Philosophical Andreia in Plato’s Republic

Abstract

In the most famous image in Plato’s Republic, Socrates peoples an underground cave with prisoners who believe that the shadows they see on the walls of the cave represent reality. He asks: what would it take for one of these prisoners to escape from his shackles and attempt the ascent to the light of the sun? There is one virtue in particular without which no prisoner can hope to escape the cave, and that is the virtue that I will call: philosophical andreia. This thesis is an inquiry into Plato’s treatment of philosophical andreia in the Republic. As we will see by way of detailed analysis of the dramatic and argumentative levels of the dialogue, philosophical andreia consists in the unity of what I will call “spiritedness” and “perseverance” in facing the many obstacles to the acquisition of wisdom. I will take the image of the cave as scaffolding for my inquiry, locating each of Socrates’ interlocutors within the cave according to their possession of the spiritedness and perseverance needed to escape from it. And I will take Socrates as performing the philosopher’s heroic katabasis to the cave in his attempt to liberate his interlocutors from its shadows. In the Socrates of the Republic, Plato presents us with a new kind of hero – the philosopher hero – and paradigm of a new kind of courage: philosophical andreia.