Desires and Values. Socratic intellectualism and the tripartion of the soul in the "Republic"

Abstract

In the Republic Plato seems to abandon the Socratic intellectualism when he accepts the existence of desires that are independent of the good. Nevertheless, this does not prevent him from still affirming that “every soul pursues the good and for its sake does all that it does”. In order to solve the apparent contradiction I propose in this article to distinguish between desires and values. The desires, generated by the parts of the soul, are closely attached to their proper objects, but the values add to them images of the good and other cognitive elements that transform the desires into acceptable motives for action within the unity of the soul. Therefore I propose to distinguish between the wish of the parts and another kind of volition that operates in the unity of the soul sub specie boni in order to decide between opposed desires which compete with one another.