... based on the belief that knowledge cannot be taught directly by a teacher but instead the students must interact and learn through their on experience. Socrates believed that in order to solve a problem you need to break it down into series of questions. He thinks that the government should not ... the government would work best if it was governed by individuals who posses great knowledge, virtue and a complete understanding of themselves. I believe that Socrates is one of the greatest philosophers I have read about. He is truly the wisest man in his lifetime. Not many philosophers would...

• Word Count: 1078
• Approx Pages: 4
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: High School

... His ideas involving spiritual matters, the soul, individual enlightenment, and the truth are still very much practiced today. The amount of influence that Socrates has on a society depends on where that society is located as well as the type of government, leadership, and religion. Those areas that ... In his younger years he followed in the footsteps of his father and became a sculptor until he left to fight in the Peloponnesian War. When Socrates returned to Greece after the war he decided to end his previous profession and become a philosophical speaker. As a debater he quickly gained ...

• Word Count: 927
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• Grade Level: Undergraduate

... only consider whether in doing anything he is doing right or wrong and acting the part of a good man or a bad one." (pg. 41) Socrates believes that one should act on moral knowledge alone. By not "calculating living or dying," you are taking away the emotional side of ones thoughts. Rather than ... be selfish and care about your own well being, Socrates is saying that one should simply follow the rules or not follow them at all. This alone will define you as a human being in the present ... being selfish and escaping, he should try to persuade the Laws to let him go by using his knowled...

• Word Count: 772
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• Grade Level: High School

... that death is a good thing. The main reason behind his decision is justice. His friend Crito came up with a plan to let him escape, but he refused. Socrates argument went like this, "One ought never to do wrong (even in response to the evil committed by another). But it is always wrong to disobey the state. ... . His way of thinking, at first was very mind boggling. But, after spending time looking at it, it startes to make more sense. To think like Socrates thought you have to be willing to never stop asking questions or settle for one answer. I like how he kept digging until he found t...

• Word Count: 883
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• Grade Level: High School

... corrupting the youth, not believing the gods, and creating deities by Meletos, Anytus, and Lycon, who have brought the present charges before the court. However Socrates has more reason to fear his older accusers who accused him of Prejudice and for his "evil fame" as being wise, than to fear the recent ones ... have a bad influence on the youth, asked Meletos who is it that has good influence on the youth? Meletos replied saying that the laws make people good. Socrates, after some replies, then stated a question to Meletos saying "then the whole nation of the Athenians, it seems makes ...

• Word Count: 728
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• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

... friends and ourselves but undermined society and morality of Athens by confusing people and attempting to destroy their social rules and orders. Socrates thinking became the major concept of philosophy because it makes people to question the decision they have made. His questioning is still ... friendship, poetry, religion, science and government. His important discussions were concerned with how one should live, with virtue and wisdom. In these discussions Socrates used an approach now known as Socratic method of questioning. Instead of lecturing people, he approaches them with a questi...

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... lecturing in a one-sided manner, therefore he is not a Sophist. His name was only used in the play due to name recognition. Socrates name was well known during that time period, and was friends with Aristophanes. The comedy The Clouds portrays Sophists as teaching people to win an argument, such ... about Sophists and Natural Philosophers; both of these groups are active during this time period and the play takes aim at them. Mellitus convicted Socrates of not believing in the gods. The comedy the Clouds portrays Natural Philosophers as not believing in the gods, and this is probably whe...

• Word Count: 613
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• Grade Level: High School

... he began to study the rhetoric and dialectics of the Sophists, the speculations of the Ionian philosophers, and the culture of Periclean Athens. At first, Socrates was a sculptor, like his father. He created the statue group of the three Graces, which stood at the entrance to the Acropolis until the ... 2nd century. In the Peloponnesian War, he served as an infantryman. He fought at the battles of Potidaea, Delium, and Amphipolis. Socrates liked to argue instead of write. Therefore, he spent a lot of time in the marketplace and other public places of Athens, trying to start ... willing. ...

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... to be the people who are supposed to be experts on all these areas. The have well thought out opinions, and they are very learned people. Socrates (470 B.C.-399 B.C.) was born near Athens, and spent most of his life in Athens. He married women named Xanthippe, who was rumored in the town ... comfort. Supposedly, he once stood in one spot for a day and night puzzling over a philosophical problem. Now you may ask what is Socrates most noted for? Well, Socrates is best known for his devotion to logic and for his great argumentative skills. But there is no general introduction into the life ...

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• Grade Level: High School

... or her convinced conscience? Each of these situations surface in the works of two ancient Greek writers. In Plato's Apology and Crito, through critical reasoning, Socrates acknowledges the word of the law. In contrast, Sophocles" play Antigone makes the point that justice should be put ahead of the law, otherwise more ... since his mother and father married through it. Furthermore, the city provided him with his education in the arts and in physical culture. Being so, Socrates claims to be born, nurtured and educated by the city, and thus is its offspring and servant. Accordingly, the sta...

• Word Count: 1064
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... language of expression that functions within a definable context and a manner of life which serves as an existential option. As a language of expression firstly, Socrates commonly articulated himself in a manner not ordinary to the everyday man of Athens; his ideas were in the pursuit of truth and wisdom in the form ... 176). Truth and the pursuit of wisdom are two ideas which always highlighted the Socratic discourse. This is easily witnessed in the opening of the Apology as Socrates utters the words, "My accusers, then, as I state, have said little or nothing that is true: but you shall...

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... way an individual thinks and how their way of thinking could contribute to improving society. In ancient Greece, there lived three great men named Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. These men were the first and still the greatest philosophers of all time. They questioned people's way of life and ... and died. "It is better to die on my feet than to live on my knees," he stated proudly. Plato became disillusioned with Athens after Socrates died. Later, he started his own university called the Academy. There, he taught philosophy, math, astronomy, science, history, physical education, and rhe...

• Word Count: 924
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• Grade Level: High School

... home often wandering through the agora (an Ancient Greek market place) and discussing his ideas with students, friends and other people he found in the street. Socrates believed in questioning people and the way they ran their lives, claiming that "the unexamined life, for a human being, is not worth living". His ... large bald spot. This added to the people of the times" fascination towards him. However in the year of 399 BC charges were brought against Socrates claiming that he was guilty of not believing in the gods that the people of the time believed in, introducing new religious bel...

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... his ideas, others felt malice. Nobody likes to be told that they are wrong. However many Athenians were devoted to the teachings of Socrates, there were that many more who bristled at his anti-democratic tone. His disposition pertaining to these matters could have stemmed partially from his ... impious and corrupting youth, so that Athenian society may be rid of him. His avoidable execution, nevertheless unavoidable in the mind of Socrates, was what resulted. Socrates thrived on his quest for an answer to the question, "What is man?" Being a simple man of simple means, it is ... Througho...

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• Grade Level: High School

... numerous enemies from his conversations, yet he also gained a following mostly comprised of youths (I imagine they found it entertaining that Socrates made fools of the high-class individuals.). Socrates" enemies charged after they had grown abundant and powerful enough. Supposedly, the way Socrates corrupted the youth is he made them disbelieve in the gods: " They repeat stock charges against all philosophers, and say ... that they investigates things in the air and under the earth, and that [Socrates] teaches people to disbelieve in the gods, and to make the worse argument appear the ...

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... able to realize that you know nothing, he made it a habit to use this sort of cross-examination on people in order to expose their own ignorance. Socrates never comes to many real conclusions about anything. In the Republic, his elenchus with Polemarchus and Thrasymachus shows many things that justice is not, but it never ... that it is easier to ask questions than answer them. Give an answer yourself, and tell us what you say the just is" (Republic 336c). Socrates defends himself in saying he doesn't know what justice is or what anything is for that matter. People who speak must think ...

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• Grade Level: High School

... with anyone who was willing to listen, the self knowledge that he inculcated were basis for his teachings. He was also a very religious individual. While Socrates were in these public areas in conversations he drew attention of other people especially the young people, who have a lot of time on their hands, some ... knowledge they knew. The people of Athens did not try to educate themselves in stead they look for some one to blame and that person was Socrates, he was accused of being some sort of criminal and that he was a bad influence on the young. He was later charged for neglecting ...

• Word Count: 534
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... by eliminating jealousy and inequality in the social classes, and adding a greater level of knowledge and understanding in the ruling class. The first wave Socrates discusses is that of common wives and children. The goal of the first wave is to promote unity in the city as a whole. The ... the obvious-eliminating inequality, but it also gives everyone a roll and removes the uncomfortably of working along side someone on the opposite gender. Socrates believed that everyone was equal in the guardian class although he addressed the fact that in ancient Greece it was believed that men would ...

• Word Count: 984
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• Grade Level: High School

... , there is any general human being as such. Only by knowing what this is can we hope to live rightly: "therefore virtue is knowledge. Socrates laid no claim to this knowledge. His advantage lay only in awareness of his ignorance. He wished to persuade men to seek it with him, ... inductive, and its outcome was to reduce all virtues, including justice, to an understanding of the true nature of good and evil. Armed with this understanding, Socrates believed, men would automatically choose the right: "No one errs voluntary." His constant exhortation was to "care for the soul" (psyche), and ...

• Word Count: 837
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... live his life with a love of wisdom and excellence, instead of wealth and personal gain, that only then would one truly be happy. A citizen of Athens, Socrates was a model citizen and faithful to his city even after they condemned him to death. It was in his belief that the state is like a parent to ... of slave and master. One chooses to belong or reside in a state and in doing so one must devote oneself to the state in which he lives. Socrates says that the individual owes the state everything that he has and is. For it is the state that provides an education and a safe environment to l...

• Word Count: 855
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• Grade Level: High School

... These are the men who become tyrannical by indulging too much in their power, a point that leads to the collapse of the democratic state. Socrates describes the phenomena of the leaders" appetites as such, "that anyone who tastes the one piece of human innards that's chopped up with those ... ). Extreme freedom (i.e. the pursuit of such appetites) can't be expected to lead to anything but a change to extreme slavery (564a). Thus according to Socrates, democracy declines into tyranny. Two of the inherent weaknesses of this democracy that allow the idlers to exploit their power are unjust c...

• Word Count: 893
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• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

... called Sophists these people received money to teach people how to argue. The sophists did exactly what Socrates was apposed to, they advertised that they had knowledge and claimed to be able to pass it on; Socrates seeks knowledge without possessing any himself. Sophists also only wanted to win arguments and not find the ... truth. Where Socrates wanted to find truth and to do that it did not necessarily mean the argument is ... says that to find truth you might find a presence of ignorance and it is necessary to find the presence of ignorance to find genuine knowledge of virtue. Socr...

• Word Count: 277
• Approx Pages: 1
• Grade Level: High School

... a series of questions and examining the effects of their answers. Almost everyone that he came into contact with he would question. For example, Socrates methodically denies Euthyphro's idea that what makes right actions right is that the gods love or approval of them. First, there is the obvious problem ... likely to disagree among themselves about moral matters no more or less often than we do, making some actions both right and wrong. More importantly, Socrates thinks of a dilemma from a deceptive and simple question: "Is the pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious...

• Word Count: 571
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• Grade Level: High School

... of knowledge and believed that there is no standard of truth. The sophists did not teach at the same time as Socrates, but the Sophists would have objections to what Socrates believed and taught. The sophists were concrete people and excelled in the areas of grammar, writing and public discourse. Theses ... none at all. He had little faith that an individual could process anything and if he could process anything he could not convey it. Socrates on the other hand believed that a man's life should be dedicated to gaining knowledge and collecting information to find the truth. This was .....

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... then they would not have power over others. If they believed in justice the "weak" would fight for their rights and that is not what they want. Socrates believed in a just world. He would rather die then to commit injustice. He believed in doing what the right thing to do was, in obeying what God ... I believe that it is far worse to do what he is doing now, trying to put a man to death unjustly" (Plato, AP. Pg. 54). To Socrates pursuing a just life gave him happiness, the freedom to express the truth with out feeling afraid of what was to happen, because he was on the side of justice .....

• Word Count: 936
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: High School