SOCRATESTHE WISEST MAN WHO EVER LIVED

BIOGRAPHY469 B.C.E. -399 B.C.E.

WHO WAS SOCRATES?• Lived during the Golden Age of

Athens—the foundation of Western culture. He was born ten years after Confucius died.

• Little is known about his early life, but Socrates was widely known to be dissatisfied with the knowledge he acquired from other teachers—led to the development of his own method of education.

• As a young man, Socrates was told by the Oracle at Delphi that he would never meet a wiser man. As a result, he spent the rest of his life testing those who considered themselves wise. 

WHO WAS SOCRATES? ONE UGLY DUDE…The extant sources agree that Socrates was profoundly ugly, resembling a satyr more than a man—and resembling not at all the statues that turned up later in ancient times and now grace Internet sites and the covers of books. He had wide-set, bulging eyes that darted sideways and enabled him, like a crab, to see not only what was straight ahead, but what was beside him as well; a flat, upturned nose with flaring nostrils; and large fleshy lips like an ass. Socrates let his hair grow long, Spartan-style (even while Athens and Sparta were at war), and went about barefoot and unwashed, carrying a stick and looking arrogant. 

HIS TRIAL AND DEATH

• Socrates was ultimately tried by the city of Athens for corrupting the youth.

• Socrates was accused of not believing in the gods in which the state believes, bringing in other new divinities, and wronging by “corrupting the youth.”

• Socrates’ trial was before a group of 501 jurors—and he was condemned by 80 votes. When the decision of sentencing was raised, Socrates suggested that the city pay for his meals, and then that he pay a fine that was the equivalent of one dollar. They chose to put him to death, largely because he antagonized them.

SOCRATES WAS A BIG DEAL

• One of the most significant Western Philosophers—the world of philosophy is often divided between Socratic and pre-Socratic thought.

• The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy describes Socrates like this: “[He] remains, as he was in his lifetime an enigma, an inscrutable individual who, despite having written nothing, is considered one of the handful of philosophers who forever changed how philosophy itself was to be conceived.”

“Therefore I am still even now going about and searching and investigating at the god's behest anyone, whether citizen or foreigner, who I think is wise; when he does not seem so to me, I help the god by showing that he is not wise. And by reason of this occupation I have no leisure to attend to any of the affairs of the state worth

mentioning, or of my own, but am incessantly in poverty due to my service to the god.”

HIS PHILOSOPHY“I CANNOT TEACH ANYBODY ANYTHING. I CAN ONLY MAKE HIM THINK.”

SOCRATES ON PHILOSOPHY

• Destroy Assumptions: Socrates said that philosophy is a peculiar practice because it builds by destroying and what it destroys is assumptions.

• Study of Human Nature: Socrates marks the transition from philosophy as a study of the universe to a study of human nature.

• The Examined Life: Socrates famously said, "the unexamined life is not worth living," summarizing his philosophy. 

SOCRATES ON VIRTUE

Virtue=Knowledge: Socrates believed that no one did wrong willingly and that those who do wrong do it out of ignorance of what was the right thing to do. Socrates believed that only an understanding of one's soul could one find genuine happiness.  One must know the nature of good, or she will act blindly on the basis of convention or convenience, calling something good because it is popular or easy. 

SOCRATES ON VIRTUE

Moral Scale: Socrates had established a sort of moral scale by which to measure the inherent good of things. At the bottom of this scale was external good; money, possessions and material wealth. Near the middle of the scale was the good of the body; health, strength, and the like. At the top of the scale was the good of the soul; wisdom and moral integrity. Accepting this scale to be true leads to the idea that it is better to suffer an injustice, even if it results in the loss of your possessions or even your life, than to commit an injustice.

SOCRATES ON EDUCATION• Admitting Ignorance: Though Socrates

was widely credited for his intelligence and wisdom, he said that the most important step to education was admitting what we don’t know.

• Self Education: the only true wisdom and knowledge comes from self-education and self-discovery.  Socrates said that he was "the wisest man" he knew, for he knew that he "knew nothing." 

• Socrates believed that the best form of learning came through conversation, discussion, and inquiry.

THE SOCRATIC METHOD

• Socrates used a teaching device called the elenchus, which is close in meaning to cross-examination. Truth is discovered in conflict of ideas and the answers ones gives to questions.

• Leads to the development of the dialectic, the idea that wisdom is generated through conflict of ideas—that a thesis and antithesis in conflict will generate synthesis, or wisdom.

• For Socrates, philosophy was less about knowing the right answers and more about the strenuous effort to find those answers. Philosophy, according to Socrates, was a lifelong quest (Tarnas). 

BEN FRANKLIN ON THE SOCRATIC METHOD

I found this [Socratic] method the safest for myself and very embarrassing to those against whom I used it; therefore, I took delight in it, practiced it continually, and grew very artful and expert in drawing people, even of superior knowledge, into concessions the consequences of which they did not foresee, entangling them in difficulties out of which they could not extricate themselves, and so obtaining victory that neither myself nor my causes always deserved.

—Benjamin Franklin, Papers