The Argument against the Body-Lover’s Virtue: Phaedo 68d2-69a4

Abstract At Phaedo 63e8-69e5, Socrates presents his defense of the philosophical life. The culmination of this defense is an argument (68d2-69a4) designed to show that body-lovers, whom Socrates contrasts with philosophers, cannot be virtuous, but can only appear so. This argument has not received much careful and rigorous scrutiny in the literature. The aim of this brief article is to remedy this neglect and to show that this argument is both more interesting and more complex than might first appear.