The Man Set Up Philosophy as A Human Inquisition
Socrates is a philosopher who set up the philosophy as a human inquisition and a moral science for the first time. And it’s said that he invented the word philosophy. So that he is called “the father of philosophy”. And he is the creator of today’s ethics.
Philosophers before Socrates, such as Thales, Anaximander, Pythagoras, Heraclitus and Democritus utterly pursued and learned about rules and causes of the nature, the world or the universe. But the huge impact of Socrates changed the language game of philosophy. So philosophers before Socrates are named “Vorsokratiker (Presocratics)”.
The Socratic Problem
Socrates wrote nothing. He thought verbal words are only livid, written text is dead words. To know Socrates thought, it can be only from describes by authors of the same age. The representative authors are Xenophon, Aristophanes and Plato. Despite, these three descriptions about Socrates are utterly different. Xenophon describes Socrates as an ideal and sincere but strict teacher led truth and virtue, also told boring moral by common knowledge. Aristophanes’ character of Socrates is bold, unreliable and stupid sophist told the way of debate, took money for a charge, also researched natural studies. Plato’s Socrates is a cynical and ironic thinker always told paradoxical sayings, also have a god-like genius of thinking and debate.
By the philosophical contribution, I’ll comment on Plato’s Socrates.
Opposition to Sophists
The first half of Socrates’ life isn’t quite known. Socrates served in the military, went to the war three times. And he studied mathematics, astronomy and natural philosophy under Archelaus. But he soon noticed these study not useful for human understanding.
It’s said that in his forties, he began to tell and argue his philosophy at agora, and to dispute with the sophists. The sophist are a school philosophy of professional teachers told various knowledge and skills, especially rhetoric to win opponents and to attract audiences in an assembly or a court. They thought language is a tool and language itself has a sense and a truth, it’s right to win a debate by sophistry. By the technique of rhetoric, we can insist yes or no, good or bad in all subjects, they thought. And their thought is relativism. Protagoras’ famous saying “Man is the measure of all things,” stands for human thinking and sense are criterion of value of all things, and value of things are different each of men.
On the contrary Socrates insisted it should be extracted the truth and the value from things themselves. By using words and logic we must take out contradictions, demonstrate intuitions and prove the truth.
The Socratic Method : Elenchos (or Maieutike)
A day of late in life, Socrates’ friend Chaerephon received the answer that “no one was wiser than Socrates” by the Oracle at Delphi. Socrates felt the answer is not correct and thought “I know nothing expect the fact of my own ignorance”, and he decided to certify it. So Socrates visited and argued with politicians, poets (playwrights) and artisans (they were considered most honourable in Greek at that time).
Socrates argued about wisdom, temperance, courage and justice with notables. The argument is processed by the Socratic Questioning, a method of questioning, a question responses an interlocutor’s question to redefine his question. For example, an interlocutor presented a definition, Socrates told a further premise and the interlocutor approved of the premise, and Socrates further discussed and proved the definition and the premise are a contradiction, then Socrates insisted on the interlocutor’s definition is false or non-sense and the converse is true. This Socrates’ method indicate new consideration and refined definition, also interlocutors can’t say anything further and must recognize their ignorance and blunder.
This method of negatively aggressive questioning is named Socratic Method (Elenchos), also is named Maieutike (the way of midwife), . Because Socrates found a new knowledge or perception went through a hardships. And Socrates developed the dialectic which is made progress by Plato, Aristotle, Kant and Hegel.
“Knowing I Know Nothing” (The Socratic Ignorance)
By the arguments, Socrates recognized personages supposed to be wise, don’t know the truth and virtue, and only he know “I know that I know nothing”, so Socrates is wiser than others.
The Socratic Ignorance is a criticism to practical knowledge and vanity. Personages in Athens knew only separated practical knowledge. They didn’t know the importance of truth and virtue, the basis of things.
Some scholars think “knowing I know nothing” is a kind of knowledge and a self-contradiction. The true meaning of the Socratic Ignorance might be an “I understand just the importance of truth and virtue”.
The meaning of Socratic Ignorance is not only a nihilism or a cynicism. He found the importance of truth, virtue and moral issues. It’s a starting point to pursuit truth, virtue, humane study and ethics.
Why Socrates accepted the death penalty ?
Socrates’ emphasis on good spirit and virtue, his dialectic method look strange and abnormal for Athens citizens at that time. (Some researchers say Socrates extremely pushed forward very conservative and common thoughts such as faith gods, temperance and a proverb “know thyself”.) Socrates’ point of view and his method of debate is shocking for the citizens. So he was blamed, hated and feared by many people. Then Socrates was accused by a fake crime of atheism or faith in Damon by malicious men.
In the trial, Socrates testified against him and bitterly attacked accusers by his philosophical faith and principle. He made jury members angry more than necessary, and unfortunately received a sentence of death.
Socrates’ policy is pursuit of virtue, wisdom and truth, and inseparability of knowledge and action. Opposition to the law and the judgement of the nation is different with his policy. It’s an injustice. So he accompanied the law of Athens, accepted the death penalty, and took a cup of hemlock to follow his particular pragmatic philosophic view. He devoted his life to his philosophy and will to virtue. Therefore his act and thought remain permanently and they turned the meaning of philosophy.
Criticism to Socrates
Socrates is a martyr of philosophy. By his saintly activity, Socrates is worshiped as a saint equal to Jesus Christ and Buddha. But Socrates is criticized by many thinkers from the later modern era.
Especially Nietzsche severely accused the activity and the philosophy of Socrates. He really dislike Socrate’s belief of processes of thinking by dialectic must lead the truth, thought it as a very strange belief. What’s more Nietzsche said it’s further wrong Socrates took a cup of hemlock by himself to follow the validity of his logic. Socrates is the prototype of the theoretical optimist and the originator of the intellectualism about knowledge and logic.
By the modern and contemporary philosophers generally regard Socrates’ philosophy as an intellectualism, an anthropocentrism and a centrism of virtue, wisdom and reason. Socrates concealed the value of lively nature and the true nature of human in the nature are pursued by the Presocratics, and first divided philosophy into the human inquisition (today’s meaning of philosophy) and the natural science.
Conclusion
Socrates is a revolutionist of philosophy and a true activist of “philosophia”. His life and activity made a huge impact on philosophy and ethics. He launched the second birth of philosophy, and philosophy became a human inquisition and a moral science. His philosophy made huge impact on the Western culture and studies.
But he made an end to natural philosophy by the Presocratics, concealed the value of lively nature and the human nature in the nature pursued by them, and divided philosophy into the human inquisition and the natural science.
References
Christopher C. W. Taylor, Socrates: Very Short Introduction (Oxford University Press, 1998)
Hiroyuki Ogino, Symposion of Philosophy: Socrates, Plato, Aristotle (NHK Publishing, 2003)
Louis-André Dorion, Socrate (Presses Universitaires de France, 2004)
Micheline Sauvage, Socrate et la conscience de l’homme (Éditions du Seuil, 1957)
Michitaro Tanaka, Socrates (Iwanami Books, 1957)
Paul Strathern, Socrates in 90 Minutes (Ivan R. Dee, 1997)
Dictionnaire Larousse de la Philosophie (Éditions Larousse, 2011)
The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy (Second Edition), (Cambridge University Press, 1995)
The Penguin Dictionary of Philosophy (Second Edition), (Penguin Books, 2005)
The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy (Second Edition Revised), (Oxford University Press, 2008)
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