Plato Republic Miranda

In Plato's Republic, Socrates explains how excess wealth and excess poverty are two problems the people will not be allowed to experience. He justifies that extreme wealth will result in the craftsmen becoming lazy and not fulfilling their duties, and that extreme poverty will result in denying the workers money to sustain their lives. Essentially, having too much or too little of wealth has the potential to cause damage. This concept connects to the idea of 'moderation' that is brought up earlier in The Republic. There appears to be an ongoing trend in The Republic that moderation is a key component towards reaching a Utopia. If there is not a balance, then the society is not in a Utopia because too much or too little of one thing can cause damage.

The idea that there needs to be a balance in a society in order for it to be good for the state is particularly intriguing. In Omelas, the child was the one part of the city that made it not perfect. Everything in the city was theoretically characteristic of a Utopia, but the child's suffering offset everything. It is interesting to consider how something like poverty, which has an inherent connotation of being bad, could actually be good in moderation. Without having the good and bad exist, how can there be balance in a Utopia? Would there be something to measure a Utopia as a Utopia if there was not something that is not perfect to reference it against? For instance, in our society we know what is good because we also know what is bad. However, that in itself also varies across cultures and ideological beliefs. How can a Utopia be a Utopia without taking the concept of balance into consideration?

Reading The Republic and repeatedly seeing the word 'moderation' leads one to believe that perhaps Utopia is not a destination but a journey. Since so many people were leaving a place like Omelas, but some of those people also stayed, perhaps there is more than one Utopia existing at a time as well. When that is taken into consideration, maybe Utopias are personal. In other words, maybe the idea of making them a society is impossible since know two people can think and agree on everything the exact same. That would suggest we do not have individuality. Is a Utopia maybe a slow convergence of consciousness where everyone becomes 'one' then? It is confusing where the line between balance and individuality should be drawn.