Plato 1

Protocol 21 June
Author: Alvin

Crossing the threshold: Socratic defense as a form of secondary reflection
A. Illustrating Marcel’s idea of “the self” (existence), Socrates provides his own version of who he is.
- Not only is Socrates’ apology a defense from all his accusations, but also it is a testimony of how
he became who he was.
B. Socrates’ account1 implicates how crucial secondary reflection is to all human activities.
- This entails his “self” emerging out from a conglomerate of forms, entering the very mystery of his
own subjectivity.
II. Content of the deposition: Guilt by association
A. Two accusations: Socrates was purported guilty of corrupting the young and impiety (not believing in
the gods of Athens, but in strange gods)
- During his time, Socrates had a tremendous influence on the Athenian youth. (23c)
- Impiety is more political than religious, as irreverence for the gods is tantamount to treason or
betrayal of his own city-state (anti-patriotism)
B. Context: Looking under the lens of Athens catastrophic defeat in the Peloponnesian war (and the
political upheavals that followed), the aforementioned charges are indeed political.
- Prior to the trial, the Athenians were looking for the causes of their military and political failure. In
this regard, Socrates became the city’s scapegoat.
III. Pre-Socratic defense: Tracing the roots of the slander
A. Pronouncement of the Delphic oracle2 in its structural sense:
- Q (Chaerephon): Is there anyone wiser than Socrates?
- A: No one is wiser. (Notice the negation in the oracle’s reply, for it opens to two possible
interpretations.)
B. On one hand, the reply would implicate Socrates being the wisest of them all.
- However, Socrates entertains the news with sheer bewilderment (an inner disturbance), for he never
believed himself to be wise. (21b)
- He demonstrates an attitude where he doesn’t easily accept the pronouncement. Thus, the
conundrum propelled his investigation, leading Socrates to groups of purportedly wise people.
1. Politicians: Anyone who assumes authority is deemed to be wise.
Having a position to uphold/protect, they appear omniscient when they are actually
not.
2. Poets (contemporaries in Athens): They possess a certain knowledge that became the
wellspring of their poetic works.
As the bystanders seem to have understood the poetic works better that its authors
could, they do not possess that knowledge, being divinely inspired, at all.
Socrates does not pretend such knowledge.
3. Craftsmen: Socrates knows practically nothing of their dexterity in crafting goods that are
being sold in the agora (city center)
Just because they are good in a certain skill, they presume to be good at everything.
- Wisdom becomes illusory. These people don’t think that there is anything they did not know. (22c)
C. On another hand, the reply could also be understood as, “no mortal being is wise because only the gods
can be wise.”
- Socrates admits that he is not wise at all.
Socratic ignorance: Only the gods are wise; thus, all mortal beings are ignorant. Yet,
there is someone from the crowd who is cognizant of his ignorance.
- Role of reversal in the text: What makes him the wiser one is his mere awareness of his ignorance.
This ignorance sets Socrates out in a certain task/mission, which is to bring everybody
else in the same consciousness. He questioned individuals to prove them ignorant of the
matters in which they claim expertise.
But the people’s pride/ego, however, gets in the way of illumination. Consequently, this
has brought him a lot of enemies (his accusers included), attaching him to malfeasance.
- Socrates brings into his defense that his actions are not a betrayal, but rather a form of public
service (life’s work)
[G]od has given Socrates this special task for him to fulfill.
In an attempt to get a better society in the end, he has sought the road less travelled,
ceasing as a patriotic person.
- Horse-gadfly imagery: Despite the horse’s continuous flicking of its tail, shooing the gadfly away,
the gadfly always returns. (30e)
Similarly, Socrates compares himself to a gadfly, continuously rousing the horse from
lethargy. He serves to awaken the consciousness of Athenian society.
Choosing to be sluggish by killing the gadfly, the horse constrains itself from being
a “great and noble” being. Unfortunately, the society eventually turned the flyswatter to
Socrates. The gadfly may have been killed, yet it was still able to fulfill its purpose.