PHILOS 2YY3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Glaucon, Thrasymachus, Thought Experiment
2 Apr 2018
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Glaucon wishes to revive thrasymachus" argument that the unjust person is better off than the just. G asks s under which heading he puts justice. S says the first one: justice is good in itself. S believes justice ought to be placed in the class of things both intrinsically valuable and instrumentally valuable: g: that it not the opinion of many they would put it in the wearisome class. The best thing: to do wrong without impunity. It is better to afflict another without penalty than to suffer affliction. The worst: to be wronged without recourse to vengeance. Suffering affliction is bad, but being powerless to take revenge is worse. The middle ground: justice is a social convention whose genesis is a contract whereby those who suffer can take revenge. What is called just" is actually only what hs become lawful. People that act justly, glaucon says, only do so unwillingly.
