The Socratic Turn addresses the question of whether we can acquire genuine knowledge of good and evil, right and wrong. Reputedly, Socrates was the first philosopher to make the attempt. But Socrates was a materialistic natural scientist in his youth, and it was only much later in life—after he had rejected materialistic natural science—that he finally turned, around the age of forty, to the examination of ordinary moral and political opinions, or to moral-political philosophy so understood. Through a consideration of Plato's account of Socrates' intellectual development, and with a view to relevant works of the pre-Socratics, Xenophon, Aristotle, Hesiod, Homer, and Aristophanes, Dustin Sebell reproduces the course of thought that carried Socrates from materialistic natural science to moral-political philosophy. By doing so, he seeks to recover an all but forgotten approach to the question of justice, one still worthy of being called scientific.
Can we come to know what is good and evil, right and wrong in our age of science? In The Socratic Turn, Dustin Sebell looks to Socrates, the founder of political philosophy, for guidance.
It is well known that Socrates was executed by the city of Athens for not believing in the gods and for corrupting the youth. Despite this, it is not widely known what he really thought, or taught the youth to think, about philosophy, the gods, and political affairs. Of the few authors we rely on for firsthand knowledge of Socrates—Aristophanes, Xenophon, Plato, and Aristotle—only Xenophon, the least read of the four, lays out the whole Socratic education in systematic order. In Xenophon's Socratic Education, through a careful reading of Book IV of Xenophon's Memorabilia, Dustin Sebell shows how Socrates ascended, with his students in tow, from opinions about morality or politics and religion to knowledge of such things. Besides revealing what it was that Socrates really thought—about everything from self-knowledge to happiness, natural theology to natural law, and rhetoric to dialectic—Sebell demonstrates how Socrates taught promising youths, like Xenophon or Plato, only indirectly: by jokingly teaching unpromising youths in their presence. Sebell ultimately shows how Socrates, the founder of moral and political philosophy, sought and found an answer to the all-important question: should we take our bearings in life from human reason, or revealed religion?
In Plato's Apology, Socrates says he spent his life examining and questioning people on how best to live, while avowing that he himself knows nothing important. Elsewhere, however, for example in Plato's Republic, Plato's Socrates presents radical and grandiose theses. In this book Sandra Peterson offers a hypothesis which explains the puzzle of Socrates' two contrasting manners. She argues that the apparently confident doctrinal Socrates is in fact conducting the first step of an examination: by eliciting his interlocutors' reactions, his apparently doctrinal lectures reveal what his interlocutors believe is the best way to live. She tests her hypothesis by close reading of passages in the Theaetetus, Republic and Phaedo. Her provocative conclusion, that there is a single Socrates whose conception and practice of philosophy remain the same throughout the dialogues, will be of interest to a wide range of readers in ancient philosophy and classics.
Rich in drama and humour, they include the controversial Ion, a debate on poetic inspiration; Laches, in which Socrates seeks to define bravery; and Euthydemus, which considers the relationship between philosophy and politics. Together, these dialogues provide a definitive portrait of the real Socrates and raise issues still keenly debated by philosophers, forming an incisive overview of Plato's philosophy.
Plato dispersed his account of how Socrates became Socrates across three dialogues. Thus, Plato rendered his becoming discoverable only to readers truly invested. In How Socrates Became Socrates, Laurence Lampert recognizes the path of Plato’s strides and guides us through the true account of Socrates’ becoming. He divulges how and why Plato ordered his Phaedo, Parmenides, and Symposium chronologically to give readers access to Socrates’ development on philosophy’s fundamental questions of being and knowing. In addition to a careful and precise analysis of Plato’s Phaedo,Parmenides, and Symposium, Lampert shows that properly entwined, Plato’s three dialogues fuse to portray a young thinker entering philosophy’s true radical power. Lampert reveals why this radicality needed to be guarded and places this discussion within the greater scheme of the politics of philosophy.
The author explores the recovery of Socratic philosophy in the political thought of G.W.F. Hegel, Soren Kierkegaard, John Stuart Mill, and Friedrich Nietzsche. Ward identifies the cause of the renewed interest in Socrates in Hegel’s call for the absorption of the individual within the modern, liberal state and the concomitant claim that Socratic skepticism should cease because history has reached its end and perfection. Recoiling from Hegel’s attempt to chain the individual within the “cave,” nineteenth century thinkers push back against his deification of the state. Yet, underlying Kierkegaard, Mill and Nietzsche’s turn to Socrates is their acceptance of Hegel’s critique of the liberal conception of the rights-bearing individual. Like Hegel, they agree that such an individual is an unworthy competitor to the state. In search of a noble individual to hold up against the state and counter the belief in the “end” of history, Kierkegaard, Mill and Nietzsche bring back and transform Socrates in significant ways. For Kierkegaard the Socratic philosopher in modern times is the person of faith, for Mill the public intellectual whose idiosyncratic identity arises from the freedom of speech, and for Nietzsche the Dionysian artist. Each model the beauty of individuality in our democratic age.
Do you suffer from the Blank Page Syndrome? Do you have trouble thinking up what you want to say when you're called on to write or to speak? Not being able to find the right words can get in the way of romance and success! Retired advertising man Malachy Walsh had to write on demand for 30 years. In Socratic Scribbling, he reveals secrets he learned from Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Quintillion, Shakespeare, and other Great Writers and Thinkers that helped him make his mark in advertising. Malachy believes good writing is less about following rules and more about making things happen with words. He shows us how to explain complicated things in simple ways, how to persuade people by getting them to convince themselves, how to tell stories that delight and instruct, and how to make speeches that engage and enchant. And it all starts when we follow Socrates as he asks the right questions.
Hugh H. Benson explores Plato's answer to Clitophon's challenge, the question of how one can acquire the knowledge Socrates argues is essential to human flourishing-knowledge we all seem to lack. Plato suggests two methods by which this knowledge may be gained: the first is learning from those who already have the knowledge one seeks, and the second is discovering the knowledge one seeks on one's own. The book begins with a brief look at some of the Socratic dialogues where Plato appears to recommend the former approach while simultaneously indicating various difficulties in pursuing it. The remainder of the book focuses on Plato's recommendation in some of his most important and central dialogues-the Meno, Phaedo, and Republic-for carrying out the second approach: de novo inquiry. The book turns first to the famous paradox concerning the possibility of such an inquiry and explores Plato's apparent solution. Having defended the possibility of de novo inquiry as a response to Clitophon's challenge, Plato explains the method or procedure by which such inquiry is to be carried out. The book defends the controversial thesis that the method of hypothesis, as described and practiced in the Meno, Phaedo, and Republic, is, when practiced correctly, Plato's recommended method of acquiring on one's own the essential knowledge we lack. The method of hypothesis when practiced correctly is, then, Platonic dialectic, and this is Plato's response to Clitophon's challenge. "This is a new book on a critically important topic, methodology, as it is explored in three of the most important works by one of the most important philosophers in the very long history of philosophy, written by a scholar of international stature who is working from many years of experience and currently at the top of his game. It promises to be one of the most important books ever written on this subject."-Nicholas Smith, James F. Miller Professor of Humanities, Lewis and Clark College "The thesis is bold and the results are important for our understanding of some of the most studied and controversial dialogues by and philosophical theses in Plato. In my view, Hugh Benson's examination of the method of hypothesis in the Meno and the Phaedo is a tour de force of subtle and careful scholarship: I think that this part of the book will be adopted as the standard interpretation of this basic notion in Plato. An excellent and important book."-Charles Brittain, Susan Linn Sage Professor of Philosophy and Humane Letters, Cornell University
"The Socratic method is one of the timeless inventions of the ancient world. It is a path to wisdom and a way to think more intelligently about questions large or small. It is a technique for teaching others and for talking to yourself. It is an antidote to stupidity, to irrationality, and to social media. It is easy to understand but challenging to master. It is useful for everyone. This book explains the Socratic method in detail: what it is, where it came from, and how to carry it out. The chapters teach the elements of the method step by step with examples from Plato's dialogues. They illustrate how to create Socratic questions of your own. They show how the teachings of Socrates produced the philosophies of Stoicism and Skepticism. The book also explains how the Socratic method can be put to work in the classroom, and it offers Socratic rules of engagement for talking about politics and other hard things. The Socratic Method is a complete guide to the practical use of a great idea"--
