Opinion (Part I)

Socrates: We must then examine further the matter we now have under consideration. Reasoning shines light and makes it clear to selves that a specific kind of life exists.

Protarchus: What do you mean? What kind of life are you speaking of?

Socrates: In the feeling of being filled and being emptied and all other things that move either towards the preservation of living beings or to the dissolution of them. And whatever usually causes pain transforms into the opposite, for which we are sometimes grateful.

Protarchus: True

Socrates: But what of an individual who is between these opposite conditions?

Protarchus: What do you mean between?

Socrates: When an individual suffers from their present condition, but they also recollects the pleasure that will ultimately end their suffering, although they are not currently being filled. Shall we say that this self is in the middle of two opposite conditions or not?

Protarchus: It must be said.

Socrates: Are they wholly suffering or wholly pleased? Which one?

Protarchus: By Zeus, they suffer double pain from the body's feelings and the soul's enduring anticipation.

Socrates: How, O Protarchus, can you say their pain is double? Is it not sometimes the case that when an individual is empty, they exist in a state of hopefulness, reassuring themselves of being filled, yet at other times, they are quite hopeless?

Protarchus: Yes, for sure.

Socrates: Do you not believe that when an individual hopes of being filled, they feel pleasure by recollecting fullness? And yet, by being empty, at the same time feels pain.

Protarchus: They must so.

Socrates: In this state, do humans and all living beings feel pain and pleasure at the same time?

Protarchus: It would appear to be so.

Socrates: And what do you think about an individual who is empty and has no hope of being filled? In this condition, must they not suffer the double pain? And yet you relied on the memory of past pleasure in all cases until the present double pain.

Protarchus: Most true Socrates.

Socrates: Now, let us apply the examination of these feelings of ours as follows.

Protarchus: In what way?

Socrates: Which of these feelings do we say is true or false, pain or pleasure? Or shall we say some are true and others false?

Protarchus: How could pleasure and pain exist when they are false?

Socrates: How is it then, O Protarchus, that fears may exist either true or false, or beliefs may exist either true or false, or opinions may exist either true or false?

Protarchus: I admit that true and false opinions may exist, but I cannot accept this for the other ones.

Socrates: What are you saying? We risk seeking reasoning of no small importance.

Protarchus: This is true.

Socrates:  Let us see if this reasoning relates to the matters that have just passed, O son of a glorious father.

Protarchus: Perhaps it does.

Socrates: Tell me then, for I am forever in a state of wonder over the proposals we were struggling through.

Protarchus: Which ones do you mean?

Socrates: Let us show that false pleasures are not true, nor true pleasures are false.

Protarchus: How is that possible?

Socrates: As you say, neither when in a dream nor awake, nor if a man is out of his senses through madness or has lost his judgement in other ways, is it possible for him to think he feels pleasure when he is in no way feeling pleasure, or to think he suffers from pain when he does not feel pain.

Protarchus: We have all assumed this always to be so, O Socrates.

Socrates: But is this correct? Should we look into whether it is right or not?

Protarchus: We should look into it.

Socrates: Let us talk a little more clearly about matters concerning pleasure and opinion. Is it not true that we have an opinion?

Protarchus: Definitely.

Socrates: Is it not true that we feel pleasure?

Protarchus: Yes.

Socrates: And, there is something that is the object of our opinion?

Protarchus: Without any doubt.

Socrates: And, there is an object of pleasure with which we are delighted?

Protarchus: Most definitely.

Socrates:  Then, in having an opinion, whether it be right or wrong, the one who holds the opinion abides firmly by it.

Protarchus: How could an opinion be lost by one who has it?

Socrates: Also, in enjoying pleasure, whether it be right or wrong, the one who experiences pleasure is not separated from the enjoyment.

Protarchus: Yes, for sure.

Socrates: Well, why is opinion allowed to become false and, in turn, allowed to become true, and yet, pleasure we only allow to be true? One must now consider if opinion and the feeling of pleasure are true in exactly the same way.

Protarchus: We need to consider this.

Socrates: Is it so that both truth and falsehood occur because of opinion, and by assigning one of these, opinion becomes something besides what itself is, and thus, every opinion is made to have the qualities of being either true or false?

Protarchus: Yes.

Socrates: And alongside this, we must also agree on whether it is only opinions that have these qualities, whilst pleasure and pain are simply themselves without having these qualities.

Protarchus: It has become apparent that we must.

Socrates: Well, it is easy enough to see that they do also have some qualities. We agreed a while ago that both pleasure and pain could be great or small, and each one can also be vehement.

Protarchus: This is true.

Socrates: And if a harmful quality is added to pleasure or opinion, shall we not say that the opinion becomes harmful, or the pleasure becomes harmful in the same manner?

Protarchus: Of course, O Socrates.

Socrates: And if rectitude is added to them, shall we not say that the opinion is right, or pleasure is right because rectitude has been added?

Protarchus: Of necessity, we must.

Socrates: But what if our opinion is mistaken by us? Must we not acknowledge that our opinion misses the mark and is incorrect and that we are not right to hold onto such an opinion?

Protarchus: Of course we must.

Socrates: What then happens if we are mistaken and miss the mark in the object of our pain or pleasure? Shall we correctly name this pain or pleasure as good or beautiful?

Protarchus: This is not possible if pleasure does not hit the mark.

Socrates: And surely pleasure often seems to take hold of us when accompanied by false opinion, not the correct one?

Protarchus: Without a doubt. In this case, we should call it a false opinion. But, as for pleasure itself, no man would ever call it false.

Socrates:  You are extremely quick, O Protarchus, to defend the reason and knowledge of pleasure.

Protarchus: This is not so. I am just speaking what I hear.

Socrates: Do we not differentiate, O companion, between pleasure that is accompanied by right opinion and knowledge and the other kind of pleasure that takes hold of us when accompanied by false opinion and ignorance?

Protarchus: The difference between them, I say, is not little.

Socrates:  Let us now reach the point where we ponder the differences between these selves.

Protarchus: You take the lead in the most appropriate way.

Socrates: Then I shall lead as follows.

Protarchus: What way?

Socrates: We agree that we say some opinions are false, and other opinions are true.

Protarchus: We do say this.

Socrates: And we were saying that pleasure and pain accompany each of them, I mean true and false opinion.

Protarchus: Definitely so.

Socrates: Then, is it not always so that opinion and the power to form an opinion comes to light from our memory and our perception?

Protarchus:  Without a doubt.

Plato, The Philebus

For readers seeking to follow this part of Socrates' thought process regarding the greater good of the human being, the fragments should be read in the following order:

Pleasure I & II, 

Infinity & Bound I & II, 

Memory, 

Desire, 

Opinion I & II, 

Pleasure III.

Note from the editor of Classical Philosophy