The Justified Deceptions In Kalipolis

By Hayden Wilkins
Turned in Monday, March 7, 2022

Justice can be found within almost every deception within Plato's Republic.

Deception is commonly seen as silver tongues dancing around the truth of the world.

But Kalipolis exists outside the world we live in, One must consider the differing natures

between our world and that of Kalipolis. The reason why the deception within Kalipolis is

justified is because of what Kalipolis is meant to be, and this can be seen with applying

the city’s purpose onto its deception-enforced concepts of the myth of the metals, and

the city’s view on marriage.

What is the purpose of Kalipolis? It exists to be an efficient and surviving city,

nothing more or less than that. The idea for Kalipolis came into being for a thought

experiment to find out what justice is. Aristotle thought that to find what justice is, one

must look at it broadly and then slowly work towards looking at the individual(Plat. Rep.

269). What makes a city though? “A city comes to be because none of us is

self-sufficient, but we all need many things”(Plat. Rep. 369b). So for the city to function,

the needs of people need to be satisfied and attended to. So what then are these

needs? “Surely our first and greatest need is to provide food to sustain life… Our

second is for shelter, and our third for clothes and such”(Plat. Rep. 369d). This can

generally be seen reflected in modern societies. We need the basics for life, then the

means to preserve that life, and finally the niceties of that life. The next question then,

how can these amenities be most

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efficiently produced? People could just provide everything for themselves and be

semi-self sufficient, but that lacks efficiency and lacks the common ideals of modern

societies. It is decided that everyone having a specialized task that contributes to the

whole in some way is the most efficient option for gathering and producing

resources(Plat. Rep. 370). Kalipolis wants to be the most efficient city possible;

efficiency which can be seen throughout its creation as being a strong and almost

minimalistic society through the consideration of the minimum of what makes a city,

what people in this city would need, and what the most efficient way to run it would be.

With this lens of knowing the purpose of Kalipolis, we can finally see how the deception

broadcasted onto its citizens can be justified.

“We aren’t all born alike, but each of us differs somewhat in nature from the

others, one being suited to one task, another to another”(370). The myth of the metals is

one of these justified deceptions which Aristotle decides to give to the imagined people

of Kalipolis. Justified thanks to this assumed truth Aristotle makes that “We aren’t all

born alike”. His deceptive myth says that all are born of the Earth “But the god who

made you mixed some gold into those who are adequately equipped to rule because

they are most valuable, He put silver in those who are auxiliaries and iron and bronze in

the farmers and other craftsmen”(Plat. Rep. 415). He goes on to state how those of

bronze parents can be born gold, vice versa, and by godly decree “If an offspring of

theirs should be found to have a mixture of iron or bronze, they must not pity him in any

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way, but give him the rank appropriate to his nature”(Plat. Rep. 415). This entire false

story, and its publication, can be justified through the lens of efficiency. To have a city of

people who train to accomplish one task from birth because they know that is what they

were meant to do means maximum efficiency in every aspect of production; prolonging

the city's existence. Another benefit of this myth lies in that The Earth gives birth to all

people equally, and that anyone can be born of gold. This means prolonged social

harmony not only because of the believed familial relations between everyone in

Kalipolis but also because of a divine trust in the special selection of those in charge.

Gods decide where the people should be placed and who are people to question the

knowledge of gods?

At first glance, the system for arranged marriages and breeding is also decided

by chance in Kalipolis with a “lottery” held for people to be assigned to each other, but

this is another deception that holds more intent behind it too. Relations between the

people of Kalipolis are thought of as every woman and man and child belonging not of

their parents, but of the city itself(Plat. Rep. 457c:d). This thought is not deceiving in

itself, it just means to hide that who’s children are who’s in an attempt to further unite

the city and incorporate efficiency into the household. This “lottery" is where the

deception lies though, for the chances to get hitched are not random at all. The whole

event is rigged to accommodate for the unsuspecting selective breeding of desirable

traits within Kalipolis, as is explained “The best men must have sex with the

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best women as frequently as possible, while the opposite is true for the most inferior

men and women… if our herd is to be of the highest possible quality, the former’s

offspring must be reared but not the latter's. And this must all be brought about without

being noticed by anyone except the rulers, so that our herd of guardians remains as

free from dissension as possible”(Plat. Rep. 459e). How is this atrociously blatant lie

even possibly considered to be even a speck efficient or of promoting the city’s longevity

though? What makes this lie just? That would be because it is fulfilling these two goals.

Efficiency is promoted by potentially selectively breeding for traits of better workers

(stronger, smarter, faster, etc.). This in turn will promote the city’s survival and will make

it as strong as it could ever be while manipulating our genes to work for Kalipolis. This

lie is protected by the city’s purpose through the lie's entirety. Everything is for the city

itself and its survival as such.

Deception can be justified if it is to accomplish the deceived’s meaning for

existing, which is why the deceptions in Kalipolis are justified due to the city being

hypothetical but the same standard would not hold in real life. Where every person in

the hypothetical of the Kalipolis was created for efficiency towards the city and the city’s

survival, the purpose of humans in our world is not yet known. Maybe when humans

know our purpose we can manifest deceptions and such to accomplish the innate goal

of our species. At that time the deception may be seen as justified. In conclusion, the

use of deception within Kalipolis is just, but only because the concept and people within

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 Cited

P., Reeve, C. D. C., & Grube, G. M. A. (1992). Republic (Hackett Classics) (2nd ed.).

Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.