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Section 96

Socrates paused for a long time, examining something within himself. Finally, he said, "You seek no small thing, Cebes. For this requires a thorough investigation into the whole cause of coming-to-be and perishing. I will tell you my own experiences concerning these matters, if you wish. Then, if anything I say seems useful to you, you can use it for persuasion regarding what you say." "I certainly wish to hear it," said Cebes. "Listen then, and I will tell you. When I was young, Cebes, I was wonderfully eager for the kind of wisdom they call investigating nature. It seemed an outstanding thing to me to know the causes of everything—why each thing comes to be, why it perishes, and why it exists. I frequently tossed myself up and down, examining first questions like these: Is it when heat and cold undergo a certain putrefaction, as some say, that animals are formed? Is it blood with which we think, or air, or fire? Or none of these, but rather the brain that provides the senses of hearing, sight, and smell, from which memory and opinion arise, and from memory and opinion, once they reach a state of rest, comes knowledge? Investigating further into their perishing, and into the things of the heavens and earth, I ended up thinking I was so completely unsuited for this investigation that nothing could be more so. Let me give you an adequate proof. Things I previously knew clearly—at least as it seemed to me and everyone else—I was so blinded by this investigation that I unlearned even what I thought I knew before! For instance, why a human being grows. I used to think it was clear to everyone that it was because of eating and drinking. When, through food, flesh added itself to flesh, bone to bone, and everything else found its proper addition, then the small mass became large, and the small man became large. That is what I used to think. Does it seem reasonable to you?" "It does," said Cebes. "Consider this further. I used to think my opinion was sufficient when a large man stood next to a small one, that he was taller precisely by a head. And a horse next to a horse. And even more clearly: ten seemed more than eight because two had been added, and the two-cubit length seemed greater than the one-cubit length because it exceeded it by half." "And what is your opinion of them now?" asked Cebes. "By Zeus," he said, "I am far from thinking I know the cause of any of these things. I do not even dare to accept that when one is added to one, either the one to which the addition was made became two, or the added one and the one it was added to became two because of the addition. I marvel that when each of them was separate, each was one and they were not two, but when they came near each other, this became the cause of their becoming two: the meeting of being placed close to each other! Nor can I persuade myself that if someone splits one thing in half, this splitting becomes the cause of its becoming two. That would be the exact opposite cause from before. Before, it was bringing them close together; now, it is moving them apart! Nor can I even persuade myself that I know why 'one' comes to be, or why anything else comes to be, perishes, or exists, following this method of inquiry. So I mix up a different method of my own, and I do not admit this one at all."