On Truth and Debt Repayment

[S]peaking of this very thing, justice, are we to affirm thus without qualification that it is truth-telling and paying back what one has received from anyone, or may these very actions sometimes be just and sometimes unjust? I mean, for example, as everyone I presume would admit, if one took over weapons from a friend who was in his right mind and then the lender should go mad and demand them back, that we ought not to return them in that case and that he who did so return them would not be acting justly—nor yet would he who chose to speak nothing but the truth to one who was in that state.” “You are right,” [Cephalus] replied.--Plato, Republic, Book 1, 331CD (translated by Paul Shorey)

The first definition of justice (offered by Cephalus) is that it involves saying the truth and repaying one's debts. Remarkably, the refutation of this definition relies on the (most unKantian) thought that there are circumstances in which one better not speak the truth. Socrates leaves unclear here what principle or judgment govern such circumstances. Later in the Republic, when he defends noble lying, he does gesture more explicitly at least at one such principle (recall) that such lies are permissible to promote the survival of the state when it requires a willingness to sacrifice one's life in the defense of fellow citizens. But that principle cannot justify lying to a madman.

One can only speculate about why one should not always speak truthfully to the insane. One might worry that Socrates and his interlocutors believe that the insane do not deserve the truth because they cannot act on it and be held accountable for it. Perhaps, the underlying concern is that it devalues the nature of truthful speech (one may say, as a form of life) in a way analogous to how demagogues debase truth. If words can't have  ordinary or regular uptake they lose their meaning. 

That one should not return arms to the insane is sensible because they may harm others or themselves. And so, here there seems to be some kind of precautionary principle at work (alongside a harm principle).  But the exchange over the main argument against Cephalus definition of truth is surreal if not especially unnerving if we recall that Cephalus is a weapon's dealer. Most harms done by weapons are caused by the sane. Then contemporary readers of the Republic would have recognized that's not a hypothetical given the prevalence of war as well as civil war they themselves experienced (and Cephalus' sons suffered from). 

In fact, it's that background knowledge (of experiencing the horrors of war and madness of civil war) is one reason why Socrates is rhetorically so effective against Thrasymachus at the end of Book I: "For factions, Thrasymachus, are the outcome of injustice, and hatreds and internecine conflicts,....wherever [injustice] is found in city, family, camp, or in anything else it first renders the thing incapable of cooperation with itself owing to faction and difference, and secondly an enemy to itself..." [351-2] The argument only goes through if civil war is really dreadful to all, a state of nature, and not an opportunity for, say, war-profiteering. Socrates here is relying on the (Hobbesian) thought that in civil wars the fruits of any profit (from theft, etc.) cannot be enjoyed. It seems clear that in context this is well understood. 

Socrates' powerful consequentialist argument against Thrasymachus assumes here that there is no honor among thieves, that in-group solidarity is always fragile and cannot be shaped in such a way such that it is unstable for a collective to maintain in-group justice and out-group injustice. One may well think, in fact, that the history of nationalism shows that gross acts of out-group injustice is constitutive of in-group 'justice.'* 

My point is that Socrates could just have well argued (with Cephalus) that you should not automatically return weapon to a sane friend once one knows something about their intentions for them. In some circumstances one will facilitate atrocities. This is why in some countries (these days) there are restrictions on exporting weapons to regimes who may use the weapons in objectionable ways. 

I don't have a clever close to this post. But let me just register that if Cephalus speaks for kind of traditional common sense, it's notable that the two ingredients of justice are truth-telling and debt-repayment. I register this not because I am surprised that fair distribution (or re-distribution) is absent (or the many other things Socrates ends up saying about the best cities). Rather, I register it because I am surprised that truth-telling is part of justice or righteousness. (Of course, in a property-owning society debt repayment is going to be part of justice.) This suggests that being reliable or trustworthy, or thought so, is in some ways fundamental to the traditional common sense conception of justice/righteousness. And while this surprises me, it strikes me as important in a way I can't fully articulate yet. 

 

*The square quotes are to honor the opinion that this circumstance may not be called justice at all.

Comments

[Aaron Lercher]

For which truths is truth-telling required by justice?

If they are the general, widely accepted, and verified truths of human psychology and behavior which Rawls allows the parties behind the veil to draw on, that's not too onerous. It helps us keep our focus on human beings, not angels or demons. This is a non-idealized aspect of Rawls's theory, which I think can and should be expanded further than Rawls said.

But if too many truths are added beyond this class, then the burdens of truth-telling increase. This threatens the political character of justice, if there is a correct metaphysics or ethical theory, and if citizens are required to tell the truth about it. But perhaps Plato's guardians can be assumed to have this all worked out so there won't be any disagreements among them.

More down to earth, some secrecy seems to be necessary for negotiations to work. Truth-telling requirements appear to conflict with this.

[Eric Schliesser]

Aaron, thank you. Yes, you nicely capture some reasons why one may be skeptical of the idea that always truth-telling is a part of justice.