Reading: Plato, Gorgias, 481b–499b (pp. 51–76)

Notes and questions:

1. At the beginning of the assigned part of the text, Callicles takes over the discussion from Polus, as Polus earlier took over from Gorgias when the latter appeared to have been refuted by Socrates (461b). The first several pages of this part (481c–488b/pp. 51–59) contain mostly long speeches by Socrates and by Callicles in which there is not much in the way of philosophical argumentation. So this part of the text does not require the sort of close attention that the argumentative passages do. You should, however, pay attention to Callicles' distinction between nomos, translated here as "law" (though, as the translator points out in his footnote, p. 53, n. 24, it can also be rendered as "custom" or "convention") and phusis (nature), and how he uses this distinction to defend the position that he thinks Polus was trying to defend earlier (482e–484a). What is it that Callicles is saying is just by nature, and what is he saying is just by law (or convention)?
2. Serious philosophical argumentation begins at 488b. At 489b, Socrates draws the conclusion that doing what is unjust is more shameful than suffering what is unjust not merely by law, as Callicles had claimed, but also by nature. How does he establish this conclusion?
   
3. Callicles defends his position by giving a new explanation of what he means by "better" or "superior" human beings (489e–490a); and, after some further questioning by Socrates, he expands this explanation a bit, and restates the position that he is defending (491a–d). Is this position the same as the one that he initially asserted, or has he been changing his position in response to Socrates' interrogation of him?
4. Socrates asks Callicles if those who, in Callicles' view, are most fit to rule the city also rule themselves (491d). Callicles replies that they are not ruled at all. "Wantonness, lack of discipline, and freedom, if available in good supply, are excellence and happiness," he says (492c). Socrates praises him for "saying clearly what others are thinking but are unwilling to say" (492d), but seems to have a low estimate of the sort of human being that Callicles describes. How is that sort of human being suppsed to be like a leaky vessel (493b–d) or like a man who keeps his foodstuffs in leaky jars (493d–494a)?
5. In the passage from 494b to 497d (pp. 67–73), Socrates tries to show Callicles that, from assumptions that Callicles himself grants, it follows that, contrary to what Callicles has said, the pleasant and the good cannot be identical. What is his argument for this conclusion?
6. In the remainder of the assigned reading (497e–499b/pp. 73–76), Socrates offers another argument for the same conclusion. What is that argument?