Unity of Platos Gorgias The

Stauffer, Devin

doi:10.1017/cbo9780511499005

Cited by 33 publications

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“…Recent writings on the Gorgias, drawing on considerations rather different from those I have presented here, offer versions of this optimistic reading of the dialogue, on which Socrates is proposing a collaboration between philosophy and Gorgianic rhetoric: seeWeiss 2003 andStauffer 2006. …”

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confidence: 84%

The Doctor and the Pastry Chef

Moss¹

2007

Ancient Philosophy

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The Gorgias' ostensible subject is rhetoric, which it defines as a "producer of persuasion." 1 But the dialogue is also centrally concerned with another kind of persuasion: Socrates' attempts to persuade his interlocutors to pursue the life of justice and philosophy. Socrates tells his interlocutors that the subject at issue between them is the most important one of all: "in what way one should live." 2 And he tries to persuade them to reject their own answers to this question and accept his own instead, not only attacking their views and making positive arguments for his own, but also saying outright and repeatedly that such persuasion is his goal: "I want…to persuade you to change your mind…Am I persuading you at all…?" (493c4-d1; cf. 494a3-5, 513c8-d1 and 527c5-6). The Gorgias not only emphasizes that Socrates wants to persuade people to choose the right life, however; it also emphasizes that he very often fails. This is dramatized in the progression of the dialogue: Gorgias is polite if uncomfortable; Polus is openly incredulous about Socrates' claims even when his own have been formally refuted (480e1-2); Callicles ends by being so annoyed that he drops out of the conversation altogether, leaving Socrates to converse with himself in a parody of his failure to engage others (505d4 ff.). The dialogue offers explicit comments on Socrates' lack of 1 PeiyoËw dhµiourgÒw, 453a2. Translations are mine except where otherwise noted. 2 500c3-4; compare the equivalent formulations "Who is happy and who is not" (472c6-d1), and "What a man should be like and what he should do" (487e8-488a1). 2 persuasiveness as well: Polus says that no one will believe Socrates' strange views; 3 Callicles accuses him of being so inept with words that he "couldn't put a speech together correctly before councils of justice or utter any plausible or persuasive sound" (486a1-b2) 4 , and later says not only that he himself is not persuaded by Socrates but that this is "what happens to most people" (tÚ t«n poll«n pãyow) (513c5-6). Of course, Socrates falls short of persuading his interlocutors in many other dialogues, and sometimes they even remark on the fact. No other dialogue, however, draws so much attention to Socrates' failures to persuade. Most significantly, the dialogue emphasizes Socrates' persuasive failures by pitting him against three orators, and pitting philosophy against rhetoric. For rhetoric is presented as a persuader extraordinaire, 5 with particular emphasis on its ability to persuade crowds, i.e. the ignorant many. 6 This makes for a sharp contrast with Socrates, 3 "Couldn't even a child refute you, and show that the things you say aren't true?" (470c4-5); compare Polus' remarks throughout the conversation. 4 Trans. D. J. Zeyl. 5 Plato chooses as its first proponent the famous orator and teacher Gorgias, notorious for extolling the power of verbal persuasion in his Encomium of Helen; when Gorgias and Socrates search for a definition of rhetoric they agree that it is "a producer of persuasion, and that's the long and short ...

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confidence: 84%

The Doctor and the Pastry Chef

Moss¹

2007

Ancient Philosophy

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“…8 Theo Kobusch geht noch einen Schritt überwunden werden. Edmonds (2012) Stauffer (2006), der den Versuch unternommen hat, mit diesem Ansatz den gesamten Dialog einer Neuinterpretation zu unterziehen. Er greift darin ähnlich gelagerte Überlegungen von Nichols (1998), Kastely (1991) und Black (1958) auf.…”

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Argumentativ überwunden, aber nicht überzeugt? : zur Wirksamkeit der sokratischen Elenktik in Platons Gorgias

Kaiser¹

2017

Graeco-Latina Brunensia

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The Gorgias is frequently read as a dialogue in which Socrates fails to convince especially his last interlocutor Callicles to adopt a philosophical way of life. Instead, Callicles becomes increasingly indignant about the repeated refutation of his personal convictions and eventually refuses to participate in the conversation any longer. In general scholars explain this result by Callicles' recalcitrance. It is supposed that the dialogue illustrates the impossibility of persuasion if an interlocutor refuses to cooperate -which would imply certain limitations of the Socratic elenchus. In contrast, this paper demonstrates that Socrates indeed achieves his aim of shaking Callicles' faith. By decoding the medicine and court imagery, ubiquitous throughout the whole dialogue, it will be argued that, far from being an illustration of failure, the text instead indicates that Socrates' conversation with Callicles is successful -and thus proves the efficacy of the elenctic method even on reluctant opponents.

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Platonic βραχυλογία and Aristotle on Say-What-You-Believe

Crane

2021

Argumentation Library

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Unity of Platos Gorgias The

Cited by 33 publications

References 0 publications

The Doctor and the Pastry Chef

The Doctor and the Pastry Chef

Argumentativ überwunden, aber nicht überzeugt? : zur Wirksamkeit der sokratischen Elenktik in Platons Gorgias

Platonic βραχυλογία and Aristotle on Say-What-You-Believe

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