Platos Tripartite Soul

In The Republic, Plato likens a division of the soul to a division of the society he resides
in. He theorizes that the soul is divided into three parts: the rational, the spirited, and the
appetitive. Each of these parts manifests themselves through classes within the society. In this
paper, I will consider Platos comparison of the soul to society, argue that his three-part division
does not adequately encompass all of the faculties of an organism, and modify his theory to
better account for all functions.
Plato begins by claiming that a just society is one in which its constituent classes fulfill
each of their respective tasks without overstepping into anothers jurisdiction. His class
divisions include the guardians, the soldiers and auxiliaries, and the merchants and workers.
The guardians, representing the rational part of the soul, oversee the society and provide its
inhabitants with a guiding wisdom. The soldiers and auxiliaries, who are the spirited, instill
courage into the inhabitants while managing the workers and merchants. The workers and
merchants, the appetitive, are purely self-interested and work for their own sensual pleasures.
These classes in society serves as an allegory for the human soul, to which the three divisions
can be applied to. In humans, the appetitive desires for physical comforts, money, and
pleasure. Fueled by honor and victory but prone to indignant anger, the spirited provides the
energy necessary to overcome adversity. Furthermore, each part of the soul is associated with
an organ: the rational is to the mind, the spirited is to the heart, and the appetitive to the belly
and genitals. The rational is tasked to maintain balance between the irrational divisions, the
appetitive and the spirited, by asserting its wisdom and judgment. Ideally then, the just person,
like the just society, is one in which there is a proper balance between the three parts.

Although convincing, Platos theory leaves several crucial aspects unexplained. If it is

assumed that the soul does in fact consist of three distinct parts, then the first issue with Platos
theory is that it the three parts do not account for the entirety of mental faculties. There are
additional faculties of the mind, such as imagination and perception, which cannot be easily
categorized under certain divisions of the soul since they are not mutually exclusive to either
the rational or irrational divisions. For example, to satisfy the demands of the irrational
divisions, the imagination and perception may be used to conjure a false reality; a starving
glutton may become entranced in his imaginations of a grandiose feast. In this case, it is unclear
which jurisdiction the faculty of imagination falls under. Likewise, the same can be said for
perception. Also absent is the full spectrum of emotion capable of being experienced. The
spirited attempts to do so, but captures a limited scope. Emotions such as angst, fear, grief, and
many others, are virtually non-existent in this theory. I will describe plausible alternatives to his
theory that include such faculties later in the paper.
If Plato intends for his model of the soul to be comprehensive, then it should also take
into consideration the full spectrum of physical faculties and processes that a body possesses.
However, by taking this into consideration, the theory of soul begins to deconstruct. Take for
example, metabolism. If we are to explain the human desire to consume as arising from a
biological necessity to sustain an organisms growth, then there is no need for interpreting
desire as an inherent part of ones soul. Similarly, it can be argued that emotions, along with
higher cognitive abilities, exist only due to physiological processes in the brain and body. The
spirited and appetitive divisions, and perhaps even facets of the rational, are better accounted
for by these processes.

By comparing observable behaviors and traits of animals and vegetation to a humans,

we can create a more plausible arrangement. Although Plato does not explicitly state that his
theory applies to animals and vegetation, I will assume that they do possess complete souls, for
the sake of this argument. If all possess complete souls, then all three divisions must be present
in each. Humans, animals, and vegetation all share the need to grow and develop their physical
vessels, and this need is fulfilled by the consumption of energy. Their vessels are all able to
transmit and receive electric signals, which must be present for an organism to perceive
physical sensations. Therefore, we can say that each possesses the appetitive division of the
soul. But when it comes to the spirited, only the animal and human possess that part since it is
unclear whether or not plants are able to process emotion, the prerequisite for experiencing
pride, anger, etc. Finally, the rational mind and higher mental faculties are only available to the
human, with the exception of a number of animal species. From this, either all humans,
animals, and vegetation have undivided souls, or only the human has a soul, that is, a divided
one.
I propose that the idea of all organisms possessing souls is a more inclusive model and
that the Platonic division of the soul into three parts is unnecessary. The faculties of the
Platonic soul are not actually inherently possessed by the soul itself, but rather afforded by the
vessel that the soul resides in and thus these faculties are under the disposal of that soul. The
more complex the organism, the more faculties the soul will be able to use. For example, most
vegetation lack brains whereas animals and humans do not. However, the brains of humans are
far more complex than those of animals. Therefore, humans have the most faculties under their
disposal, followed by animals, and lastly vegetation. That soul which resides in the plant cannot

register emotion yet it is still capable of consuming and growing. That soul which resides in the
animal cannot access the higher planes of consciousness yet it is still capable of feeling and
acting on emotions. And the soul which resides in the human is capable of all the
aforementioned. Under this model, the interrelationships between body and soul are better
understood and faculties unaccounted for in the Platonic soul are accounted for.