WGAP announces the following talk:
Speaker: Sebastian Odzuck
Title: “Doing what we want is not doing what seems best. Plato’s Gorgias 466a-468e”
Time: April 1st, 4-6pm
Location: LC 203
Abstract: In Gorgias 466a-468e Socrates argues for the claim that orators have the least power in the cities, because they are not doing what they want, but merely what seems best to them. In the course of his argument, Socrates claims that we actually do not want any of our actions, but only that for the sake of which the action is done. I ask whether this is an appropriate analysis of all kind of human action in general. I will argue that Socrates is right to make this claim, although there seem to be clear counterexamples to this assumption. Although this is not explicitly stated in the text, I will also argue that Socrates in this passage presupposes that it is sufficient for our lives to be good to lead a life lead by reason (nous), no matter what actually is the outcome of our actions.