Why is rhetoric controversial according to plato

But before starting to do it, Cicero warns, it is necessary to win listeners favor at the beginning of the speech, then to establish a subject of a dispute and only after it to begin to prove what the speaker insists on and what he. In this triad the main role is played, according to his opinion, a process of finding of what needs to be told and with what arguments to confirm told.

The solution of the first question is reached by means of the proof. Determination and assessment of an act is carried out by correlation to the corresponding type on the basis of concepts and definitions.

At permission of the third question there are used concepts of correctness and a wrongfulness, justice and injustice. Really, when he speaks about proofs in the judicial speech, then he pays attention to value of commonplaces, or. Nontechnical means of persuasion. But it does not mean that Cicero did not recognize a role of logic and philosophy in rhetoric. However, he was skeptical, for example, to the logic of the stoic chrysippus as too artificial and therefore as little use in oratory art, where, according to him, it is necessary to rely on Aristotelian logic and dialectics.

Therefore his treatises about oratory are written not in the form of traditional handicraft manuals and directions, which were widespread at rhetorical schools of that time, but in the form of free dialogue in which thoughts of the author are expressed by the best-known speakers in the past. Some western researchers consider an original contribution of Cicero to rhetoric, first, development of a concept about a duty of the speaker, secondly, underlining of a role of style and execution of the speech.

However, it is easy to show that tasks which are set for the speaker by cicero were clearly and are accurately formulated still by Aristotle, and partially and Plato. It is slightly more difficultly the situation with a duty of the speaker to achieve consent with audience and also to put some idea to listeners about action and to induce them to such action. There is Cicero, relying on the experience and practice of that. As for the roman rhetoric after Cicero, the need for public speeches was considerably fallen after falling of the republic and emergence of monarchy, except for judicial oratorical skill.

But even the nature of judicial eloquence was considerably changed. Short rise of oratory and rhetoric after Cicero was connected with a name of mark fabiusquintilian who was considered as the best-known speaker in the last quarter of the century ad. Though Quintilian was also a great admirer of Cicero, but he was guided in the rhetoric not so much for the people and general democratic public, but the coterie of connoisseurs of style and beauty of the speech.

Therefore he wanted to see in the speaker not so much the thinker, then the stylist. It is characteristic that he defines also rhetoric as art to speak well. In this regard there were considerably extended and were enriched the methods and ways of an argumentation, and together with them and possibilities of the rhetoric. Withdrawal from antique tradition in rhetoric, though was designated in the latest roman rhetoric, nevertheless was not expressed in obvious and moreover in a sharp form.

Therefore this stage of rhetoric development can be characterized as transitional from antiquity to the Middle Ages when belief was come to the place of persuasion, which, according to fathers of the church, had to replace also all earlier created means of persuasion.

The rhetorical culture of antiquity is the cornerstone of Europe humanitarian education since the renaissance up to the xviii century. It is not a coincidence that today the remained texts of speeches of antique speakers have historical interest, and moreover they exert powerful impact on the present events, keep huge cultural value, being the role models of convincing logic, inspired feeling and truly creative style.

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Ainur Koshekova koshekova71 mail. North Kazakhstan State University , Kazakhstan. Zhainagul Duisebekova zhainagul. SuleymanDemirel University , Kazakhstan. Received: 10 January Accepted: 09 March The doctrine of eloquence was arisen from generalization and systematization of those methods of conducting polemics, disputes and debates which were widely adopted in antique Greece with its developed political life and fight of different parties for influence on masses.

Therefore it is necessary to be limited only to achievement of the practical purposes and first of all to try to obtain a victory over the opponent by means of the dexterous and estimated on outer effect persuasion techniques. In this case, we are not talking about how to expose the opponent disparagingly and to win in a dispute, but aspiration to find the truth by joint efforts. The rhetoric is differed from analytics and dialectics first of all in the applied character as it is intended to convince people during polemic, of the public speech or lawsuit.

Nontechnical ways of persuasion on his terminology, which are contacted with conclusions made from them. Perhaps, the outstanding speaker of antique Rome mark Julius Cicero was the only exception from them who was permanently emphasizing in the compositions about need of a combination of eloquence to persuasiveness, rhetoric with philosophy. But before starting to do it, Cicero warns, it is necessary to win listeners favor at the beginning of the speech, then to establish a subject of a dispute and only after it to begin to prove what the speaker insists on and what he disproves.

For example, Irani argues against "the standard reading", that "all love" e. But the Symposium makes it explicit that though eros is self-interested, it is not a possessive desire, but a creative one, with the beautiful object inspiring transformative work on the part of the lover d. In this, as in much else, the Symposium and the Phaedrus seem to be in agreement.

The kind of love that takes the nature of the other as central Phdr. Though it is not controversial to claim that psychology is central to the Phaedrus' account of rhetoric d , there is substantial disagreement over what features of the palinode's psychology are relevant, how exactly they contribute, and how if at all, they inform Socrates' own practice in the dialogue.

In Chapter 8, Irani shifts the focus from the chariot allegory to the account of soul as a "self-mover" which precedes it, and argues that this is identified, not with the soul as a whole the charioteer and two horses , but with the rational part alone p. Through comparisons with Alcidamas, it is argued that the "ensouled speech" of the true rhetorician is "a mode of discourse whose power is derived from a person's own intellectual resources, rather than the authority of someone else" p.

Since it is through this activity that we express our nature as self- movers and perfect the kind of creatures we are p. Further, this is possible only for the philosophical lover, who attends to the nature of the other as a reason seeker.

This love of wisdom informs Socrates' love for Phaedrus p. Once this is appreciated we can see that this account of philosophical discourse is the same care of the soul that Socrates identifies in the Gorgias as the political art p. We have, then, an answer to why the attitude towards argument exhibited in the Gorgias cannot benefit: if you seek only to dominate, you cannot attend to the nature of the other as an independent reason seeker, which is our highest good p.

Thus the Phaedrus may be read as justifying Socrates' use of argument as a therapeutic practice. For if it is essential to human happiness that we bring our desires in line with our values, and if it is in virtue of our status as reasoners that we can understand those values, then the role of the rational part of the soul in achieving the human good is assured p.

Irani is right that reading the two dialogues closely together has numerous benefits. Though other studies have pointed to comparisons between the two works, none has explored them so richly. There are times when the drive for continuity eclipses differences, not just between those two works, but also between the second and first parts of the Phaedrus. Rhetoric in the second half of the Phaedrus is practised by someone with knowledge, for the purposes of teaching some form of didactic, or demonstrative, dialectic, which differs from at least Socrates' own practice in the Gorgias , and, arguably, from the philosophy described in the Phaedrus' palinode.

This makes it tricky to identify philosophy in all its forms, at least with the requirements for rhetoric suggested in the Gorgias and developed in the second part of the Phaedrus both of which are concerned with teaching, Grg. It is not just knowledge of the human soul required here as Irani suggests, p. It is worth noting how far this is from Socrates' repeated insistence in the dialogues that he is not a teacher, and shares in no art of speaking e. Apology 17b. This is the sort of difficulty which has led Charles H.

And he asks him to do it in a way that helps to distinguish rhetorical from philosophical discourse: the former produces speeches of praise and blame, the latter answers questions through the give and take of discussion dialegesthai , d10 in an effort to arrive at a concise definition, and more broadly, with the intent to understand the subject. Gorgias is forced by successive challenges to move from the view that rhetoric is concerned with words speeches to the view that its activity and effectiveness happen only in and through words unlike the manual arts to the view that its object is the greatest of human concerns, namely freedom.

But persuasion about what exactly? But surely there are two kinds of persuasion, one that instills beliefs merely, and another that produces knowledge; it is the former only with which rhetoric is concerned.

The analogy of this argument to the critique of poetry is already clear; in both cases, Socrates wants to argue that the speaker is not a truth speaker, and does not convey knowledge to his audience. As already noted, Socrates classifies poetry dithyrambic and tragic poetry are named as a species of rhetoric. Its goal is to gratify and please the spectator, or differently put, it is just a kind of flattery. Strip away the rhythm and meter, and you have plain prose directed at the mob.

The rhetorician is a maker of beliefs in the souls of his auditors a3—4. And without that skill—here Gorgias begins to wax at length and eloquently—other arts such as medicine cannot do their work effectively b ff.

Rhetoric is a comprehensive art. But Gorgias offers a crucial qualification that turns out to contribute to his downfall: rhetoric should not be used against any and everybody, any more than skill in boxing should be. Although the rhetorician teaches others to use the skill justly, it is always possible for the student to misuse it.

This is followed by another damaging admission: the rhetorician knows what justice, injustice, and other moral qualities are, and teaches them to the student if the student is ignorant of them a.

But Gorgias is not a philosopher and does not in fact know—cannot give an account of—the moral qualities in question. So his art is all about appearing, in the eyes of the ignorant, to know about these topics, and then persuading them as is expedient cf. But this is not something Gorgias wishes to admit; indeed, he allows himself to agree that since the rhetorician knows what justice is, he must be a just man and therefore acts justly b-c.

He is caught in a contradiction: he claimed that a student who had acquired the art of rhetoric could use it unjustly, but now claims that the rhetorician could not commit injustice.

A new point emerges that is consistent with the claim that rhetoricians do not know or convey knowledge, viz. Socrates adds that its object is to produce gratification.

To develop the point, Socrates produces a striking schema distinguishing between care of the body and care of the soul. Medicine and gymnastics truly care for the body, cookery and cosmetics pretend to but do not.

Politics is the art that cares for the soul; justice and legislation are its branches, and the imitations of each are rhetoric and sophistry. As medicine stands to cookery, so justice to rhetoric; as gymnastics to cosmetics, so legislation to sophistry. The true forms of caring are arts technai aiming at the good; the false, knacks aiming at pleasure bd. Let us note that sophistry and rhetoric are very closely allied here; Socrates notes that they are distinct but closely related and therefore often confused by people c.

The nub of the matter concerns the relation between power and justice. For Polus, the person who has power and wields it successfully is happy. For Socrates, a person is happy only if he or she is morally good, and an unjust or evil person is wretched—all the more so, indeed, if they escape punishment for their misdeeds.

And if these hold, what use is there in rhetoric? For someone who wishes to avoid doing himself and others harm, Socrates concludes, rhetoric is altogether useless.

Tied into logical knots, Polus succumbs. All this is just too much for yet another interlocutor in the dialogue, Callicles. The rhetoric of the Gorgias reaches its most bitter stage. Callicles presents himself as a no-holds-barred, bare-knuckled, clear-headed advocate of Realpolitik , as we would now call it. Conventional talk of justice, fairness, not taking more than is your share, not pursuing your individual best interest—these are simply ways by which the weak seek to enslave the strong.

The art of rhetoric is all about empowering those who are strong by nature to master the weak by nature. His example is none other than Socrates; philosophy will he says prophetically render Socrates helpless should he be indicted. Helplessness in the face of the stupidity of the hoi polloi is disgraceful and pathetic a-c. By contrast, what would it mean to have power? Callicles is quite explicit: power is the ability to fulfill whatever desire you have.

Power is freedom, freedom is license a-c. The capacity to do what one wants is fulfillment in the sense of the realization of pleasure.

Rhetoric is a means to that end. The quarrel between rhetoric and philosophy, thus understood, ultimately addresses a range of fundamental issues. Its quarrel with philosophy is comprehensive, and bears on the nature of nature; the existence of objective moral norms; the connection if any between happiness and virtue; the nature and limits of reason; the value of reason understood as the rational pursuit of objective purpose in a human life; the nature of the soul or self; and the question as to whether there is a difference between true and false pleasure, i.

Socrates too starts to speak at length, sounds rhetorical at times, and ends the discussion with a myth. Callicles advances a substantive position grounded in a version of the distinction between nature and convention and defends it. Readers of the dialogue will differ as to whether or not the arguments there offered decide the matter.

Is all of rhetoric bad? Are we to avoid—indeed, can we avoid—rhetoric altogether? Even in the Gorgias , as we have seen, there is a distinction between rhetoric that instills belief, and rhetoric that instills knowledge, and later in the dialogue a form of noble rhetoric is mentioned, though no examples of its practitioners can be found a-b.

The Phaedrus offers a more detailed explanation of this distinction. Readers of the Phaedrus have often wondered how the dialogue hangs together. A slightly closer look reveals that any such simple characterization is misleading, because the first half is also about rhetoric, in several different ways. The other two are rhetorical as well, and presented as efforts to persuade a young beloved. All three are justly viewed as rhetorical masterstrokes by Plato, but for different reasons.

The first is a brilliantly executed parody of the style of Lysias an orator and speech writer of significant repute. The themes of poetry and rhetoric, then, are intertwined in the Phaedrus. It looks initially as though both rhetoric and poetry have gained significant stature, at least relative to their status in the Ion , Republic , and Gorgias.

I will begin by focusing primarily on rhetoric, and then turn to the question of poetry, even though the two themes are closely connected in this dialogue. The answer to this crucial question constitutes one of the most famous contributions to the topic. In essence, Socrates argues that someone who is going to speak well and nobly must know the truth about the subject he is going to discuss. The sort of theory Polus and Callicles maintained in the Gorgias is false see Phaedrus e4—a4.

How to show that it is an art after all? Quite a number of claimants to rhetoric are named and reviewed, and readers who have an interest in the history of Greek rhetoric rightly find these passages invaluable. Many rhetoricians have artfully and effectively misled their audiences, and Socrates argues—somewhat implausibly perhaps—that in order to mislead one cannot oneself be misled. It will not only be coherent, but structured in a way that mirrors the way the subject itself is naturally organized.

At this point we might want to ask about the audience ; after all, the rhetorician is trying to persuade someone of something. Might not the speaker know the truth of the matter, and know how to embody it artfully in a composition, but fail to persuade anyone of it? Would not a failure to persuade indicate that the speaker lacks the complete art of rhetoric?

Just as an expert physician must understand both the human body and the body of medical knowledge—these being inseparable—so too the expert speaker must understand both the human soul and what is known about the soul.

The consequence of this approach to rhetoric has now become clear: to possess that art, one must be a philosopher. True rhetoric is philosophical discourse. But what happened to the question about the audience? This last demand is a matter of practice and of the ability to size up the audience on the spot, as it were. The reader will find them summarized at b5—c6. If the audience is philosophical, or includes philosophers, how would the true, artful, philosophical dialectician address it?

This question is not faced head-on in the Phaedrus , but we are given a number of clues. Dialectical speech is accompanied by knowledge, can defend itself when questioned, and is productive of knowledge in its audience e4—a4.

Popular rhetoric is not an art, but a knack for persuasion. Artful rhetoric requires philosophy; but does philosophy require rhetoric? The Phaedrus points to the interesting thought that all discourse is rhetorical, even when the speaker is simply trying to communicate the truth—indeed, true rhetoric is the art of communicating the truth notice the broad sweep of the discussion of discourse at e5—b4.

Rhetoric is present wherever and whenever people speak d10—e4 and context. Even when one is not sure what the truth is, and even when one is thinking through something by oneself—carrying on an inner dialogue, as it were—discourse and persuasion are present. The bottom line is that there is no escaping from persuasion, and so none from rhetoric—including of course from the very problem of distinguishing between warranted and unwarranted persuasion.

Self-deception is an ever-present possibility as Socrates implies here, and notes at Cratylus d. That is a problem about which the philosopher above all worries about. The speech is quite explicitly a retraction of an outlook that does not espouse these views; ordinary rhetoric moves in a very different moral, metaphysical, psychological, and epistemic world. It is an interesting fact that Plato deploys certain elements of poetry such as myth, allegory, simile, image in drawing the contrast between these outlooks.

That poetry is itself a kind of persuasive discourse or rhetoric has already been mentioned. But what about the rationale that the poets and rhapsodes are inspired? Inspiration comes up numerous times in the Phaedrus. These references are uniformly playful, even at times joking. The case is first made by noting that three species of madness are already accepted: that of the prophets, that of certain purifying or cathartic religious rites, and the third that inspiration granted by the Muses that moves its possessor to poetry ba.

As noted, it begins to look as though a certain kind of poetry the inspired is being rehabilitated. And yet when Socrates comes to classify kinds of lives a bit further on, the poets along with those who have anything to do with mimesis rank a low sixth out of nine, after the likes of household managers, financiers, doctors, and prophets e1—2! The poet is just ahead of the manual laborer, sophist, and tyrant. The philosopher comes in first, as the criterion for the ranking concerns the level of knowledge of truth about the Ideas or Forms of which the soul in question is capable.

This hierarchy of lives could scarcely be said to rehabilitate the poet. The Phaedrus quietly sustains the critique of poetry, as well as much less quietly of rhetoric. Does the critique apply to the dialogues themselves? Scholars dispute the answers to these well-known questions. There is general agreement that Plato perfected—perhaps even invented—a new form of discourse. Most obviously, his dialogues are dramas with several formal features in common with much tragedy and comedy for example, the use of authorial irony, the importance of plot, setting, the role of individual character and the interplay between dramatis personae.

His works also narrate a number of myths, and sparkle with imagery, simile, allegory, and snatches of meter and rhyme. Indeed, as he sets out the city in speech in the Republic , Socrates calls himself a myth teller d9—10, e4—5. In a number of ways, the dialogues may be said to be works of fiction; none of them took place exactly as presented by Plato, several could not have taken place, some contain characters who never existed.

These are imaginary conversations, imitations of certain kinds of philosophical conversations. As reader, one is undoubtedly invited to see oneself reflected in various characters, and to that extent identify with them, even while also focusing on the arguments, exchanges, and speeches.

Exactly what to make of his appropriation of elements of poetry is once again a matter of long discussion and controversy. Plato: aesthetics Plato: ethics. I would also like to thank David Roochnik for his help with various revisions along the way. Introduction 2. Ion 3. Gorgias 5. Phaedrus 5.

So Ion, and by extension Homer, are faced with a series of unpalatable alternatives: They could continue to defend the claim that they really do know the subjects about which they discourse—in the sense of possess the techne kai episteme of them, i.

Yet if they do defend that claim they will be liable to examination by relevant experts. They could admit that they do not know what they are talking about. This admission could be understood in several ways: b. Phaedrus Readers of the Phaedrus have often wondered how the dialogue hangs together. Bibliography Adams, J. Annas, J. Rowe eds. Asmis, E. Kraut ed. Auerbach, E. Trask, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Ausland, H. Baracchi, C.

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