Socrates and Diotema in the Symposium

Socrates’ questioning of Agathon and his recollection and retelling of his being questioned by Diotima is easily my favorite piece of Plato’s work that I have read so far. I found Socrates to be much more humble and relatable, though he still behaves in the classic Socratic way when questioning Agathon, in that he seemingly leads him down logical avenues just to force him to contradict himself. However, it was still much easier to stomach the Socratic dialogue when it was presented as more of an actual dialogue rather than simply Socrates explaining to his friends why they are all wrong and he is right. I also found the views on love which he conveys through his recounting of the words of Diotima to be much more mature and reasonable than his opinions in Lysis and Phaedrus, and less idealized or romanticized.

One of the parts of Socrates speech that I most appreciated was near the end of his questioning of Agathon, where he states that “Whenever you say I desire what I already have, ask yourself whether you don’t mean this: I want the things I have now to be mine in the future as well.” This is a rather important distinction, as one of my major complaints with Socrates in Lysis and Phaedrus was that he believed that one could only desire, and by extension, love what one does not possess. While on the surface this seems logical, as it would seem illogical to continue to desire to possess something once it has been possessed, it also implies that all love between two people would disappear if they entered a relationship or that one would immediately cease to value something once that thing was obtained. What Socrates does with this statement is mend the hole in his logic in a simple but entirely reasonable way. This also enables the philosophical perception of love in the Socratic dialogues to be better related to real life love, which most people can know from experience continues even after a relationship is established or a desired thing is obtained. .

I found myself very intrigued by Diotema and Socrates’ that the goal of love is to “possess the good forever,” and the way lovers accomplish this goal is “giving birth to beauty.” Diotema believes that all people are pregnant, not in a literal sense, but figuratively, meaning that all human beings wish to create something beautiful from themselves as an expression and extension of their love. While this includes children, it could also include literature, artwork, or honor. According to Diotema, this quest for reproduction is also a quest for immortality through the things one leaves behind. This desire for immortality stems from a desire to be godlike, and the immortal reproduction of person or thing through love is what makes them most godlike and therefore most good, in Diotema’s eyes.

While I have a more secular viewpoint and cannot agree that the purpose of reproduction through love is to become the most godlike as possible, I do agree with the idea of reproduction through love itself. The idea of preserving love through the production or creation of something seems strange at first, especially when referring to something other than children, but becomes more reasonable the more one thinks about it. Whenever someone loves someone or something, they seek to have concrete proof of this. A couple may have a child, or one may create something for the other. However, this concept also applies to other kinds of love, for example, a music lover might try to compose new music, an art lover tries to create new art, and a book lover may write new material. It is even common for a long creative project to be called a “labor of love,” colloquially. This concept of a manifestation of love also applies to other, non-romantic kinds of love in a way that many of Socrates’ other ideas do not. I find this very satisfying for the same reasons I liked Diotema’s explanation of how love can persist once the object of love has been “obtained,” essentially because it grounds Socrates’ theories more in reality and makes them applicable to more kinds of love that might be encountered more frequently in the real world.