Cebes notices that the above argument has a significant resemblance to Socrates’ doctrine of recollection (from Plato’s book, Meno), where Socrates’ argues that there is something which he calls a “true opinion” in each man which can be discovered or ‘recollected’ by questioning him, and this ‘true opinion’ can then be converted into knowledge by further questioning. This leads on to Socrates’ next argument for the immortality of the soul: the Theory of Recollection. The theory states that if man is able to answer a question with a correct answer without knowing or having learnt of the subject before, the man must have prior knowledge from a previous life, and when answering the question is merely recollecting the prior knowledge. As mentioned above, Plato wrote about this, and wrote an account of Socrates demonstrating the truth of this theory. He took one of Meno’s slaves and asked him to construct a square twice the size of a given square. With the aid of some diagrams and thought-provocative questions from Socrates, the slave manages to complete the task given to him. Socrates claims that he had not taught the slave anything new, but had helped recollect, a priori knowledge. Plato believes that this knowledge is pre-natal, and so through dialogue argues that if man has a priori knowledge, the soul must exist before the body.
This argument however does not prove that the soul exists immortally. It provides a logical argument that soul can exist before birth, it could also exist after death but there is no argument for its immortality. The soul could exist after many deaths, millions of deaths, and possibly even after the extinction of human race as we know it to be, but that does not mean the soul can exist eternally. It could also be argued that it is impossible for someone to recollect knowledge such as the time of the fall of Rome unless they have learned of it, or were present at the time. This theory of having prior knowledge would only work with concepts like logic and mathematics. However, Plato believed that logic and mathematics were the only types of true knowledge (with the exception of mystic insight).
Cebes was not convinced by this argument for the immortality of souls, so Socrates presents his third argument, known as the Affinity Argument. For this argument Socrates works with the assumption that there are two types of existences: the seen and the unseen. He says that the seen is an existence susceptible to change and the unseen is not. His next point that there is a part of us that represents the body and another part representing the soul, and therefore concludes that the body is changing (as it is seen) and the soul is unchanging (as it is unseen). The soul resembles the divine and the body, the mortal because “nature orders the soul to govern and rule,” and the body obeys and serves. As the soul is the more divine out of the two, and is unchanging it can be concluded that the soul outlasts the body.
After being convinced that Socrates will not be upset or unsettled if Simmias voices his opinions on the premise of his argument, Simmias then objects that “the soul might be like a harmony from a lyre, ‘invisible and bodiless and all-beautiful and divine, yet nevertheless bound to perish when someone breaks the lyre or cuts its strings.” By this he means that once the body has been broken (through death) the soul could go with it and ceases to exist. Cebes is also unconvinced by Socrates argument and admits that he is persuaded that the soul can exist before and after death but wonders if the soul could survive so many deaths and not be weakened and disappear completely.
Socrates then gives his fourth and final argument, the Argument from Form of Life. He explains that the Forms are the cause of all things in the world, and all things participate in forms. He begins by “relating the nature of the soul to three primary examples of opposites” The examples given are large and small, hot and cold, fire and snow and odd and even. Socrates explains that the characteristic of fire is hot, and excludes the opposite of hot, that being cold. The argument shows that a characteristic will not admit it’s opposite. The soul will bring with it life, and since life and death are opposites, the soul will not admit death. That which will not admit death is deathless and will always bring deathless, so the soul can then be said to deathless. The deathless is indestructible therefore the soul is indestructible. It is here that Socrates’ argument is proved; if the soul is indestructible then it must be that it is immortal. In terms of Forms, the soul participates in the form of life, and so the soul can never die.
Socrates’ surrounding friends find this final argument to be irrefutable and logically valid. Plato’s approach to proving the immortality of the soul seemed to be to provoke the reader to question and object. This he did by presenting the Cyclical Argument, the Theory of Recollection and the Argument of Affinity. It would be obvious to say that these first three arguments are not wholly convincing, as Socrates’ interlocutors criticised the arguments. Plato carefully explores the existence of the soul in different worlds in an attempt to take the reader through the steps he has taken to come to his final argument and conclusion. The arguments may also serve the purpose of showing the reader examples of invalid arguments and false premises. Each of the first three arguments manages to prove the existence of the soul, the existence of the soul before birth and death (though the latter is less convincing) but none manage to prove the immortal existence of the soul.
The final argument is most definitely the most convincing, and it can be seen that Plato knows this too. He uses the Theory of Forms in last argument, which he believes to be the most certain of all his theories. A factor concerning all four of Plato’s arguments is that one must accept a number of assumptions for the arguments to be valid. If the assumptions are unproven and eventually turn out to be invalid, then even Plato’s final and most convincing argument would be regarded as invalid.
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(Arguments of the Phaedo)