Pilot and navigation

Use in the book

The pilot leads the list of experts whose false claim would be exposed in the dream (173b). If the hypothetical temperance governed us completely, no one pretending to be a pilot could deceive us, and we would be safer at sea. This gives the diagnostic fantasy a practical and high-stakes example.

At 174c the pilot's art reappears after knowledge of good and bad is hypothetically removed. It still prevents death at sea; its proper technical function has not disappeared. The subtraction test nevertheless says that these results’ occurring well and beneficially would be lost without knowledge of good and bad (174c–d). How that knowledge secures the benefit is not explained.

The recurrence therefore supports the division between technical success and value. It is not evidence that navigation is worthless or that survival has no ordinary benefit. The argument asks whether reliable survival, taken simply as a technical achievement, exhausts the explanation of doing well. Nor is there an explicit ship-of-state allegory here, even though political management is discussed nearby.

Places to read

1. 173bFalse pilot excluded and maritime safety imagined
2. 174c–dNavigation retains its function without knowledge of good and bad

Translation in this edition

The edition uses “pilot” consistently rather than changing to “captain” at the second occurrence. That continuity lets the reader recognize the same expertise in the dream and the subtraction test.

κυβερνήτης

Attested: κυβερνήτης (kybernētēs). A pilot or navigator; the dreamed rule of temperance would prevent an unqualified claimant to this expertise from deceiving the community. References: 173b. Lexical identification: lemma: κυβερνήτης. See Pilot and navigation.

κυβερνητική

Attested: κυβερνητικὴ (kybernētikē). The art of piloting or navigation; it would still prevent death at sea without knowledge of good and bad, but Socrates says these results’ occurring well and beneficially would be lost (174c–d). References: 174c. Lexical identification: lemma: κυβερνητική. See Pilot and navigation.

κινδυνεύοντας (kindyneuontas)

Being in danger, here at sea and in war; the literal sense differs from the hesitant assent at160b. References: 173b. Lemma: κινδυνεύω. See Pilot and navigation.

κωλύσει (kōlysei)

Prevent or hinder; navigation would still prevent death at sea, even without knowledge of good and bad. References: 174c. Lemma: κωλύω. See Pilot and navigation.

Use in the book

At 117c–d the passenger who recognizes his ignorance leaves the question of moving the tiller to the pilot and remains quiet. This example distinguishes acknowledged ignorance from the presumptuous ignorance that produces mistakes. At 119d a more ambitious shipboard comparison challenges Alcibiades' choice of rivals: being the best pilot among one's shipmates is not enough when the trireme must fight an enemy. The proper benchmark is the opposing leader's skill.

At 125c–126a2 the ship tests the proposed definition of political rule as directing people who use other people. Boatswains direct rowers, yet Alcibiades agrees that the relevant virtue is piloting. The craft governs those sharing a voyage, and it possesses good counsel toward keeping them safe at sea. Thus neither coordinated human command nor good counsel alone singles out political expertise. One must specify its civic object and end.

At 135a the analogy becomes lethal. Someone lacking sense and virtue in piloting but free to do whatever seems good to him would destroy himself and his shipmates. The dependent group is essential: the damage caused by ignorant authority cannot be confined to the ruler. This case supports the conclusion that all rule without virtue leads to doing badly.

The stages give the nautical examples unusual coherence. First one should entrust a task to a recognized expert; next an aspirant to command must prepare against serious opposition; then he must identify the distinct expertise required; finally unchecked authority without it exposes everyone to ruin. The comparison supports accountable rule, without making technical navigation a sufficient qualification for governing a city.

Places to read

1. 117c–117dThe uninformed passenger responsibly defers to a pilot
2. 119d–119eNaval combat redirects competition toward opposing leaders
3. 125c–126a2Crew organization and safety specify the pilot’s craft and good counsel
4. 135a–135bUnskilled unrestricted command threatens the entire ship and models bad civic rule

Translation in this edition

The edition’s note identifies the κελευστής as the one giving time to a trireme's rowers. “Virtue of piloting” preserves ἀρετή in both the role analysis and the final disaster example; “mere skill” would hide this connection.

ἐρέτης

Attested: ἐρέταις (eretais; 125c). A rower; the boatswain's use of rowers gives a concrete example of coordinating people within a specialized activity. Lexical identification: lemma: ἐρέτης. See Piloting and seafaring.

κελευστής

Attested: κελευστῶν (keleustōn; 125c). At 125c: Boatswains directing rowers, an example of people making use of people. Lexical identification: lemma: κελευστής. See Piloting and seafaring.

κυβερνάω / κυβερνήτης / κυβερνητική

Attested: κυβερνήτῃ (kybernētēi; 117d); κυβερνητικὴ (kybernētikē; 125c); κυβερνητικῆς (kybernētikēs; 135a). At 117d: The pilot to whom an ignorant passenger properly entrusts steering. At 125c: Piloting excellence that directs the coordinated crew. At 135a: Piloting virtue lacking in the destructive unchecked controller. Lexical identification: family label: κυβερνάω / κυβερνήτης / κυβερνητική. See Piloting and seafaring.

ναυτιλία / ναυτικός

Attested: ναυτικὰ (nautika; 124e); ναυτιλίας (nautilias; 125d). At 124e: Seafaring affairs, excluded as the specific competence Alcibiades seeks. At 125d: A voyage shared by participants whom the pilot’s craft directs. Lexical identification: family label: ναυτιλία / ναυτικός. See Piloting and seafaring.

οἴαξ

Attested: οἴακα (oiaka; 117d). A tiller or steering lever; deciding which way to move it requires the pilot's expertise rather than the passenger's uninformed guess. Lexical identification: lemma: οἴαξ. See Piloting and seafaring.

Use in the book

The pilot at 226b has equipped his ship with worthless sails and rudders. Socrates asks whether he can fail to know that he will suffer loss and risk his own death, the ship’s destruction and the loss of everything carried. The companion says he cannot. The conclusion, crossing into 226c, is that he does not expect gain from the worthless tackle. This is the longest and most consequential of the short professional examples.

Unlike the farmer’s unproductive plant or the horseman’s damaging food, the equipment here endangers an interconnected enterprise. Pilot, vessel and cargo can all be lost together. The example is especially important because it introduces suffering loss before the formal discussion of gain’s opposite at 226e–227a. The reader has already been shown what the later abstraction can mean: failure that exceeds the price of the faulty item.

Socrates distinguishes the prediction of loss from the risk of the larger catastrophe. The pilot will suffer loss and will be in danger of perishing; the latter is not asserted as an inevitable event. Even so, this is not a developed calculation of risk, probability and expected return. The decisive condition is knowledge that the equipment is worthless for the contemplated use. The companion grants that such knowledge defeats the expectation of gain from it.

The case leaves open questions the original moral accusation might have raised. Someone selling defective tackle could profit while passing the danger to another person; someone knowingly accepting some risk might obtain a compensating benefit. Neither possibility is examined here. They expose the limited role of the analogy rather than changing the example’s stipulated outcome. What the pilot establishes is the relation between worthless equipment and the knowledgeable user’s expectation.

A ship appears again at 228c when Hipparchus sends a fifty-oared vessel to bring Anacreon to Athens. It is not this pilot’s ship, and its condition is not discussed. The later vessel belongs to the practical resources of cultural patronage, whereas the first belongs to the test of instrumental worth.

Places to read

1. 226bἱστία καὶ πηδάλια — Sails and steering equipment are the concrete defective inputs.
2. 226bζημιωθήσεται καὶ κινδυνεύσει — Certain loss and exposure to further danger are separately expressed.
3. 226b–cἀπὸ τῶν σκευῶν τῶν μηδενὸς ἀξίων — The conclusion collects those fittings as worthless tackle.

Translation in this edition

The edition’s “pilot” should not suggest the modern operator of an aircraft. Its “will be in danger” preserves the risk construction; “losing” the ship and cargo translates forms of the same destruction verb that supplies “perishing” for the pilot. “Tackle” distinguishes the nautical collection from the more general “instruments” and “equipment” used in the culminating craft example at 226c.

Use in the book

The pilot is selected without hesitation at 136d. This is not a claim that navigation encompasses all knowledge, but that the relevant craft governs the relevant danger. The lover’s philosophical generalist remains less competent in that domain. The choice gives concrete meaning to the abstract question of usefulness.

A striking reversal follows at 138e. The philosopher is told not to entrust his own household to another. The earlier example approved entrustment to an expert; the later question insists on a task he must himself perform. The natural reading is not a ban on all delegation or specialist assistance. The difference is the sphere of responsibility being claimed for philosophy: rightful judgment and ordering must be something the philosopher can actually exercise.

Friends may then entrust arbitrations to him. Here he is the recipient of trust rather than its giver. The sequence runs from choosing a reliable pilot, to refusing to evade one’s household responsibility, to proving reliable for others. It turns the educated spectator into a potential decision-maker whose competence matters to people depending on him.

This connection is argumentative rather than lexical magic. The same verb can describe different lawful or customary arrangements, and the text does not derive a universal political theory from it. What it does is expose a common practical demand: a person trusted with important matters must know enough to do the work rightly, not merely appear cultivated in conversation.

Places to read

1. 136dτῷ κυβερνήτῃ ἢ τῷ φιλοσόφῳ — The storm makes the choice of the appropriate practitioner explicit.
2. 138eτὴν αὑτοῦ οἰκίαν οὐκ ἄλλῳ ἐπιτρεπτέον — Responsibility for one’s own household is not to be passed off.
3. 138eοἱ φίλοι αὐτῷ διαίτας ἐπιτρέπωσιν — The philosopher may himself receive friends’ trust in arbitration.

Translation in this edition

“Pilot” is the edition’s rendering throughout this example. The repeated English “entrust” makes a connection that would be obscured by translating the later occurrences only as “give” or “allow.” The passage does not specify the legal form of either nautical or arbitral responsibility.

Use in the book

Pilots and sailors are jointly classified as helpers (976a). The category includes both directing a vessel and the broader labor that makes navigation possible. No one among them is to be proclaimed wise as a soothing assurance. The strong prohibition targets the attribution of the title, not every claim that a pilot can steer competently.

The reason is the inability to know the wind's anger or friendliness (976a–b). The personification brings the variability of conditions into view: the art desires favorable wind but cannot secure knowledge of its changing disposition. The local obstacle is therefore dependence on something beyond the practitioner's guaranteed command. It is related to generalship's need for fortune but expressed through a different example.

This image should not be expanded into a ban on all empirical weather knowledge. The speech does not survey forecasting methods or distinguish particular sailing routes. Its assertion is sweeping at the level relevant to the wisdom inquiry, but its stated example remains the wind. Modern navigation or meteorology cannot be judged by a lexical gloss on pneuma.

The later calendar gives winds and rains a place in measured divine provision (979a). That cosmological assurance is not itself a demonstration that a particular pilot can predict a particular gust. The distinction helps preserve the distance between the whole's alleged intelligible order and an individual's uncertain practical situation.

The soothing verb also returns negatively of the gods, who cannot be soothed concerning justice (980d). The recurrence links the rhetoric of assurance with a broader refusal to replace what is true or just by comforting persuasion, without claiming that the two contexts are identical.

Places to read

1. 976aτοὺς κυβερνήτας ἅμα καὶ τοὺς ναύτας — Pilots and sailors are taken together
2. 976aπαραμυθούμενος — The speech resists soothing proclamation of their wisdom
3. 976a–bπνεύματος ὀργὴν οὐδὲ φιλίαν — Anger and friendliness personify the wind's uncertain condition
4. 976bὃ προσφιλὲς ἁπάσῃ κυβερνητικῇ — Favorable wind is dear to the pilot's whole art
5. 979aἀνέμων τε καὶ ὑετῶν — Winds and rains later enter the account of measured provision

Translation in this edition

“Pilot” and “sailor” remain separate, as do “wind's anger” and “friendliness.” The conspicuous personification is retained rather than flattened into “bad weather.” The apparatus has a variant for the negative particle, but the article follows the printed text.

Hostile wind personified — ὀργή (orgē)

ὀργή (orgē)

Hostile wind personified. The wind’s fierce or angry disposition supplies one side of the uncertainty confronting nautical expertise. Attested: ὀργὴν (976a). Pilots sailors and the uncertainty of the wind.

Favorable wind personified — φιλία (philia)

φιλία (philia)

Favorable wind personified. The wind’s friendliness names the favorable condition dear to the pilot’s art, yet not guaranteed by its knowledge. Attested: φιλίαν (976b). Pilots sailors and the uncertainty of the wind.

Uncertain wind — εἰδέναι (eidenai)

εἰδέναι (eidenai)

Uncertain wind. No practitioner could know the wind’s anger or friendliness in the exclusion of pilots and sailors as wise. Attested: εἰδείη (976a). Pilots sailors and the uncertainty of the wind.

Steering under uncertain conditions — κυβερνήτης (kybernētēs)

κυβερνήτης (kybernētēs)

Steering under uncertain conditions. The pilot is helpful but is not to be proclaimed wise, because the wind’s anger or friendliness cannot be known in the required way. Attested: κυβερνήτας (976a). Pilots sailors and the uncertainty of the wind.

Desire for favorable conditions — κυβερνητικός (kybernētikos)

κυβερνητικός (kybernētikos)

Desire for favorable conditions. The feminine substantivized form names the whole pilot’s art to which the wind’s friendliness is dear. Attested: κυβερνητικῇ (976b). Pilots sailors and the uncertainty of the wind.

Companion in nautical help — ναύτης (nautēs)

ναύτης (nautēs)

Companion in nautical help. Sailors are joined to pilots in the helping category; the text does not reduce all nautical labor to steering. Attested: ναύτας (976a). Pilots sailors and the uncertainty of the wind.

Reassuring but unwarranted praise — παραμυθεῖσθαι (paramytheisthai)

παραμυθεῖσθαι (paramytheisthai)

Reassuring but unwarranted praise. The Athenian resists someone soothing the speakers by proclaiming a sailor or pilot wise. The soothing force is distinct from proof of the title. Attested: παραμυθούμενος (976a). Pilots sailors and the uncertainty of the wind.

Uncertain nautical condition — πνεῦμα (pneuma)

πνεῦμα (pneuma)

Uncertain nautical condition. The wind’s anger and friendliness personify the external conditions the pilot cannot reliably know. Here pneuma is not a metaphysical spirit. Attested: πνεύματος (976a). Pilots sailors and the uncertainty of the wind.

The wind’s anger or friendliness (contextual phrase)

πνεύματος ὀργὴν οὐδὲ φιλίαν (976a–b)

The genitive assigns both personified dispositions to the wind. Their surrounding negative says no one could know them in the sense required for the pilot’s claim to wisdom. The favorable member is dear to navigation, showing desire for good conditions without claiming control over them. Pilots sailors and the uncertainty of the wind.