Great Ideas of Philosophy

Lecture SevenSocrates on the Examined LifeScope: Socrates (c. 469–399) is perhaps the most admired figure in the history of philosophy. Even whendismissing so many of the “pagan” thinkers, Saint Augustine would venerate Socrates, regarding him as atrue philosopher because he was willing to die for what he believed.What is known of his life comes by way of a good friend, Xenophon, and a loyal and loving student, Plato.The former provides a picture of Socrates as neighbor and fellow-citizen; the latter, a Socrates at sea on theendless voyages of mind and spirit.Before Socrates, the major schools of philosophy emphasized cosmological and physical topics or, thankschiefly to the Sophists, rhetorical techniques designed to highlight the ignorance of one’s adversaries. InSocrates, however, at least as he is revealed in Plato’s dialogues, there is a commitment to objectify the selfand hold it up to scrutiny. As there is nature, so, too, there is a human nature, and it is a fit subject fordiscourse and dispute. But what vexations arise when the subject is the object is the subject! “Theunexamined life is not worth living,” but what form shall the examination take?OutlineI. It was Socrates more than any predecessor, though there were ample pre-Socratic precedents, who worked toperfect the dialectical method of inquiry, the vaunted “Socratic” method that tests every assumption for itsgrounding and its implications.A. Socrates described himself as a gadfly—approaching those who were sure of what they knew andinterrogating them until their certainty was shown to be groundless.1. In ancient Greek mythology, a gadfly knocked a chap off his horse, who had been trying to fly up toheaven and engage hubristically in arrogating to himself the powers of the divine.2. Socrates is a gadfly, then, in the sense of unseating the confident rider who believes he is on the flightpath to truth.3. Socrates was well trained in the art of rhetoric and the great Sophist teachings of his time, but he goesbeyond Sophism. His objective was not just to expose the ignorance of an interlocutor but to find thetruth and, ultimately, defeat skepticism itself.B. The first obligation of a philosopher, Augustine suggests, is the willingness to die for the principles of hisphilosophy. If this standard were generally applied, few philosophers would measure up—but Socrates did.1. His friends urged him to flee after his trial rather than die—the trial had been a sham; no one wouldthink less of him. Socrates preferred to die rather than abandon all that he had taught about the law asthe corporate expression of rationality.2. The charges against Socrates were that he had failed to respect the gods of Athens and had corruptedAthenian youth. The Socrates given to us by Xenophon, however, was a deeply religious andreverential man, not at all skeptical on the spiritual level, although perhaps less than obeisant to thecustomary devotional beliefs and practices of his contemporary Athenians.3. That Socrates corrupted the youth of Athens also seems unlikely. In the Symposium, the one dialoguein which we might expect to find debauchery and corruption, Alcibiades complains that in attemptingto be Socrates’s lover, one gets nowhere. Socrates simply will not participate at that rich, lusty,corporeal level; indeed, given his wisdom and the depth of his thought, Socrates must have beenamong the loneliest people who ever lived.4. Why did Socrates choose suicide? Because he recognized that the rule of law is the corporate or publicexpression of human rationality itself. Law is the means by which the rational power of corruptibleman might minimize corruption. Having devoted his life to rationality, Socrates would not abandoneverything he had stood for and taught merely because his own situation was compromised.II. “The unexamined life is not worth living”: Why? And if this is true, how are we to examine our lives?A. What is the matter with a life of perfect satisfaction and gratification that is based on an illusion—providedby drugs or machines?©2004 The Teaching Company Limited Partnership 17