In the Protagoras, Socrates attempts to demonstrate to Protagoras that the traditional account of moral weakness is incoherent. He argues that akrasia, moral weakness, is simply ignorance. In line 353a10, Socrates embarks on a journey with Protagoras in which he questions the "ordinary people" about being overcome by pleasure and doing something that was wrong when they knew it was wrong . Socrates uses the examples of eating and drinking and having sex to illustrate that people will partake in hedonistic pleasures despite knowing that they may meet a bad end. He demonstrates that the immediate pleasure of an act, which can cause "disease and poverty", is not what makes the act bad, but that the resulting illness or poverty, which becomes painful, makes the act evil (353d3). Socrates then uses the example of medical practices to show that things that might be immediately painful are good. He infers that experiences are not good because of the immediate pain they cause, but rather because of the subsequent pleasure. These procedures rid a person of or at least ease their pain. Ultimately, it is the protection of both the people and therefore the society that benefits from it that makes the unpleasant experience enjoyable. The statement that symbolizes akrasia is that a person who knows evil is bad, does it because he or she is overwhelmed by pleasure, and a person who knows good is good refuses to do it because of the pleasure immediate. Socrates argues that this argument uses too many names; he suggests reducing it to a question of “good” and “bad” then “pleasure” and “pain” (355c1). In the new declaration, the words pleasure and good will be interchangeable, as will pain and evil. This is the following argument: A ...... middle of paper ...... which are closer; the inability to discern which of these is actually greater is ignorance. Education, knowledge, is the cure for this problem, because if a person knows that there is a more beneficial choice, then he will receive his salvation or improvement. He argues that if what is pleasant is also good, then no one who knows there is a better choice will switch to a bad thing. Socrates furthers his argument by saying that no one voluntarily chooses to indulge in evil, knowing that there is an option to choose good and that, likewise, one would not choose greater pain over lesser pain. According to the law of human nature, people choose what is most beneficial to them – such as medical care. For example, a person might choose to have a decayed tooth removed, which would be painful, because it would relieve more pain in the distant future. QuotePlato, Protagoras, 351b-358d