In the Symposium, Phaedrus, Pausanias, Eryximachus, Aristophanes, Agathon, Socrates and Alcibiades all gather at Agathon’s residence to share a drink together. All of whom, not including Socrates, are part of the elite; intellectual and aristocratic. The reason for such a high profile gathering was their intention to celebrate Agathon’s victory at a contest; he was a playwright in tragedy. He is described as a young beautiful man with a superior command of words. Soon after their dinner, they begin giving their own account of love and they each take turns. Beginning with Phaedrus, the main point he shares is that eros can be connected to virtue. According to Phaedrus, shame comes from love and virtue comes from shame, thus being in love will make whoever practicing love virtuous. Moreover, Phaedrus adds that when a person is in love they tend to care about how they appear to others. Thus, if there was an army entirely made up of homosexuals then, he thinks, it would be nearly invincible since no lover would want to look cowardly.
Next was Pausanias, a lawyer, who argues that not all love is necessarily good nor bad and it …show more content…
But according to my story, a lover does not seek the half or the whole, unless, my friend, it turns out to be good as well. I say this because people are even willing to cut off their own arms and legs if they think they are diseased…. That’s because what everyone loves is really nothing other the good. (51-52)
What Diotime refutes is Aristophanes’ account of love. Aristophanes stated that lovers seek each other because they want to feel whole again, but Diotima thinks that lovers only love what is good and people would be willing to amputate their limbs if they truly believed it to be diseased or bad. This argument of hers seems to be mostly true. Most people would rather amputate their arms to prolong their life if they found out that they had a disease that would
Next was Pausanias, a lawyer, who argues that not all love is necessarily good nor bad and it …show more content…
But according to my story, a lover does not seek the half or the whole, unless, my friend, it turns out to be good as well. I say this because people are even willing to cut off their own arms and legs if they think they are diseased…. That’s because what everyone loves is really nothing other the good. (51-52)
What Diotime refutes is Aristophanes’ account of love. Aristophanes stated that lovers seek each other because they want to feel whole again, but Diotima thinks that lovers only love what is good and people would be willing to amputate their limbs if they truly believed it to be diseased or bad. This argument of hers seems to be mostly true. Most people would rather amputate their arms to prolong their life if they found out that they had a disease that would