HISTORY OF WESTERN PHILOSOPHY [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

Socrates:
Philosophical Life
Socrates

The
most interesting and influential thinker in the fifth century was Socrates, whose
dedication to careful reasoning transformed the entire enterprise. Since he
sought genuine knowledge rather than mere victory over an opponent, Socrates
employed the same logical tricks developed by the Sophists to a new
purpose, the pursuit of truth. Thus, his willingness to call everything into
question and his determination to accept nothing less than an adequate account
of the nature of things make him the first clear exponent of critical philosophy.

Although
he was well known during his own time for his conversational skills and public
teaching, Socrates wrote nothing, so we are dependent upon his students
(especially Xenophon
and Plato)
for any detailed knowledge of his methods and results. The trouble is that
Plato was himself a philosopher who often injected his own theories into the
dialogues he presented to the world as discussions between Socrates and other
famous figures of the day. Nevertheless, it is usually assumed that at least
the early dialogues of Plato provide a (fairly) accurate representation of
Socrates himself.

Euthyphro: What is Piety?

In the Euqufrwn (Euthyphro), for example, Socrates engaged in a sharply critical conversation with an
over-confident young man. Finding Euthyphro perfectly certain of his own
ethical rectitude even in the morally ambiguous situation of prosecuting his
own father in court, Socrates asks him to define what "piety" (moral duty) really is.
The demand here is for something more than merely a list of which actions are,
in fact, pious; instead, Euthyphro is supposed to provide a general definition that
captures the very essence of what piety is. But every answer he offers is
subjected to the full force of Socrates's critical thinking, until nothing
certain remains.

Specifically, Socrates systematically
refutes Euthyphro's suggestion that what makes right actions right is that the
gods love (or approve of) them. First, there is the obvious problem that, since
questions of right and wrong often generate interminable disputes, the gods are
likely to disagree among themselves about moral matters no less often than we
do, making some actions both right and wrong. Socrates lets Euthypro off the
hook on this one by aggreeingonly for purposes of continuing the
discussionthat the gods may be supposed to agree perfectly with each other.
(Notice that this problem arises only in a polytheistic culture.)

More
significantly, Socrates generates a formal dilemma from a (deceptively)
simple question: "Is the pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or
is it pious because it is loved by the gods?" (Euthyphro 10 a) Neither alternative can do the work for
which Euthyphro intends his definition of piety. If right actions are pious
only because the gods love them, then moral rightness is entirely arbitrary,
depending only on the whims of the gods. If, on the other hand, the gods love right
actions only because they are already right, then there must be some non-divine
source of values,
which we might come to know independently of their love.

In fact, this dilemma proposes a
significant difficulty at the heart of any effort to define morality by
reference to an external authority. (Consider, for example, parallel questions
with a similar structure: "Do my parents approve of this action because it
is right, or is it right because my parents approve of it?" or "Does
the College forbid this activity because it is wrong, or is it wrong because
the College forbids it?") On the second alternative in each case, actions
become right (or wrong) solely because of the authority's approval (or
disapproval); its choice, then, has no rational foundation, and it is
impossible to attribute laudable moral wisdom to the authority itself. So this
horn is clearly unacceptable. But on the first alternative, the authority
approves (or disapproves) of certain actions because they are already right (or
wrong) independently of it, and whatever rational standard it employs as a criterion for making
this decision must be accessible to us as well as to it. Hence, we are in
principle capable of distinguishing right from wrong on our own.

Thus, an application of careful
techniques of reasoning results in genuine (if negative) progress in the
resolution of a philosophical issue. Socrates's method of insistent questioning
at least helps us to eliminate one bad answer to a serious question. At most,
it points us toward a significant degree of intellectual independence. The
character of Euthyphro, however, seems unaffected by the entire process,
leaving the scene at the end of the dialogue no less self-confident than he had
been at its outset. The use of Socratic methods, even when they clearly result
in a rational victory, may not produce genuine conviction in those to whom they
are applied.

Apology: The Examined Life

Because of his political associations
with an earlier regime, the Athenian democracy put Socrates on trial, charging him with undermining state
religion and corrupting young people. The speech he offered in his own defense,
as reported in Plato's Apologhma (Apology), provides us with many reminders of the central
features of Socrates's approach to philosophy and its relation to practical
life.

Ironic Modesty:

Explaining
his mission as a philosopher, Socrates reports an oracular message telling him
that "No one is wiser than you." (Apology 21a) He then proceeds through a series of ironic descriptions
of his efforts to disprove the oracle by conversing with notable Athenians who
must surely be wiser. In each case, however, Socrates concludes that he has a
kind of wisdom that each of them lacks: namely, an open awareness of his own
ignorance.

Questioning Habit:

The goal of
Socratic interrogation, then, is to help individuals to achieve genuine
self-knowledge, even if it often turns out to be negative in character. As his
cross-examination of Meletus shows, Socrates means to turn the methods of the
Sophists inside-out, using logical nit-picking to expose (rather than to
create) illusions about reality. If the method rarely succeeds with
interlocutors, it can nevertheless be effectively internalized as a dialectical mode of
reasoning in an effort to understand everything.

Devotion to
Truth:

Even after
he has been convicted by the jury, Socrates declines to abandon his pursuit of
the truth in all
matters. Refusing to accept exile from Athens or a commitment to silence as his
penalty, he maintains that public discussion of the great issues of life and
virtue is a necessary part of any valuable human life. "The unexamined
life is not worth living." (Apology 38a) Socrates would rather die than give up
philosophy, and the jury seems happy to grant him that wish.

Dispassionate Reason:

Even when
the jury has sentenced him to death, Socrates calmly delivers his final public
words, a speculation about what the future holds. Disclaiming any certainty
about the fate of a human being after death, he nevertheless expresses a
continued confidence in the power of reason, which he has exhibited (while the
jury has not). Who really wins will remain unclear.

Plato's dramatic picture of a man
willing to face death rather than abandoning his commitment to philosophical
inquiry offers up Socrates as a model for all future philosophers. Perhaps few
of us are presented with the same stark choice between philosophy and death,
but all of us are daily faced with opportunities to decide between convenient
conventionality and our devotion to truth and reason. How we choose determines
whether we, like Socrates, deserve to call our lives philosophical.

Crito: The Individual and the State

Plato's description of Socrates's final days continued in the Kritwn (Crito). Now in prison awaiting execution, Socrates
displays the same spirit of calm reflection about serious matters that had
characterized his life in freedom. Even the patent injustice of his fate at the
hands of the Athenian jury produces in Socrates no bitterness or anger. Friends
arrive at the jail with a foolproof plan for his escape from Athens to a life
of voluntary exile, but Socrates calmly engages them in a rational debate about
the moral value of such an action.

Of course Crito and the others know
their teacher well, and they come prepared to argue the merits of their plan.
Escaping now would permit Socrates to fulfil his personal obligations in life.
Moreover, if he does not follow the plan, many people will suppose that his
friends did not care enough for him to arrange his escape. Therefore, in order
to honor his commitments and preserve the reputation of his friends, Socrates
ought to escape from jail.

But Socrates dismisses these
considerations as irrelevant to a decision about what action is truly right.
What other people will say clearly doesn't matter. As he had argued in the Apology,
the only opinion that counts is not that of the majority of people generally,
but rather that of the one individual who truly knows. The truth alone deserves
to be the basis for decisions about human action, so the only proper apporoach
is to engage in the sort of careful moral reasoning by means of which one may
hope to reveal it.

Socrates's
argument proceeds from the statement of a perfectly general moral principle to
its application in his particular case:

One ought never to do wrong (even in
response to the evil committed by another).

But it is always wrong to disobey the
state.

Hence, one ought never to disobey the
state.

And since avoiding the sentence of
death handed down by the Athenian jury would be an action in disobedience the
state, it follows Socrates ought not to escape.

The argument is a valid one, so we are
committed to accepting its conclusion if we believe that its premises are true.
The general commitment to act rightly is fundamental to a moral life, and it
does seem clear that Socrates's escape would be a case of disobedience. But
what about the second premise, the claim that it is always wrong for an
individual to disobey the state? Surely that deserves further examination. In
fact, Socrates pictures the laws of Athens proposing two independent lines of
argument in favor of this claim:

First, the state is to us as a parent
is to a child, and since it is always wrong for a child to disobey a parent, it
follows that it is always wrong to disobey the state. (Crito 50e) Here we might raise serious doubts about the
legitimacy of the analogy
between our parents and the state. Obedience to our parents, after all, is a
temporary obligation
that we eventually outgrow by learning to make decisions for ourselves, while
Socrates means to argue that obeying the state is a requirement right up until
we die. Here it might be useful to apply the same healthy disrespect for moral
authority that Socrates
himself expressed in the Euthyphro.

The second argument is that it is
always wrong to break an agreement, and since continuing to live voluntarily in
a state constitutes an agreement to obey it, it is wrong to disobey that state.
(Crito 52e) This may be a better argument; only the second
premise seems open to question. Explicit agreements to obey some authority are
common enoughin a matriculation pledge or a contract of employment, for
examplebut most of us have not entered into any such agreement with our
government. Even if we suppose, as the laws suggest, that the agreement is an
implicit one to which we are committed by our decision to remain within their
borders, it is not always obvious that our choice of where to live is entirely
subject to our individual voluntary control.

Nevertheless, these considerations are
serious ones. Socrates himself was entirely convinced that the arguments hold,
so he concluded that it would be wrong for him to escape from prison. As
always, of course, his actions conformed to the outcome of his reasoning.
Socrates chose to honor his commitment to truth and morality even though it
cost him his life.