The Republic
Plato
Contains spoilers for the entire book.
Discussion topics
Topic 01 of 08
Thrasymachus
How did you respond to Thrasymachus's claim that justice is simply the advantage of the stronger?
Keep the conversation going
- Does Socrates really defeat him, or only silence him?
- Where do you see his view of justice at work in the world today?
There is no single right answer. Bring your own reading.
Discussion topics
How did you respond to Thrasymachus's claim that justice is simply the advantage of the stronger?
Keep the conversation going
- Does Socrates really defeat him, or only silence him?
- Where do you see his view of justice at work in the world today?
If you had a ring that made you invisible, would you still act justly, as Glaucon's challenge asks?
Keep the conversation going
- Why do Glaucon and Adeimantus press Socrates to prove that justice is worth having for its own sake?
- What would count as a satisfying answer to them?
Why does Socrates decide to look for justice in a city first, and only then in a single soul?
Keep the conversation going
- How convincing do you find the parallel between the three classes of the city and the three parts of the soul?
- What is gained and lost by thinking of a person as a small city?
What did you make of Socrates's plan to censor the stories told to children and finally to banish most poets from the city?
Keep the conversation going
- Why does he fear the power of poetry so much?
- Does his argument have any force for the stories and screens of our own time?
Why does Socrates argue that the city will never be well governed until philosophers rule?
Keep the conversation going
- Would you trust philosopher rulers with the power he gives them, including the noble lie?
- What does he think makes the philosopher fit to rule, and is he right?
How did you react to the guardians' life without private property or families of their own?
Keep the conversation going
- Why does Socrates think these sacrifices are needed to keep the rulers honest?
- What does his insistence that women can be guardians too say about his ideas?
What does the allegory of the cave suggest about education and about what it means to know something?
Keep the conversation going
- Why does the freed prisoner have to go back down into the cave?
- What might the shadows on the wall be in our own lives?
By the end, has Socrates shown that the just person is happier than the unjust one?
Keep the conversation going
- What did you make of the decline of cities into timocracy, oligarchy, democracy and tyranny?
- How does the closing myth of Er change, or confuse, the argument?
There is no single right answer. Bring your own reading.