Sunday, February 22, 2009
Sarcastic Irony in Theaetetus part I
In the first part of Theaetetus, the dialogue focuses on Protagoras' theory that knowledge is perception, so that a perceiver produces it, rather than the world that one perceives. Throughout the dialogue, Socrates reiterates that he knows nothing, and operates in dialogue only to help his partner in conversation to bear the fruit of his own knowledge, just as a midwife, though she bears no children of her own, assists other women in their pregnancy and in the delivery of children. This seems very ironic, since Socrates participates in the dialogue as the primary speaker, who puts forward the brunt of the analysis, while Theaetetus only briefly answers questions and listens. At a certain point, the dialogue seems to offer convincing support of Protagoras' theory, and to concede that the perceiver must have unerring knowledge. At this point, after Socrates has effectively provided the entire analysis, he reiterates once again his lack of knowledge, and that he offers no contribution of his own, but merely extracts answers from Theaetetus. In this way, he likens himself to a mere object of Theaetetus' unerring perceptive knowledge (and therefore objects of perception to the concept of the midwife), in a quite humorously effusive concession that directly precedes a devastating secondary critique of Protagoras' theory, in which Socrates draws particular attention to the theory's absurdity. This part of the dialogue seems to bear testament to a bent for sarcastic humor as concerns Plato.
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Having read further, it seems more likely that Plato uses this part to illustrate sarcasm, rather than that he actually partakes in it. I am also more on the fence now about whether Socrates in fact devastates Protagoras' theory at exactly this part.
ReplyDeleteIrony and humor, no question. I'm not sure I see the sarcasm to which you refer, however. Is he gratuitously nasty or undersevedly harsh to anyone (Protagoras, Theodorus, Theatetus...) in this process?
ReplyDeleteAt this particular point in the dialogue, I do think that Socrates diverges from a more formal, perhaps more respectful mode of discussion, and in fact teases Theaetetus, Protagoras, and Theodorus. However, the sarcasm that I am claiming occurs is a light sarcasm, and Socrates seems to engage in it playfully, rather than out of a sense of malice. Theodorus and Theaetetus seem to pick up on Socrates' less than serious behavior at different parts in the dialogue. At 157 c, Theaetetus says, "I can't even quite see what you're getting at, whether the things you are saying are what you think yourself, or whether you are just trying me out." Later, at 169 b, Theodorus compares Socrates to two malicious villains, Sciron and Antaeus. Socrates admits of the similarity, but insists that his behavior, rather than being purely gratuitous, stems from a want for exercise. I'm not sure I can prove at this moment that the incident I described in the above post constitutes sarcasm, as it is very subtle and difficult to notice if one reads it out of context from the preceding part of the dialogue that builds it up. For this reason, and/or maybe for other reasons, I may have described it badly. I will try to think of a better way to articulate what I think I've found.
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