Ancient Philosophy

Pre-Socratics

Protagoras

In the second half of the 5th century BCE, a skeptical movement emerged in opposition to the great pre-Socratic systems previously discussed. The most significant figure of this movement was Protagoras, the leader of the sophists. Initially, the term "sophist" bore no negative connotation; it was synonymous with "teacher." A sophist was someone who earned a living by imparting knowledge to young individuals, knowledge believed to be beneficial for their practical lives. Since society did not provide such education at public expense, sophists taught only those who had personal means or whose parents were financially capable. This circumstance imbued the activities of sophists with a certain class bias, exacerbated by the political climate of the time. In Athens and many Greek cities, democracy had triumphed politically, yet no measures were taken to reduce the wealth of old aristocratic families. It was primarily the wealthy who embodied what we now recognize as Hellenic culture; they had access to education and leisure, and their travels largely softened their traditional prejudices, while the time spent in debate sharpened their intellect.

What was then termed democracy left the institution of slavery untouched. Slavery enabled the affluent to enjoy their wealth without oppressing free citizens. However, in many cities, particularly in Athens, the poorer citizens harbored a double animosity towards the wealthy—stemming both from their dependency and tradition. The rich were often suspected—sometimes justifiably—of impiety and immorality, of undermining ancient beliefs, and possibly of attempting to destroy democracy itself. Thus, in the cultural sphere, political democracy became intertwined with conservatism, while those who championed innovation in culture leaned towards political reaction.

A somewhat similar situation exists in contemporary America, where "Tammany Hall" primarily represents a Catholic organization created to defend traditional theological and ethical dogmas against the encroachments of enlightenment. However, the enlightened in America are politically weaker than their counterparts in Athens, as they have failed to unite with the plutocracy. Nonetheless, there exists in America one significant and highly intellectual class interested in protecting the plutocracy—the corporate legal class. In some respects, the functions of this class are analogous to those performed by sophists in Athens.

Athenian democracy, despite its considerable limitations that excluded slaves and women, was, in certain respects, more democratic than any modern system. Judges and most executive officials were chosen by lot and served for short terms. Thus, akin to our jurors, they remained average citizens, with biases characteristic of the middle class and lacking professionalism. In Athens, generally, every case was heard by a large number of judges. Plaintiffs and defendants, or accusers and the accused, appeared in person, representing themselves rather than through professional lawyers. Naturally, the success or failure of a case heavily depended on oratory skills and the ability to appeal to popular prejudices. While individuals had to deliver their own speeches, they could hire specialists to compose speeches for them or, as many preferred, pay for guidance in the cunning required to succeed in court. It was believed that sophists taught these arts.

The Age of Pericles in Athenian history parallels the Victorian era in English history. Athens was a wealthy and prosperous city, not overly troubled by wars. It enjoyed a democratic system under the governance of aristocrats. As previously observed in relation to Anaxagoras, the opposition to Pericles from the democracy gradually gained strength; his supporters were attacked one by one. The Peloponnesian War broke out in 431 BCE. Athens, alongside many other regions of Greece, was ravaged by plague. The population of Athens, which had reached 230,000, significantly dwindled and never returned to its former levels. Pericles himself was removed from command in 430 BCE and fined by the court for the illegal appropriation of public funds, though he was soon reinstated. His two sons perished from the plague, and in the following year (429 BCE), he himself died. Phidias and Anaxagoras were condemned. Aspasia was also prosecuted for impiety and maintaining a house of ill repute but was acquitted.

In such a society, it was natural for those facing the risk of incurring the hostility of democratic politicians to seek to acquire legal skills. For Athens, despite its strong commitment to the practice of persecution, was, in one respect, more liberal than contemporary America, as those accused of impiety and corrupting youth were allowed to defend themselves. This explains the popularity of sophists among one class and their unpopularity among another. Yet, in their own estimation, sophists served rather impartial ends, and it is undoubtedly true that many of them genuinely cared about philosophy. Plato devoted his efforts to caricaturing and discrediting them, but one should not judge sophists solely by Plato’s polemics against them. Consider, in a lighthearted mood, the following excerpt from Plato's dialogue "Euthydemus," where two sophists, Dionysiodorus and Euthydemus, seek to confuse a simple man named Ctesippus:

“Tell me, do you have a dog?”—“Yes, and a very fierce one,” replied Ctesippus. —“Does she have puppies?”—“Yes, also fierce.” —“And their father, surely, is also a dog?”—“I have even seen him mating with the female.” —“Well then, this dog is yours?”—“Of course.” —“Then this father is yours, thus your father is a dog, and you are the brother of the puppies.”

In a more serious vein, consider the dialogue titled "Sophist." It presents a logical discussion regarding definition, using the term "sophist" as an illustration. Currently, we are not interested in the logic of this discussion. At this moment, I wish to quote only its concluding statement:

"This name denotes a hypocritical imitation of an art based on opinion, which entangles another in contradictions, an imitation belonging to the realm of representational art, which conjures phantoms and distinguishes in its creations not the divine but the human aspect of trickery; whoever considers a complete sophist to arise from this flesh and blood would seem to express himself quite justly."

A well-known anecdote about Protagoras—undoubtedly apocryphal—illustrates the connection of sophists to the courts as it appeared to public consciousness. It is said that Protagoras taught a young man on the condition that the latter would pay him for his instruction only if he won his first trial. However, it turned out that the young man's first trial was instigated by Protagoras himself in order to collect his fee.

Yet it is time to leave these preliminary remarks and examine what is actually known about Protagoras.

Protagoras was born around 500 BCE in Abdera, the city from which Democritus hailed. He visited Athens twice, the second visit occurring no later than 432 BCE. He drafted a code of laws for the city of Phuria in 444-443 BCE. There is a tradition that Protagoras faced legal persecution for impiety, but this is seemingly untrue, despite the fact that he wrote a book titled "On the Gods," which began with the assertion: "Concerning the gods, I cannot know whether they exist or not, or what they are like in appearance. For there are many obstacles to knowledge—the obscurity of the matter and the brevity of human life."

His second visit to Athens is satirically depicted in Plato's Protagoras, while his teachings are more seriously explored in Theaetetus. Protagoras is primarily known for his doctrine that "Man is the measure of all things—of things that are, that they are, and of things that are not, that they are not." This doctrine is interpreted to mean that each individual serves as the measure of all things, suggesting that when people differ, there exists no objective truth that renders one correct and the other incorrect. Essentially, this is a skeptical doctrine, apparently grounded in the "deceptiveness" of the senses.

One of the three founders of pragmatism, Ferdinand Schiller, often referred to himself as a disciple of Protagoras. This is likely because Plato, in his Theaetetus, asserted—while interpreting Protagoras—that one opinion may be superior to another, even if it cannot be truer. For instance, when a person suffers from jaundice, everything appears yellow to them. Thus, it is futile to claim that things are not truly yellow but are instead colored as a healthy person perceives them. However, we can assert that since health is preferable to sickness, the opinion of the healthy person is superior to that of the jaundiced individual. This perspective is evidently akin to pragmatism.

For practical purposes, disbelief in objective truth makes the majority the arbiters of what ought to be believed. Consequently, Protagoras defended law, custom, and traditional morality. Although, as we have seen, he was uncertain about the existence of gods, he was convinced that they deserved worship. This viewpoint is evidently valid concerning a person whose theoretical skepticism is consistent and logical.

Protagoras spent his mature life in a sort of continuous lecturing tour across the cities of Greece, teaching for a fee anyone who yearned for practical success and higher spiritual culture. Plato protested against the sophists' practice of charging for education, partly from a position of snobbery (by modern standards). Plato himself possessed ample resources, and thus he appeared unable to comprehend the needs of those lacking financial means. It is curious that contemporary professors, who see no reason to forgo salaries, often echo Plato's accusations against the sophists.

However, there is another point in which the sophists differ from most contemporary philosophers. Typically, each teacher—excluding the sophists—established a school that exhibited certain characteristics of brotherhood, with varying degrees of communal living (often resembling monastic life) and generally espousing an esoteric doctrine not proclaimed to the public. All this was natural where philosophy arose from Orphism. Among the sophists, there was nothing akin to this. What they taught, in their view, was not connected to religion or morality. They taught the art of debate and provided as much knowledge as was necessary for that purpose. Generally speaking, they could, much like modern lawyers, demonstrate how to defend or contest a given opinion, without caring to defend their own conclusions. Those for whom philosophy served as guidance in life, intimately tied to religion, were naturally shocked; to them, the sophists appeared frivolous and immoral.

To some extent—though one cannot ascertain the magnitude of this circumstance—the hatred that the sophists elicited not only from the general public but also from Plato and subsequent philosophers was attributable to their intellectual honesty. The pursuit of truth, when sincerely undertaken, must ignore moral considerations. We cannot know in advance what truth will prove to be in relation to what is deemed instructive in a given society. The sophists were willing to follow the evidence wherever it might lead them. This often brought them to skepticism. One sophist, Gorgias, claimed that nothing exists, and if anything does exist, it is unknowable, and even if something exists and is knowable by one individual, that individual cannot convey their knowledge to others. We do not know what Gorgias's arguments were, but I can well imagine that they possessed a logical strength that compelled Gorgias's opponents to seek refuge in teachings. Plato always endeavored to promote views he believed would lead people to virtue. Plato was hardly ever intellectually honest, as he consistently evaluated doctrines based on their social significance. Yet even in this, he was not honest, for he pretended to follow arguments and judge based on purely theoretical criteria, while in fact directing the debate in such a manner that it ultimately led to virtue. Plato introduced this vice into philosophy, where it has persisted since. The character of his dialogues is predominantly defined by his hostility toward the sophists. One of the shortcomings of all philosophers since Plato has been their investigations in ethics proceeding from the assumption that they already know the conclusions they are to reach.

In Athens, at the close of the fifth century BCE, there were individuals who seemingly taught political doctrines that appeared immoral to their contemporaries, as well as to the democratic nations of our time. In the first book of Plato's Republic, Thrasymachus argues that there is no justice apart from the interest of the stronger, that laws are created by governments for their own benefit, and that there are no objective criteria by which to measure one’s conduct in the struggle for power. Callicles, according to Plato (in Gorgias), advocated a similar doctrine. The law of nature, he argued, is the law of the stronger, but for convenience, humans established institutions and moral precepts to restrain the strong. Such doctrines are now more widely disseminated than they were in antiquity. Regardless of how they are perceived, they were not characteristic of the sophists.

During the fifth century BCE, independent of the role the sophists played in this process, Athens experienced a transformation from rigid puritan simplicity to a witty and rather cruel cynicism in its struggle against the dull and equally brutal resistance of a waning orthodoxy. The beginning of this century is marked by Athens's defense of the Ionian cities against the Persians and the victory at Marathon in 490 BCE. By the end of the century (in 404 BCE), Athens suffered defeat at the hands of Sparta, and in 399 BCE, Socrates was executed. After this, Athens lost its political significance, yet it gained undeniable cultural preeminence, lasting until the rise of Christianity.

Certain circumstances in the history of Athens during the fifth century BCE are crucial for understanding Plato and all subsequent Greek thought. During the first Persian War, glory primarily came to Athens due to their decisive victory at Marathon. Ten years later, during the second Persian War, Athens still maintained its preeminence among the Greeks at sea, but on land, victories were largely attributed to the Spartans—the recognized military leaders of the Hellenic world. However, the Spartans held narrow provincial views; they ceased fighting the Persians as soon as the latter were expelled from European Greece. The defense of the Asian Greeks and the liberation of the islands conquered by the Persians were successfully undertaken by Athens. Athens emerged as the leading naval power and established strong imperial control over the Ionian islands. They thrived during the rule of Pericles, who was a moderate democrat and a moderate imperialist. The grand temples, whose ruins still recall the glory of Athens, were erected under his auspices to replace those destroyed by Xerxes. The city rapidly grew wealthy and culturally advanced. As often occurs in such times, particularly when wealth is derived from external trade, traditional morality and beliefs fell into decline.

During this time, Athens was home to an extraordinarily large number of brilliant individuals. Three great playwrights—Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides—all belonged to the fifth century BCE. Aeschylus participated in the battle of Marathon and witnessed the conflict at Salamis. Sophocles was still orthodox in his religious views. However, Euripides was influenced by Protagoras and the spirit of free thought of his time; his interpretations of myths were skeptical and deconstructive. Aristophanes, the comedic poet, mocked Socrates, the sophists, and philosophers in general, yet, despite this, belonged to their circle. In Plato's Symposium, he is depicted as being on very friendly terms with Socrates. The sculptor Phidias, as we have seen, was associated with the circle of Pericles.

During this period, Athens's superiority was more artistic than intellectual. Except for Socrates, none of the great mathematicians and philosophers of the fifth century BCE were native Athenians. As for Socrates, he was not a writer and confined himself to oral discussions.

The onset of the Peloponnesian War in 431 BCE and the death of Pericles in 429 BCE marked the beginning of a dark period in Athenian history. The Athenians maintained naval superiority, while the Spartans held the advantage on land, repeatedly invading Attica during the summer months, excluding Athens itself. Consequently, Athens became inundated with refugees, and its population suffered greatly from a devastating plague. In 414 BCE, the Athenians dispatched a significant expedition to Sicily, aiming to capture Syracuse, an ally of Sparta; however, this endeavor ended in failure. The war hardened the hearts of the Athenians, rendering them cruel and vengeful. In 416 BCE, they seized the island of Melos, executing all the able-bodied men and enslaving the remaining inhabitants. In his play The Women of Troy, Euripides protested against such barbarity.

The conflict also bore an ideological dimension, with Sparta championing oligarchy while Athens stood for democracy. Paranoia festered among the Athenians, who suspected some of their own aristocrats of treachery, which many believed contributed to Athens' eventual maritime defeat at the Battle of Aegospotami in 405 BCE.

By the war's end, the Spartans established an oligarchic regime in Athens known as the "Thirty Tyrants." Some of these thirty, including their leader Critias, were former students of Socrates. They were rightly unpopular, and within a year, they were overthrown. With Spartan consent, democracy was restored, but it was a bitter and resentful democracy. An amnesty prevented the proponents of democracy from openly seeking revenge against their internal foes, yet they seized any opportunity to circumvent the terms of the amnesty and pursue their enemies. It was in this tumultuous atmosphere that Socrates was condemned and executed in 399 BCE.