Refute Thrasymachus Argument About Justice In The Republic

This paper argues that Socrates does not successfully refute Thrasymachus’s argument about justice in The Republic. In Book I, Socrates attempts to refute Thrasymachus point about the craftsmen analogy in regards to Thrasymachus’s argument. Socrates argues that every craft seeks the advantage of what it rules over and not its own advantage. (342c) He further goes into this idea of how competition doesn’t exist between people in the same craft. “In any branch of knowledge or ignorance, do you think that a knowledgeable person would intentionally try to outdo other knowledgeable people…”. (350a) Socrates asks Thrasymachus this question in hopes to weaken Thrasymachus’s argument by concluding that the unjust man is really just bad and ignorant.
He believes that any knowledgeable person in a craft will not try to surpass his fellow craftsman. He asks, “Do you think that a musician… wants to outdo another musician…?” (349e) This is weak because it contradicts Socrates’s own argument by discussing the unjust man and his actions, which implies that there is indeed a possibility of unjust acts to get ahead in society. Thrasymachus explains that when people act justly it is a disadvantage to them because the unjust are at an advantage, even though his argument is complex it is more sensible than Socrates