How To Be An Agnostic
Wittgenstein argued with Popper. That it is far more important
than either of those facts is not just because Socrates features in
nearly every Platonic dialogue. It is because Plato constructs them
in such a way as to conjure up something of the same sense of
encounter with Socrates in us, his readers.
He does this partly by his inclusion of descriptions of Socrates’
impact on those around him. ‘I made progress when I was with
you, if only in the same house, not even in the same room; and
still more, so it seemed to me, when I was in the same room and
looked at you (rather than elsewhere) while you were talking;
but most of all when I sat beside you, quite close, and touched
you,’ says one of Plato’s characters, Aristeides.
It is also implicit in the way the dialogues are constructed. For
example, many have rather tortuous introductions: the Symposium
begins with one Apollodorus addressing anonymous individu-
als who are asking about what happened at the famous drinking
party. The anonymous individuals are us – reading to fi nd out
the same thing. Moreover, ‘we’, as it were, are not the fi rst to ask
Apollodorus this question. Another, Glaucon, has recently asked
him the same thing too. And, as if to underline the point again,
Apollodorus himself says that he only knows about the occasion
second-hand. Luckily for him, and us, he managed to glean the
details from Aristodemus. In this way, Plato identifi es his readers
with his characters: we are encouraged to see ourselves, personally
as well as intellectually, drawn to the action too.
Other devices Plato uses throw the content of the dialogues
onto his readers, forcing them to make it their own. The early
dialogues in particular are characterised by ending in agnostic
impasses – aporia: ‘We think we are friends but just what friend-
ship is we have not been able to discover’, Socrates says at the
end of the Lysis, inviting the reader to think more on the issue
and on their own experience of friendship. For some readers,
the uncertainty that aporia implies is unnerving and unwanted,
because nothing conclusive is ever reached. But as well as accu-
rately refl ecting Socrates’ conviction that he knew nothing for
sure, and that there is therefore always more to be said – more