Justice In Plato's The Republic

The idea of justice is one that generally most people will agree on but almost no one can explain why. In The Republic by Plato, Socrates tries to come up with a way to find true justice. After making his argument, it is inferred that Plato takes over the argument but continues to use Socrates as a mouth piece. To help in understanding an analogy is created and although it seems reasonable at first, it is not. Plato tries his best to have his line of reasoning flawless, nonetheless it has flaws. His ideology along with his analogy are flawed which consecutively means that justice is not how he makes it out to be. Justice comes into play in a conversation between Cephalus, an older man who is an archetype of Athens at the time, and Socrates, …show more content…
Socrates comes up with his utopia that is based on simplicity. He gives the citizens of his city only the necessities: water, food, shelter, and medicine. Adeimantus, Glaucon’s brother, argues that people are not content with simplicity and that they desire luxuries. This city then becomes the Repurified City, a city with more trades that are not necessary for survival. More farmer are added because of the increase in population, more land is added for the farmers, and warriors are added due to the increase need for land. They also start establishing the fundamentals and ideals of the city and how they will educate/raise the people in order for all of them to work together in harmony. It is agreed that the people will be told that they all have different metals in their veins. Some will be told that they have gold, others silver, and others bronze/iron. Gold belongs to the rulers, silver to the guardians, and bronze/iron to the workers. The workers will only be allowed to be work in one specific field and so will their children, the guardians will get an education in philosophy and will be physically trained and will be able to be guardians or upgrade to gold if they pass tests, and the rulers will be philosopher kings. The iron class will only be educated in their field and will have to be moderate in order for the city to work well. Those in the silver class will mainly be taught philosophy and physical training and will have to be moderate and courageous. However, they will learn censored myths because if they read stories on cowardly and selfish gods they are more likely to imitate their actions and start to think of themselves as individuals rather than part of the city. Rulers are going to make sure the laws and people are just and with them being philosophers it is concluded that they will rule wisely. As for reproduction, the lower class can decide for themselves while in the higher class their partners are decided by a