---
date: '2023-09-25'
description: philosophy notes on socratic method, wisdom as self-understanding, platonic forms, and the pursuit of knowledge through questioning rather than claiming expertise.
id: Socrates
modified: 2026-06-05 15:08:12 GMT-04:00
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  - philos1aa3
title: Socrates
created: '2023-09-25'
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[[thoughts/university/twenty-three-twenty-four/philo-1aa3/Presocratics|Pre-Socratic]] inquiry asks what nature is and how things come to be. In the _Phaedo_ (96a–99d), Plato’s Socrates recalls his own early interest in such explanations and his disappointment with accounts that leave out why something is best.

Apollo’s oracle at Delphi: Chaerephon asks whether anyone is wiser than Socrates. The answer is no (_Apology_ 20e–21a). The Delphic maxim “know yourself” is a different saying; Socrates invokes it in the _Phaedrus_ (229e–230a).

### Wisdom

Lecture summary:

> Begins in self-understanding

What is the way we ought to live?

Socrates tests the oracle by questioning people reputed to be wise. His advantage is limited: when he lacks knowledge, he does not assume he has it (_Apology_ 21b–23b). The craftsmen know their crafts; their mistake is taking that expertise as authority about everything important.

_Philo-sophia_: love of wisdom. In Diotima’s account in the _Symposium_ (203e–204b), the philosopher recognises a lack and seeks wisdom. The already-wise have no need to seek it; the complacently ignorant see no need. Her account places Eros, a _daimon_, between mortal and divine (202d–203a).

Socrates asks: what is $X$?

- What account applies to every case?
- What explains why a particular thing is an instance of $X$?

In the _Euthyphro_ (6d–8b), calling pious whatever the gods love produces a problem when the gods disagree: the same act could count as both pious and impious. The definition has to survive that contradiction.

> Platonic Idea (Form)
> The idea of X is the form all particular Xs share, and which cause them to be X.

This lecture summary matches the explanatory role Plato gives Forms in the _Phaedo_ (100b–101d): beautiful things are beautiful through Beauty. A Form is intelligible and stable; a particular body can change. These are claims made through Socrates in Plato’s dialogues, so they need to be distinguished from a secure account of the historical Socrates.

Charges for Athenian trials?

Animosity with regards to his way of being?

Sources: Plato, [_Apology_](https://classics.mit.edu/Plato/apology.html), [_Phaedo_](https://chs.harvard.edu/primary-source/plato-phaedo-sb/), [_Phaedrus_](https://classics.mit.edu/Plato/phaedrus.html), [_Symposium_](https://classics.mit.edu/Plato/symposium.html), and [_Euthyphro_](https://classics.mit.edu/Plato/euthyfro.html), at the passages above.