LECTURE NOTES
SOCRATES AND THE QUEST FOR VIRTUE
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Socrates is discussed on page 42 of the textbook.
The pre Socratics were interested in the big question, what element composes reality.
Socrates was interested in how does one become a good person?
Socrates comes up with the moral philosophy
FIVE MORAL PHILOSOPHIES OF SOCRATES
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Care for the soul is all that matters
Self knowledge is required for the good life
Virtue is knowledge (there is no place for weakness of will and ignorance is evil.)
You cannot harm the good person, but in trying to harm the good you harm yourself.
Is the good, good because God has chosen it, or does God choose the good because it is good.
Socrates is going to be charged with disregarding the gods that will get him into trouble.
SOCRATES VIDEO NOTES: THE GREEKS CRUCIBLE
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Socrates was unique in the Athenian culture. He was ugly with a large head and his eyes were too
big. His appearance was the opposite of what Greeks considered beautiful. He walked about
barefoot in a dirty robe.
He breaks every rule with proportion and measure according to the Greek concepts of beauty.
He cares only about the mind.
Greeks took the Gods out of the heavens and replaced them with reason.
Greeks began to calculate the movement of stars and moon through mathematics; which began the
birth of science.
Socrates’ job was as a stone mason, though he rarely worked.
Thales was the first man to measure the height of the pyramid.
Socrates used reason and logic to study people.
Socrates walked the streets talking and debating with everyone.
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His life was spent questioning the assumptions of the Athenians, of what was right and wrong.
He would turn convention on its head to prove a point.
Socrates believed in freedom of thought. “An unexamined life is not worth living.”
While he spent his days in debate, the city was at war threatened by the Spartans.
The Spartans burn the countryside and surround Athens.
Athens relied on food shipments from fleet. One year plague comes in shipment.
Plague comes in food shipments and spreads like wildfire.
Violent ulcerations, uncontrollable diarrhea, fever.
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Notes are contributed by student, Tanya Ahmed – Section P05
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People crawled into the city tunnels of the water system to die; which further caused the spread of
disease.
Plague killed a third of Athens’ population and struck the figure head Pericles.
Pericles died in 429 B.C.E. after six months of suffering.
After Pericles’ death, Athens descends into mob rule.
Leaders gave the mob whatever they wanted in exchange for power.
The Generals who won a naval battle against Sparta were thrown into prison for not picking up
soldiers who fell overboard. Socrates stood up for the generals.
After the death of Pericles, Athens never again had a political leader with a well thought out plan.
Conflict spread over a decade.
Spartans ravaged Athens. Neither side was able to defeat the other. Deprived of victory, Athenians
became frustrated.
The conflict becomes a stalemate.
Athenians launches an invasion of Sicily that ends in disaster. The Athenians built fleets and armor
for a force of 10,000. Six months later
There is a call for reinforcements.
Two fleets are loss and 50,000 men are killed or imprisoned.
The Persians will aid the Spartans by building them a navy. Persians took advantage of Athens’
weakness.
The Spartans blocked food shipments with their navy. People starved in the streets.
Athens surrenders in 404 B.C.E. They were forced to tear down city walls and burn their fleet except
12 ships…for communication purposes.
Athenians search for a scapegoat within the city walls…someone to blame for what’s happened.
They’re looking for Socrates, who has always been a public voice against tradition.
Socrates is arrested for undermining religion and corrupting the youth. (see page 42)
He’s put on trial in a public marketplace. The jury, selected at random from the population, was of
the same type that condemned the 6 generals to death 7 years earlier. His speech time is limited by
a water clock, as are all speeches in the Athenian system.
Socrates shows no fear…he is quite stubborn. He’s so stubborn he insists that he be granted free
dinners for life. He also insists that a life of thinking for one’s self is the only life worth living.
An apology could have saved his life, but he refused, and was unilaterally sentenced to death.
The jail in which Socrates was held still exists today, and we can even guess at which cell in which he
was held.
His method of execution was by drinking the poison hemlock, which caused a slow, painful death
through a slow disabling of the central nervous system.
Socrates ends up redefining what a hero is. He died for his principles with conviction. Rather than
being a large, muscular war hero, he was an intellectual and social hero. Effigies of Socrates can still
be found, and in the years after his death the Athenians came to be more like him.
Athens never became a large military force again, but instead flourished as an intellectual
community.
Notes are contributed by student, Tanya Ahmed – Section P05