Socrates’ Questdifferent way to Protagoras again. It seems he thought that a
regard for religious practice was a good thing for human beings
because of the way it focused on his central interest: how we
might understand the nature of human ignorance – our status
in between animals and gods. This agnosticism leaves open
questions about the nature and existence of divinities, because
nothing much can be said about either matter. (Xenophon
puts an apparently positive argument about the existence of
gods into Socrates’ mouth in his Memoirs of Socrates but its
purpose – in Xenophon’s slightly clumsy way – is negative;
to distance Socrates from the accusation of atheism. It clearly
does not work as a proof, and Socrates in life would have seen
straight through it.) So, Socrates’ theology – his God-talk –
would have been almost wholly conducted at the human level,
around human limits. The value of the divine was to remind us
of what lies beyond us. It’s a spiritual stance that coincides with
his understanding of himself as a philosopher.
Beautiful people
The story of Socrates questioning the people of Athens is the
story of his full emergence onto the public stage. It is told in
the Apology, probably Plato’s earliest dialogue and also closest to
the historical Socrates. The dialogue is a reconstruction of the
speech Socrates made to defend himself at his trial. In it he also
rehearses what was, in effect, his philosophical creed:
- The human condition is one of uncertainty.
- Reason, coupled to an agnostic attitude, can help us under-
stand that condition. - Human wisdom, such as it is, is found in a deep apprecia-
tion of the limits of our understanding. - Such self-knowledge is best gained with others and seeking
it is to care for the soul. - The ‘ignorant wise’, those who lack or refuse this self-
knowledge, ought to be challenged for everyone’s sake.