Platos Repulic, book V Essay -- essays research papers fc

ABSTRACT This paper discusses the viability of certain aspects (the sex lottery) of Platos Republic, book V. It is college level A paper.Book V of The Republic finds Socrates explaining the practical inside information necessary in the creation of an ideal polis. He proposes a system for population control and homo eugenics based on a lottery of sorts which give determine who will mate with whom and when. The lottery is rigged by the rulers in order that the best of the herd will mate much more often than others. However, only the rulers of this society will know the lottery is rigged. This system will presumably assure that children will be conceived as the result of reason, not ill-considered number behaviors such as love or lust, and will produce the best possible future generations (Plato 458d 460c). I argue that Platos lottery would not cede worked in his time, nor would it work now because the desire to propagate was and still is a human instinct propelled by passion, n ot something that can simply be levelheaded away. While Plato proposed that licentiousness would be forbidden and matrimony given the highest degree of sanctity (458e), I do not think that would be enough to free a massive rise in sex crimes and passionate affairs. Instead of a just society, Platos proposal would have created one of fear, self-doubt and leave out of trust in the government and is not something I would advocate implementing. While we can never really know how this utopia would have played out in Platos time, the negative effects on a society when passions are forcibly controlled can be illustrated in a modern sense by the Catholic Church and our penal system.Plato wrote that guardians would be drawn together by a necessity of their natures to have intercourse (458d) and yet, their sexual interludes should be limited by the use of the lottery. It is important to point out that since reliable and accessible birth control is a recent luxury, Plato was not simply advo cating for selective child birth, he was talking about abstaining from heterosexual sex unless you won the lottery. I dont think Platos lottery system would have worked out as well as he envisioned. When the less desirable of the population were consistently unlucky and unable to propagate year after year, what would have happened to them psychologically? disposed that copulation was to be an honor bestowed upon... ...or other punishments. Whether restraint of sexual instincts are willingly accepted or forced upon a community, the results can take on to a decidedly non-ideal situation.By looking at some modern examples, I have shown how human desire can, and often does, override reason and the law purge when faced with community imposed consequences or dire punishments. While current society differs greatly from Platos Greece, people are still people and human instinct existed then just as it exists today. People who are denied the ability to choose if and with whom they can hav e sex are liable to become irrational or turn to violent means to reach that end, regardless of the era in which they live. In Platos ideal society these unsanctioned actions could have lead to an increased level in the publics fear for their physical safety. Individuals consistently denied by the rulers to copulate might develop self-worth issues and finally, a pin-prick of imperfection in this utopian society may be discovered by those who are forbidden from enjoying physical relations with those they desire or love. Works CitedPlato, The Republic. Trans. Benjamin Jowett. spick-and-span York Barnes & Noble Books, 2004.