Socrates (470-399 BC) The unexamined life is not worth living
Athens Athens is where this all takes place It s one of the most powerful city-states in all of Greece A democracy recently freed from Spartan tyranny
The Socratic Method The Socratic Method, designed by Socrates, was simply his method of doing philosophy Also called elenchus which means crossexamination It s been one of the two major models for education ever since Vs. The Banking Method
Socratic vs. Banking Methods Socratic Method Dialogue Both parties are active Both parties learn Goal is to work together to find the Truth, not to win the argument Banking Method Monologue Only one part (the teacher) is active, the other (the student) is passive Goal is to deposit knowledge into the empty piggy bank of the student s mind
Why the Socratic Method Works Dialogue and activity are experiential engagement: we learn best when we re invested completely in what s going on around us Examples: Learning to drive Learning to play an instrument Learning a foreign language
The Major Point of the Socratic Method The students must think for themselves. It teaches not only the material but a method for learning more and a desire to learn more Hones the students cognitive skills by making them an active participant in learning Catch a fish for a man, feed him for a day. Teach a man how to fish, feed him for a lifetime
The Problem Getting people to think for themselves is not always what everyone wants The Authority (whether it be government, capitalism, big business, religion, etc.) doesn t always want people to think for themselves but, rather, to simply believe what they tell people to believe, without question
The Question: By getting people to think for themselves, is Socrates (a) Enlightening the people of Athens, making them smarter and thus making the democracy stronger; providing them freedom of thought, imagination and wonder (b) Corrupting the people of Athens by encouraging them to question the beliefs, norms, practices, and values forced upon them by the Authority
Plato s The Euthyphro All we know about Socrates we learn from his student Plato s dialogues that feature him as the main character We know them to be relatively historical accurate
Plato s The Euthyphro This is the first dialogue in a trilogy Euthyphro (Socrates on his way to court to defend himself against charges of murder) Apology (Socrates defense in court) Crito (Socrates time in prison after the trial ends)
Plato s The Euthyphro Things to look for in the text: Plato is on his way to court to defend himself against charges of impiety which means, roughly, immorality Plato believed in universal definitions of ethical terms (Truth, Justice, Beauty, Goodness, etc., can be defined in such a way as to fit all specific situations you encounter)
Moral Goodness (Piety) Do you think it s possible that there s a single definition for piety that might fit all specific situations? How would you define piety (aka moral goodness?)
Moral Goodness (Piety) Let s take some examples and see if a universal definition might fit these very different kinds of impiety (Moral Badness):
Alex Rodriguez (a.k.a. A-Rod) New York Yankees all-star third basemen
A-Rod One of the highest paid athletes of all-time Got caught doping (using performance enhancing drugs [p.e.d. s]) to give him an unfair advantage in the game Suspended for a year (longest disciplinary action ever) Lied about it to his fans, teammates, friends, and family for years and only admitted to it after he got caught
Bernie Madoff Stock Broker
Bernie Madoff Set-up a fraudulent investment scam that defrauded thousands of investors of billions of dollars over a 25 year period Contributed to the massive economic collapse that caused the recession Found guilty on 11 counts of defrauding hardworking Americans and sentenced to 150 years in prison (the maximum allowed)
The Euthyphro Summary of the Dialogue Socrates is on his way to court to defend himself against charges of impiety He runs into his old friend Euthyphro who is on his way to court to prosecute his own father for murder They get into a discussion about what piety means
Euthyphro s Father Euthyphro s father returned to his homestead to discover one his servant's murdered one of his slaves Unsure how to proceed, Euthyphro s father tied up the murderous servant, threw him in a hole, and told everyone to wait while he went to find out how to proceed by visiting a local magistrate While he was gone, the servant in the hole died from exposure and lack of food, making Euthyphro s father likewise guilty of murder/manslaughter
Pious or Impious? Euthyphro decides to bring his father to court on charges of murder/manslaughter for the death of the servant he threw in a hole (4e) Euthyphro says that people think I am crazy to prosecute my own father
Pious or impious? (a) Impious (4b) Is then the man that your father killed one of your relatives? Or is that obvious, for you would not prosecute your father for the murder of a stranger? (b) Pious (4b) It is ridiculous, Socrates, for you to think that it makes any difference whether the victim is a stranger or a relative. One should only watch whether the killer acted justly or not
Pious! Says, Euthyphro (4e) Both my father and my relatives are angry that I m prosecuting my father for murder on behalf of a murderer for they say, it is impious for a son to prosecute his father for murder. But their ideas of the divine attitude to piety an impiety are wrong, Socrates
Great!, thinks Socrates. I m being charged with impiety and here is a man so confident he knows what impiety means he s willing to prosecute his own father! (5d) So tell me then, Euthyphro, what is piety and what is impiety?
The Structure of the Dialogue The rest of the dialogue is aimed at trying to find the definition of piety / moral goodness Socrates uses his famous Socratic method: getting Euthyphro to think for himself by getting definitions out of him, one by one, demonstrating the flaws in his definition, and getting him to strengthen them over and over
Definition 1: What I am doing now (5e) I say that the pious is to do what I am doing now, to prosecute the wrongdoer, be it about murder or temple robbery or anything else, whether the wrongdoer is your father or your mother or anyone else; not to prosecute is impious
Problem with Definition 1 (6e) Bear in mind then that I did not bid you tell me one or two of the many pious actions but that form itself that makes all pious actions pious In other words: Euthyphro didn t give Socrates a definition at all, merely an example. But! We re not even sure yet if what Euthy is doing is an example of piety we need to know what piety means first before we can use that definition to compare Euthyphro s actions to it.
Definition 2: What the gods love (7a) What is dear to the gods is pious, what is not is impious In other words: Whatever the gods enjoy, whatever they love, whatever they find pleasurable, that is what makes an action pious
Improvement with Definition 2 (7a) Splendid, Euthyphro! You ve now answered the way I wanted. Whether your answer is true I do not yet know, but you will obviously show me that what you say is true In other words: this time it s at least a definition, not just an example, a universal criteria to view all individual pious actions. Whether it s a good definition remains to be seen
Problem with Definition 2 (7b) The gods are in a state of discord, they are at odds with one another on matters of Goodness and Beauty, for example Things that can be measured or weighed or counted are easy disagreements to overcome. But things like Goodness (piety) and Beauty are much more difficult and often result in major disagreements, even among the gods
Problem with Definition 2 cont. (7e) Then according to your argument, my good Euthyphro, different gods consider different things to be just, beautiful, ugly, good, and bad thus, the same things then are loved by the gods and hated by the gods, and would be both god-loved and god-hated, that is, both pious and impious at the same time. For example:
Let s Poll the Gods! If we ask the gods of ancient Athens, for example, whether or not Justin Bieber s music is good they might reply: Zeus: ugh, he s awful! Athena: he should be eaten by snakes! Hades: actually, I love his stuff Hermes: I m a belieber!!! Poseidon: that chick with the spiky hair? Meh, I ll pass. Aphrodite: love it! Break me off a piece of that!
Let s Poll the Gods! Thus: 4 gods love Bieber, 4 gods hate Bieber. If the definition of what is Good is whatever is pleasing to the gods then Justin Bieber s music is: (a) pleasing to the gods (some of them loved him); and (b) displeasing to the gods (some of them hated him) This means it s both pious and impious at the same time! Not a very good definition!!!
Definition 3: What all the gods love (9e) I would certainly say that the pious is what all the gods love, and the opposite, what all the gods hate, is the impious
Improvements with Definition 3 It s a definition, like number 2, and unlike number 1, so yay. It fixes the problem in definition 2 by clarifying that something is pious only if every single one of the gods all agree upon it (that they all like it/love it/find it pleasing)
Problem with Definition 3 (10a) Socrates asks: is the pious being loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because it is being loved by the gods? In other words: is something good because the gods love it, or do the gods love something because it s good?
Side-by-Side Euthyphro s Position Gods love makes something Good I love pasta and my love makes pasta good Socrates Position If something is Good that s why the gods love it Pasta is good, that s why I love it
Conclusion Socrates position is right: our loving something doesn t make it good, but, instead, we love something because it s already good.
Why That s So Important Socrates position can be restated this way: just because an Authority (the gods, the government, etc.) loves something, that doesn t make that something good. Ideally, the opposite is the case: the Authority ought to love what is Good and then make the Good into law.
Euthyphro s position is called relativism Relativism is the ethical position that moral laws are relative to the time, place, and community they exist in. Relativism does not believe in universal laws or universal principles of right or wrong that apply to all places and all times For Euthyphro, whatever the Authority loves is Good. This is relativism. What is Good is relative to whatever the gods happen to love.
Problems with Relativism (1) Nothing stops the Authority from changing its mind: what s Good/moral one day could be Evil/immoral the next if it s all about whatever the Authority happen to find pleasurable (2) There s no way to track progress: the Authority changes its mind from time to time just like certain clothes come in and out of fashion, neither improving nor getting worse, just changing with the times (3) There s no way to say that what another culture is doing or better or worse than our own if all moral standards are just relative to one s own culture (4) All we d need to do to figure out if something is Good is to consult the laws (what the Authority likes and wants us to do)
An example: Slavery in America Let s go back to 1790 America. According to relativism (if Euthyphro is right): (1) The Authority might love slavery today, hate it tomorrow (free the slaves!), then change its mind again and love slavery (back to being slaves!) (2) Fast forward to 2015 where slavery is no longer legal in America. According to relativism, things are neither better nor worse only different (3) In 2015, without slavery, we see another nation out there that has slaves. According to relativism, our nation is neither better, nor worse, than that other nation, merely different, with different, relative, values (4) In 1790, in order to find out what s morally Good, according to relativism, we just need to consult the Authority and sure enough, slavery they like, therefore slavery (according to relativism) is morally Good.
The Take-Away Just because the Authority says something is Good doesn t make it Good! It might be Good, but the fact that it s a law doesn t make it Good. Example: Obama could make it a law that I can t, specifically, eat my neighbor for no reason. That might be Good. But it s not Good only because Obama said so. Socrates demands we not passively accept the bias of the Authority but to think for ourselves and look into the Nature of the Good on our own!
Now you can explain Jay-Z to your friends! I m wonderin if a thug s prayers reach Is Pious pious cause God loves pious? Socrates asks, whose bias do ya ll seek? All for Plato, screech - No Church in the Wild