Socrates and Motives: Why Choose Death? When Socrates stood trial he held that his work and questions were worth giving his life for. He wasn’t willing to give in to the accusers and say what he was doing was wrong because to him that would be a renouncement of what he believed was right. Nathanael “Nate” Saint, a pilot during WWII, served as a missionary in Ecuador during the 1950s; he and four of his friends were killed by the tribe they were attempting to reach when they refused to shoot the
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Michelle Meeks 9/3/2013 PHI1010 Word Count: 460 Socrates In “The Apology” and “The Crito” Socrates argues about the importance and value of one’s self. He talks of how the greatest benefit is to be “as good and as wise as possible” and that no outcome, even death, would be more detrimental to the soul than betraying one’s own philosophy. In “The Apology,” Socrates argues that to be a good man you must be honest and put yourself before others. He states to the jury that “perhaps you think
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escape prison is in question. At the beginning of the dialogue, Crito offers Socrates an escape though Socrates has already made up his mind and quickly refuses this opportunity. For Socrates believes that though he may have been convicted for the wrong reasons, the laws are just. In this essay, I will examine both arguments given by Crito and Socrates. Crito does not start with very strong arguments to persuade Socrates. His first argument is that if he does not escape, he will not only lose a
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From book one of the Republic of Plato we find various renditions of what specifically justice is. Socrates begins the conversation of justice with an elder statesman by the name of Cephalus and furthers the discussion with the son of Cephalus, Polemarchus. Socrates is seemingly “toying” with or having fun at the disposal of Polemarchus by challenging his argument and every point and he identifies various inconsistencies in the stories of both men regarding justice. By now the story turns
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Plato documents what occurs during Socrates’ trial, where a philosopher named Socrates was accused for being an evil-doer by simply questioning his surroundings. He defends himself in order to prove that he is innocent. But Socrates’ accusers will not accept any reason other than the one that they provided. Rather than saying that he is wrong, Socrates continues to argue for his righteousness, but then accepts that his accusers will always remain unrighteous. Socrates believes that it is better to die
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the dialogues between Socrates and Criton, Socrates’ best friend in his whole life. In this time, Socrates had already been put into prison by the unfair adjudgement in the court and he was waiting for the death penalty. When a Greek ship from Delos came back, he needed to get the death penalty. Before this time, Criton had visited Socrates for a few times, and tried to persuade him escape from this prison, but it was not worked. In the beginning of this dialogue, Socrates asked Criton, “Why have
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Thrasymachus respectively define “justice”? On what grounds does Socrates refute them? In the first book of Plato’s Republic three possible definitions of the term “justice” are brought up by Cephalus, Polemarchus, and Thrasymachus which Socrates is able to refute. Though Socrates presents no personal opinion himself he is able to question each explanation given to him by the others. The book begins with a discussion between Socrates and Cephalus where the question of justice is initially brought
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In Pluto’s Crito, Crito try’s to persuade Socrates to escape from jail to prevent them from killing him. However, Socrates provides a counter argument to his pleas. Crito presents seven different arguments for Socrates escape from prison. Crito argued that if Socrates does not escape, he would hurt Crito. First, Crito will loose Socrates friendship if he dies. If Socrates dies, people will think that Crito didn’t do anything to help Socrates therefore, the people will look down at Crito because
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Writing Prompt : Socrates and “True Knowledge” With the notion of philosophy and the studying of philosophy it is well known that it is powerful and dangerous. Philosophy has many reasons for its importance such as how to understand your ideas, the origin of your ideas, how to contrast arguments. Philosophy can also help you defend arguments, read it, build your position and understand it. Philosophy is used for the betterment of the world, gender, race, civilization, town, state, country, etc
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In ‘The Apology’ written by Plato, Socrates is being accused of many things by Meletus. Socrates is being accused of corrupting the youth in general, corrupting the you intentionally and that Socrates is an atheist; in all of which he does not defend himself but rather manipulate what all the accusations against him are. In the middle of ‘The Apology’, Meletus accuses Socrates of “corrupting the youth by demonic teachings” but instead of defending himself, he starts to manipulate the accusations
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