Plato's Euthyphro Dilemma

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“Euthyphro” is a story by Plato that tells of an encounter between Socrates, his mentor, and a man named Euthyphro. They exchange a dialogue over a period time while they await they’re on trials, as Socrates is being prosecuted by a man named Meletus and Euthyphro is prosecuting his own father for manslaughter. Socrates believes that Euthyphro is crazy basically for doing such a thing but is denied this accusation when Euthyphro claims that what he is doing, is a pious act. Peaking Socrates’ interest, he asks Euthyphro to define what makes something pious. Throughout the dialogue, he has several attempts in to which he tries define what makes something pious. Even though he is a wise man, I believe that he never arrives at a proper definition …show more content…

This definition is short and yet again simple, but slightly changed from the previous attempt. “I would certainly say that the pious is what all the gods love, and the opposite, what all gods hate, is the impious.” (Plato, 11) Socrates’ response to this statement is what is known as the “Euthyphro Dilemma”. Although he hasn’t stated that this definition is incomplete, he is curious as to not what makes it pious, but what the conditions of being deaminized as pious are. “We shall soon know better whether it is. Consider this: Is the pious being loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because it is being loved by the gods?” (Plato, 12) This question is then confusing to Euthyphro, and also most likely the modern reader, Socrates is then able to break it into simpler terms by instead of using piety and actions, he uses the qualities of being carried, led, and being loved. “I shall try to explain it more clearly: we speak of something carried and something carrying, of something led and something leading, of something and something seeing, and you understand that these things are all different from one another and how they differ?” “Tell me then whether the thing carried is a carried thing because it is being carried, or for some other reason?” (Plato, 12) Socrates then uses this logic and applies it to the case of piety. “What then we say about the pious, Euthyphro? Surely that it is being loved by all the gods according to what you say? Yes. Is it being loved? Because it is pious, or for some other reason? For no other reason? It is being loved then because it is pious, but it is not pious because it is being loved? Apparently. And yet it is something loved and god-loved because it is being loved by the gods? Of course. Then the god-loved is not the same as the pious, Euthyphro, nor the pious the same as the god-loved,

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