Socrates on Music

Even at the literal level of the argument in Republic II and III, Socrates’ critique of music and the poets acknowledges just how powerful these media are in human life: there would be no need to edit them for style and content if they were merely diverting, rather than formative. He not only observes the depth at which music touches our consciousness (“…rhythm and harmony most of all insinuate themselves into the inmost part of the psyche and most vigorously lay hold of it in bringing grace with them…” 401D), which we now understand to involve neural integration unmatched by other cognitive processes (See Leviton, This is Your Brain on Music); he is clearly aware of just how plastic human nature is as a whole. Socrates here expresses this insight negatively, in terms of risk and corruptibility, but the flip side is our potent educability. He assumes neither that humans are naturally good nor that they are bad; he observes, rather, that we are capable of learning.