If we accept Plato's implicit recognition of our finitude but reject his
claim that finitude can finally be overcome through philosophy, what
are our options? More specifically, what are our political options?

Tyranny, of course, is completely out of the question. To be under
the thumb of someone who makes use of other persons and the
resources of society to fulfill his or her own insatiable longing for
completion and wholeness is, as Plato suggests, the worst political
nightmare imaginable. But if, as I suggested in the last chapter,
tyrants and Plato's philosophers seek to satisfy the same longing by
different means, Plato's aristocratic city governed by philosopher-
kings is also undesirable. If we reject the claim that philosophers can
make contact with a singular, infinite, and eternal order of things, we
will also reject the claim that society should be structured with the

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