the problem is what happens if the bread I eat today is poisoned? If so, then the bread that I eat today won't nourish me but kill me instead. Thus, there obviously is no connection between the bread that I ate before and the bread that I am going to eat today. So, when reasoning, the matter becomes worse and more likely to fall into a false property. Hence, there is no real connection in reasoning between the cause and the effect.


B/ According to Hume, do we have any proof that "external object" resemble our impressions or ideas of them?

Hume says that we can have proof or ideas that resemble to external objects. He found three relations that characterize the behavior of ideas: resemblance, contiguity, and cause and effect. In his first relation which he names resemblance, Hume says that our idea comes from the things or other ideas that resemble it. For example, the idea of the mermaid is a combination image of a female human and a fish. Without knowing what a fish looks like, no one can imagine to cling the fish tail to the body of a girl to form the image of a mermaid. Of course, with the idea of a mermaid, it shows us the obvious proofs that everyone living on this earth should know: the proof of a fish tail and the proof of a female figure. Besides, the connotation meaning of that mermaid idea is to imply people who have predominant appearance that exceeds the truth of its quality; so, by looking at some people whose appearance overstated their corresponding personality, a person can easily comes up with the idea of a mermaid. In addition to sight, sound is a strong impression that can cause our resemblance ideas; by listening to a sound, we can know the resources from which the sound is caused and how it can be created. For example, the sound of a wooden stick that beats on another wooden object is different from the sound of a wooden stick that beats on a tin can. Once we hear those sounds and see how they have been created, next time, if we hear them, we can imagine or have concepts of what form that same sounds. But without seeing the wooden stick and the tin can, we can hardly guest how that sound is created; by that, I mean the kind of objects that cause that sound. In An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, section II, "Of the Origin of Idea", Hume classifies perceptions into two categories: ideas and impressions. Ideas are different from impressions in the meaning that they are less lively perceptions than those of impressions:

Here therefore we may divide all the perceptions of the mind into two classes or species, which are distinguished by their different degrees of force and vivacity. The less forcible and lively are commonly denominated Thoughts and Ideas.

For the definition of impression, Hume writes:

The other species want a name in our language, to rank them under a general term or appellation. Let us, therefore, use a little freedom, and call them Impression; employing that word in a sense somewhat different from the usual. By the term impression, then, I mean all our more lively perceptions, when we hear, or see, or feel, or hate, or desire, or will. (An Enquiry, section II, paragraph 3).

Furthermore, he explains that thoughts are powerful and can go beyond the universe and is unbounded. However, mostly they are perceptions that are copies of impressions or of more lively ones:

But though our thought seems to possess this unbounded liberty, we shall find, upon a nearer examination, that it is really confined within very narrow limits, and that all this creative power of the mind amounts to no more than the faculty of compounding, transposing, augmenting, or diminishing the materials afforded to us by the senses and experience. (An Enquiry, section II, paragraph 5).

For abstract ideas, we can also find proofs for them. For example, the mathematical statement "a triangle is a closed shape that has three sides" can be checked to see if it is true by understanding what three sides mean, and by drawing a picture of the three lines that intersect one another to form the shape of a triangle. The knowledge of lines are of course come from our previous impression or learning that there are in fact straight lines in our world. Also, once we know the definition of a triangle, if someone says " a triangle does not have three sides," we would know immediately that that statement is not true due to our previous perception of a triangle. Since it is very hard or impossible to conjure a new idea without a previous specific impression involving things contained in that idea, there is always a proof that an external object will resemble to a certain specific idea or impression.

C/ According to Descartes, God has established certain laws of nature and God has "impressed in our souls notions of these laws that, after having reflected sufficiently, we cannot deny that they are strictyly adhered to in everything that exists or occurs in the world" (Discourse on Method, part 5, paragraph 1). Does Hume agree with Descartes that we can know that God has impressed notions of nature directly to ours soul?

No, Hume doesn't agree with Descartes that we can know that God has impressed notions of laws of nature directly to our souls for the following reasons:

First of all, Hume says that there is no necessary connection between cause and effect. If there is no connection between cause and effect then how can we know what really causes an effect although we can presume there is connection, and how can we know that God is the one who caused the laws of nature to be impressed in our souls? He can prove that there is no connection using external impression and internal recognition. For external impression, as I already explained in part (a) above that with external objects, we can always find proofs through our perceptions of them by senses or by contact experience. If we cannot find any existing proof for something through our perceptions of it, then we cannot say that that something exists; for example, like a mermaid if one to creates the mermaid, he or she has to know in advance that there is a tail of a fish which he or she always sees in real life and there is a beautiful girl image which he or she always sees in real life, and with those 2 real images, he or she then combines them to create the imaginary image of a mermaid, God's existence can be proved by a figure of something must have already existed like God, perfect and all-knowing, but Hume thinks that we can't find any proof of such a perfect and all-knowing, or omniscient person who did really exists; thus, for an external proof, we fail to prove that God is the resemblance of something existed. Hume writes:

In reality, there is no part of matter, that does ever, by its sensible qualities, discover any power or energy, or give us ground to imagine, that it could produce anything, or be followed by any other object which we could denominate it effect. Solidity, extension, motion; these qualities are all complete in themselves, and never point out any other event which may result from them. The scenes of the universe are continually shifting, and one object follows another in an interrupted succession; but the power of force, which actuates the whole machine, is entirely concealed from us, and never discovers itself in any of the sensible qualities of body. ( An Enquiry, section VII, part I, paragraph 8).

And: "It is impossible, therefore, that idea of power can be derived from the comtemplation of bodies, in single instances of their operation; because no bodies ever discover any power, which can be the original of this idea (An Enquiry, Section VII, part I, paragraph 8).

Since we can't find any idea of power or the necessary connection through the resemblance of external or real objects, how can we know that God is the power to cause the notions of laws in our souls or He is the one who caused the universe to operate?

Second, Hume does not think that by only reasoning, we can create new ideas about things around us since every of our new ideas can only be initiated by some previous impresions of real things that we could see, hear or feel. And if there may be a new idea created through reasoning, that idea may be very arbitrary including being queer, or strange or unrealistic, or too fictional to be true. Therefore, if we don't have any provable idea that God exists, can we think that He exists? Hume thinks that the idea of the existence of God is only an imaginable idea by reasoning but not by any impression or real sense that makes us know that He exists since no one has ever seen God before. Specifically speaking, we can use reasoning to say that since animals have related parts of the body, God may be the creator of these related parts. The related parts are obviously the impression of the real things in nature.

To prove that God has not impressed in our souls notions of the laws of nature or that God doesn't exist by our mind, Hume gives an example that if God causes us to know how things operate then why our mind can control some parts of the body but not other parts? If we know the principle - the laws of nature -that God has impressed in our soul upon which our mind can direct certain parts of the body, we should know that by that same principle, our mind can also use to direct other parts of the body which it actually cannot. For example, we can use our mind to move our legs or arms and hands but not our kidneys our our hearts. Once our hearts cease to beat, we die. Can we control our heart so that we can live again by using our mind? Of course not. Hume says that some philosophers cannot answer that question why the mind cannot control the body, and therefore, death comes when the heart stops beating, they claim that God exists and that He is the one who causes the heart to stop beating because human beings must die due to the sin that Eva made. But then, the idea of God cannot be proved by any external object or any real sense such as seeing, or hearing because no one has ever seen God or has ever heard him talk directly to them (only a few claims to see God - the Saints - but the majority of men don't). The idea of God is still considered as a suggestion or by a reasoning since we don't have something real that exists that is as perfect as God's characteristics, we cannot conclude that God is a resemblance of somthing like it.

Hume writes:

Is there any principle in all nature more mysterious than the union of soul with body; by which a supposed spiritual substance acquires such an influence over a material one, that the most refined thought is able to actuate the gross matter? Were we empowered, by a secret wish, to remove mountains, or control the planets in their orbit; this extensive authority would not be more extraordinary, nor more beyond our comprehension. But if we must know this power; we must know ist connextion with the effect; we must know the secret union of our soul and body, and the nature of both these substances; by which the one is able to operate, in so many instance, upon the other. (An Enquiry, Section VII, part I, paragraph 11).

Thus, we cannot know any power or any cause that can show us the cause of the operation of our soul and body, and of the universe. So, why do we think that there is a power such as God's power that can cause all of these relations? Hume writes:

But to hasten to a conclusion of this argument, which is already drawn out to too great a length: we have sought in vain for an idea of power or necessary connexion in all the sources from which we could suppose it to be derived. It appears that in single instances of the operation of bodies, we never can, by our utmost scrutiny, discover any thing but one event following another, without being able to comprehend any force or power by which the causes operates, or any connexion between it and it supposed effect... The authority of the will over its own faculties and ideas is not a whit more comprehensible: so that, upon the whole, there appears not, throughout all nature, any one instance of connextion which is conceived by us. (An Enquiry, Chapter VII, Part II, paragraph 1).

Definitely, not. Hence, God did not impress notions of laws of nature upon our souls because we can't find the necessary impressions fo all the relations between things (in our body, nor in the universe) by external objects, internal recognition nor by reasoning.

However, Hume says that we can say God exists by looking at the things He created around us. As I just said above that we can find related parts in all kinds of animal that have the same functions; for example the tiger's eyes related to the human's eyes; the monkey looks like human beings; thus, we can say that God did create other animals before He created human beings. The Designer theory is a theory that says that there must be a designer who designs all the related parts of animals. Hence, God is proved to exist not by an impression or by something that resembles to Him that did exist but by looking at the real things existing around us that we can say that God exists because he is the designer of those meaning things. Hume's theory of the Designer is an interesting theory about God as a designer.


Works Cited

Hume, David. "An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding." Mondern Philosophy - An Anthology of Primary Sources. Eds. Roger Ariew and Eric Watkins. Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company. 1998. 491-557.

Descartes' Argument for the Existence of Material Objects

A/ The argument for the existence of material objects:

The final conclusion that Descartes makes concerning the existence of material objects is that they exist and that they are the cause of Descartes' ideas of them. This conclusion is made finally in Meditation 6. In Meditations 2 and 5, Descartes also mentions about their existence as being a suspect of truth for his investigation, and in Meditation 2, material objects are corporeal things that he can observes using senses. Thus, when he speaks about corporeal things that he perceives by senses, we know that he is talking about material objects. In addition, not only material objects are objects that Descartes perceives through senses, in Meditation 5, Descartes mentions about another kind of material objects that associate with figures, numbers, size and shape and pertain to mathematics; in other words, objects that can cause idea of them, and they are what Descartes can conceive either by himself or by means of other ideas such as mathematics. In these Meditations, Descartes already recognizes or has a feeling that they really exist, but he needs to examine more so that they can be better known; in other words, he knows that they exist, but he must prove that his knowledge of them are clearly and distincly perceptions so that he can say about the certainty of their existence. Let us look back at some statements that he writes regarding the existence of those material objects in Meditation 2 and 5. For example, in Meditation 2, Descartes says that material objects have a distinct impression on him by starting to view and to examine his own body as a material object:

But as to the body, I was not in any doubt. On the contrary, I was under
the impression that I knew its nature distinctly. (31)

For corporeal things other than his own body, Descartes says, also are more distinctly known:

But int still seems (and I cannot resist believing) that corporeal things--
who images are formed by thought, and which the senses themselves
examine-- are much more distinctly known than this mysterious "I" which
does not fall within the imagination. (32)

Finally, Descartes give out another example that he made on the wax, a natural object that he can touch and conduct an experiment to study its existence. In his observation of the wax, he finds out about its true property, one that is unchanged and remains eternally while other properties change and disappear under our senses. After this experiment about the wax, Descartes thinks that if the corporeal objects exist, he knows more clearly about them by the intellect:

It is what my imagination shows it to be: namely, that this piece of wax
can change from a round to a square shape, or from the latter to a
triangular shape? Not at all; for I grasp that the wax is capable of
innumerable changes of this sort, even though I am incapable of running
through these innumerable changes by using my imagination. Therefore
this insight is not achieved by the faculty of imagination. (32)

Even though Descartes' knowledge about the wax is gained by his reasoning, he cannot deny that the wax and its material are not in a dream or in an imagination. Finally, in Meditation 6, Descartes proves that material objects exist and that they are the cause of his ideas of them:

1) There must be some cause for my ideas of sensory things:

And since the ideas perceived by sense were much more vivid and explicit
and even, in their own way, more distinct than any of those that I deliberately
and knowingly formed through meditation or that I found impressed on my
memory, it seemed impossible that they came from myself. Thus the remaining
alternative was that they came from other things. (50)

2) This cause is either in me or outside of me:

I cannot understand them clearly and distinctly without me, that is, without a
substance endowed with understanding in which they inhere, for they include
an act of understanding in their formal concept. Thus I perceive them to be
distinguished from me as modes from a thing. I also acknowledge that there
are certain other faculties, such as those of moving from place to another, of
taking on various shapes, and so on, that, like sensing of imagining; cannot be
understood apart from some substance in which they inhere, and hence without
which they cannot exist. But it is clear that these faculties, if in fact they exist,
must be in a corporeal or extended substance, not in a substance endowed
with understanding. (50-51)

3) This cause is not in me [because I am not aware of being this cause]:

But this faculty surely cannot be in me, since it clearly presupposes no act of
understanding, and these ideas are produced without my cooperation and
often even against my will. (51)

4) This cause must therefore be outside me:

Therefore, the only alternative is that it is in some substance different from
me, containing either formally or eminently all the reality that exists objectively
in the ideas produced by that faculty, as I have just noted above. (51)

5) This external cause must be either physical bodies or God:

Hence this substance is either a body, that is, a corporeal nature, which
contains formally or eminently all the reality that exists objectively in
the ideas, or else is God. (51)

6) This cause cannot be God (for then He would be deceiving me):

But since God is not a deceiver, it is patently obvious that he does not send
me these ideas either immediately by himself, or even through the meditation
of some creature that contains the objective reality of these ideas not formally
but only eminently. For since God has given me no faculty whatsoever for
making this determination, but instead has given me a great inclination to believe
that these ideas issue from corporeal things, I fail to see how God could be
understood not to be a deceiver, if these ideas were to issue from a source
other than corporeal things. (51)

7) Therefore, the cause of my ideas of physical must be actually existing physical bodies:

For since God has given me no faculty whatsoever for making this determination,
but instead he has given me a great inclination to believe that these ideas issue
from corporeal things, I fail to see how God could be understood not to be a
deceiver, if the ideas were to issue from a source other than corporeal things.
And consequently corporeal things exist. (51)

For the proof that God is not a deceiver, the following statement of Descartes in Meditation 3 will count:

The whole force of the argument rests on the fact that I recognize that it
would be impossible for me to exist, being such as nature as I am (namely,
having in me the idea of God), unless God did in fact exists. God, I say,
that same being the idea of whom is in me: a being having all those
perfections that I cannot comprehend, but can somehow touch with my
thought, and a being subject to no defects whatever. From these
considerations it is quite obvious that he cannot be a Deceiver, for it is
manifest by the light of nature that all fraud and deception depend on
some defect. (40)

B/ How the view that Descartes articulates in Meditation 6 provides a foundation for mechanistic science:

Recall that I did mention about Descartes' example of the wax and objects that are the subjects of mathematics in Meditation 2 and 5. The special idea about how to obtain the true property of the wax using reasoning and experiment but not using senses proves that Descartes is the founder of mechanistic science or science in general because mechanistic science is the study of the relationship among size, shape, extension and motions of physical or material objects, and because when he studies about the wax, he focuses on its size, shape and its extension which are the most important things that are changing and therefore reveal the true property of it, the extension and the changing of the size and the shape of the wax. All of these things, of course, are subjects that mechanistic science use as said by the above definition. In Meditation 6, Descartes also admits the important role of the quantities rather than the qualities of material objects which include size, shape, extension -- the essential properties that can assist the creation of concepts that are used by mathematics and mechanistic sciences, and by first sensing them he can have better ideas of them.

Moreover, I also recalled that the use of the senses antedated the use of reason.
And since I saw that the ideas that I myself fashioned were not as explicit as
those that I perceived through the faculty of sense, and were for the most part
composed of parts of the latter, I easily convinced myself that I had absolutely
no idea in the intellect that I did not have beforehand in the sense faculty. (49)

Although, senses and material objects are the essential things for the observation and study of science, senses appear less precise and untrusted:

Afterwards, however, many experiences gradually weakened any faith that
I had in the senses. Towers that had seemed round from afar occasionally
appeared square at close quarters. Very large statues mounted on their
pedestals did seem large to someone looking at them from the ground level
and in countless other such instances I determined that judgments in matters
of the external senses were in error. (50)

And Descartes thinks that reasoning makes him think differently than what he perceives through senses:

As to the arguments that used to convince me of the truth of sensible things,
I found no difficulty responding to them. For since I seemed to be driven
by nature toward many things about which reason tried to dissuade me, I
did not think that I was taught by nature deserved much credence. (50)

C/ Strength and weakness of Descartes' attempt to ground science in philosophy:

1/ Strength:

* His belief in the existence of the natural objects which are the main subjects for the study of any science because science is the study of natural things-- things that exist around us.

* His great idea in finding the true properties of material objects. For example, his experiment of the wax shows that unlike other people who don't have any doubt about the senses, Descartes use his observation that assists him checking his senses such as seeing, hearing, touching, smelling ect. in discovering that all of the properties such as shape, size, color and fragrance of the wax are not permanent properties of the wax and can be changed because they all disappear when the wax is melted. Thus, Descartes has built an important foundation of mechanistic science, that is using the doubted mind -- a mind in reasoning -- to discover true properties of material objects.

* His account of using senses as the first action that scientists must use in order to study material objects is a good foundation for science because some scientists even don't use senses at all and use only imagination in establishing scientific concepts.

2/ Weakness:

* Even though Descartes uses senses as the first condition in studying material objects, he later denies senses as an important role in scientific study because he thinks that reasoning is more important. For example, he says that the extension property of the wax cannot be found without 'the doubting mind' that re-checks all the phenomena given by senses:

Not at all; for I grasp that the wax is capable of innumerable changes of this sort,
even though I am incapable of running through these innumerable changes by
using my imagination. Therefore this insight is not achieved by the faculty of
imagination. What is it to be extended? Is this thing's extension also unknown?
for it becomes greater in wax that is beginning to melt, greater in boiling wax,
and greater still as the heat is increased. And I would not judge correctly what
the wax is if I did not believe that it takes on even greater variety of dimensions
than I could ever grasp with imagination. It remains then for me to concede that
I do not grasp what this wax is throught imagination; rather, I perceive it through
the mind alone. (33)

* For the example of the wax, it is obviously that Descartes did not use his mind alone, since he couldn't obtain the extention of the wax without first doing an experiment on it. Thus, Descartes' accomplisment is not by reasoning alone but by a combination of senses and reasoning; however, his "first doubting mind" is what he acclaimed as his reasoning achievement in his succesful experiment of material objects.

* In deed, although in science and especially in mathematics, many mathematicians and physicists did come up with theories that are the results of their "first doubting mind" that something needs to be re-examined in the process, and many theories are just the result of reasons or by a priori. Morevoer, many others compiled and created scientific conceptions through observations and using senses such as Newton's theory of gravity because it is obviously that Newton couldn't come up his theory of the earth's gravity without "first seeing a falling apple or falling objects to the ground". Thus, Descartes heavy account on only reasoning is not a good ground for science.

References

Descartes, Rene. "Meditations on First Philosophy". Modern Philosophy - An Anthology of Primary Sources. Eds. Roger Ariew and Eric Watkins. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1998. 22-62.

The Drama of Socrates' Trial

1/ Does Socrates claim to know the answers to the questions that he asked the Athenians who were unable to answer?



Socrates knew the answers to the questions that he asked the Athenians during his trial. For instance, the first accusation the Meletus charged against him was that he was a wise man and a student of all things in the sky and below the earth, and that he used it to disgrace the gods, and even taught those things to others for money. When Socrated defended himself against this charge, he asked Meletus and other Athenians to give proofs for this accusation, but they couldn't do it. To prove that he did not charge fees for his students, Socrates gave a list of the men whom he had taught such as Gorgias of Leontini, Prodicus of Ceos, Hippias of Elis, and Evenus. He said that those men, instead, had taken his knowlege to teach others and made people pay money to them. (Apology 19e-20a,b,c)

To prove that he was not the one who studied things beyond the common and therefore were wise, Socrates argued that he had been telling all the wise men whom he met that he was not wise. First of all, Socrates said that the kind of wisdom that was blamed on him was human wisdom and not the other kind of wisdom and that other wise men were wiser than him because they possessed a wisdom that was higher than human wisdom. The first witness that he called upon was the God of Delphi. Socrates then told the story of his friend, Chaerephon, who went to Delphi to ask who was wiser than Socrates, and the Pythian replied that no one was wiser than Socrates, but the reason why the oracle said that was because Socrates had declared before the oracle that he had not been wise at all, and that for him, wisdom was worthless ( Apology, 23a,b). Therefore, the gods knew that Socrates possessed a good personality, modesty, and that Socrates was also wise because he knew there still were more things to learn and his knowledge was not advantageous at all.

To prove that he did not disgrace the gods, Socrates told the stories of his own venture to find men who were wise or not wise in order to know whether what the gods said was true or not, and the result was that no wise men whom he had contacted with were truly wise. Socrates said that for every man he met and talked with, he found out that they were not wise, and when he let them know that they were not wise, they became dislike him. Therefore, instead of becoming famous and popular, Socrates became unpopular and had many enemies. Socrates reasoned that since those wise public men claimed that they knew thing of which they did not really know while Socrates knew what he did not know; that was why Socrates knew they were just foolish and boastful people who loved to adorn and overpraise themselves. The fact that Socrates acknowledged that he himself knew what he did not know showed that he knew something that other wise men did not know, i.e., they thought they knew something when they did not know it. That means that they didn't have any precise knowledge of what they had known or had not known. Socrates also didn't forget to state specifically who were among those wise people; he said they were poets, craftmen, and politicians. For that reason, Socrates claimed that he had helped in proving that what the gods said was correct that no men was wise, and that human wisdom was worth little or nothing. Socrates also proved that because of this service to the gods, he lived in poverty.

2/ Does Socrates prove that he is not guilty of one or both of the official charges against him?

Socrates did prove that he was not guilty of both of the charges against him, but not by the exact truth of the matters but by his cunning reasonsing and intelligent analysis. What I mean is that it was just because of the oracle about his wisdom that made him go around and talk to wise men to try to find out if the oracle was true, and because of this mission, he had to use reasoning and intelligent analysis to analyze about what other wise men knew and whether they were wise. For the first charge, I already explained in the above paragraphs; according to what Socrates said and according to his rationalization, I think he had skiffully proved that he had been partly slandered on the first charge. For the second charge which was his guilty of corrupting the young and for not believing in the gods in whom the city believes, Socrates proved the following:

When Socrates called Meletus to tell the jurors, who were the men of Athens, to acknowledge that he was the one who corrupted them, they were silent and didn't know what to say ( Apology, 24a,b,c). Socrates then argued that if he wanted to corrupt his associates, he also ran the risk of being harmed by them because Socrates thought that the people who were bad would do something bad to others. Therefore, how could he be willing to do such an evil action deliberately, for if he had done that, he would not have done that purposefully but unwillingly. Socrates even took this opportunity to reverse the charge back to Meletus that Meletus was guilty of ignorance and slander, and that Meletus had never been at all concerned with those matters befor accusing Socrates.

For the charge that he did not believe in the gods, Socrates explained the following: He never wrote books with theories against the gods, and one of the wise men did that was Anaxagoras. Socrates then said that Meletus claimed that he believed in spiritual things and taught about them, whether new or old. But Socrates reasoned that if he believed in spiritual things, he must inevitably believed in spirits. So if he believed in spirits, he must also believed in gods because gods were spirits.

3/ Socrates seems to have shown that a significant and influential portion of the Athenian citizen population did not know what they said they knew. Explain what political problems this would cause in Athens, and why it would cause these problems. What was Socrates' "service to the god," and how does Socrates think his "service to the god" will help Athens address these problems?

As I explained in part (1) and (2) above, Socrates twice condemned that Meletus did not know what he should have known before accusing Socrates. First, he claimed that Meletus did not make any investigation before accuising him, that Meletus listened to other people such as Anytus and Lycon, and acted on behalf of the craftmen, the politicians, and the poets. Second, Meletus had given no thought to the subjects about which he broght Socrates to trial. Finally, Socrates attacked the whole justice system for its prejudice manner by the fact that he would run on the risk on the side of law and justice rather than join them when they engaged in an unjust course (32a,b,c). Socrates said that he was a righteous man whom the god ordered to do what he had been doing, teaching the spiritual things to the public; therefore, by prosecuting a good man like him, the justice system would do more harm to themselves and to the public than to him.

For the Athenian citizen population, Socrates said that the same result applied to them if they did not know what they thought they knew. For example, Socrates said people who were to fear death were the same with the people who thought that they knew things when they actually did not know. Because Socrates said that "no one knew whether death may not be the greatest of all blessings for a man, yet men fear it as if they know that it is the greatest of evils" (29b). Also he thought that to fear death was to disobey the gods because the gods punished men who committed sin with death. For other matters, since Socrates knew that the gods disliked the people who were arrogant and thought that they themselves were wiser than the gods, if this population, which he mentioned specifically as poets, craftmen, politicians continued acting and teaching their wisdom, they would be impious and disobeyed to the gods. However, the most important disastrous sequence of this ignorance of them was the fact that they did not care for others but only care for themselves. Socrates claimed that those wise men used their knowledge and wisdom to benefit themselves, and not to benefit the public or the gods, and he gave a specefic example that they used their knowledge to earn money.

For question: What was Socrates' service to god? I think, first of all, Socrates said that he served the gods by proving what the god Pythian said was true that no one was wiser than him - this I already listed as an answer in part (1) above. Next, Socrates claimed that by teaching the spiritual things, he proved that he believed in spirits, and therefore believed in the gods. Third, Socrates said that by acting as a good man, without taking into account the risk of death and by only caring whether what he did was right or wrong, he lived the life of a philosopher which the god ordered him to live, and so he obeyed god's command. Therefore, by these services to the god, he taught the public the spiritual things that god wanted him to do, and by doing this, he benefited the public as well as the gods. But the main advantage of his teaching was to improve the public to become better citizens. Thus, by letting the public as well as the justice system knew what they didn't know before, Socrates helped them see their deficiencies that they never thought of until they met and talked with him. Of course, by this condemning and this contemptuous manner Socrates had for the government, he would cause a chaos and untrustworthiness between the public and the government; that was why finally, Socrates' verdict was decided by them as a death sentence. In conclusion, Socrates claimed that what he taught the people he met, including the system justice who brought him to trial so that they would open their eyes and would learn more about what they didn't know - to act right and justly to serve the public and the gods better - because Socrates thought that he was a good man, was superior to a majority of people, was god's gift and that god had ordered him to do what he had been doing.

Refernces

Plato. Five Dialogues - Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Meno, Phaedo. 2nd ed. Trans. Grube, G.M.A. Eds. Cooper, John M. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 2002.