Socrates And His Pursuit Essay Research Paper

Socrates And His Pursuit Essay, Research Paper

The pursuit for the meaning of knowledge, a search the scholar Socrates had great difficulty achieving. He takes us into a world of questioning and makes us contemplate our thoughts of the particular concept on hand. In order to focus on the statements given to him, which were to defuse his drive of the question, he analyzed. Analyzing brought upon a whole variety of methods, which in turn broke down the big question into countless smaller questions. Evidently the definitions given to him are disproved, a repeated scenario for young Theaetetus. Thus, Socrates explored human thought to a point only a few men in history have achieved and we can that this was an art he tried to teach Theaetetus and those who were interested. This is what must be proven, whether Socrates teachings were to alter the behavior of how the pupil sees knowledge or to just change the pupil s knowledge.

Part of Socrates great art was to find a reasonable question out of statements given to him. Theaetetus was always asked to answer honestly and without regret the questions that were given to him. Take for example the first question given to him-what is knowledge. Socrates would then focus on the response Theaetetus gave him and determined its credibility. Mostly the statements were disproved and Socrates would ask him if he d agree. Evidently this was a cycle that never broke, but both were not in any way discouraged. By agreeing to continue Theaetetus not only became enlightened of Socrates teachings, he also accepted his way of thinking.

Further finding to portray Socrates as a man of teaching can be found in the basic parts of his method of question-answer. When Theaetetus presents his answer to the question of the moment, Socrates would then derive a statement, which would express his thoughts of the answer. The answer was integrated into the discussion and this was what Socrates would express whether the reply would fit into the equation of the current thought. This was Socrates way, a natural occurrence in the dialogue, thus dealing with behavior and not an urge to correct young Theaetetus. In 154d-e it becomes apparent when Theaetetus is asked a question in which he s response becomes vital to the discussion in terms of Theaetetus s thoughts and continuation of the conversation (Socrates needs to blend the ideas together).

To be fair and for argument s sake we must find some evidence pointing in the other direction to strengthen the view. There is to some degree a level of difficulty in Socrates teachings, which seem to do the opposite of his intentions. In 210b, Socrates points out to Theaetetus that his definitions are not consistent- knowledge is neither perception nor true judgement, nor an account added to true judgement . Though, the theories were incorrect on defining knowledge, hasn t his sense of knowledge changed. Not only is Theaetetus ideas and truths washed away but what of his knowledge of courage. He had what seemed to be an enthusiastic approach to difficulties, but what is to be of his ideals now. He s a young boy and to be incorrect in every angle of the matter, there must be a change of ideals. Very clear of this is (in 165d) when Theaetetus states how he has contradicted himself and Socrates points out that this has probably happened more than once. One should view this not negatively but more as evidence of Theaetetus trying to grasp new concepts. Nonetheless his beliefs are altered even if by Socrates standards this is acceptable in hopes of a better thinker.

With both sides one can also come to the conclusion that Socrates is a man who not only changes attitudes but as well as a man that shifts people s understanding of knowledge. Hasn t Socrates explain his point by means of not only using methods that helped visualize but as well as rearranging he s pupils thoughts of the matter. One might add this argument to be a more civilized way to settle our dilemma, but what we have shown evidence for (the former point of views) can also be used for this new concept we ve stumbled upon. In the example used previously (165d) Well, I draw a conclusion that contradicts my original suppositions , we can examine and see that Socrates has two effects on Theaetetus. The first effect is that Socrates is changing he s perception of worldly views. The second is the one stated previously in which Theaetetus has to grasp new ideas. This can be associated with most of Socrates and Theaetetus conversation using the question-answer style.

Being totally unbiased one can come up with a more rational viewpoint that corresponds to the original (stated in the beginning). Socrates obviously had no intent in demolishing the ideals of Theaetetus and replacing it with his own. Neither is there any evidence that this is what occurred. In fact, examples that Socrates gave not only were to help in illustrating the theory at hand, but as well as showing his frame of thought. Take in to account the example Socrates gives Theaetetus trying to describe if perception is what our senses know and if we know what they tell us is always understood. He gives us the example of foreign language to explain in detail what he s trying to explain. Are we to say that Socrates is not trying to teach Theaetetus how to analyze. Is he not trying to show Theaetetus how to take better criticism of arguments displayed to him. This seems more like