Plato's moral and political philosophy
Subtitle: individual and polis in the Republic
By: Gerald Cardenas Cantu
Publisher: University of California, Irvine
Published: 2010
Place of publication: Irvine, Calif
Language: eng
Format: [electronic resource] :
Number of pages: 201
ISBN-13: 9781109691245
Description: Interpretations of the relation between Plato's political and moral philosophy are mired in controversy. What is the polis' good? What is individual happiness? Is the polis' good reducible to individual happiness, or is it something above and beyond? Is individual happiness reducible to one's contribution to the polis' good, or is it defined independently? Consideration of these questions is tied up with the metaphysics of the polis, for different metaphysical views yield different answers.       Chapter 1 exposits and criticizes two main views in the literature. Neither view satisfies the condition of adequacy that interpretations of Plato's political philosophy must be compatible with two prima facie theses: The first is an ethical thesis stating that individual happiness is irreducible to the polis' good. The second is a political thesis stating that the polis' good is irreducible to individual happiness. Political organicism holds that the polis is an organism and individuals are organically dependent on the polis. Organic dependence violates the ethical thesis since it has the implication that individual happiness is defined by one's contribution to the polis' good, for it as senseless to ask whether the individual has value apart from the polis as it is to ask whether a hand has value apart from the organism to which it is attached. Individualism holds that the polis is reducible to features of individuals. This metaphysical account leads to the view the polis' good is nothing but the aggregate of individual happiness, which violates the political thesis.  In chapter 2 I develop an interpretation that does satisfy the condition of adequacy. Weak organicism establishes the political thesis while remaining logically consistent with the ethical thesis. Weak organicism includes both the view that the polis is an organic whole (whose good is organic unity) composed of classes of functionally integrated individuals and a Platonic account of the mereological relations of the polis implying that individuals as such are not structurally dependent on the whole polis (whereas individuals qua citizens, i.e., individuals instantiating a sortal part or class, are structurally dependent). These relations make conceptual space for the possibility that the happiness of individuals as such is non-reductive, the ethical thesis expressly accepted by Plato and which is incompatible with political organicism. Chapter 3 considers the relation between the polis' good and individual happiness. It assesses a specific individualistic argument accounting for that relation through a case study of the primitive polis, from which the evidence of the individualistic argument is derived. I show that the individualistic conclusion that the polis' good is derivative of the good of realizing individual happiness does not follow from the evidence that the end of the polis is the realization of individual happiness. This criticism deflates individualism as a way of accounting for the relation between the polis' good and individual happiness. Thereafter I outline my view, according to which the polis' good and individual happiness are irreducible to one another and of coordinate importance.       Weak organicism is consistent with Plato's ethical thesis, but it does not establish it. In chapters 4 and 5, I exposit a non-reductive conception of individual happiness and argue that all individuals in the polis are happy. I focus specially on the happiness of workers, since the guardians' happiness is much discussed in the literature.       Chapter 4 frames the issue in terms of showing that individuals are happy if they are capable of satisfying the necessary condition that they are virtuous. Then I give a dispositional account of virtue, which I call genuine virtue. Genuine virtue implies that in order to be virtuous, individuals must have each virtue as a disposition: they must choose virtuous actions from settled patterns of judgment. Philosophic virtue qualifies genuine virtue insofar as wisdom is had with knowledge. Since knowledge is an unknown variable, and therefore the content of the attitudinal dispositions of philosophers is unknown, it is not clear they would choose just acts from settled patterns of judgment. Nevertheless, I offer reasons for thinking philosophers would have dispositions to choose just actions for the sake of inner justice, which is sufficient to satisfy the conditions of genuine virtue.       Chapter 5 considers whether workers can be virtuous.
Notes: Title from PDF t.p. (ProQuest, viewed on Nov. 17, 2010 ).

Thesis (Ph.D., Philosophy)--University of California, Irvine, 2010.

Includes bibliographical references.