Thrasymachus

After Socrates successfully refutes Thrasymachus’ definition of Justice, Thrasymachus is entirely content in leaving with nothing. Glaucon on the other hand is able to recognize that one can come to know justice and injustice in themselves and for this reason is unsatisfied with not knowing. Through a systematic analysis of the refutations made by Socrates, I intend to reveal that the intent of Thrasymachus is not to gain any knowledge of justice, but to outdo Socrates in argument, and that the result of this is for all parties to be free of preconceived notions about justice.

Thrasymachus interrupts Socrates’ discussion of justice, being carried out with Polemarchus, in order to express his own notion of justice, one he deems to be the finest. From the beginning Thrasymachus is a man noticeably driven by his appetites: he refuses even to speak until he knows he will get money as a result. His superior definition is that justice is the advantage of the stronger. By the stronger, Thrasymachus means those who are politically strong and possess the ability to create laws in the city, the rulers. Through this ability the ruler is able to control the beliefs of his citizens (the weaker) about what is and is not just. It is also just for those citizens to obey these laws. Because the rulers have the ability to, they will use peoples’ values of justice in order to benefit themselves. What is unjust, then, is what happens to be contrary to what the ruler has said is just. This is not really a definition of justice, but rather an observation of justice because it is entirely dependant on the decrees of the ruler and reactions too them by the people, it does not exist as an entity in itself.

Thrasymachus’ description of justice places limits on the way Socrates is able to proceed with his refutation. If all common beliefs about justice are created by rulers, then any preconceived notions, in fact any notions other than what has been proposed by Thrasymachus, are unreliable. As a result, in the investigation Socrates must refute this definition through contradictions within itself and when it has been refuted no view of justice will remain.

The process of refutation begins by questioning Thrasymachus about the fallibility of rulers; Thrasymachus says that they are fallible. This would mean that Thrasymachus’ definition is self-contradicting. Rulers make the laws with the aim of benefiting themselves and the ruled are bound to follow them, but because the ruler is fallible, he will ultimately make laws which are not to his advantage. It seems as though Thrasymachus will have to abandon one of his two criterion: either, justice is not always the advantage of the stronger, or it is not always just to follow the laws. At this moment, justice is both the advantage and disadvantage of the stronger.