From the Beginning to Plato

SOCRATES AND THE BEGINNINGS OF MORAL PHILOSOPHY 303
position here at the end of the Protagoras is a difficult question, 24 but however
else we take it we can no longer rest secure in the thought that Socrates accepts
the view he attributes to the many at 319b-d.
Second, outside the Protagoras there are other passages in which Socrates
testifies to his rejection of the folk view. In the dialogue named for him, Crito
urges Socrates to escape from prison in part on the grounds that the many
apparently believe that it is the proper thing to do. Socrates responds by asking
whether one should pay attention to the views of everyone or rather only to the
views of the wise (tōn phronimōn). For example, Socrates asks, in the case of
physical training should one pay attention to the views of anyone and everyone or
to the views of the expert—the doctor (iatros) or the physical trainer
(paidotribēs)—the instructor and one who knows (tōi epistatēi kai epaionti)?
When Crito replies that it is the advice of the expert that ought to be heeded in
this case, just as the Athenians in the Protagoras would maintain, Socrates
continues that the same point holds in other cases, but especially in the case of
matters concerning justice or injustice, the shameful and the fine, the good and
the bad, that is, matters of the sort they are presently considering (47a-d).
According to Socrates in this passage in the Crito, it is not the advice and
opinion of the many that ought to be heeded in facing the decision whether to
escape, but rather the advice and opinion of the one—if there is one—who
knows. Thus, while Socrates does not explicitly say that when faced with
decisions concerning (and so requiring) virtue, one should not consider the views
of just anyone, but only the views of the expert, he does say that in these
circumstances one should only pay attention to the one who knows and the
analogy with the doctor and physical trainer suggests that the knowledge
involved is expertise. 25
In another passage Socrates’ rejection of the folk view that virtue is not an
expertise is more explicit. The Laches begins with two fathers soliciting the
advice of two Athenian generals—Laches and Nicias— concerning the proper
education of their sons. In particular, they want to know whether they should
enrol their sons in a particular form of military training. When the two generals
offer incompatible advice, Laches recommending against the training, Nicias
recommending in its favour, one of the fathers turns to Socrates for his vote to
decide the issue. Socrates responds that this is no way to reach a decision. Again
he points to the example of physical training and maintains that in this case we
would not heed the advice of the majority, but rather the advice of the one who
had been trained under a good physical trainer (paidotribēi)—again, just as the
Athenians in the Protagoras would maintain. As Socrates puts it, ‘for I think that
it is necessary to judge by knowledge but not by number if one intends to judge
well’ (Laches 184e8–9). Thus, Socrates continues, the proper way to decide the
issue that faces the fathers is to heed the advice of the expert (tecknikos)
concerning that thing about which they are currently seeking advice. After
determining that the thing concerning which they are now seeking advice is the
proper care of the soul, Socrates concludes that in order to decide whose advice