Utopia and The Republic

So anyone who has read Plato's The Republic will I'm sure note the similar idea between Utopia as Moore puts it and the "ideal city" created by Socrates and his fellow philosophers as a city soul metaphor in The Republic.

I actually used Utopia to help me write a paper for my philosophy class (Plato's Republic). Yes, it is actually an entire semester dedicated to one book of Plato's work, because it is genuinely that difficult to grasp. Moving on, having not read the entire book of Utopia, this may be an unfair question to pose. BUT! I wanted to look into where I would rather live: Moore's Utopia or Plato's Kallipolis.

Utopia is pretty sweet mainly of course because of the six hour work days. Who can complain about that? This means everything must be super efficient because they don't require working after actual work hours, so everything gets done. There is freedom of religion, democratic ideas even though there is a single prince ruler, etc. Great!

In Kallipolis, there are a million and a half concepts that seem great at first. Then you spend a semester with Dr. Reichard and you realize that nothing in the ideal city is ideal at all. And then you question yourself, or is it? And then finally you come to the conclusion that you have no idea what Plato wants you to think he thinks and you vow to never take another philosophy course again. But! Without that course I would have no purpose in making this blog post. The Kallipolis seems great because it believes each person is best suited to do a job. However, they must do that job. Women have awesome rights and although they are seen as the "weaker sex," they are still seen as capable. The city is fully functional because each part of society does their part, and they do it better than any one else could. Therefore, the city is in perfect harmony because all the parts work together.


However, even though I haven't studied the rest of Utopia to see where it goes wrong as I have with The Republic, one thing makes me lean towards Utopia anyway. The fact that Utopians, country or city goers, swap with each other so they can learn both ways of life. Everyone in this manner gets to experience everything. In Plato's republic, it is all aligned around the principle of specialization: you do what you were meant to do and what you are best suited for, regardless of what that may be. A carpenter is solely a carpenter, because he is best suited for carpenting. A guardian is solely a guardian because he or she is best suited for guarding the city. There is no freedom of choice in this city. Now, taken that it is a metaphor for the soul the comparison of the two may not be ideal. However, the city was created to be ideal regardless of its purpose.

Just a comparison I've made between the two courses. If I read further into Moore's Utopia I would probably have more to say or possibly a shift of opinion, but until then, Thomas Moore>Plato.