Part One: Summary

In order to address the translation problems that I raised in my previous communication, The translation problem of Parmenides 132c6-7, I found it necessary to take a closer look at what Plato said about nous (νοῦς), and its operation, noein (νοεῖν).

“Mind” is perhaps the least problematical translation of the Greek “nous,” which has also been translated as “intellect,” “intelligence,” “reason,” “understanding,” “thought,” “spirit,” “wit,” etc., each choice emphasizing a different, cognitive aspect of mental life. The modern usage of the English word “mind” covers a broad enough range of meaning to include these other cognitive aspects and can be stretched to imply intentional (“I am of a mind”), volitional (“I’ve made up my mind”), affective (“I mind you”) and even somewhat vaguely causal (“I bring to mind”) connotations. All of this makes “mind” more suitable for translating Plato’s “nous,” and for carrying the additional meaning load that will emerge from our study of Plato’s texts.

But before we embark on the inquiry of what is mind/nous for Plato, we need to take note of a caveat that Plato himself supplies toward the end of his writing career. In the tenth book of the Laws, he has the Athenian Stranger warn that we shall never adequately know what mind is. In his own words: “[L]et’s not, on the other hand, reply in a way that we would bring on night in the middle of the day by looking straight into the sun, by presuming that we could ever look upon mind [nous] with mortal eyes and get to know it adequately…”[i]

This was Plato’s prescient warning against the futility of such projects as Kant’s two Critiques of Reason and all the neo-Kantian and post-Kantian critical philosophies that followed Kant in their bold ambition to know precisely what is human reason and thereby control, also precisely, what it can and cannot do. The futility of which Plato warned is evident in the complete failure of the Kantian critique program from its first 18^th century formulation and its immediate 19^th century successor schools of German Critical Philosophy down to its latest iteration in the form of 20^th century Heideggerian Destruktion and the more recent 21^st century “critical theory” fads at our universities.

More on this Platonic caveat and how the failure to heed it has brought about the now unfolding crisis of Western civilization will follow later in this discussion.

To the extent that we know some things about mind, Plato’s Socrates (but also Timaeus and the Eleatic Stranger) argues that mind is (1) a power residing in the soul and impossible to be anywhere but in the soul[ii] whose action is simultaneously not only (2) cognitive[iii], but also (3) volitional[iv] and (4) directive[v] and (5) causal[vi] and (6) moral[vii] in the sense that its operation is activated only under the influence of “The Good.” Further, the mind of which Plato’s Socrates et al. speak is not merely (7) the mind of the individual man[viii]. The mind found in the soul of individual man is but a small fragment of the (8) great mind that reigns in the great soul which animates the well-ordered, living universe: the cosmos[ix]. Accordingly, the human mind depends for its subsistence on this cosmic mind; and the virtue of the human mind – its ar-etē (ἀρετή) – is to achieve ar-monia(ἁρμονία), harmony, with the cosmic mind, i.e., to discover how to fit in the cosmos. Etymologically, both aretē and armonia derive from the verb ar-ariskō (ἀραρίσκω), which means “to fit together.” The word for “number,” ar-ithmos (ἀριθμός) derives from the same verb and denotes a multitude of things that “fit together.”

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These findings suggest that in Plato’s writings, mind had retained the characteristics found in the Homeric poems: it is the cognitive, deliberative, volitional action of living, ensouled subjects both human and divine and it directs and controls the universe. But this understanding of mind is not limited to Plato and Homer. It pervades the Greek literary record from Homer to Plato.

Thales speaks of god being the mind of the universe, and of “everything being ensouled and full of spirits”[x]; according to Xenophanes “god is mind and thought and eternity”[xi]; Heraclitus speaks of the common mind which binds together everything in the way that law binds together a city[xii]; then there is the “relentless mind” of Pindar[xiii], the “willful mind” of Bacchylides[xiv], the “unbending mind” of Aeschylus[xv], the “mind that loves” of Sophocles[xvi], and the “mind that shoots arrows” of Euripides[xvii].

This literary record reflects the popular world-image that prevailed in Archaic Greece, in whose mythology and folklore everything both animate and inanimate was full of “spirits,” minds of a kind – from the speaking water of the Delphic Oracle  to the weeping rock of Niobe at Mount Sipylus – and in whose usage of everyday, non-literary language, “mind” and its verb conveyed then, as they do to this day in modern Greek, the same variety of meaning – cognitive, deliberative, volitional, affective, causal, etc. – as is found in the classical literary record.

Anaxagoras seems to have been the first to attempt a systematic treatment of the archaic Greek understanding of mind in a book whose opening sentence, according to Diogenes Laertius, was “all things were together; then came Mind and set them in order.” Plato has Socrates explain that he began his journey as a young man by being drawn to Anaxagoras’s book and its promise to show that mind is the cause of everything; and that upon discovering that Anaxagoras failed to deliver on his promise, he undertook his “second sailing,” his own philosophical journey to discover what can be discovered about mind.

The result of Socrates’s “second sailing” is an inquiry not only into the traditional (in the Greek context) cognitive, deliberative, and causal aspects of mind, but also, in a revolutionary Socratic/Platonic turn, into the ethical and affective (erotic) aspects of mind. This revolutionary turn to the ethical and affective aspects had the collateral effect of producing a radically new understanding of all the other aspect of the mind’s activity. After the Socratic subordination of mind to “the good,” cognitive, deliberative, and causal action will be understood differently than before.

To clarify: Socrates’s link of the archaic Greek understanding of mind to the idea of “the good” triggered a revolutionary transformation in our understanding of how cognition works and launched a revolution in science. In the reports to follow, I shall try to trace how this transformation happened and what political consequences followed in the ancient Greek world.

Criton M. Zoakos

June 16, 2023

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Notes:

i Laws X.897d: “μὴ τοίνυν ἐξ ἐναντίας οἷον εἰς ἥλιον ἀποβλέποντες, νύκτα ἐν μεσημβρίᾳ ἐπαγόμενοι, ποιησώμεθα τὴν ἀπόκρισιν, ὡς νοῦν ποτε θνητοῖς ὄμμασιν ὀψόμενοί τε καὶ γνωσόμενοι ἱκανῶς.”

[ii] Timaeus 30 b4: “[I]t is impossible for mind to be found apart from soul” (“νοῦν δ’ αὖ χωρὶς ψυχῆς ἀδύνατον παραγενέσθαι”); Philebus 30c9: “Wisdom and mind could never come into existence without soul.” (“Σοφία μὴν καὶ νοῦς ἄνευ ψυχῆς οὐκ ἄν ποτε γενοίσθην.”)

[iii] Plato’s succinct statement of the cognitive aspect of the mind is in Philebus 65d2: “[B]ut mind is either identical with the truth or of all things most like the truth and the truest.) (“νοῦς δὲ ἤτοι ταὐτὸν καὶ ἀλήθειά ἐστιν ἢ πάντων ὁμοιότατόν τε καὶ ἀληθέστατον.”) His extended statement of the case is, of course, in Books 6 and 7 of the Republic.

[iv] Phaedo 99a7-b2: “[B]ut to say that I do the things I do and do them using my mind but without choosing that which is best would be a lot of foolish talk” (“ὡς μέντοι διὰ ταῦτα ποιῶ ἃ ποιῶ, καὶ ταῦτα νῷ πράττων, ἀλλ’ οὐ τῇ τοῦ βελτίστου αἱρέσει, πολλὴ ἂν καὶ μακρὰ ῥᾳθυμία εἴη τοῦ λόγου.”

[v] Philebus 28c7: “[M]ind is king of heaven and earth” (“νοῦς ἐστι βασιλεὺς ἡμῖν οὐρανοῦ τε καὶ γῆς”); 30d8: “mind always rules the universe” (“ἀεὶ τοῦ παντὸς νοῦς ἄρχει.”)

[vi] Philebus 30e1: “[M]ind belongs to the class that has been called the cause of all” (“νοῦς ἐστὶ γένους τῆς τοῦ πάντων αἰτίου λεχθέντος.”)

[vii] Republic 508b10-d6: “ – [P]lease understand then, that this is what I called the offspring of the good to which the good  gave birth in proportion with itself: as the good is in the mental domain to mind and the objects of mind, so is the sun in the visible world to vision and the objects of vision.” – How is that? he said; explain some more. – “You know, I said, that when our eyes are no longer turned upon objects whose colors are no longer illuminated by the light of day but the light of night, the eyes are dimmed and they seem almost blind, as if clear vision were not in them. – Yes, indeed, he said. – Yet when when we turn the eyes on objects illumined by the sun, they see clearly, and vision appears to reside in these same eyes. – Certainly. – Then think of the soul in the same way: When it is focused on something on which truth and reality shine, it understands and knows them and is shown to possess mind;”  (“Τοῦτον τοίνυν, ἦν δ’ ἐγώ, φάναι με λέγειν τὸν τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ ἔκγονον, ὃν τἀγαθὸν ἐγέννησεν ἀνάλογον ἑαυτῷ, ὅτιπερ αὐτὸ ἐν τῷ νοητῷ τόπῳ πρός τε νοῦν καὶ τὰ νοούμενα, τοῦτο τοῦτον ἐν τῷ ὁρατῷ πρός τε ὄψιν καὶ τὰ ὁρώμενα. –   Πῶς; ἔφη· ἔτι δίελθέ μοι. –   Ὀφθαλμοί, ἦν δ’ ἐγώ, οἶσθ’ ὅτι, ὅταν μηκέτι ἐπ’ ἐκεῖνά τις αὐτοὺς τρέπῃ ὧν ἂν τὰς χρόας τὸ ἡμερινὸν φῶς ἐπέχῃ, ἀλλὰ ὧν νυκτερινὰ φέγγη, ἀμβλυώττουσί τε καὶ ἐγγὺς φαίνονται τυφλῶν, ὥσπερ οὐκ ἐνούσης καθαρᾶς ὄψεως; –   Καὶ μάλα, ἔφη. –   Ὅταν δέ γ’ οἶμαι ὧν ὁ ἥλιος καταλάμπει, σαφῶς ὁρῶσι, καὶ τοῖς αὐτοῖς τούτοις ὄμμασιν ἐνοῦσα φαίνεται. –   Τί μήν; –   Οὕτω τοίνυν καὶ τὸ τῆς ψυχῆς ὧδε νόει· ὅταν μὲν οὗ καταλάμπει ἀλήθειά τε καὶ τὸ ὄν, εἰς τοῦτο ἀπερείσηται, ἐνόησέν τε καὶ ἔγνω αὐτὸ καὶ νοῦν ἔχειν φαίνεται·”)

[viii] When Socrates is challenged that his mind has shortcomings, he agrees that while it may be true for his individual mind, it is otherwise for the true, God-like mind:  Philebus 22c2:   “PHILEBUS: [B]ut neither is your mind the good, Socrates, but it shall be subject to the same objections. SOCRATES: My mind, perhaps, Philebus, but I certainly don’t think this applies to the true mind which is God-like.” (“ΦΙ. Οὐδὲ γὰρ ὁ σὸς νοῦς, ὦ Σώκρατες, ἔστι τἀγαθόν, ἀλλ’ ἕξει που ταὐτὰ ἐγκλήματα. –  ΣΩ. Τάχ’ ἄν, ὦ Φίληβε, ὅ γ’ ἐμός· οὐ μέντοι τόν γε ἀληθινὸν ἅμα καὶ θεῖον οἶμαι νοῦν, ἀλλ’ ἄλλως πως ἔχειν.”)

[ix] Socrates in the Philebus dialogue, after explaining that the physical elements (earth, water, air, fire) that make up our bodies are but small, dependent fragments of the great supply of elements that make up the body of the cosmos, asks Protarchus whether this human body that belongs to the cosmos also has a soul, and if so, whether this soul and the mind in it are not a part of the soul and the mind of the cosmos: Philebus 30a-d: ” – SOCRATES: Shall we not say that our body has a soul?  – PROTARCHUS: Clearly, we shall.   – SO: Where did it get it, Protarchus, unless the body of the universe had a soul, since that body has the same elements as ours, only in every way superior?   – PR: Clearly it could get it from no other source.  – SO: No; for we surely do not believe, Protarchus, that of those four elements, the finite, the infinite, the combination, and the element of cause which exists in all things, this last, which gives to our bodies souls and the art of physical exercise and medical treatment when the body is ill, and which is in general a composing and healing power, is called the sum of all wisdom, and yet, while these same elements exist in the entire heaven and in great parts thereof, and area moreover, fair and pure, there is no means of including among them that nature which is the fairest and most precious of all.  – PR: Certainly, there would be no sense in that.  – SO: Then if that is not the case, it would be better to follow the other line of thought and say, as we have often said, that there is in the universe a plentiful infinite and a sufficient limit, and in addition a by no means feeble cause which orders and arranges years and seasons and months, and may most justly be called wisdom and mind.  – PR: Yes, most justly.   – SO: Surely reason and mind could never come into being without soul”. (“ – ΣΩ: πόθεν, ὦ φίλε Πρώταρχε, λαβόν, εἴπερ μὴ τό γε τοῦ παντὸς σῶμα ἔμψυχον ὂν ἐτύγχανε, ταὐτά γε ἔχον τούτῳ καὶ ἔτι πάντῃ καλλίονα;   – ΠΡ: δῆλον ὡς οὐδαμόθεν ἄλλοθεν, ὦ Σώκρατες.  – ΣΩ: οὐ γάρ που δοκοῦμέν γε, ὦ Πρώταρχε, τὰ τέτταρα ἐκεῖνα, πέρας καὶ ἄπειρον καὶ κοινὸν καὶ τὸ τῆς αἰτίας γένος ἐν ἅπασι τέταρτον ἐνόν, τοῦτο ἐν μὲν τοῖς παρ᾽ ἡμῖν ψυχήν τε παρέχον καὶ σωμασκίαν ἐμποιοῦν καὶ πταίσαντος σώματος ἰατρικὴν καὶ ἐν ἄλλοις ἄλλα συντιθὲν καὶ ἀκούμενον πᾶσαν καὶ παντοίαν σοφίαν ἐπικαλεῖσθαι, τῶν δ᾽ αὐτῶν τούτων ὄντων ἐν ὅλῳ τε οὐρανῷ καὶ κατὰ μεγάλα μέρη, καὶ προσέτι καλῶν καὶ εἰλικρινῶν, ἐν τούτοις δ᾽ οὐκ ἄρα μεμηχανῆσθαι τὴν τῶν καλλίστων καὶ τιμιωτάτων φύσιν.   –ΠΡ: ἀλλ᾽ οὐδαμῶς τοῦτό γ᾽ ἂν λόγον ἔχοι. – ΣΩ: οὐκοῦν εἰ μὴ τοῦτο, μετ᾽ ἐκείνου τοῦ λόγου ἂν ἑπόμενοι βέλτιον λέγοιμεν ὡς ἔστιν, ἃ πολλάκις εἰρήκαμεν, ἄπειρόν τε ἐν τῷ παντὶ πολύ, καὶ πέρας ἱκανόν, καί τις ἐπ᾽ αὐτοῖς αἰτία οὐ φαύλη, κοσμοῦσά τε καὶ συντάττουσα ἐνιαυτούς τε καὶ ὥρας καὶ μῆνας, σοφία καὶ νοῦς λεγομένη δικαιότατ᾽ ἄν. – ΠΡ: δικαιότατα δῆτα. σοφία μὴν καὶ νοῦς ἄνευ ψυχῆς οὐκ ἄν ποτε γενοίσθην.  – ΣΩ: σοφία μὴν καὶ νοῦς ἄνευ ψυχῆς οὐκ ἄν ποτε γενοίσθην.”)

[x] Diels-Kranz Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, Thales Fr. A23: “Θαλῆς νοῦν τοῦ κόσμου θεόν, το δὲ πᾶν ἔμψυχον ἅμα καὶ δαιμόνων πλῆρες.”

[xi] Diels-Kranz Die Fragmente …, Xenophanes, Fr. A1; “οὐσίαν θεοῦ σφαιροειδῆ, μηδὲν ὅμοιον ἔχουσα ἀνθρώπῳ· ὅλον δὲ ὁρᾶν καὶ ὅλον ἀκούειν, μὴ μέντοι ἀναπνεῖν· σύμπαντα τε εἶναι νοῦν καὶ φρόνησιν καὶ ἀίδιον.”

[xii] Diels-Kranz Die Fragmente …, Herakleitos, Fr. B114: “ξὺν νόῳ λέγοντες ἰσχυρίζεσθαι χρὴ τῷ ξυνῷ πάντων, ὅκωσπερ νόμῳ πόλις, καὶ πολὺ ἰσχυροτέρως.

[xiii] Pindar, Pythian Odes Ι.95 “νηλέα νόον”

[xiv]Bacchylides, Lyrica Epinicia 4.9: “ἑκόντι νόῳ”

[xv] Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound 164: “ἄγναμπτον νόον”

[xvi] Sophocles, Electra 913: “ὁ νοῦς φιλεῖ”

[xvii] Euripides, Hecuba 603: “καὶ ταῦτα μὲν δὴ νοῦς ἐτόξευσεν”