The Republic: Protagoras, Gorgias and Meno A vigorous line of thought in contemporary moral philosophy, which I will call "neo-Aristotelianism", is centered on three things: (1) a rejection of traditional Enlightenment moral theories such as Kantianism and utilitarianism; (2) the claim that another look at the ethical concerns and projects of ancient Greek thought could help us overcome the impasse in which Enlightenment moral theories have left us; (3) more specifically, an attempt to reinterpret Aristotle's ethical work for the late twentieth century so as to transcend this impasse. The "neo-Aristotelian" rejection of Platoneo-Aristotelians such as Martha Nussbaum(1) and Alasdair MacIntyre,(2) despite their many differences,(3) are therefore united not only in their positive turn towards Aristotle but also in their refusal to Plato and Plato's Socrates.(4) Yet some characteristics of these refusals invite further reflection. Nussbaum, for example, consistently recognizes that the Socratic-Platonic project requires us to remake ourselves: "In short, I argue that [in the Protagoras] Socrates offers us, in the form of empirical description, a radical proposal for the transformation of our lives. " (FG 117, LK 112) But to what extent has Socrates done justice to the particular kind of remake that Plato offers us? More specifically, do you recognize the extent to which Socrates aims to focus his interlocutors on a process of questioning, rather than simply delivering doctrine to them?(5) Or has his Socrates been flattened, his dialogic style made monological, so as to more easily support his overall thesis?(6) As for MacIntyre, he sees the parallel between his work and that of Plato quite clearly when he says that in his earlier dialogues "Plato is indicating a general state of inconsistency in the use of language evaluative in Athenian culture" (AV 131)? Mutatis mutandis, isn't this exactly what the opening chapters of After Virtue attempt to show? And to what extent must MacIntyre's "quest for the good" in his crucial chapter "The Virtues, the Unity of a Human Life and the Concept of Tradition" be tied to a Platonic, rather than Aristotelian, notion of the good? When he says «now it is important to underline that it is a question of systematically asking ourselves these two questions ["What is good for me?" and «What is the good for man?»] and of the attempt to answer in facts as well as in the word which provides moral life with its unity" (AV 219, emphasis added), is not Plato's Socrates to serve here as the ultimate source of inspiration??