Dialogue Between Socrates and Meno

The topic that I found very compelling was Plato’s “Meno”. This section is a dialogue between Socrates and Meno. Meno asks Socrates if virtue can be taught or if it is learned through practice. Socrates explains that he himself does not truly know what virtue is and has not come across anyone who does. Socrates then asks Meno to try and define the term virtue. Meno then describes virtue with being relative to gender roles.

In the book, “Five Dialogues: Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Meno, Phaedo, Plato” Meno states, “A man’s virtue consists of being able to manage public affairs and in so doing to benefit his friends and harm his enemies and to be careful that no harm comes to himself; if you want the virtue of a woman, it is not difficult to describe: she must manage the home well, preserve its possession, and be submissive to her husband” (pg.

61). Socrates quickly rejects Meno’s definition. He says that while his definition is understandable, there has to be something that all those instances have in common.

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A good definition should mention this common origin or essence.

Meno then provides and second definition. In short, Meno who is slightly confused at this point, describes virtue as the capability to rule over other people. Socrates then explains that this rule can only be true if it is justice. “For justice is virtue” (pg. 62). However, Socrates explains that Meno has defined a concept of virtue by only talking about one kind of virtue, not the overall essence.

Meno tries to define virtue again by saying that virtue is to have power and find happiness in beautiful things. Socrates points out that all men do not desire good things, that they sometimes desire bad things or things that are not good for them. He the questions Meno, asking him does he mean that they bad things that they desire are believed to be good or that they are aware that they are bad but still desire them anyway.

Meno believes that both situations could be true. Meno then concedes that virtue can only be expressed in a good way, or virtuously. Meno then has an idea of what virtue could be, but they still end up with questions and not completely defining what virtue actually is. Meno is completely confused, he explained Socrates’ questioning and numbing, giving us an idea of how his questioning made others feel. With this he discusses a paradox with Socrates.

The paradox is that we either know something or we do not know something. If we truly know something, we don’t need to ask anymore questions about it. But if we don’t know something we still can’t ask questions about it since we cannot possibly know what we are looking for and won’t know if we have actually found it. He dismisses this paradox and makes several more arguments using the slave boy demonstration where he tries to prove that all learning is recollection. I found all of this to be a very interesting topic for many reasons. All of these values and philosophical outlooks are equally expressed by Meno and Socrates. While I agree with somethings, I pose an objection to others.

The first thing I found interesting was that when Meno originally described what virtue was, he addressed the stereotypical gender roles. Men were seen as virtuous if they are able to handle their public affairs, to be skilled at fighting and being brave. Ultimately being a man’s man. While for a woman to be virtuous she has to be good at taking care of the household, and children, all while being absolutely submissive to the man. While this is clearly not true, I found it interesting how general roles and norms were and could still be a fundamental basis of virtue. Another thing I found interesting was that the definition of virtue is still not defined after the conversation.

Some can say that the definition is still not completely true or figured out. We as humans have so many definitions of virtue, and I don’t believe that we know the true essence of virtue. The discussion of whether virtue can be taught poses many questions and discussions. Moral virtue is known to be a type of knowledge, or a type of true opinion. But could moral virtue be taught? I found this very interesting. I however, do think that moral virtue can be taught. For example, a baby or small child could not possess moral virtue naturally. They are taught by their parents to behave in the right manner. We as humans learn virtue through practice and repetition.

Whenever morality is involved, I do believe that we are taught right from wrong. We are not born to be morally correct. If this was true, there would be no hate, no crimes, no war, and no reason to even debate about these topics. Meno’s objection and paradox resonated with me in some ways, I do not agree with him. Even if we believe we know something, we should still inquire or ask questions about it. Like Socrates says, we don’t know what we really know. To seek and acquire knowledge is better that claiming to have knowledge that you can’t be sure you have. This reading was a perfect example of claiming to be versed in something you actually know very little about. Meno began the conversation with Socrates confident, and left puzzled and insecure of his knowledge.

The next section of reading were of Aristotle. In book III Aristotle develops an idea of ethical responsibility. He explains that our understanding as humans actions can depend on whether or not those actions are voluntary or involuntary. A voluntary action is one that is consciously acted upon by a person, or it could be an action that comes from a choice, or decision making, which in turn can receive praise or blame. There are two categories of voluntary action: one with choice and one without choice.

A voluntary action with choice is one that is done with thought and decision making behind it, while a voluntary action without choice is one that is done because of impulsivity, or and overcoming feeling of emotions. An involuntary action however, can come from things that are forced often times externally, or induced by ignorance. In Book III of “Nicomachean Ethics”, it is described as “What is forced has an external principle, the sort of principle in which the agent, or [rather] the victim, contributes nothing” (pg. 30). On the other hand, ignorance can also make actions involuntary. An example of this could be telling a woman in the grocery store congratulations on her pregnancy. She now becomes offended because she is not pregnant. While you meant no harm, you were ignorant in the situation, and made an ignorant involuntary action. Involuntary actions, can usually be looked over, or pitied. Aristotle further explains that some actions are mixed.

But mixed actions are more similar to voluntary actions. They are done consciously and willingly, but contain some elements of voluntary and involuntary actions. It seems that the best way to analyze moral correctness is choice, which is of course made voluntarily. We as humans make choices and achieve some sort of desired end, but we are not to be responsible or our involuntary actions and their outcomes. I found this section to be compelling, but I also found some areas that could have been explained or talked about more. While he talks about voluntary and involuntary actions, Aristotle seems to not talk of any definitive definition of responsible action that could tell the readers what kind of actions one should be responsible for. He simply only tells the readers what we are not responsible for.

This ultimately means that because we are ignorant, no one intentionally does devious things. Does this mean that bad people are only bad due to their ignorance? This topic of discussion is very compelling, being as how people may have distinctively different answers. I however think that a bad person is only bad because of their ignorant actions. ‘Bad’ people know and understand right from wrong, and could have made better decisions to depict otherwise.