Searching With Socrates

By Gerard T. Lyle Jr.   (Tom)

"But how will you look for something when you don't in the least know what it is? How on Earth are you going to set up something you don't know as the object of your search? To put it another way, even if you come right up against it, how will you know that what you have found is the thing you didn't know?"1
  Could this be a paragraph from Alice in Wonderland? Yes it could. No, it isn't. It is Meno talking to Socrates in Plato's dialogue Meno. Socrates has just shared with Meno an explanation of how he, (Socrates), infects his listeners with the perplexity which he himself feels.2 The questions are Meno's way of neutralizing Socrates' tool of perplexity, (at least in Meno's mind), for he has been warned how Socrates has a way of perplexing his opponents in conversation.3 Meno even accuses Socrates of using witchcraft on him.4
  As it turns out, Socrates recognizes the questions as the old trick argument that, "A person cannot try to discover either what he knows or what he does not know. He wouldn't seek what he knows, for since he knows it there is no need of the inquiry, nor what he does not know, for in that case he does not even know what he is to look for."5
  Up to this point the conversation is but a mental sword fight of ideas, unproductive and, surely, to Socrates, boring. However, Socrates is about to perplex Meno with a reply to Meno's question, which opens the door to very broad topics such as immortality, Soul, and reincarnation, which Socrates states are, "Something true, I thought, and fine."6
  In this essay we will concern ourselves with Socrates' tool of perplexity and the search for clarity which is born from it, which I here call the Socratic search. In particular, we will concern ourselves with how each works and, in general, with what the ramifications of them may be as seen in Plato's metaphysics.
  If I understand Plato correctly, a person becomes inflicted with Socrates' perplexity when some information is gained, or an experiential learning is completed, which discloses a new concept that conflicts with a concept which the person holds and regards as significant, perhaps significant enough to have used as a tool to deal with the world. The person may have formed a belief concerning the old concept such as that it is true. Because of this new information and or experiential learning, the person now entertains the possibility that the information he once used as a tool, and or believes in, may no longer be appropriate or may even be false. A conflict of ideas in the person's mind follows. This conflict generates confusion to some degree, if this confusion is not cleared up, then it will lead to frustration to some degree. If this frustration is not cleared up, then it will lead to anger to some degree. If this anger is not cleared up, then it will lead to a mode of behavior which, because it stemmed from anger, may not be beneficial, for anger clouds our reason as well as our intuition.
  The clearing up of confusion before it leads to frustration and anger, etc. is Socrates' most important job in this process of perplexity. In other words, in a directed process of perplexity you do not take something away from someone, (such as a belief), unless you replace it with something equally satisfying to the person, for if you do, then you will lead the person into pain, the pain of frustration and its ramifications. This process of perplexity is successful as long as Socrates gives the person the information and/or learning experience to begin the conflict of ideas in the first place, and later clears up the perplexity. The state of confusion is unpleasant and a person will make great efforts to remove themselves from such a condition. Therefore, Socrates gains much favor when he, after initiating the process of perplexity, clears up the confusion for the person he perplexed. It is like a stacked deck of cards. Socrates becomes more in the category of a friend to the person rather than being someone for that person to engage with in a mental sword fight of ideas. Socrates calls this being a midwife, not a small3 part of which is discerning the real from the unreal, (phantoms of the mind).7
  For example, in the dialogue Meno, Socrates begins the process of perplexity in Meno by answering Meno's questions, which have implied that it is a waste of time to engage in a search for something you already know or for something you do not know. Socrates responds3 with the concept that learning is remembering what we already know.8 According to Socrates, we have learned everything about this world and the other world in our former lifetimes. The Soul already knows all that is, we have only to remember it. This clearly eliminated, with respect to Plato's works, the possible speculation that, given reincarnation to be true, (as Socrates says he thinks it is fine and true), we incarnate for the purpose of acquiring knowledge. For if we already have knowledge of all that is, why then would we still incarnate? This assumes that there is a plan to the universe of which reincarnation is a part.
  Socrates then demonstrates his point that learning is remembering to Meno's satisfaction by guiding a slave boy, who is ignorant of Geometry, to solve a Geometric problem. From then on, Meno's attitude changes from the vanity of mentally crossing swords with the great and famous Socrates to the humble exploration of philosophical concepts with an eye to gaining truth, (the truth is what exists: dictionary definition), rather than self-serving victories in the realm where vanity corrupts philosophy. In this case the first step of the process of perplexity in Meno is not dramatized, as it is in the taking hold of the slave boy with perplexity. The boy goes from a "not-knowingness", to confidence, then to the stage of admitting to Socrates that not only doesn't he, (the slave boy), know the answer, but also that he doesn't even think he knows the answer. Socrates rescues the boy by guiding him with questions to bring out the answer which, according to Socrates, the slave boy already knew.  Here we see that Socrates has used his tool of perplexity on two different people during the course of one dialogue. He brings them through the process unconfused and as confident in their new knowledge as they were in their old knowledge before the process of perplexity began. This seems to me to be no small accomplishment, and If I understand Socrates' method correctly, there was no charge for services rendered.
  The slave boy was convinced that he didn't know the answer at one point, yet Socrates brought out the answer in the boy as the midwife would deliver the child from its mother. If, as the dialogue suggests, Meno was satisfied with the demonstration, then it means that Meno had new information to operate on in the world -- that learning is remembering. He had now, at least in his thoughts, no reasonable excuse not to philosophically explore beyond the boundaries of his own conceptual prejudices.
  Meno had learned from his encounter with Socrates that if Meno, or anyone else, was not careful, then he could lock himself out of areas of knowledge that may be beneficial to him. (like solving Geometry problems, or watching a person, untrained in Geometry, solve a Geometry problem). Thus, although it may be true, according to Socrates, that we have learned all that is before entering this life, it appears that since we are not in a state of complete remembrance, we can, at times, resemble the proverbial donkey, which can be coaxed to move only by a carrot dangled in front of it. For some of us this carrot is new and intriguing knowledge.
  Another way to get the donkey to move is pain. Yes, pain. For many of us, because of our strong yet subtle attachments to erroneous concepts, pain is the teacher which prompts us to lesson our mental grip on one concept as we find another which we feel is more accurate, or at least less painful to hold onto. If we hold onto a concept which is inaccurate, then we will experience pain to the degree that the concept is not accurate. This is due to thwarted expectations.
  For example, if a person held fast to the concept that nothing dies in the physical world (terminates its physical existence) then every time something dies of which this person is aware, this person will suffer the pain of a thwarted expectation to the degree that this person holds fast to the erroneous concept. Thus thwarting, or its resultant pain, will challenge the concept held by the person to the point of perplexity to some degree. The person then begins to clear up the confusion. The search will lead to a new concept, or a modification of the old one.
  Through this experiential learning the person's concept is evolved to a concept which is more in tune with the realities of life, such as in this world there is terrestrial death, or in other words a termination of individual physical existence and at times group existence such as an extinct species. When this occurs, the person will suffer less or not at all because the new concept will be thwarted less, (depending to what degree the old concept, which invited pain, was changed in terms of accuracy), or not thwarted at all if the change was to an accurate concept such as in this world there is a termination of physical existence.
  This rapidity of a successful modification depends on several factors. First, the pain which results from the attachment to an erroneous concept must be sufficient to challenge the person to a point of perplexity. The intensity of the search will be proportional to the desire to get out of pain. This will depend on the degree of attachment to the old concept. In other words, the time it takes to get out of the pain of a thwarted expectation depends on how much the person tries to hold onto the old concept. Even though the person is being prompted by pain, subtle attachments or desire to hold onto the old concept at least to some degree is common. It is frequently heard that man is a creature of habits, our thinking can get habitual and it may take several times of experiential learning to form new habits of thinking even though we may know a new concept is better to operate on.
  On the surface, one may say that it is irrational to hold onto a concept which will bring pain. It is almost as if the person was holding onto the pain itself. But we must remember that many of our concepts are deeply ingrained in our subconscious mind and the one that gives the person the most trouble now may, at another time, have been associated with a mode of behavior which was highly significant in his mind, to his personal survival, such as the Greek concept that might makes right, which Plato dealt with in the opening book of The Republic.
  There are many examples of old concepts being associated with survival. Immigrants have to adjust to new ways in a new country and give up, to some degree, their old concepts of living. Another example is men returning from war. In one area of their lives it was legitimate to kill, yet now they must readjust their thinking and their instinctive habits.
  We must remember that pain is only one way which moves the donkey. There is at least one more way. New or intriguing information can challenge our old concepts and initiate the process of perplexity which generates a search for clarity -- The Socratic Search.
  Meno's questions to Socrates in the Meno can be symbolic of the erroneous thinking that a person can dwell on which can, if not properly adjusted, progress and/or cause pain in an individual as well as on a group level. We have just seen some examples on an individual level, perhaps an example on a group level will be of service here. In Sir Francis Bacon's time, the medical profession taught that the blood did not circulate in the body. Harvey, a friend of Bacon's, declared and proved to satisfaction that the blood circulated in the body. This began the process of perplexity on a grand scale. Harvey supplied information which moved a world dwelling in the darkness of ignorance one step closer to the light of true understanding.
  For those who were strongly attached to the concept that the blood did not circulate in the body, Harvey's information was more of a hot foot than a carrot. But either war, hot foot or carrot, the donkey moved and the search for more accurate knowledge began on a group level. What was their goal? It was to clear up the confusion caused by this new information with all its ramifications in medicine. Here we see, on a grand scale, what Socrates referred to when he said, in the Meno, "We shall be better, braver, and more active men if we believe it right to look for what we don't know than if we believe there is no point in looking because what we don't know we can never discover."9
  It is my understanding that the process of perplexity, which Socrates appears to have perfected to a very high degree, (if we can believe what we read in the present translations of Plato's dialogues), exists also on a crude level in this world, at least, and manifests more or less continuously in Humanity, and includes, in the process, The Socratic Search for clarity. A person not engaged in the directed process of perplexity, nevertheless runs into new concepts, or old concepts dressed up with a stronger emotional appeal, every day. But here he doesn't have the benefit of a quiet garden in Athens with Socrates to assist in clearing up the confusion. Here, it seems to me, that we have a key to understanding Plato's works, but we will look into this more later.
  The process of clearing up the personal confusion without the aid of Socrates also constitutes what I call The Socratic Search. The search may be short or long depending on many conditions, some of which we have already considered, but one of the most significant factors is fear of change, or fear of the unknown. As Socrates said, the search will make us braver men.10 Is it guaranteed that a Socratic Search, unattended by a Socrates, will be successful? Well, if the Soul knows all that is, then it is just a matter of searching, or remembering. We are stimulated to search due, (at least), to curiosity and/or pain. Will we have help in our search, or are we just thrown to the wolves to fend for ourselves?
  In the Meno, Socrates and Meno explore an area of life which is little recognized but much used. This is the area of right opinion and knowledge.11 Today we hear people talk about the benefit of operating on their "gut feeling". This is especially common with people who work in management positions. They actually advocate, and are open in themselves, to increase this "gut feeling" in terms of frequency and quality. Quality is included here because the business man knows that not every "gut feeling" works out although he realizes, through experience, (both his and that of others), that the "gut feeling" may have been accurate; however, his interpretation of that "gut feeling" may have been in error.
  Some people have different names for this right opinion with respect to their personal biases. For instance, a man on the street may be more comfortable in calling this right opinion a "hunch" rather than the term right opinion. A religionist may be more comfortable with calling right opinion knowledge that is a Divine inspiration; whereas that same religionist would be strongly inclined to call it the work of the devil when this right opinion operates in a person who does not share the religionist's view to the degree that the particular religionist is comfortable with the difference in views.
  Today because of the curiosity of the public, mass media, and religious tolerance, (compared to the days of the Inquisitions), many people are comfortable with the term "insight" or "intuition". Another term used frequently is "the voice of conscience" which always urges us to be good. This later concept, by the way, has really permeated the media to the point where we find it in a cartoon character of Walt Disney. He created a character, an animated cricket called Jiminy, who would appear on Disney's National Television show as an animated master of ceremonies. His musical parting words as he strolled across our television screens twirling his closed umbrella were, " ... and always let your conscience be your guide."
  It may well be that in the translations from the Greek of Plato's works, the term "right opinion" may not be as close in connotative description as Plato would have desired, due to the philosophical biases of our translators. But whatever label we put on it, the person in The Socratic Search is not alone in his trials, but has access to this special knowledge which is described as right opinion.
  Where does this right opinion come from? Socrates says it is a Divine dispensation.12 Surely this is a subject for countless hours of philosophical speculation. Is it right opinion which informs Socrates as to the right question to ask a person that sits in conversation with Socrates? Is it right opinion that guides Socrates' train of thought in the dialogues? Is there a cause and effect relationship concerning right opinion? If so does this mean that right opinion can be increased in an individual with respect to frequency and quality at will? As we can see, one question leads to another when dealing in the area of the unknown; however, that is what Socrates does best, for he would not be able to perplex in an area that a person knew was the truth through right opinion. For example, a person who knew that there was a terrestrial death waiting for him at some point in his future, and knew it not on belief but through his own experiential learning, (plus that of others), as well as his own right opinion, would, in all probability, be imperturbable with respect to the particular subject matter mentioned. 
  Later, when we overlay our thoughts concerning The Socratic Search onto Plato's metaphysics, perhaps we will get a right opinion on the question: Is it guaranteed that a Socratic Search will be successful without the aid of a Socrates, (a teacher, which is another name for Master in the Hebrew, or Guru which is the name for teacher in Hindi).
  Could Plato have shared with us, in the Meno, the philosophical-psychological basis of the motivation of man that is involved with a learning process -- our remembering of all that is?13But if the Soul knows everything because of its previous experience, ("Seeing all that is both in this world and the other world"14) then, as we declared earlier, the Soul cannot be incarnated for the purpose of knowledge. Yet The Socratic Search is involved in remembering what we already know -- knowledge. Is this a contradiction?
  Perhaps not, since one is more on a macroscopic level while the other is more on a microscopic level. The former is more like the overall operation of a factory while the latter is like a machine in that factory. But why must we search in the first place? If the Soul already knows all that is, why doesn't everyone born in this world manifest 100% of that previously acquired knowledge? 
  Is this a flaw in Plato's metaphysics? Why are there morons? Why are there intelligent people? Why do people live in poverty? Why do people live in wealth? Why is ignorance extant in this world? Sound familiar? Many have, at some time in their lives, expressed similar concerns mixed with feelings of confusion, frustration, and anger? Some have even gone as far as thinking, (or saying), that it must be a bad God, a good God wouldn't allow these things to exist! Some may have reacted to a point that they declared to friends, family and sometimes to the world through literature and/or the media, that there is no God.
  These exasperations are mentioned solely because they are involved in the process of perplexity and, if we have no competent guide, precipitate the extended Socratic Search for truth to clear up the discomfort of confusion and/or the pain of thwarted subtle attachment to inaccurate concepts. It may be of interest to note here that Plato does respond, in his dialogues, to the question, Why, if the Soul knows all that is, are we not born manifesting this knowledge? We will look at this response later as our understanding of the process of perplexity is expanded into Plato's metaphysics.
  However, now let's ask the obvious question, for those of us who are neophytes in Plato's metaphysics, or have no desire to tune in to it. Who wants to go through all that confusion and pain? Who wants to get involved or have anything to do with the process of perplexity whether we have the help of a Socrates or whether we go through it trying to discern right from wrong opinions in our mental culture? In short, who needs it?
  It is easy to forget, while we are in an exploration of the process of perplexity as well as being in the process of perplexity that the process in itself is not something which we consciously choose to go through. It is the intrigue of new knowledge and/or the pain of holding onto inaccurate concepts, (the carrot and/or the hot foot), that invokes the process of perplexity and this initiates The Socratic Search for truth for clarity of confusion.
  What we choose is whether or not to take in and operate on a concept or concepts. This is where our basic choice lies, not in whether we want to be involved in a process of perplexity or not. Perplexity follows the thwarted expectation as well as the thwarting of its associated wants, desires and needs. To some degree, we will always be in the "on deck circle" waiting to step into the batters box so to speak, as long as we choose to operate on inaccurate concepts which are bound to be thwarted in the course of everyday living. It is a matter of discernment in our original choices. It must be said here that we also choose to modify or give up our attachments to the concepts due to the influence of the pain associated with the thwarting.
  An intellectual understanding is not enough, however, to rise above the very practical problem of choosing and operating on a concept that is inaccurate - why? Some of us are fooled into thinking, (an inaccurate concept which leads to pain), that because we have knowledge of something that we rise above the effects of it. Nothing could be farther from the truth. An addict can have intellectual knowledge that the thing which he is addicted to will bring physical, emotional, and mental ruin; however, he continues to use it as long as he allows his habit to be his master.
  In short, although Sir Francis Bacon may be correct that knowledge is power, knowledge is not enough. Something else is required. That something is a level of discernment which produces emotional mastery. The person must be able to sort out his emotional life in order to get through the process of perplexity, as we will see later, on a grand scale. When prudence, (practical wisdom), directs the emotional life, then the person can rise above the problems connected with the process of perplexity, with careful analysis, with respect to his choosing of concepts, and a strong determination to modify the inaccurate ones he is presently operating on to the degree he understands them to be inaccurate. If he is in doubt as to whether a concept is inaccurate or not, then he has but to wait awhile and observe how it fairs in every day living. If it brings him inharmony and pain it is inaccurate, and the degree of inharmony and pain in his life as a result of operating on the concept will indicate the degree to which he is attached to the concepts, (as well as its mental, emotional, and physical directives). 
  We have seen earlier how the search makes us more active, but Socrates also tells us that the search will make us better and braver men.15 Why shall we be better and braver men? Well, for one thing, a confused person is less efficient in life, but the ideal fruit of the search, in general, is the remembrance of what we already know, the knowledge of all that is. Why shall we be better men if we know all or at least more of what is than we manifest at present? Certainly the creature comforts would be greatly improved due to inventions related to this additional knowledge, that is, if we apply it prudently.
   It seems to me that these two questions: Why will the search make us better men?, and why are we not manifesting our knowledge of all that is?, can lead us deeper, (a search perhaps), into Plato's metaphysics. It may be well for us to remind ourselves here that the main topic under consideration in Plato's dialogue Meno, from which we drew our point of interest, namely the process of perplexity and the resulting Socratic Search for truth, is virtue. Meno asks Socrates if virtue can be taught, and although Socrates wants first to explore what virtue is, (which he really does), he yields to Meno's stubbornness and pursues whether virtue can be taught or not.
  Well the bottom line of the discussion is the consideration that virtue cannot be taught because it is a Divine dispensation.16 Why, we may well ask, does the Divine dispense virtue to mortals. Is the Divine dispensation of virtue, which Socrates and Meno have determined to be in part wisdom,17 connected to the search? Could this be why the search will, according to Socrates, make us better men? What is the criteria of dispensation? What does Socrates mean by the Divine? 
  Perhaps it is possible that since the subject of searching and the subject of virtue appear so closely related in the same dialogue and that since both would lead us to the discovery in ourselves of all that is, we may be able to use them as pitons to climb the mountain of Plato's lofty metaphysics, which, if I understand correctly, may even lead to that age old question, which haunts many thinking individuals, Why does man exist?
  But first, let us regroup so that we can form our base camp, be sure of our position, and make ready our equipment for the ascent. So far we have the following concepts. If we have them well, ( and if they are accurate to a high degree), then we will find little inharmony during the climb. They are as follows:

1. There is a process of perplexity.

2. The process of perplexity generates a search for truth to clear up confusion.

3. The process of perplexity exists both particularly, as a tool, and generally, not as a tool of any particular person.

4. It is better to search than not to search.

5. The search will make us better, braver, and more active.

6. The Truth is what exists, (dictionary definition).

7. Prudence, (practical wisdom), is the accurate application of accurate knowledge for the greatest good.

A person's life can very well be a series of searches. The series being by no means linear, since the search depends on individual choices of operating concepts. The result of any one search may or may not be a higher level of understanding because the person may settle for a concept on a level of understanding below that which got challenged due to a quick way out of the pain of a thwarted concept, but this would eventually lead to pain again and the search for clarity of confusion would be once again initiated, or should we say resumed. This puts the process of perplexity, not only on a dynamic level covering one individual's lifetime, but also on a general level of all persons in this world. This constitutes a gradient of the process of perplexity for this world. The number of individuals on the gradient is the number of individuals in this world at any given instant in time.
  We are now applying the process of perplexity to Plato's metaphysics in the myth of the cave18 where the population's understanding of reality, (if my understanding of this myth is correct), ranges from the mere shadows of reality, to that which casts the shadows, to that of the higher realm of ideas and then to a oneness with the whole of reality, (stepping out3 of the cave into the light of day).
  The image of light and darkness is a play on degrees of understanding.19 The person with a keener insight, or the more discerning person, rises above the darkness of ignorance. How is this done? Enter The Socratic Search. In order for a person to advance on the gradient of the process of perplexity, he would have to adjust his operating concepts to those which match up to a higher degree with what actually occurs in this world and, as we will see later, in the other world. This means that the person is exercising a greater degree of discernment which is based on right opinion, knowledge and experience. The more insightful, or the more discerning, the person is in his choices of concepts, the higher he advances in the light of understanding. The entire cave is a symbol of this world and the outside of the cave is a symbol of the other world. 20
  The process of perplexity, one would first think, relates only to this world, but, as we shall see later, it relates to both in that this world and the other world become a continuous gradient of the light of understanding of the whole of Humanity. Through this process of the cave of life, because of an initial perplexity and its resulting search, which set off a series of perplexities and searches, we end up remembering all that is in this world and the other world. Nevertheless, the person who achieves the light outside of the cave, after a while, returns to assist his previous cave-mates out of the cave. This sounds like Socrates describing the true guide, who has put right opinion to use in this world as a service to his fellow man. 21
  Are we suggesting that perplexity leads to prudence? Somewhere on the gradient of perplexity, the Divine dispenses prudence. How do we qualify? It is my opinion that somewhere in our travels on the gradient of perplexity we reach a stage where we tune in to the higher aspects of morals and ethics and, because of this attunement, qualify for a degree of the Divine dispensation. We reach this stage of qualification when we listen, (to some degree), to moral conscience and prefer the higher aspirations to the lower aspirations. Here we are not the best judge of whether we have reached such a stage because, as Plato states in The Timaeus, no one deliberately does bad things, (because in their mind they hold onto a concept which tells them it is right to do the action).
  It is when experience, right opinion, and virtue urge us to the understanding that our concept is non-beneficial that we, to a degree, listen less and less to that concept which others determine to be bad but that we followed because our concept declared it was right to do. Gradually we abandon the old concept with its dictates and grasp a new concept with new or modified dictates. But this is a very subtle business and most of us are unaware that we are in a change and are only conscious of the pleasure of the intrigue with the new concept, (or the pain from the old one).
  Prudence is a manifestation of the faculty of discernment, or the ability to discern what is from what is not, (the phantoms of the mind which Socrates declared to Thaetetus). Prudence, when of the highest moral persuasion, is the accurate application of accurate knowledge for the greatest Good. this is wisdom. In other words, wisdom is the discernment to draw a distinction, identify the better part of that distinction, and then, if it is of the highest aspirations, beneficially apply it in this world and the other world for the purpose of upgrading individuals on the gradient of perplexity, (if it is their will to do so, and without interfering with Karma).
  Discernment is required to listen to a right opinion as it flashes in our mind, for many of us have a right opinion but discard it as being a whim of the mental life, a mere phantom of the mind. It takes a high degree of discernment to differentiate what is a non-beneficial phantom from a right opinion, for the mind is a manufacturer of many subtle illusions and reasons, which may not all be true.
  Now let us continue by asking the question that thinking people at some time in their lives inevitably ask themselves. Why is life in this world necessary? Why do our conceptions, to a degree, hold the mere shadow of reality - of all that is? Perhaps this question has been one of the most perplexing of all in the History of Mankind. The question is still demanding an answer. Does The Socratic Search, as we overlay it on Plato's metaphysics, extend into the realm of the question, Why is life in this world necessary?
  In The Timaeus, Plato shares with us his understanding, not only of how everything began, but also why we find ourselves on the gradient of perplexity in the first place. To summarize Plato's ideas, (according to Cornford's translation), with respect to our question, we see that according to Plato,22 The Father made some lesser gods23 and they in turn made man according to the plan of the Father. Each man was given a home, a star. In time, each man had to come to Earth for one lifetime. When this occurred, the lesser gods built into man24 seven attributes, according to the plan of the Father, which man would have to master.25 These were as follows:

1. Dread and necessary affections;

2. Pleasure, the strongest lure of evil;

3. Pains that take flight from good;

4. Temerity  5. Fear       > a pair of unwise counselors;

6. Passion hard to entreat;

7. Hope, too easily lead astray.

These they combined with irrational sense and desire that shrinks from no venture. If, in that incarnation the man mastered the seven built-ins, then he would return to his star and live happily. 26However, if he was corrupted by the built- ins due to the exercise of his Free-Will, then he would have to be born again.27 If he still did not master them,28 then he had to be born again, in lesser forms until he gained some foothold on discernment and began his journey back through the chain of life through his mastery of the seven built-ins.29
  Prior to this explanation in The Timaeus, we find Plato stating the effect of non-mastery of our affections as follows: "It is, indeed, because of these affections that today, as in the beginning, a soul comes to be without intelligence at first, when it's bound in a mortal body."30 So we see that our exploration of the process of perplexity and its offspring, the Socratic Search, has brought us to Plato's response to our question: Why do we have to begin our search in the shadows of reality? (The Myth of the Cave). The answer is that we somehow failed to master the seven built-ins and that we did not always live in the shadows of reality but devolved due to lack of discernment, (the first part of wisdom), in the areas of the seven built-ins until now on our way back up the chain of life, we find ourselves in each incarnation searching for more discernment in order to progress to mastery of these seven built-ins.
  If we train the telescope of our Socratic Search for truth onto Plato's Myth of Er, 31 we may gain some insight into the expansion of our gradient of perplexity in this world into the other world and thus extend the territory of our Socratic Search. Briefly, specifically with respect to our question regarding why man is not born manifesting the knowledge of all that is and also why there are individual differences, the Myth of Er is as follows. Er dies and goes to the other world where he is told that he is to observe all and return to Earth to report what he has observed. After many different phases of what seemed to be a sorting process and a penal and reward system based on behavior in this world, Er observes a group of souls on a plain just before they drink from the river of forgetfulness, "whose waters no vessel can contain." 32 With this, Plato explains symbolically why we do not manifest the knowledge of all that is from birth.
  The group is instructed that they are to choose their next life from a vast selection of lives. Some choose quickly, their choice based on their dominant desire. These, upon closer observance, were found later in inconsolable sorrow and tears because their desires blinded them to all other things they had to do in the same life they chose due to their strong desire for certain aspects of that life. For example, a man chose the life of a tyrant due to his dominant desire for power, only to find that later in that same life he had to eat his own children. Some of those who chose lifetimes associated with the lower aspirations came from Heaven before they arrived at the plain where they were now choosing. The explanation was that in Heaven they gravitated to like souls and, although they were basically good, some of their hidden desires were not allowed to come out because of the lofty atmosphere and peer pressure. Thus, these lower aspirations were suppressed and not mastered. The unmastered built-ins will get the most attention. They seem to shout the loudest in our minds, and if we have not gained some degree of wisdom with the discernment to see the difference between the lower aspiration and the higher aspiration, then we will succumb to it and suffer the pain of its effects.
  Some souls on the plain examined very minutely each lifetime, looking for the humble life of service accompanied by good health and contentment. These latter had the discernment and will to choose the less self-serving lifetimes. So we see that, according to Plato, there is a choosing on a soul level between incarnations, (after a period in an area of punishment and reward), of the next incarnation before we drink from the River of Forgetfulness. This process is continued until we gain the wisdom necessary to choose the life of highest aspirations, thereby mastering the seven built-ins and going to live on our star, our first estate.
  So we see that the process of perplexity not only exists on a microscopic level directed by true guides of the quality of mind of a Socrates, but also exists on a grand scale covering the whole of this world and the other world and constitutes a gradient of perplexity up which we travel by our individual Socratic Search for clarity. Our goal is clarity of confusion while we are on the gradient, but we are rewarded with much more. We regain the knowledge of all that is, but with one tremendous difference -- we regain it along with the wisdom to apply it for the greatest good.
  Wisdom signals the end of our Socratic Search, but here is where we have just begun. Every question demands an answer, and every answer can raise more questions. Plato has given some answers which ask some questions. Why was it in the plan of the Father to include in man the built-in attributes for man to conquer? Was it a basic training for the will? Was it man's job to purify the impure which the Father mixed with the pure to make man? When man finally masters the built-ins and is put on a star, what happens next? What have the first men been doing who were not corrupted? How many of the first men passed the test? How many stars in our Universe are occupied by one man, a man who passed the test or a man who failed it but later mastered the seven built-ins? Why did the Father make man in the first place? Why did the Father make the lesser Gods? What is the Father's overall plan and why is it necessary? Where did the Father come from and why? 
  Where does Plato get his information? Is it right opinion? Was it passed on from Socrates through his teacher Diotima, (a woman from Manitea)? If so, where did she get the information? Did she remember it, as Socrates tells us all learning is remembering? Did she transcend the cave of darkened understanding and gain wisdom, to a degree, then return as a true guide? Was Socrates a true guide? Was Plato a true guide?
  Let us give Plato the last word for our conclusion to our explanation of the process of perplexity and The Socratic Search. "We must accordingly distinguish two kinds of cause, the necessary and the Divine. The Divine we should search out in all things for the sake of a life of such happiness as our nature admits; the necessary for the sake of the Divine, reflecting that apart from the necessary those other objects of our serious study cannot by themselves be perceived or communicated, nor can we in any other way have part or lot in them." 33
		
NOTES:
All references are out of The Collected Dialogues of Plato, edited by Edith Hamilton and Huntington Cairns; Bollingen Series LXXI, Princeton University Press copyright 1961: ninth edition April 1978, unless otherwise noted.

1. Meno, 81d
2. Meno, 80c
3. Meno, 79e
4. Meno, 80a
5. Meno, 80e
6. Meno, 81a
7. Thaetetus, 150b,c
8. Meno, 81c,d
9. Meno, 86b,c
10. Meno, 86b,c
11. Meno, 97b,c
12. Meno, 100a
13. Meno, 86a
14. Meno, 81b
15. Meno, 86c
16. Meno, 100b
17. Meno, 89a
18. Republic, Bk. VII, 518a
19. Same as 18
20. Republic, Bk. VII, 517b
21. Republic, BK. VII, 519c, 520c
22. Timaeus, 41c,d,e. Plato's Cosmology, (The Timaeus): Running Commentary, Cornford, Francis M., Bobbs Merrill Co., Indianapolis, 1975.
23. Timaeus, 69c, also 41c,d Cornford - see note 22
24. Timaeus, 9c,d, Cornford- see note 22
25. Timaeus, 42b, Cornford- see note 22
26. Timaeus, 42b, Cornford- see note 22
27. Timaeus, 90e, 91a, Cornford- see note 22
28. Timaeus, 91d, 92b, Cornford- see note 22
29. Timaeus, 42d, Cornford- see note 22
30. Timaeus, 44a, Cornford- see note 22
31. Republic, BK. X 614b to the end.
32. Republic, BK. X, 621b
33. Timaeus, 68e, 69a, Cornford- see note 22

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. The Collected Dialogues of Plato, edited by Edith Hamilton and Huntington Cairns; Bollingen Series LXXI, Princeton University Press copyright 1961: ninth edition April 1978.