The claim attributed to him by Plato that "an unexamined life is not worth living"… he inspired his followers to think for themselves instead of following the dictates of society and the accepted superstitions concerning the gods" (Mark 1). Do to Socrates' carefree lifestyle of no conformity, he was often accused of breaking laws and customs. Similarly, The Apology and Crito, speaks of Socrates experience with these accusations and how he believes persuasion is the most effective means of protest. The Apology is a dialogue written by Plato in 399 BC. The Apology features a speech presented by Socrates during his trial with the government.
I will provide a brief opening statement. Socrates was accused for corrupting the youth, teaching out of the charge and not believing in gods. These accusation were brought by Melatus, Anytus, Lycon and citizens of Athens. Below I will try to prove that Socrates was not guilty for corrupting young people neither willingly nor unwillingly, he was not a sophist, and also he believed in God. The first accusation brought by Melatus was Socrates did not believe in gods that means he was accused for being atheism.
Socrates was searching for a way to prove that relativist way of thinking was false. Relativists believe that truths were relative to culture and morality. If Socrates could undo the work of the sophists, he could prove the existence of objective facts with universal definitions. Socrates was motivated to prove them wrong because he disagreed of the pre-Socratics and wanted to undo the sophists rhetoric of training people how to win arguments with manipulation, instead of truth. In Meno, we find that Socrates was charged with impiety and on his way to the courthouse, he finds Euthyphro.
Socrates was charged with corrupting the youths of society. Forcing them to think differently, to question things, pushing his strange ideas upon them. This was the considered to be the main reason for his trial, but in truth the assembly just wanted to rid society of Socrates, he was considered a threat for Athenes. Thanks to his ideals, the youths of Athens realised how Athenian democracy was lacking and how weak it was. Socrates’s words “ To start of the trial, Socrates went on to say that he will deal with one accusation at a time, and immediately he pointed out one of the accusations, “be careful not to be deceived by an accomplished speaker like me” (The Apology.
Socrates was one to tear others opinions down and only value his own, “There, some fellow named Socrates swings around claiming he’s walking on air and talking a lot of other nonsense on subjects that I know neither a lot nor a little but nothing at all about.” (Plato, Apology, 19c) Firstly, in the First set of the Accusations, Plato simply states the fact that, “They say there’s a man called Socrates, a ‘wise’ man, a thinker, about things in the heavens, an investigator of things below the earth, and someone who makes the weaker argument the stronger” (Plato, Apology, 18b-c). This means that
In Socrates’ first speech, he regards the rational non-lover as the superior, as they will never be tempted into shameful acts. He wishes to leave, but realizes it is foolish, and sees a daemon (a warning personified) so he corrects his mistake in the second speech. The lover can become holy, even more than the lover, but that comes with risks. They can only be holy with self restraint, without going too far. We can see the parallel with Equus, much like Socrates, Dysart and society in general are seen as the norm and most successful, but Alan forces us to reconsider that, and shows us the flaws in Dysart and society’s values.
With this request at hand given by Echecrates, Phaedo narrated what happened during the execution. In this narration, important themes were discussed by Socrates with his followers and admirers. In the narration of Phaedo, the discussion between Simmias and Socrates centered on the idea of being a philosopher. From this discussion, it was expounded that the idea that a philosopher must be ready at the face of death. For Socrates, men who immersed themselves in philosophy should prepare themselves for death and dying.
Socrates and his friends, cebes and simmias whether it is wrong to kill oneself.in their discussion, Socrates begins by saying that it is wrong to kill oneself because it is against the will of God. He thinks that killing oneself shows disrespect to the gods because men are possessions of the gods and the gods are right to be angry and give out punishment if one of the possessions kills himself. Even though Socrates ultimately extols the virtues of dying for true philosophers he strongly feels that common person does not have a right to take away his own life since it does not belong to him but rather he is gods’
Finally, Socrates claims that the unjust man is ignorant, weak and bad. Socrates argument is effective in the way that he does not shatter Thrasymachus’ argument without reason, he is given many examples that change his way of thinking. Thrasymachus is told to put his ‘set in stone’ ideas under different situations, and once he does, he can clearly see that he should not have been so stubborn, as soon as he does so, he can see that his arguments aren’t suited to all situations. By the end of the argument, Thrasymachus isn’t so much debating the definition of justice, as he is defining the required traits to be a ruler of
Therefore, if anything is in itself not composed of truth nor is reality such as imitation and painting, it can only lead us into deeper ignorance. If it is not. If imitation is not improving the government of cities or audience as and teachers do, then there is no need for it according to Socrates. With this being said, Socrates only solution to the poison of imitation is to do away with it all at once or for the Imitator to acquire knowledge of what they are imitating, to avoid deceiving people with false image of