66 ideas
| 13773 | For the truth you need Prodicus's fifty-drachma course, not his one-drachma course [Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Socrates: If I'd attended Prodicus's fifty-drachma course, I could tell you the truth about names straightway, but as I've only heard the one-drachma course, I don't know the truth about it. | |
| From: Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]), quoted by Plato - Cratylus 384b |
| 7421 | A philosopher is one who cares about what other people care about [Socrates, by Foucault] |
| Full Idea: Socrates asks people 'Are you caring for yourself?' He is the man who cares about the care of others; this is the particular position of the philosopher. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Michel Foucault - Ethics of the Concern for Self as Freedom p.287 | |
| A reaction: Priests, politicians and psychiatrists also care quite intensely about the concerns of other people. Someone who was intensely self-absorbed with the critical task of getting their own beliefs right would count for me as a philosopher. |
| 1649 | Socrates opened philosophy to all, but Plato confined moral enquiry to a tiny elite [Vlastos on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: To confine, as Plato does in 'Republic' IV-VII, moral inquiry to a tiny elite, is to obliterate the Socratic vision which opens up the philosophic life to all. | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Gregory Vlastos - Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher p.18 | |
| A reaction: This doesn't mean that Plato is necessarily 'elitist'. It isn't elitist to point out that an activity is very difficult. |
| 5842 | Philosophical discussion involves dividing subject-matter into categories [Socrates, by Xenophon] |
| Full Idea: Self-discipline and avoidance of pleasure makes people most capable of philosophical discussion, which is called 'discussion' (dialegesthai - sort out) because people divide their subject-matter into categories. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Xenophon - Memorabilia of Socrates 4.5.12 | |
| A reaction: This could be the original slogan for analytical philosophy, as far as I am concerned. I don't think philosophy aims at complete and successful analysis (cf. Idea 2958), but at revealing the structure and interconnection of ideas. This is wisdom. |
| 648 | Socrates began the quest for something universal with his definitions, but he didn't make them separate [Socrates, by Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Socrates began the quest for something universal in addition to the radical flux of perceptible particulars, with his definitions. But he rightly understood that universals cannot be separated from particulars. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 1086b |
| 11159 | My account shows how the concept works, rather than giving an analysis [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: My assimilation of essence to definition ...may not provide us with an analysis of the concept, but it does provide us with a good model of how the concept works. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 3) | |
| A reaction: An example of the modern shift in analytic philosophy, away from the dream of given a complete analysis of a concept, towards giving an account of the concepts relationships. Compare Shoemaker in Idea 8559. |
| 164 | It is legitimate to play the devil's advocate [Socrates] |
| Full Idea: It is legitimate to play the devil's advocate. | |
| From: Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]), quoted by Plato - Phaedrus 272c |
| 1647 | In Socratic dialogue you must say what you believe, so unasserted premises are not debated [Vlastos on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Socrates' rule of "say only what you believe"….excluded debate on unasserted premises, thereby distinguishing Socratic from Zenonian and earlier dialectics. | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Gregory Vlastos - Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher p.14 |
| 115 | Socrates was pleased if his mistakes were proved wrong [Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Socrates: I'm happy to have a mistaken idea of mine proved wrong. | |
| From: Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]), quoted by Plato - Gorgias 458a |
| 22099 | The method of Socrates shows the student is discovering the truth within himself [Socrates, by Carlisle] |
| Full Idea: Socrates tended to prefer the method of questioning, for this made it clear that the student was discovering the truth within himself. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Clare Carlisle - Kierkegaard: a guide for the perplexed 7 | |
| A reaction: Sounds like it will only facilitate conceptual analysis, and excludes empirical knowledge. Can you say to Socrates 'I'll just google that'? |
| 5844 | Socrates always proceeded in argument by general agreement at each stage [Socrates, by Xenophon] |
| Full Idea: When Socrates was setting out a detailed argument, he used to proceed by such stages as were generally agreed, because he thought that this was the infallible method of argument. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Xenophon - Memorabilia of Socrates 4.6.16 | |
| A reaction: This sounds right, and shows how strongly Socrates perceived philosophy to be a group activity, of which I approve. It seems to me that philosophy is clearly a spoken subject before it is a written one. The lonely speculator comes much later. |
| 11157 | Modern philosophy has largely abandoned real definitions, apart from sortals [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: In modern analytic philosophy we find that, as a result of sustained empiricist critique, the idea of real definition has been more or less given up (unless it be taken to be vestigially present in the notion of a sortal). | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 3) | |
| A reaction: The account of essences as falling under sortals (roughly, categorising terms) is associated with David Wiggins. Kit Fine is in the business of reviving Aristotelian real definitions, as are fans of scientific essentialism (see under 'Nature'). |
| 11389 | Socrates sought essences, which are the basis of formal logic [Socrates, by Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: It is not surprising that Socrates sought essences. His project was to establish formal reasoning, of whose syllogisms essences are the foundations. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 1078b22 | |
| A reaction: This seems to reinforce the definitional view of essences, since definitions seem to be at the centre of most of Socrates's quests. |
| 11171 | Defining a term and giving the essence of an object don't just resemble - they are the same [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: There is an analogy between defining a term and giving the essence of an object. ..However, I am inclined to think that the two cases are not merely parallel but are, at bottom, the same. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p.13) | |
| A reaction: The proposal is something like the meaning of a concept being the essence of the concept. And essence is definition. The parallel is that they both lead to necessities, either derived from objects or from concepts. Sounds good to me. |
| 639 | Socrates developed definitions as the basis of syllogisms, and also inductive arguments [Socrates, by Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Socrates aimed to establish formal logic, of whose syllogisms essences are the foundations. He developed inductive arguments and also general definitions. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 1078b |
| 11151 | An object is dependent if its essence prevents it from existing without some other object [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: One object depends upon another (in one sense of the term) if its essence prevents it from existing without the other object. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 2) | |
| A reaction: I take the interest of this to be that essences are usually thought to be intrinsic, but this seems to involve the object in necessary external relations. |
| 17996 | Powers are claimed to be basic because fundamental particles lack internal structure [Psillos] |
| Full Idea: The argument for fundamental powers is that fundamental particles are simple, without internal structure. Hence they have no parts which can be the bearers of further properties (powers or non-powers) which in turn ground the properties of the particles. | |
| From: Stathis Psillos (What do powers do when they are not manifested? [2006], p.151), quoted by Anna Marmodoro - Do powers need powers to make them powerful? 'The Problem' | |
| A reaction: If a power is basic, what has the power? I think the best answer is that at the fundamental level this is a false dichotomy. If you could zoom in, you would say that basic substance is active in a way that everyday stuff doesn't appear to be. |
| 1652 | Socrates did not consider universals or definitions as having separate existence, but Plato made Forms of them [Socrates, by Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Socrates did not regard the universals or the objects of definitions as separate existents, while Plato did separate them, and called this sort of entity ideas/forms. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 1078b30 |
| 11152 | Essences are either taken as real definitions, or as necessary properties [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: Essence has been conceived either on the model of definition, involving the 'real' as opposed to 'nominal' definitions, or it is elucidated in modal terms, located in de re cases of modal attributions (an object being necessarily a certain way). | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 2) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] Fine sets out to defend the definitional view, which derives from Aristotle, his line being that necessity depends on essence, and so cannot be used to define it. I think I agree. |
| 11161 | Essentially having a property is naturally expressed as 'the property it must have to be what it is' [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: We have an informal way of saying an object essentially has a property, as 'the object must have the property if it is to be the object that it is', and this form of words manages to convey what we wish to convey. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 4) | |
| A reaction: The importance of this claim is that it makes no mention of 'necessity'. Fine's view is plausible, but hard to evaluate once he has said. We seem to then divide an object's properties into identity properties, causal properties and peripheral properties. |
| 11160 | Simple modal essentialism refers to necessary properties of an object [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: The simplest form of the modal account takes an object to have a property essentially just in case it is necessary that the object has the property. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 3) | |
| A reaction: Fine wants to reverse the account, explaining necessities in terms of prior essences. |
| 11158 | Essentialist claims can be formulated more clearly with quantified modal logic [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: With the advent of quantified modal logic, philosophers have been in a better position to formulate essentialist claims. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 3) | |
| A reaction: A nice illustration of the role which logic plays in modern analytic philosophy. It is not an unreasonable assumption that we will understand a theoretical problem more clearly if we can articulate it more accurately. |
| 11167 | Metaphysical necessity is a special case of essence, not vice versa [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: Far from viewing essence as a special case of metaphysical necessity, we should view metaphysical necessity as a special case of essence. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 9) | |
| A reaction: This strikes me as one of the most powerful proposals in modern philosophy (even if it is a reiteration of Aristotle!). |
| 16537 | Essence as necessary properties produces a profusion of essential properties [Fine,K, by Lowe] |
| Full Idea: If an essence is a sum of essential properties (had in all possible worlds where it exists), Fine points out that it seems grossly to overgenerate essential properties ('S is either a man or a mouse', or 'S is such that 2+2=4'). | |
| From: report of Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994]) by E.J. Lowe - What is the Source of Knowledge of Modal Truths? 6 | |
| A reaction: To me this is the sort of mess you get into when you accept that 'being such that p' is a property. Defenders of the modal approach always have to eliminate 'trivial' properties from essences, but non-trivial is a defining feature of an essence. |
| 11163 | The nature of singleton Socrates has him as a member, but not vice versa [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: Can we not recognise a sense of 'what an object is', according to which it lies in the nature of a singleton to have Socrates as a member, even though it does not lie in the nature of Socrates to belong to the singleton? | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 5) | |
| A reaction: Important and persuasive. It echoes the example in Idea 11162, that the necessary relation is not part of the essence. Socrates is necessarily in {Socrates}, but that is because of the set, not because of Socrates. Essences causes necessities. |
| 11164 | It is not part of the essence of Socrates that a huge array of necessary truths should hold [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: Necessarily any necessary truth will hold if Socrates exists. But it is no part of Socrates' essence that there be infinitely many prime numbers, ..or that objects like the Eiffel Tower have their own necessary essence. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 5-6) | |
| A reaction: This and the 'singleton Socrates' example (Idea 11165) are the twin prongs of Fine's attack on the modal account of essentialism. I think they constitute one of the best single pages in the whole of recent philosophy. Bravo. |
| 10935 | An essential property of something must be bound up with what it is to be that thing [Fine,K, by Rami] |
| Full Idea: Fine's view is that the notion of an essential property of a thing should be bound up with the notion of what it is to be that thing (unlike, for example, Socrates being such that there are infinitely many primes). | |
| From: report of Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994]) by Adolph Rami - Essential vs Accidental Properties §2 | |
| A reaction: I would think that Fine is so obviously right that it was hardly worth saying, but philosophers are a funny lot, and are quite likely to claim that features of prime numbers are part of the essence of a long-dead philosopher. |
| 10936 | Essential properties are part of an object's 'definition' [Fine,K, by Rami] |
| Full Idea: According to Fine's definitional characterization of essential properties, they are those of an object's properties that are part of the object's 'definition'. | |
| From: report of Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994]) by Adolph Rami - Essential vs Accidental Properties §2 | |
| A reaction: This demands not just an account of what a definition is, but also the notion that there is only one fixed and correct definition (since the object presumably only has one essence) - but there seems to be something relative about a good definition. |
| 11165 | If Socrates lacks necessary existence, then his nature cannot require his parents' existence [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: If there is nothing in the nature of Socrates which demands that he exists, then presumably there is nothing in the nature of Socrates which demands that his parents exist. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 6) | |
| A reaction: This sounds conclusive to me, against any claim that Socrates necessarily had those parents, if the claim is based on the identity or esssence of Socrates. |
| 11166 | The subject of a proposition need not be the source of its necessity [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: We naturally suppose, if a subject-predicate proposition is necessary, that the subject of the proposition is the source of the necessity. But that singleton 2 contains 2 is necessary, whether the number or the set is the subject of the proposition. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 9) | |
| A reaction: A very nice addition to his general attack on the idea that essence should be accounted for in terms of his necessity. He asks a beautifully simple question: for each necessity that we accept, what is the source of that necessity? |
| 11169 | Conceptual necessities rest on the nature of all concepts [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: Conceptual (and logical) necessities can be taken to be the propositions which are true in virtue of the nature of all concepts (or just the logical concepts). | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 9-10) | |
| A reaction: The idea that something might be true simply because of the nature of a concept sounds good, and a slightly better formulation than traditional accounts of analytic truth. |
| 11162 | Socrates is necessarily distinct from the Eiffel Tower, but that is not part of his essence [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: It is necessary that Socrates and the Eiffel Tower be distinct. But it is not essential to Socrates that he be distinct from the Tower, for there is nothing in his nature which connects him in any special way to it. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 5) | |
| A reaction: I find this simple argument very persuasive in separating out necessary facts about an object from the essence of that object. |
| 11168 | Metaphysical necessities are true in virtue of the nature of all objects [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: The metaphysically necessary truths can be identified with the propositions which are true in virtue of the nature of all objects whatever. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p. 9) | |
| A reaction: This is part of Fine's proposal that necessities are derived from the essences or natures of things, which view I find very congenial. |
| 1650 | For Socrates our soul, though hard to define, is our self [Vlastos on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: For Socrates our soul is our self - whatever that might turn out to be. | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Gregory Vlastos - Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher p.55 | |
| A reaction: The problem with any broad claim like this is that we seem to be able to distinguish between essential and non-essential aspects of the self or of the soul. |
| 23252 | Socrates first proposed that we are run by mind or reason [Socrates, by Frede,M] |
| Full Idea: It would seem that historically the decisive step was taken by Socrates in conceiving of human beings as being run by a mind or reason.. …He postulated an entity whose precision nature and function then was a matter of considerable debate. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Michael Frede - Intro to 'Rationality in Greek Thought' p.19 | |
| A reaction: This is, for me, a rather revelatory idea. I am keen on the fact the animals make judgements which are true and false, and also that we exhibit rationality when walking across uneven ground. So pure rationality is a cultural construct! |
| 11170 | Analytic truth may only be true in virtue of the meanings of certain terms [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: Just as a necessary truth may be true in virtue of the identity of certain objects as opposed to others, so an analytic truth may be true in virtue of the meanings of certain terms as opposed to others (such as 'bachelor' rather than 'unmarried'). | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p.10) | |
| A reaction: This is a beautifully simple observation, that the necessity of 'bachelors are unmarried men' derives from part of the proposition, not from the whole of it. So what is it about the part that generates the apparent necessity? The nature of the concept! |
| 11172 | The meaning of 'bachelor' is irrelevant to the meaning of 'unmarried man' [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: Strictly speaking it is irrelevant to the meaning of 'bachelor' that the phrase 'unmarried man' means what it does. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Essence and Modality [1994], p.13) | |
| A reaction: His point is that the necessary truth here derives from the meaning of 'bachelor', and not from the meaning of 'unmarried man'. But is also true that 'unmarried man' means 'bachelor' (for those familiar with the latter, but not the former). |
| 199 | The common belief is that people can know the best without acting on it [Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Most people think there are many who recognise the best but are unwilling to act on it. | |
| From: Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]), quoted by Plato - Protagoras 352d |
| 195 | No one willingly commits an evil or base act [Socrates] |
| Full Idea: I am fairly certain that no wise man believes anyone sins willingly or willingly perpetrates any evil or base act. | |
| From: Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]), quoted by Plato - Protagoras 345e |
| 1653 | Socrates did not accept the tripartite soul (which permits akrasia) [Vlastos on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Xenophon indirectly indicates that he does not associate Socrates in any way with the tripartite psychology of the 'Republic', for within that theory akrasia would be all too possible. | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Gregory Vlastos - Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher p.102 |
| 5843 | People do what they think they should do, and only ever do what they think they should do [Socrates, by Xenophon] |
| Full Idea: There is no one who knows what they ought to do, but thinks that they ought not to do it, and no one does anything other than what they think they ought to do. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Xenophon - Memorabilia of Socrates 4.6.6 | |
| A reaction: This is Socrates' well-known rejection of the possibility of weakness of will (akrasia - lit. 'lack of control'). Aristotle disagreed, and so does almost everyone else. Modern smokers seem to exhibit akrasia. I have some sympathy with Socrates. |
| 5253 | Socrates was shocked by the idea of akrasia, but observation shows that it happens [Aristotle on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Socrates thought it a shocking idea that when a man actually has knowledge in him something else should overmaster it, ..but this is glaringly inconsistent with the observed facts. | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Aristotle - Nicomachean Ethics 1145b24 | |
| A reaction: Aristotle seems very confident, but it is not at all clear (even to the agent) what is going on when apparent weakness of will occurs (e.g. breaking a diet). What exactly does the agent believe at the moment of weakness? |
| 5839 | For Socrates, wisdom and prudence were the same thing [Socrates, by Xenophon] |
| Full Idea: Socrates did not distinguish wisdom from prudence, but judged that the man who recognises and puts into practice what is truly good, and the man who knows and guards against what is disgraceful, are both wise and prudent. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Xenophon - Memorabilia of Socrates 3.9.3 | |
| A reaction: Compare Aristotle, who separates them, claiming that prudence is essential for moral virtue, but wisdom is pursued at a different level, closer to the gods than to society. |
| 5867 | For Socrates, virtues are forms of knowledge, so knowing justice produces justice [Socrates, by Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Socrates thought that the virtues were all forms of knowledge, and therefore once a man knew justice, he would be a just man. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Aristotle - Eudemian Ethics 1216b07 | |
| A reaction: The clearest possible statement of Socrates' intellectualism. Aristotle rejected the Socrates view, but I find it sympathetic. Smokers who don't want to die seem to be in denial. To see the victims is to condemn the crime. |
| 5069 | Socrates was the first to base ethics upon reason, and use reason to explain it [Taylor,R on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Socrates was the first significant thinker to try basing ethics upon reason, and to try uncovering its natural principles solely by the use of reason. | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Richard Taylor - Virtue Ethics: an Introduction Ch.7 | |
| A reaction: Interesting. It seems to me that Socrates overemphasised reason, presumably because it was a novelty. Hence his view that akrasia is impossible, and that virtue is simply knowledge. Maybe action is not just rational, but moral action is. |
| 5836 | All human virtues are increased by study and practice [Socrates, by Xenophon] |
| Full Idea: If you consider the virtues that are recognised among human beings, you will find that they are all increased by study and practice. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Xenophon - Memorabilia of Socrates 2.6.41 | |
| A reaction: 'Study' is the intellectualist part of this remark; the reference to 'practice' fits with Aristotle view that virtue is largely a matter of good habits. The next question would be how theoretical the studies should be. Philosophy, or newspapers? |
| 5840 | The wise perform good actions, and people fail to be good without wisdom [Socrates, by Xenophon] |
| Full Idea: It is the wise who perform truly good actions, and those who are not wise cannot, and, if they try to, fail. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Xenophon - Memorabilia of Socrates 3.9.6 | |
| A reaction: The essence of Socrates' intellectualism, with which Aristotle firmly disagreed (when he assert that only practical reason was needed for virtuous actions, rather than wisdom or theory). Personally I side more with Socrates than with Aristotle on this. |
| 185 | Socrates despised good looks [Socrates, by Plato] |
| Full Idea: Socrates despises good looks to an almost inconceivable extent. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Plato - The Symposium 216e |
| 5070 | Socrates conservatively assumed that Athenian conventions were natural and true [Taylor,R on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Socrates' moral philosophy was essentially conservative. He assumed that the principles the Athenians honoured were true and natural, so there was little possibility of conflict between nature and convention in his thinking. | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Richard Taylor - Virtue Ethics: an Introduction Ch.8 | |
| A reaction: Taylor contrasts Socrates with Callicles, who claims that conventions oppose nature. This fits with Nietzsche's discontent with Socrates, as the person who endorses conventional good and evil, thus constraining the possibilities of human nature. |
| 5838 | A well-made dung basket is fine, and a badly-made gold shield is base, because of function [Socrates, by Xenophon] |
| Full Idea: A dung-basket is fine, and a golden shield contemptible, if the one is finely and the other badly constructed for carrying out its function. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Xenophon - Memorabilia of Socrates 3.8.6 | |
| A reaction: This is the basis of a key idea in Aristotle, that virtue (or excellence) arises directly from function. I think it is the most important idea in virtue theory, and seems to have struck most Greeks as being self-evident. |
| 5837 | Things are both good and fine by the same standard [Socrates, by Xenophon] |
| Full Idea: Things are always both good and fine by the same standard. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Xenophon - Memorabilia of Socrates 3.8.5 | |
| A reaction: This begs many questions, but perhaps it leads to what we call intuitionism, which is an instant ability is perceive a fine action (even in an enemy). This leads to the rather decadent view that the aim of life is the production of beauty. |
| 3017 | The only good is knowledge, and the only evil is ignorance [Socrates, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: There is only one good, namely knowledge, and there is only one evil, namely ignorance. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 02.4.14 | |
| A reaction: Ignorance of how to commit evil sounds quite good. |
| 1646 | Socrates was the first to put 'eudaimonia' at the centre of ethics [Socrates, by Vlastos] |
| Full Idea: Socrates' true place in the development of Greek thought is that he is the first to establish the eudaimonist foundation of ethical theory, which became the foundation of the schools which sprang up around him. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Gregory Vlastos - Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher p.10 | |
| A reaction: I suspect that he was the first to fully articulate a widely held Greek belief. The only ethical question that they asked was about the nature of a good human life. |
| 1663 | By 'areté' Socrates means just what we mean by moral virtue [Vlastos on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Socrates uses the word 'areté' to mean precisely what we mean by moral virtue. | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Gregory Vlastos - Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher p.200 |
| 4323 | Socrates is torn between intellectual virtue, which is united and teachable, and natural virtue, which isn't [PG on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Socrates worries about the unity and teachability of virtue because he is torn between virtue as intellectual (unified and teachable) and virtue as natural (plural and unteachable). | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by PG - Db (ideas) | |
| A reaction: Admittedly virtue could be natural but still unified and teachable, but Socrates clearly had a dilemma, and this seems to make sense of it. |
| 8003 | Socrates agrees that virtue is teachable, but then denies that there are teachers [Socrates, by MacIntyre] |
| Full Idea: Socrates' great point of agreement with the sophists is his acceptance of the thesis that areté is teachable. But paradoxically he denies that there are teachers. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Alasdair MacIntyre - A Short History of Ethics Ch.3 | |
| A reaction: This is part of Socrates's presentation of himself as 'not worthy'. Virtue would be teachable, if only anyone knew what it was. He's wrong. Lots of people have a pretty good idea of virtue, and could teach it. The problem is in the pupils. |
| 126 | We should ask what sort of people we want to be [Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Socrates: What sort of person should one be? | |
| From: Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]), quoted by Plato - Gorgias 487e |
| 4111 | Socrates believed that basically there is only one virtue, the power of right judgement [Socrates, by Williams,B] |
| Full Idea: Socrates believed that basically there is only one virtue, the power of right judgement. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Bernard Williams - Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy Ch.1 | |
| A reaction: Which links with Aristotle's high place for 'phronesis' (prudence?). The essence of Socrates' intellectualism. Robots and saints make very different judgements, though. |
| 7808 | Socrates made the civic values of justice and friendship paramount [Socrates, by Grayling] |
| Full Idea: In Socrates' thought, the expressly civic values of justice and friendship became paramount. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by A.C. Grayling - What is Good? Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: This is the key move in ancient ethics, away from heroism, and towards the standard Aristotelian social virtues. I say this is the essence of what we call morality, and the only one which can be given a decent foundational justification (social health). |
| 23907 | Courage is scientific knowledge [Socrates, by Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Socrates thought that courage is scientific knowledge. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Aristotle - Eudemian Ethics 1230a06 | |
| A reaction: Aristotle himself says that reason produces courage, but he also says it arises from natural youthful spirits. I favour the view that there is a strong rational component in true courage. |
| 7585 | Socrates emphasises that the knower is an existing individual, with existence his main task [Socrates, by Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: The infinite merit of the Socratic position was precisely to accentuate the fact that the knower is an existing individual, and that the task of existing is his essential task. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Søren Kierkegaard - Concluding Unscientific Postscript 'Inwardness' | |
| A reaction: Always claim Socrates as the first spokesman for your movement! It is true that Socrates is always demanding the views of his interlocutors, and not just abstract theories. See Idea 1647. |
| 5841 | Obedience to the law gives the best life, and success in war [Socrates, by Xenophon] |
| Full Idea: A city in which the people are most obedient to the laws has the best life in time of peace and is irresistible in war. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Xenophon - Memorabilia of Socrates 4.4.15 | |
| A reaction: This is a conservative view, with the obvious problem case of bad laws, but in general it seems to me clearly right. This is why it is so vital that nothing should be done to bring the law into disrepute, such as petty legislation or prosecution. |
| 1661 | Socrates was the first to grasp that a cruelty is not justified by another cruelty [Vlastos on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Socrates was the first Greek to grasp the truth that if someone has done a nasty thing to me, this does not give the slightest moral justification for doing anything nasty to him. | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Gregory Vlastos - Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher p.190 |
| 5846 | A lover using force is a villain, but a seducer is much worse, because he corrupts character [Socrates, by Xenophon] |
| Full Idea: The fact that a lover uses not force but persuasion makes him more detestable, because a lover who uses force proves himself a villain, but one who uses persuasion ruins the character of the one who consents. | |
| From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Xenophon - Symposium 8.20 | |
| A reaction: A footnote says that this distinction was enshrined in Athenian law, where seduction was worse than rape. This is a startling and interest contrast to the modern view, which enshrines rights and freedoms, and says seduction is usually no crime at all. |
| 1657 | Socrates holds that right reason entails virtue, and this must also apply to the gods [Vlastos on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: It is essential to Socrates' rationalist programme in theology to assume that the entailment of virtue by wisdom binds gods no less than men. He would not tolerate one moral standard for me and another for gods. | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Gregory Vlastos - Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher p.164 |
| 1662 | A new concept of God as unswerving goodness emerges from Socrates' commitment to virtue [Vlastos on Socrates] |
| Full Idea: Undeviating beneficent goodness guides Socrates' thought so deeply that he applies it even to the deity; he projects a new concept of god as a being that can cause only good, never evil. | |
| From: comment on Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Gregory Vlastos - Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher p.197 |