Spoonus, Part I

The Spoonus, also known as The Socratic Soul, is the most recently discovered Socratic dialogue. Spoonus was a student of Socrates (via Plato’s writings), and has recently died; his soul transmitted to the underworld. He wishes to question Socrates regarding the philosophy of the soul that Socrates maintained in life. Spoonus’s soul arrives in Elysium, where the soul of Socrates has resided since his execution, although he plans to move into the Tower of Cronos as soon as the Form of his Credit Check is processed (although in his case it is probably just a formality). Spoonus arranges to meet with Socrates before he leaves Elysium. Scholars disagree as to whether this is an account of the historical Socrates, or whether the writer, possibly Spoonus himself (or his reincarnated soul) is putting words in Socrates’ mouth.

SPOONUS: Hello, Socrates. It is indeed an honor to have an audience with you. I am sorry I am late; Charon did not have change for a drachma.

SOCRATES: You are outrageous, Spoonus. Have you come to converse with me about the journey hither? Or have you come to inquire of me, as Meno, Crito, and others did in life? Surely, as a soul freed from the body, you know everything, and there is no knowledge which I can impart to you.

SPOONUS: Perhaps there is. You once said that “we must at some previous time have learned what we now recollect.” If we learned before life what we recollect in life, we must have lacked knowledge before we learned it as souls, for to learn is to acquire knowledge, and how can one acquire what one already has? So perhaps there remains something I can learn even now. At the very least, help me to recollect the words you spoke in life.

SOCRATES: I will certainly attempt to do so.

SPOONUS: I am interested in your ideas about the soul. As I understand it, you once proved that the soul is eternal by demonstrating that a servant boy, who had no apparent knowledge of geometry, could arrive at a correct mathematical conclusion without any instruction at all. That is to say, the boy had knowledge which he had not been taught. If he had this knowledge, he must have known it before birth and forgotten it, but you helped him “recollect” it.

SOCRATES: What you say is true. In fact, all knowledge obtained in the body is recollection. For when men are interrogated in the right manner, they always give the right answer of their own accord, and they could not do this if they did not possess the knowledge and the right explanation inside them.

SPOONUS: So then, if men are not interrogated in the right manner, they might not give the correct answer?

SOCRATES: To speak of a right manner implies a wrong manner, so what you say might be true.

SPOONUS: Let us explore, then, the correct manner of interrogation. In questioning the boy, you asked him what the dimensions would be of a square with an area of eight feet, based on the knowledge of the dimensions of a square with an area of four. You said, “The side of this is two feet. What about each side of the one which is its double?” He replied, “Obviously, Socrates, it will be twice the length.” Clearly, he was incorrect. You questioned him further, he saw his error, and he arrived at the correct dimensions.

SOCRATES: It happened exactly as you say. I did not teach the boy anything, but all I did was question him.

SPOONUS: But as to the “correct” way of interrogation, you knew the correct answer, and so were able to ask him questions that aided his “recollection.” Did you not lead him in your questioning? Would you not say that the “correct manner” is merely that by which the knowledgeable leads the unknowledgeable, and is that not teaching?

SOCRATES: I did not lead him; I only asked him questions about what was true. He merely recollected things in order, from the more simple principles of linear doubling to the more complex principles of two-dimensional doubling.

SPOONUS: Yet if you had not known, or recollected, the answer yourself, would you not have been unable to interrogate him correctly? If someone who lacked knowledge, like Euthyphro, had questioned him, would it not have become apparent that the boy could not recollect the truth, and at best could recollect only part of it? And does it not seem that he “recollected” both truth and falsehood? As a student of Euthyphro he would have learned or recollected nothing wholly true. Therefore, you did teach him.

SOCRATES: On the contrary, whether I had continued questioning him or not, if the boy was philosophically inclined, he would have questioned himself, and demonstrated to himself the correct answer. He would have recollected it on his own without my influence, although it might have taken him some time. Therefore, all learning, whether under a tutor or on one’s own, is recollection. And if it is recollection, then knowledge exists in the soul before birth, and the soul is eternal. We must recollect what our souls know, however, because we forget it when we are born.