Notes and Comments on Phaedo -- 35

18 September 2023

Notes and Comments on Phaedo – 35

Continuing my series on Phaedo, I am using the Harold North Fowler translation published by the Loeb Classical Library:

“Then one of those present – I don’t remember who it was – said: ‘In Heaven’s name, is not this present doctrine the exact opposite of what was admitted in our earlier discussion, that the greater is generated from the less and the less from the greater and that opposites are always generated from their opposites?  But now it seems to me we are saying that this can never happen.’

“Socrates cocked his head on one side and listened.  ‘You have spoken up like a man,’ he said, ‘but you do not observe the difference between the present doctrine and what we said before.  We said before that in the case of concrete things opposites are generated from opposites; whereas now we say that the abstract concept of an opposite can never become its own opposite, either in us or in the world about us.  Then we were talking about things which possess opposite qualities and are called after them, but now about those very opposites the immanence of which gives the things their names.  We say that these latter can never be generated from each other.’

“At the same time he looked at Cebes and said: ‘And you – are you troubled by any of our friends’ objections?’

“’No,’ said Cebes, ‘not this time; though I confess that objections often do trouble me.’

“’Well, we are quite agreed,’ said Socrates, ‘upon this, that an opposite can never be its own opposite.’

“’Entirely agreed,’ said Cebes.

“’Now,’ said he, ‘see if you agree with me in what follows: Is there something that you call heat and something you call cold?’

“’Yes.’

“’Are they the same as snow and fire?’

“’No, not at all.’

“’But heat is a different thing from fire and cold differs from snow?’

“’Yes.’

“’Yet I fancy you believe that snow, if (to employ the form of phrase we used before) it admits heat, will no longer be what it was, namely snow, and and also warm, but will either withdraw when heat approaches it or will cease to exist.’

“’Certainly.’

“’And similarly fire, when cold approaches it, will either withdraw or perish.  It will never succeed in admitting cold and being still fire, as it was before, and also cold.’

“’That is true,’ said he.

(Ibid, Fowler, pages 353-357, 103B-103E)

1.  Someone present at the jail objects to the way the current discussion is moving based on the previous discussion about opposites.  In the previous discussion it was argued that opposites generate each other ultimately leading to the conclusion that life and death generate each other.  In contrast, the current discussion is saying that opposites dissolve each other and are distinct from each other rather than cyclically linked.

Socrates responds by saying that the previous discussion was about material things, but in the current discussion they are talking about ‘abstract’ objects.  Another way to look at this is that in the first discussion the focus was on opposites as they appear in the third hypostasis, the material realm of time and differentiation; but in this conversation they are talking about opposites as understood, and experienced, in the second hypostasis, or nous, mind, intellect.

2.  The main difference between opposites in materiality and opposites in the realm of nous is that materiality is the realm of differentiation whereas in nous things are not yet differentiated in the way they are in materiality.  I addressed this a bit in my previous posts. 

3.  This is a little complicated.  The highest hypostasis is the Good and the One and it has no differentiation; that is why it transcends concepts, as well as any kind of affirmation or negation.  The second hypostasis, that of nous, is more differentiated than the One but the differentiated aspects found in nous have no material content that separate aspects from each other.  The three primary facets of nous are Life, Mind (Intellect), and Being.  But these are not three separate things in the way that three houses are separate things, or three trees are separate things.  The three facets of the second hypostasis are a unity, but in materiality we have to talk about the second hypostasis from these three perspectives because in materiality they are not unified.

4.  I think it is helpful to go back and look at the previous discussion about opposites.  I’ll quote from 70E, page 245 in the Fowler translation:

“’Now,’ said he, ‘if you wish to find this out easily, do not consider the question with regard to men only, but with regard to all animals and plants, and, in short, to all things which may be said to have birth.  Let us see with regard to all these, whether it is true that they are all born or generated only from their opposites, in case they have opposites, as for instance, the noble is the opposite of the disgraceful, the just of the unjust, and there are countless other similar pairs.  Let us consider the question whether it is inevitable that everything which has an opposite be generated from its opposite and from it only.  For instance, when anything becomes greater it must inevitably have been smaller and then have become greater.’”

In this passage Socrates is referring to material things such as animals and plants.  In the passage above Socrates specifically puts aside material things in his discussion of opposites when he says,

“’Now,’ said he, ‘see if you agree with me in what follows: Is there something that you call heat and something you call cold?’

“’Yes.’

“’Are they same as snow and fire?’

“’No, not at all.’

“’But heat is a different thing from fire and cold differs from snow?’

“’Yes.’

In this passage Socrates is referring to qualities as realities not dependent upon their association with material instantiations.  Socrates is moving the conversation from the third hypostasis to the second hypostasis of Mind/Nous. 

5.  There is a contemplative dimension to this discussion about opposites and how they relate to each other in the different dimensions of Platonic cosmology.  A friend of mine referred to these passage as a kind of ‘yoga’; Pierre Hadot might have thought of them as ‘Spiritual Exercises.’  What I mean is that these presentations of opposites found in Phaedo can be used as objects of meditative inquiry.  Meditative inquiry differs from analytic inquiry.  Meditative inquiry, or contemplation in the Platonic sense, means to lift the mind to higher dimensions by following the presence of what is being considered to its source.  One of the clearest examples of this in Platonic literature is beauty; the instruction is to consider beauty in different contexts such as a beautiful tree, a beautiful song, and a beautiful house.  By approaching these multiple examples of beauty it is possible to shift our attention from the material object to beauty as such, and by doing this one enters into noetic beauty from which all material beauty derives.

In a similar way, all these examples of opposites can be used in a contemplative context to lift our mind and soul to the source of opposites which lies in the noetic dimension.  Notice how in the earlier quote Socrates instructs to not just take men, but to also consider plants and animals in contemplating whether or not they are born from their opposites (that is to say whether being alive and being dead mutually generate each other). 

Socrates then goes on to offer further opposites, such as greater and smaller, to expand the range of the contemplation.  This is a classic approach to Platonic contemplation.  Each of these passages about opposites can be used in this manner to deepen our understanding of the coming and going of opposites in the material realm and their ultimate reality in the noetic.