Hallo, this is Dr. Bin Song in the course of introduction to philosophy at Washington College.

In light of the situation of the on-going global pandemic of Covid-19, and its seemingly unstoppable vigor in the U.S., we are witnessing a phenomenon in the American society which is very disturbing from a philosophical point of view. In the U.S., there is a strong trend of public opinion navigated by top politicians and pundits to be “anti-science,” and thus, to challenge the authority of scientists and experts during the process of policy makings in face of this public health crisis. This trend has contributed significantly to the direly high number of infection and death in the U.S.

This phenomenon looks particularly striking for me, and I also believe it looks so for people who share a similar personal experience with me. I grew up in a non-Western country, and have a memory on how in the colonial era, Western countries used their advanced science and technology to defeat our indigenous cultures, and ever since, to learn, pursue, and even transcend the scientific achievement of Western countries has become a national priority for many of these once-colonized non-Western countries. However, while non-Western countries are trying to imitate what the U.S has achieved in science, a large proportion of American citizens seem to not respect science at all, even if this would imply the tragical death of their fellow citizens!

So, the question is: why so? Why could it happen that in such a robust democracy as in the U.S., the country has the best scientists in the world and the strongest advocacy on freedom of speech, while voters can significantly defy against science so as to have irreversibly influenced the making of defective (to say the least) public policies?

This question, believe me, is very philosophical, because more than two thousand years ago, in ancient Greece, there was a giant philosopher who asked almost exactly the same question to the Athenian democracy, the very democracy which is often seen as the original model of the liberal democracies all over the world today. And this philosopher is Plato (c.a. 429-347 B.C).

Plato grew up during the Peloponnesian War, and learned with Socrates as his student for an extensive period of time in his youth. After Socrates was sent to death by the democratically elected Athenian court, Plato spent another 12 years travelling around, and studying with another philosopher, the mystic mathematician Pythagoras. During this time, he also began a lifelong relationship with the ruling family of Syracuse, and frequently gave advice on how to govern the city-state. After turning into his 40s, Plato returned to Athens, and founded his school named “Academy.” This is also allegedly the first liberal arts college in the Western civilization.

The question asked by Plato, which is extremely similar to the one that I just asked, is that: why did Athens kill Socrates? In other words, why did such a proud and powerful democracy kill its most intelligent citizen?

As discussed in last unit of this course, Socrates chose the sentence of death rather than being exiled because he had a faith in democracy. Despite being acutely aware of the fault of democracy, Socrates still believed that only in a democracy, can its citizens retain the right of questioning, and thus, sincerely believe what they do on the basis of vetting alternative answers to their questions. However, as Socrates’s most staunch and outspoken student, Plato understood his teacher’s death as more a sign of the stubborn and wicked ignorance of the Athenian mob, rather than as embodying any intrinsic strength or merit of the Athenian democracy. More importantly, in order to answer the question why Athens killed Socrates, Plato applied the Socratic method which he learned from Socrates to systematically tackle issues that the later development of philosophy was intensively focusing upon, such as the issue of metaphysics to explore what really exists in the world, the issue of epistemology to investigate, if some essential realities exist behind the appearance of the world, how humans can know them, the issue of ethics on how to differentiate good from bad human behaviors or habits, and the issue of political philosophy on who should be a ruler. In fact, Plato could be considered as the first systematic philosopher in human history, and because of this, some historian even claimed that the entire history of Western philosophy is just a long footnote to Plato.

Nevertheless, among all the writings of Plato’s, there is one work to stand prominently, and its title is The Republic. In The Republic, using the mouth of Socrates, Plato depicts a utopian state which is centered upon the supreme government of a philosopher-king, and thus represents his ideal of the best politics that humans can ever imagine. From this work, we select Book VI for this week’s required reading, and this excerpt also presents the most exemplary thinking of Plato to answer his question, why did Athens kill Socrates?

So, Why did Athens kill Socrates, its most intelligent citizen?

In the first part of the excerpt, Plato talks about who should be a ruler of a state. His view is that the person who affords to be a ruler should have genuine knowledge of rulership, viz., the knowledge about how to govern, how to organize, and how to put right persons into the right positions so as to realize the overall justice of their state. But what does genuine knowledge look like? Plato says that it would be like the knowledge of mathematics. In mathematics, once we have a definition of a triangle, for instance, and all its proven attributes, such as the sum of its three angles equal to a flat one, then, every particular triangular thing in the physical world, no matter how different they are from each other, must comply with the knowledge. By the same token, Plato thinks that genuine human knowledge is always about abstract objects in an intelligible world, and these intelligible objects are eternal, unchanging, always manifesting harmony and proportion. Plato has a great name for these intelligible objects, viz., this is a world of “forms.” After all, who can be a ruler? Plato’s answer is that only those people who have genuine knowledge of the forms of “rulership,” “governance,” “justice” and all others related to good government can rule, and accordingly, these people transcend limited opinions of human individuals and are able to claim “authority” over those public opinions. For Plato, this sort of people, who are definitely not many, have a proper name, “philosopher,” and his ideal state will be governed by a philosopher-king. In today’s context, particularly the one we just discussed above, these people would be those scientists and experts on public health, so that when a crisis of pandemic takes hold, ordinary citizens in a country can expect genuine knowledge from these scientists and experts about how to control it.

Since the difference between philosophers vs non-philosophers, between the authority of knowledge vs uninformed public opinions be understood as such, why did the Athenian democracy kill the best philosopher in its time? And why were the views of scientists and experts frequently overlooked and disregarded by the public during a crisis of public health?

Plato’s answer to this question is crystalized in his very famous “allegory of ship”. So, in the second part of the excerpt from The Republic, Plato tells a story about a mutiny among sailors against their captain. In this story, the owner of a ship, the captain, could not navigate the ship, so he has to appoint a leader among his sailors to hold the helm. Now, there were two people who can potentially be this leader. One is a demagogue who can do nothing but cater for the needs of those rebellious and greedy sailors; and another is a “star-gazer,” who knows genuinely how the season changes and how the wind blows on the seas, and thus, can really navigate the ship well. However, this star-gazer does not appeal to the needs of the sailors, since according to his best judgement, this star-gazer thought of those needs as largely irrelevant to the knowledge of seafaring, and what matters most for him is to get those authentic knowledge of seafaring. So, the result of the mutiny is quite expectable: since every sailor has the equal amount of freedom to vote, the demagogue is elected, and the star-gazer is disregarded, and what lies ahead of the crew would be just a complete disaster since no one in power really knows how to navigate the boat.

There is one sentence that summarizes the conclusion of Plato’s allegory of ship quite well, which is “the pilot should not humbly beg the sailors to be commanded by him – that is not the order of nature; neither are ‘the wise to go to the doors of the rich’ … but the truth is, that, when a man is ill, whether he be rich or poor, to the physician he must go, and he who wants to be governed, to him who is able to govern.” (The Republic, Book VI 490e)

So, in a word, why does it happen that in a democracy, philosophers were disregarded, Socrates got killed, while the authority of scientists and experts are distrusted and challenged? For Plato, this is because there is one intrinsic dimension to the existing political institution of democracy which can utilize the cruel power of the majority vote, viz., “the tyranny of the majority,” to defeat the authority of knowledge and merit. Because of the existence of this dimension of democracy, if the majority of voters remain uninformed, no institutional arrangement within such a democracy can guarantee an elected leader who has the needed knowledge and merit of leadership, and all policies can accordingly be made wisely for the genuine benefits of humanity.

My questions to you are that: do you agree with Plato’s answer? Do you have any better answer? Or, are you thinking about solutions to deal with this intrinsically self-defeating dimension of democracy?

Required Reading:

Plato, The Republic: Book VI (484a-490e), Trans. by Benjamin Jowett.

Recommended Further Reading:

About “freedom of speech and meritocracy,” please read Bryan W. Van Norden, “The Ignorant Do Not Have a Right to an Audience,” in The New York Times (June 25, 2018)

About an analysis of American politics about and during the pandemic, please read Jonathan Chait, “American Death Cult,” in New York magazine (July 20, 2020)

Recommended Further Watch:

Quiz:

1, which philosophers have influenced Plato’s thought?

A, Socrates
B, Pythagoras
C, Aristotle

2, According to the required reading from The Republic Book VI, which of the following qualities belong to a philosopher?

A, Good memory
B, Having eternal, true knowledge
C, Being a lover of learning
D, Generosity
E, Being sociable and gracious rather than jealousy and covetous
F, Not fearing death and thus, being brave

3, According to the required reading from The Republic Book VI, Adeimantus critiques philosophers because he thinks philosophy is too abstract, and thus, useless for the public. Is this statement true or false?

4, Who is the analogy of “philosopher” in the allegory of the ship?

A, The star-gazer and able navigator.
B, The captain as the owner of the ship.
C, The elected leader of the sailors.

5, According to Plato, where should the authority of a leader come from?

A, the majority vote of the people
B, the needed knowledge and merit for genuine leadership.
C, the appointment of a monarch
C, the divine command of the God.

6, Plato calls abstract objects of genuine human knowledge as “forms,” and thinks that these forms are eternal, unchanging, and lies in an intelligible world which is different from the becoming and corruptible physical world. Is this statement true or false?

7, At the end of the lecture in this unit, Dr. Bin Song asked several questions. What’s your thought on them? Please choose some of these questions, and write a couple of sentences to answer it or them.

Hallo, this is Bin Song at the course of Introduction to Philosophy at Washington College.

Our course starts from telling my personal story on how I entered the study of philosophy, and then, we discussed ancient Greek philosophy as a tradition of rational criticism and debate. In last unit, we introduced the charismatic figure, Socrates, who would like to sacrifice his life to his belief in democracy and his practice of philosophy.

Now, it is a perfect time to introduce one of the central skills that a philosophy major is required to command: logic, and the art of Reasoning. Quite obviously, without the tool of good reasoning, those ancient Greek philosophers cannot rationally debate each other; and Socrates cannot apply his Socratic method to have extensive dialogues with his Athenian fellow citizens on varying topics either, such as what is justice, courage, goodness, etc. In other words, the birth of philosophy in ancient Greece is distinguished by its logical mindset, a mindset to use evidence, reasoning, and argument to collectively advance human knowledge.

I also linked two recent articles here to help you appreciate how important the skill of reasoning is. One is titled “Want a good job? Major in philosophy.” Its thrust is that the major of philosophy teaches students how to think critically, logically and independently, and it also teaches students how to find better solutions to problems with an open-minded awareness that real life problems normally do not have a singular, one-size-fit-for-all solution. And these skills of critical thinking and problem solving prepare philosophy students for a variety of jobs, and in particular, increase the needed momentum and adaptivity in their middle careers, no matter what job they would be pursuing. Another article is “how teaching philosophy could help combat extremism,” and its major claim is that the critical and independent thought to which a philosophy student is habituated is a powerful antidote to the simplistic, tribalist and extremist thinking that today’s extremely open yet dividing media environment is prone to inculcate. In other words, individually, learning how to think philosophically prepares one for jobs, while from the perspective of society, the consistent implementation of critical thinking, rational debate and free inquiry is absolutely vital to the well-functioning of a democracy.

Even if we do not quote any history or article, the significance of learning how to think makes a common sense. In the human society, if you look around, everything that humans have accomplished start from an idea. If you want to become rich, you need a business idea; if you want to speak a new language, live in a new country, and have new human relationships, you need an idea about how to do so. More importantly, when many ideas existing in your mind, how to differentiate good ideas from bad ones, how to connect these ideas to form a solid body of knowledge, and how to learn new ideas to complement the old, all of these lie rightly at the initial moment of any human activities. In this sense, we will find that the ability to think rigorously, creatively, and independently before delving into any depth of human activities is really what distinguishes humans from animals, humans from machines and more importantly, distinguishes human individuals from each other. In other words, this ability makes us not act from impulse, not act from old programming, but from our independent, autonomous, and creative center of human personality: reason.

Good, enough for the significance of the ability of thinking. Let’s move on to the basics of Logic, and the art of reasoning.

Regarding the art of reasoning, or how to make good argument, there are two aspects of it, one is technical and another is ethical. The technical side of it pertains to the basics of logic, and the ethical side of it is about how to rationally debate, persuade, and learn from your disputants. Let’s proceed following one aspect after another.

So, the first question is: what is logic?

Logic is the study of reasoning, which provides standards for distinguishing good reasoning from bad reasoning.

But, before we get to the standards part, the immediate second question is: what is reasoning?

All reasoning consists of two components: (1) at least one premise, and (2) one conclusion. The premise(s) of your reasoning provides the reasons or evidence that you are using to support your conclusion. Accordingly, the conclusion of your reasoning is a statement that you believe on the basis of your premise(s). For example, the following is reasoning: “I should stay quiet when others are studying in the library because that’s what I would expect of others.” Here, I am concluding that I should be quiet based on the premise that I would expect the same from others.

There are two general types of reasoning: Induction and deduction

Inductive reasoning is reasoning in which you base your conclusion on a premise(s) that supports your conclusion with some degree of probability. That is, the premise(s) gives you a strong reason for concluding something but doesn’t guarantee that this conclusion is true. For example, you might conclude that the courses in this fall semester (this refers to 2020 Fall) would end up in a few weeks after the Thanks Giving holiday so that you have booked a travel for that time, because in your mind, the school most often ended that way before. However, while this conclusion may be quite probable given your past experience, it is not automatic and certain. Indeed, something could happen abruptly so as to change the normal schedule. The current pandemic is one best example for this. So, all inductive reasoning is like this. Even if all your premises are true, your conclusion is at most probable, not certain.

Deductive reasoning is different. If the premise(s) of deductive reasoning is true, your conclusion will automatically be true too. In other words, there is an automatic transmission of truth value from the premises to the conclusion in deductive reasoning. In fact, we say that deductive reasoning is “valid” (viz., acceptable) only if the conclusion is automatically true when the premises are true. For example, the following is valid deductive reasoning: “If someone is a human then they will someday die; Socrates is a human; therefore Socrates will someday die.” Notice that, in the case of this reasoning, if the premises are true, the conclusion is automatically true. It’s guaranteed to be true. However, it is usually the case that the premises in valid deductive reasoning are not themselves certain. For example, the premise that if someone is a human then they will someday die is not certain because it is itself a conclusion drawn from inductive reasoning.

To see this, you need only consider how we can claim to know that all humans die. We believe this premise because we have concluded it from the further premise that all humans have always died in the past. But, it is still possible that in the future we might figure out how to make ourselves immortal. At least, the idea of immortal human beings is not self-contradictory, and hence, is possible in reality. So, we can’t conclude with certainty that if someone is a human, they will someday die. Of course, it’s very likely and for practical purposes we might not question it; but, strictly speaking, it is only probable and not automatically true.

So, even though the conclusions of deductive reasoning are automatically true given that their premises are true, the conclusions of such reasoning may still not be true. This can be the case when at least one of the premises is false. For example, consider this reasoning: “If you are a human then you will live forever; you are a human; therefore you will live forever.” Here one of the premises is probably false. So the conclusion that you will live forever is not automatically true. It would have to be true only if both of the premises were true.

From these discussions, we also find that deductive reasoning could be sound or valid. If all of the premises of a valid deductive argument are true then its conclusion will also be true. Such a deductive argument that has all true premises is called sound deductive reasoning. So, in valid deductive reasoning the conclusion is automatically true if all of its premises are true; and in sound deductive reasoning all of the premises are actually true.

In light of these discussions, since reasoning comprises of inductive one leading to probable conclusion, and of deductive one leading to certain conclusion as long as its premises are also certain, our standards to judge whether one’s reasoning is good or bad include the following points: whether they raise enough evidences to support the high probability of their conclusion, and whether they conform to the rules of deductive reasoning so that their arguments appear to be valid and sound. If not, we definitely can use two counter-arguments to refute them: that is, we can raise contrary evidence to refute that inductive conclusion, and we can also point out inconsistency of their deductive reasoning.

However, even if our own argument contains highly probable inductive reasoning, and sound deductive reasoning, we cannot guarantee that our arguments always sound persuasive to our audience. Why? That’s because as mentioned, apart from the technical side of reasoning, viz., the basics of logic that we just mentioned, there is another ethical side of argumentation and debate. In other words, for that sort of rational debate favored by ancient Greek philosophers which leads to the advancement of human knowledge, we do not only need the basics of logic, we also need a practical art of persuasion, one that could turn our audience into willing listeners even if we may disagree each other on certain points of views. Believe me, this side of the art of reasoning turns out to be more difficult than commanding the rules of good reasoning, although the latter is also utterly important. I also believe that this difficulty does not sound unfamiliar to you. An instinct of human beings which may be inherited from our aggressive animal nature is that we usually misunderstand disagreement of views as a sort of clash of persons, so that whenever someone refutes our view, our initial impulse tends to perceive it as a personal attack, and then, we will wield everything in our hand to fight back. In this case, debate may easily turn into being irrational, and the ideal of learning and advancing human knowledge through rational debate will be just thrown under the bus.

So, here, I will raise a six-step program for the art of persuasion, which is also the ethical part of the art of reasoning. And its central concern is how to criticize with kindness, and thus, realize the ideal of rational debate. Do remember, if you want to be a good artist of reasoning, you must practice both the technical side, and this ethical side of the art consistently. Neither of the two aspects can be dispensed with another.

So, how to deliver a successful critical response?

1. You should attempt to re-express your target’s position so clearly, vividly, and fairly that your target says, “Thanks, I wish I’d thought of putting it that way.” This means you always understand your disputant accurately and thoroughly before criticizing their views. In an actual dialogue, this step could be said in a sentence like “Peter, let me try to grasp what you have said. … Is this what you mean?” or “Sarah, I do not fully understand the point you just mentioned … Can you clarify it a little bit before we’re moving forward? Did you say that …? Is this what you mean?”
2. You should list any points of agreement (especially if they are not matters of general or widespread agreement). This is very important for the art of persuasion, which shows the existence of a common ground among disputants, and thus, would not turn the dialogue into overtly antagonistic or hostile.
3. You should mention anything you have learned from your target. This point deepens the last point even further, isn’t it so? The necessity of rational debate consists in the limitedness of knowledge of any human individual. So we need to come together to debate, to analyze, and more importantly, to learn from each other. A highlight of what you have learned from your disputant is a must-do before moving the debate forward.
4. Only then are you permitted to say so much as a word of rebuttal or criticism. Considering the standards of good reasoning we mentioned above, you can refute the view of your disputants through raising contrary evidences or pointing out their inconsistency. In the future, if you continue to sign up in philosophy courses, you will learn more methods of refutations and how to apply those methods into varying contexts. But overall, to raise contrary evidences and point out inconsistency are always a good start.
5. If your refutation pertains to ethical issues, make sure you do before you say it. For instance, you may refute that your interlocutor’s view not to donate to a certain charity is too selfish. In order that this refutation is really persuasive, you need to do before you say it, which may mean that you must already have a such a record of donation, or you can make your interlocutor believe that you will make such a donation. Regarding ethical issues, humans are persuaded by examples and deeds more than by words.
6. After all these five steps have been successfully conducted, you need to put yourselves into your disputants’ shoes, and explain from their perspective, how their pre-established views can accept your critique, and thus, how this critique can enlighten their own understanding on the addressed issue. In this way, you help your disputants realize that as a team, you are learning from each other, and collectively, you are contributing to the advancement of human knowledge, which is what rational debate is all about.

Ok, let me simplify these six steps in some pithy words so that you can memorize them:

To present persuasive criticism or refutation to others, you need to:

• 1, Recapitulate others’ views.
• 2, Find where you agree with them.
• 3, Explain what you have learned from them.
• 4, Present your criticism rationally, viz., following the basics of logic.
• 5, If disputing ethical issues, do before you say.
• 6, Explain how others can accept your criticism.

Recommended further reading:

Daniel Dennett, Intuition Pumps And Other Tools for Thinking (W. W. Norton & Company, 2013)

Recommended further watch:

Quiz

(1) When you arrive at your office, and find that the door has been opened; based upon your past experience, you conclude that the janitor is working inside right now. What type of reasoning are you utilizing to reach this conclusion?
A, Induction
B, Deduction

(2) A gym trainer is struggling to figure out whether he should quit the job he loves because he has the least clients among peer trainers. He thought that “All marketing strategies are to sell products that clients do not want, and I hate it. There is a specific way of marketing for gym trainers to promote their training programs. Therefore, I would not learn this marketing skill in my profession even if this means the decrease of the number of my clients.” What type of reasoning is this gym trainer using to reach his conclusion?
A, Induction
B, Deduction.

(3) If you get it correct on last question, how would you describe that gym trainer’s reasoning?
A, it is a valid and sound deductive reasoning.
B, It is a valid deductive reasoning because if the premises are true, the conclusion is true.
C, It is not a sound deductive reasoning because some premise of it is not true.

(4) There are two components for the art of reasoning. What are they?

A, the basics of logic which state the rule of good reasoning.
B, the art of persuasion which lays out the rules for the ethical practice of argumentation.

(5) There are six steps for the art of persuasion addressed by this meeting. Please find a topic to debate with your friends, family members, or peer-students following these steps, and then, submit a short report of the debate. In the report, you only need to state the topic of the debate, people’s views on the two sides, and what you have experienced or learned from the process. The report needs to be within 100 words.