Plato's Apology & Crito - 1 Plato’s Apology zThe Apology is the first of three dialogues on trial...
Transcript of Plato's Apology & Crito - 1 Plato’s Apology zThe Apology is the first of three dialogues on trial...
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Plato's Apology & Crito - 1
Plato’s Apology
The Apology is the first of three dialogues on trial & death of Socrates
Apology - an account of the trial Crito - the day before Socrates’
execution Phaedo - the day of the execution These three dialogues were
probably written in the 390s B.C.
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Plato’s Apology
Most of the dialogue is Socrates’ long speech to the jury at his trial 1. A special kind of wisdom
• Socrates’ survey• His conclusion (21d)
– Knowing the limits of one’s genuine knowledge– Being able to distinguish between opinion and genuine
knowledge
sense of word apology
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Plato’s Apology
2. The formal indictment (24 b-c)• Not the real reason that Socrates
was brought to trial• What was the real reason?
– Some debate but probably his hostility to the leaders of the government and to the democratic form of government - see 31e.
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Plato’s Apology
• Some secondary factors– By their persistent questioning,
Socrates and his students annoyed many prominent Athenians
– Socrates’ refusal to lend his support to the government’s prosecution of 10 generals after the Peloponnesian War (32b). See Tarrant’s note 55 on p. 220.
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Plato’s Apology
3. Socrates’ apology• The sense of the word “apology”
here Are two apologies (closely related)
• (1) Care for the soul (30b)
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Plato’s Apology
• (2) The classic passage: “. . . The unexamined life is not worth living . . .” (Grube trans. 38a) [Tredennick & Tarrant: “. . . Life without this sort of examination is not worth living . . .”]
• Cf. The analogy to a fly buzzing around a lethargic horse (30e-31a)
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Plato’s Apology
4. The conviction & sentencing Convicted initially by a vote of 281
to 220 & sentenced to death• Socrates is invited to propose an
alternative penalty• His response• The second vote for the death
penalty
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Plato’s Apology
5. Closing comments on death • Death is one of two things:
annihilation or change; Socrates does not argue for one or the other here
• The latter is a form of immortality• In either case, it is nothing to fear
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Plato’s Crito
Plato’s Crito An account of the day before Socrates’
execution 1. Socrates & Plato on the opinions of
the masses (44d)• Socrates & Plato's elitism
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Plato’s Crito
2. Socrates’ reasons for refusing to escape Some secondary reasons
• fate• old age• is immoral to do wrong in
response to wrong (49b & 49d)
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Plato’s Crito
The primary reason: The social contract theory• main elements
– an agreement (49e, 51e) analogy of state to parents (51b-d)– tacit– when made? (51d)– emigrate (51d)– no violence (51c)
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Plato’s Crito
– What if one disagrees with the laws and rules of one’s state? (51c)
Only 2 options (51b-c, 52a) A secondary reason for refusing to
escape • A consequentialist argument (50b
& 53b)
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Plato’s Crito
A critique of Socrates’ arguments in the Crito If one disagrees with the laws of one’s
state, are there only 2 options? Difficulties with the right to emigrate The scope of the contract - how does it
include non-participants? Joseph Tussman’s surrogate theory
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Plato’s Crito
Critique (cont’d) What if one makes an agreement to an
evil government? Socrates tries to cover (49e). Does he succeed? The paradox Hanna Pitkin’s theory of hypothetical
consent
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Plato’s Crito
Critique (cont’d) In his death, was Socrates a martyr for
free speech? Was he “the first martyr of free speech”? (I.F. Stone)
A brief history of the social contract theory after Plato
Plato’s Crito is the locus classicus Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan (1651)
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Plato’s Crito
John Locke (English, 1632-1704) - Two Treatises of Government (1679-83)
Jean Jacques Rousseau (French, 1712-1778) - Du Contrat Social (1762)
Thomas Jefferson (United States, 1743-1826) - Declaration of Independence (1776)
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Plato’s Crito
John Rawls (United States, b. 1921) - A Theory of Justice (1971)