Socrates: the Question of Morality :: Philosophy, Philosophers

The question of morality came up when Socrates and Cephalus were having a conversation about money. Cephalus says soul who has led a bad life will have nightmares and a soulfulness who leads a good life will not have such dreams and will be happy. Cephalus says being true and giving things prat is morality. Socrates awards an example were you can do something good by not gibing something back. His example was if you borrow a weapon from a friend, and he is sane at the time and at the time you should give it back your friend is insane then you shouldnt give it back so you can protect him from doing harm which is also good. Cephalus agreed that Socrates was correct that this was doing something good so Socrates said if that is the case than the definition of morality isnt to tell the truth and give back whatever one has borrowed. Polemarchus interjected verbalize that morality is to tell the truth and to give back whatever one has borrowed if you intrust Simonides. Polemarchus s ays what Simonides was trying to say was friends owe friends good deeds not bad ones. Socrates responds by saying, what Simonides meant was we give back to people what is appropriate for them, or owed to them. Polemarchus said to be consistent with what I said earlier it has to be the art of giving benefit and harm to friends and enemies respectively. Socrates makes a point that morality only seems to be multipurpose when something is not being used, for example when money needs to be saved. Socrates asks if a moral person can harm anyone and Polemarchus agreed that a moral person could harm an evil man. What Socrates was trying to get at was well if this man was really moral why is he trying to harm anyone. Socrates goes on saying many things but one main point he made was as follows It is not the job of a moral person to harm a friend or anyone else, it is the job of his opposite, an immoral person. Polemarchus agreed to this, which basically went against everything he said in th e opening of this conversation. Socrates says that the claim that its right and moral to give back to people what they are owed, if this is taken to mean that a moral person owes harm to his enemies and help to his friends, turns out to be a claim no canny person would make.