";s:4:"text";s:3767:" The Fall of the Athenian Empire. This technique involves finding holes in their own theories and then patching them up. A.A. Long "How Does Socrates' Divine Sign Communicate with Him? Professors often manipulate the facts or the legal principles associated with the case to demonstrate how the resolution of the case can change greatly if even one fact changes. He was arguably guilty of the crimes with which he was charged, impiety and corrupting the youth, because he did reject the city’s gods and he did inspire disrespect for authority among his youthful followers (though that was not his intention). Socrates wrote nothing.
All that is known about him has been inferred from accounts by members of his circle—primarily Plato and Xenophon—as well as by Plato’s student Aristotle, who acquired his knowledge of Socrates through his teacher. Its powerful advocacy of the examined life and its condemnation of Athenian democracy have made it one of the central documents of Western thought and culture. Most lawyers can probably tell you about their shining Socratic method moment. How is it used? What knowledge we have of Socrates must therefore depend primarily on one or the other (or both, when their portraits coincide) of these sources. To do otherwise would have caused him to break his ". The Socratic method represents the core of an attorney's craft: questioning, analyzing, and simplifying. Although Socrates himself wrote nothing, he is depicted in conversation in compositions by a small circle of his admirers—Plato and Xenophon first among them. He is portrayed in these works as a man of great insight, integrity, self-mastery, and argumentative skill.
His style of philosophizing was to engage in public conversations about some human excellence and, through skillful questioning, to show that his interlocutors did not know what they were talking about.
(Plato and Xenophon also wrote separate accounts, each entitled Apology of Socrates, of Socrates’ trial.) Of the contemporary sources, the greater extent of information is taken from the dialogues of Plato and Xenophon (both devotees of Socrates), and the testaments of Antisthenes, Aristippus, and Aeschines of Sphettos, and the lesser from the plays of Aristophanes. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). He studied music, gymnastics, and grammar in his youth (the common subjects of study for a young Greek) and followed his father's profession as a sculptor.
Yannis Simonides performing excerpts from his one-man show. ", Chapter 5 in: Battle of Arginusae § Trial of the generals, The Legacy of Socrates: Essays in Moral Philosophy, Moral Philosophy – The Discovery of Ethics : Socrates, The Story of Philosophy: From Ancient Greeks to Great Thinkers of Modern Times, Philosophers in Conversation: Interviews from the Harvard Review of Philosophy, Socrates: Reason or Unreason as the Foundation of European Identity, A History of Ancient Philosophy IV: The Schools of the Imperial Age, Childhood, Education and Philosophy: New Ideas for an Old Relationship, The Vices of Learning: Morality and Knowledge at Early Modern Universities, "The Rise and Fall of the Socratic Problem", The Death of Socrates and the Life of Philosophy: An Interpretation of Plato's Phaedo, Plato and the Socratic Dialogue: The Philosophical Use of a Literary Form (p. 75), Agora, Academy, and the Conduct of Philosophy (p. 9), Socrates: A Guide for the Perplexed (p. 2 and footnote 10 on pp. The beliefs of Socrates, separate from those of Plato, are hard to define as …