Socrates

Socrates (in ancient Greek, Σωκράτης , Sōkrátēs ; Alopece, Athens, 470 BC - ib., 399 BC) was a classical Greek philosopher considered one of the greatest, both in philosophy Western and universal. He was the teacher of Plato, who had Aristotle as his disciple, these three being the fundamental representatives of the philosophy of Ancient Greece. Other disciples of his are Antisthenes, Aristippus and Esquines.

There is no evidence that Socrates published any of his writings. Details of his life are known from three contemporary sources: the dialogues of Plato, the works of Aristophanes, and the dialogues of Xenophon. The most complete accounts of Socrates that have survived from antiquity are found in Plato's dialogues. However, questions remain regarding the distinction between the real-life Socrates and the Platonic portrayal of Socrates .

He spent much of his life turning book pages with everyone in Athens, trying to determine if anyone had any idea what he was talking about, especially when the subject matter was important, such as justice, beauty, or truth. He did not leave any writings, but he inspired many disciples. In his old age, he became the focus of the hostility of many in the city who saw sophists and philosophy as destroyers of the city's piety and morality; and he was convicted and executed in 399 BC. c.

Socrates is a leading figure in the transformation of Greek philosophy into a continuous and unified project. He is considered the father of political philosophy, of ethics and is the main source of all the important topics of Western philosophy in general; Perhaps his most important contribution to Western thought is his dialectical mode of inquiry, known as the Socratic method or "cast" method, which he applied to the examination of key moral concepts such as good and justice. Traditional historiography divides all thinkers prior to Socrates (with the exception of Democritus) as "Pre-Socratics", and those influenced by Socrates into "major Socratics" (Plato and Aristotle) ​​and "minor Socratics" (Megarics, Cynics and Cyrenaics). .

Biography

Early years

He was born in Athens, where he lived during the last two thirds of the 5th century BC. C., the most splendid time in the history of his hometown, and of all ancient Greece. He was the son of Sophroniscus, a stonemason by profession, which is why in his youth he was called Σωκράτης Σωφρονίσκου ( Sōkrátēs Sōfronískou , 'Socrates son of Sophroniscus'), and of Fenáreta, a midwife, related to Aristides the Just .

According to Plutarch, when Socrates was born, his father was advised by the oracle to let his son grow up as he pleased, without opposing his will or repressing his impulses . However , neither Xenophon nor Plato mentions this intervention by the oracle. which suggests that it may be a much later popular tradition .

Education

He received a traditional education: literature, music and gymnastics. He later got acquainted with the dialectics and rhetoric of the Sophists. At first, Socrates followed the work of his father; he made a set of statues of the three Graces, which stood at the entrance to the Acropolis until the 2nd century BC. C. He had the philosopher Archelaus as a teacher who introduced him to reflections on physics and morals .

Marriage

He married Xanthippe (or Xanthippe), who was from a noble family. According to an ancient tradition, he treated the philosopher very badly, although in reality Plato shows, by narrating the death of Socrates in the Phaedo , a normal and even good relationship between both.

Political and military life

During the Peloponnesian War against Sparta, he served as a hoplite with great valor at the battles of Potidaea in 432 BC. c.-430 BC C., Delio in 424 a. C., and Amphipolis in 422 a. C.

He was obedient to the laws of Athens, but avoided politics. He believed that he could better serve his country by devoting himself to philosophy .

Appearance

He was small in stature, with a prominent belly, bulging eyes, and an exaggeratedly turned-up nose. Her figure was cause for joke. Alcibiades compared him to the Silenes, the drunken and lascivious followers of Dionysus.

Plato considered the day he washed his feet and put sandals on him worth remembering, and Antiphon the sophist said that no slave would want to be treated as he treated himself. He always wore the same cloak, and was extremely austere in food and drink.

From a very young age, he drew the attention of those around him for the sharpness of his reasoning and his ease with words, in addition to the fine irony with which he sprinkled his gatherings with the young aristocratic citizens of Athens, whom he asked about their confidence. in popular opinion, although very often he did not offer them any teaching.

The judgment

Although during the first part of his life he was a patriot and a man of deep religious convictions, Socrates nevertheless suffered from the mistrust of many of his contemporaries, who disliked the new position he took against the Athenian state and established religion, mainly against the metaphysical beliefs of Socrates, which posited "an ethereal existence without the consent of any god as an explicit figure." He was accused in 399 a. C. to introduce new gods and corrupt the morals of youth, moving it away from the principles of democracy. On the contrary, Socrates declared himself devoted to the gods, and did not intend to introduce new deities, to which he stated:«How could I introduce new gods by saying that a divine voice manifests itself to tell me what to do? [...] On the other hand, that the divinity knows in advance what is going to happen and that it announces it with signs to whoever it wants, just as I say, everyone also says it and believes it. But while these call, omens, voices, coincidences and diviners to those who announce the signs, I call it divine genius and I think that by calling it that, I express myself in a more truthful and pious way than those who attribute to birds the power of the gods .

Although the underlying cause for taking Socrates to trial, according to Xenophon, was that he opened his doors as a disciple to Critias, who like other disciples of Socrates was a member of the pro-Spartan faction later called the Thirty Tyrants, who became in power in Athens after the Peloponnesian War, and were accused of massacres and economic hollowing out by their Democratic enemies.

The Apologyfrom Plato he collects the essentials of Socrates' defense at his own trial; a valiant vindication of all his life. He was sentenced to death, although the sentence only achieved a slim majority. In accordance with the legal practice of Athens, Socrates made an ironic reply to the death sentence of the court by proposing to pay only a small fine given the little value that a man endowed with a philosophical mission had for the State. It is also mentioned that Socrates jokingly asked that he could be condemned simply by "inviting him to eat at the communal banquets", alluding to the fact that these were deplorable. Both one and the other angered the jury so much that it voted again in favor of the death penalty by a large majority. Socrates' friends offered to pay bail, and even planned his escape from prison, but he preferred to abide by the law and died for it. He spent his last days with his friends and followers.

Death

Hemlock poisoning was a method commonly used by the Greeks to carry out death sentences. Socrates was tried and, found guilty, served this sentence in the year 399 BC. C.​

He died at the age of 71, serenely accepting this sentence, a method chosen by a court that judged him for not recognizing the Athenian gods and corrupting youth. According to Plato in the Apology that he left from his teacher, he could have avoided the sentence, thanks to the friends he still had, but he preferred to abide by it and die.

At his death several Socratic schools arose, since his doctrines were interpreted differently by his disciples. Thus, along with the Platonic Academy, four minor Socratic schools arose: the Cyrenaic, the Cynic, that of Elis and Eretria, and the Megarian .

Plato was unable to attend the last moments and these were reconstituted in the Phaedo, according to the narration of several disciples. Here is the step that describes the symptoms:He walked, and when he said that his legs felt heavy, he lay down on his back, as the individual had advised him to do so. And at the same time the one who had given him the poison examined him, taking hold of his feet and legs from time to time, and then, squeezing his foot hard, he asked him if he felt it, and he said no. And after this he did the same with his calves, and ascending in this way he told us that he was getting cold and stiff. As he groped him he told us that when that got to his heart, then he would be extinct.

The belly area was already almost cold, when uncovering himself, since he had covered himself, he told us, and it was the last thing he spoke:
"Crito, we owe Asclepio a rooster. " So pay for it and don't neglect it.
"So it shall be done," said Crito. Look If you want something more.
But to this question he no longer answered, but in a little while he shuddered, and the man discovered him, and his gaze was rigid. Seeing him, Crito closed his mouth and eyes.
This was the end, Echecrates, that our friend had, the best man, we can say, of those we knew then, and, in a very remarkable way, the most intelligent and the most just.

Phaedo 117e-118c .

Later, in his honor and by way of recognition, the Modern Academy of Athens placed a statue of him at the entrance of the institution.

Legacy

Socrates' main legacy is perhaps his own death: a philosopher condemned to death by the democracy of Athens, for introducing new gods.

The basis of his teachings and what he instilled was the belief in an objective understanding of the concepts of justice, love and virtue; and self knowledge. Socrates described the soul ( psyche ) as that by virtue of which we are called wise or mad, good or bad, a combination of intelligence and character.

Assuming a posture of ignorance, he questioned people to later expose the inconsistency of their statements; this was called "Socratic irony", which is expressed by his famous phrase "I only know that I know nothing" (Ἓν οἶδα ὅτι οὐδὲν οἶδα, hèn oîda hóti oudèn oîda ).

At the same time, he was able to bring such unity to the plane of knowledge, by holding that knowledge is virtue and ignorance is vice. His nonconformity prompted him to oppose popular ignorance and the knowledge of those who claimed to be wise, although he himself did not consider himself a wise man, even when one of his best friends, Chaerephon, asked the oracle of Delphi if there was anyone wiser. than Socrates, and the Pythoness replied that there was no Greek wiser than him ( Apology 21a). Hearing what happened, Socrates doubted the oracle, and began looking for someone wiser than him among the most renowned characters of his time, but he realized that they actually thought they knew more than they really did.

Philosophers, poets, and artists all believed they had great wisdom, while Socrates was aware of both the ignorance around him and his own. This led him to try to make people think and make them see the real knowledge they had about things.

He believed that all vice is the result of ignorance and that no person desires evil; in turn, virtue is knowledge and those who know good will act justly. His logic emphasized rational discussion and the search for general definitions. In this sense he influenced his disciple Plato and, through him, Aristotle.

He believed in the superiority of discussion over writing, and therefore spent most of his adult life in the markets and public squares of Athens, initiating dialogues and arguments with anyone who would listen to him, whom he used to respond to through questions.

The wisdom of Socrates does not consist in the simple accumulation of knowledge, but in revising the knowledge that one has and from there building more solid knowledge.

The power of his oratory and his faculty of public expression were his forte in getting people's attention. Another thinker and friend influenced by Socrates was Antisthenes, the founder of the Cynic school of philosophy. Socrates was also the teacher of Aristippus, who founded the Cyrenaic philosophy of experience and pleasure, from which emerged the higher philosophy of Epicurus. For both the Stoics and the Greek philosopher Epictetus, Socrates represented the personification and the guide to reach a higher life.

He had great influence on Western thought, through the work of his disciple Plato.

Aristotle, a disciple of Plato, points out the two great contributions of Socrates:Two things must be fairly attributed to Socrates, on the one hand the inductive argument (επακτικοί λόγοι) and on the other the general definition (ορίζεσθαι καθόλον )Metaphysics M, 4; 1078b 27

Dialectics

He was the true initiator of philosophy insofar as he gave it its primary objective of being the science that seeks the interior of the human being. Dialectics is the method of sharing knowledge, used mainly by Plato, inspired by the maieutics of Socrates. After raising a proposition he analyzed the questions and answers raised by it. This makes him an extraordinary and decisive figure; it represents the reaction against sophistic relativism and subjectivism, and is a unique example of unity between theory and conduct, between thought and action. Plato adopted this method in which knowledge is reached through dialogue and conversation.

Maieutics

He favored a method, which he called (probably evoking his midwife mother) maieutics, that is, making the interlocutor discover his own truths. Maieutics was his greatest merit, an inductive method that allowed him to lead his students to solve the problems that arose through skillful questions whose logic enlightened their understanding. According to him, knowledge and self-mastery would allow the relationship between human beings and nature to be restored. For Socrates this was a method by which the soul would come to knowledge, a way of building knowledge by answering questions, and a way of analyzing the truth by comparing different opinions. Socrates believed that knowledge can be built from opinions and reasoning.

Politics

It is argued that Socrates believed that "ideals belong to a world that only the wise man can understand", making the philosopher the only kind of person fit to rule others. In Plato's dialogue, the Republic , Socrates openly opposed the democracy that ruled Athens during his adult life. According to him, Athenian democracy was not up to the ideal government represented by a perfect regime led by philosophers. However, it is possible that the Socrates of Plato 's Republic is colored by Plato's own views. During the last years of Socrates' life, Athens was in constant flux due to political turmoil.Democracy was eventually overthrown by a junta known as the Thirty Tyrants, led by Plato's relative Critias, who had been a student and friend of Socrates. The tyrants ruled for about a year before Athenian democracy was restored, at which point he declared an amnesty for all recent events.

Socrates' opposition to democracy is often denied, and the question is one of the major philosophical arguments trying to determine exactly what Socrates believed. The strongest argument of those who claim that Socrates did not really believe in the idea of philosopher kings is that the view is not expressed before Plato 's Republic , which is widely considered one of the "middle" dialogues of Plato and not representative of the historical views of Socrates. Furthermore, according to Plato 's Apology of Socrates , an "early" dialogue, Socrates refused to follow conventional politics; he often claimed that he couldn't look into other people's business or tell people how to live their lives when he didn't yet know how to live his own.He believed that he was a philosopher committed to the search for Truth, and did not claim to know everything completely. Socrates' acceptance of his death sentence after his conviction may also serve to support this view. It is often claimed that much of the anti-democratic tendencies are from Plato, who was never able to get over his disgust at what was done. to his teacher .

In any case, it is clear that Socrates thought that the laws of the Thirty Tyrants were also objectionable; when called upon to assist in the arrest of a fellow Athenian, Socrates refused and narrowly escaped death before the tyrants were overthrown. However, he fulfilled his duty to serve as Prytanis when he was tried by a group of generals who presided over a disastrous naval campaign; even then, he maintained an uncompromising attitude, being one of those who refused to proceed in a manner not supported by law, despite intense pressure. Judging by his actions, he considered the Thirty Tyrants' laws less legitimate than the Democratic Senate that sentenced him to death.

Socrates' apparent respect for democracy is one of the themes emphasized in the 2008 play Socrates on Trial by Andrew David Irvine. Irvine argues that it was because of his loyalty to Athenian democracy that Socrates was willing to accept the verdict of his fellow citizens. As Irvine puts it: "During a time of war and great social and intellectual upheaval, Socrates felt compelled to express his views openly, regardless of the consequences, so today he is remembered not only for his sharp wit and high ethical standards but also for his loyalty to the view that in a democracy the best way for a man to To serve yourself, your friends, and your city - even during times of war - is to be loyal and speak the truth publicly."​

Obras

Socrates did not write any works because he believed that "everyone should develop their own ideas." We know in part his ideas from the testimonies of his disciples: Plato, Xenophon, Aristippus and Antisthenes, above all .

Nor did he found a regular school of philosophy. All that is known with certainty about his teachings is drawn from the work of Plato, who attributed his own ideas to his teacher, and described Socrates as hiding behind an ironic profession of ignorance, known as Socratic irony , with great wit and insight. mental.

In addition to the aforementioned disciples, he had other disciples and listeners, among which Euclid of Megara, Phaedo of Elis and Esquines of Sphetus can be remembered.

Sources

Since Socrates did not write any work, we can approach his figure through four sources:

• Aristophanes' comedy, The Clouds , which was written when Socrates was only 41 years old, ridiculing him and placing him in the place of the sophists.
• Plato's dialogues as the most important material.
• Xenophon's writings in which he speaks of Socrates, which, however, contain historical and geographical errors.
• And finally, the mentions of Aristotle throughout all his works; he did not know him directly but his account is traditionally considered to be the most objective, as he is a disciple of Plato .

Aristophanes (450 BC - 386 BC)

The theatrical representation of Aristophanes' work is important, most of his juries have grown up believing the lies that are spread about him in it, says Plato in his Apology of Socrates, where in it they shouted "fraudster!" . Socrates argues that Aristophanes is more dangerous than the three men who brought charges against him, because Aristophanes had poisoned the minds of men while they were young.

Aristophanes, Xenophon, and Plato were about forty-five years younger than Socrates, so their knowledge is limited to Socrates' later years. Furthermore, the years between The Clouds and the trial of Socrates were years of war and upheaval, so the Athenian intellectual freedom that Pericles boasted about at the beginning of the war had been completely eroded by the end of it .

Plato (424/3 BC - 347 BC)

Plato does not represent Socrates' views and methods as he remembered them, much less as originally expressed. Note that Plato may have shaped the character of Socrates (or other characters) to serve his own purposes, whether philosophical or literary. The dialogues depicting Socrates as a youth occurred, if at all, before Plato was born or when he was a young child. But the philosophical tradition has decided to ignore the historical issues and assume why Plato's Socrates is the Socrates that is relevant to the potential progress of philosophy. That strategy gives rise to a new Socratic problem.His student Aristotle also refers to Socrates in his writings. In his Metaphysicshe wrote about his life and teachings as well as that of his teacher and other philosophers.

Xenophon (425 BC - 386 BC)

Another important source for the historical Socrates is the historian and military man, Xenophon, who says of Socrates: "I never knew anyone who was more careful to find out what each of his companions knew." The sometimes startling differences between Xenophon's and Plato's Socrates are largely explained by the differences between their two personalities. Xenophon was a practical man whose ability to recognize philosophical questions is limited, so his Socrates appears as a practical and useful adviser. Xenophon's Socrates further differs from Plato's in offering advice on the subjects in which Xenophon was most experienced: the minting of money and the administration of wealth,suggesting that Xenophon may have made the character of Socrates a spokesman for his own views. The other works of his that mention Socrates are Anabasis, Apologia, Hellenica, and Symposium .

Socrates in art

• sculptures
• Modern Academy, Athens (Greece)
• Original Hellenistic work, in the Archaeological Museum of Cambridge (United Kingdom)
• National Library, Montevideo (Uruguay)
• Montevideo, Uruguay
• Bayreuth, Bavaria (Germany)
• Statue of Socrates in the National Botanic Gardens of Ireland, Glasnevin, Dublin
• Statue of Socrates at the University of Wyoming (United States)
• Athens Square Park in Queens (United States)