Summaries of essays on classics


Author: Doctor Terence Rajivan Edward
Draft version: version 1 (9 July 2026)


Socratic Method by Hugh H. Benson. Against scholars who argue that there is no Socratic method in Plato's dialogues, Benson will argue "Plato's Socratic dialogues coherently present Socrates practicing a distinctive philosophical method featuring a common form, a common strategy, and a common epistemological presupposition." The Socratic dialogues are the following (in alphabetical order): Apology, Charmides, Crito, Euthyphro, Euthydemus, Gorgias, Hippias Major, Hippias Minor, Ion, Laches, Lysis, portions of the Meno, Protagoras, and Republic. The common form is the Elenchos. Socrates himself believes he and imitators have a distinctive method. In Apology, he does not believe he is being prosecuted for believing in unpopular positions, such as one should harm neither one friends nor one's enemies, one's leaders should be determined by knowledge, not popular election or lot, or even that the sun is a fiery ball of iron. Although he does not say so, such grounds for prosecution would put any philosopher at risk.  He is prosecuted for a distinctive method. The oracle says no one is wiser than Socrates, but Socrates seeks to find someone wiser, believing he is not wise, though he fails. The Socratic method involves a test of a reputed wise man's wisdom, and it aims to persuade those reputed to be wise of their ignorance, if not wise, and to learn from their wisdom, if wise. This is the elenchos, says Benson. "Of the 34 interlocutors in the Socratic dialogues 21 have some claim to wisdom that Socrates goes on to examine. In no case is the interlocutor's wisdom uncovered and in only 7 cases is the interlocutor persuaded of his ignorance." The question Socrates often asks the reputedly wise is of the form "What is F-ness?" "Following the interlocutor's answer to this initial question, a series of other questions elicit answers from the interlocutor that are used by Socrates to derive the negation of the original answer. At this point the interlocutor either revises his initial answer (e.g., Euthyphro 10d1-2), offers an entirely new answer (e.g., Hippias Major 289e2-4), admits to being unable to say what he knows (e.g. Laches 194b1-4), professes his ignorance (e.g., Charmides 162b9-10), is replaced by another interlocutor whose wisdom is examined (e.g., Gorgias 461e5-462b2), or marches off in a huff (e.g., Euthyphro 15e3-4)." Benson presents a formal structure involved. Initial answer p is given to the Socratic question (referred to as the apparent refutand). To further questions, interlocutor answers q, r, s… (referred to as the premises of the elenchos). Owing to being contradictory, the combination of p, q, r, and s is false. Vlastos asks how Socrates can then claim p false, when all he has established is inconsistency with q,r, and s, whose truth he has not established. Various commentators follow Vlastos in thinking of Socrates as making this claim - this is called the constructivist interpretation. The nonconstructivist interpretation does not take Socrates to be making this claim, nor take him to be justified if he did. Benson says that for Socrates, the various answers given: p, q,r, and s, all have the same epistemic status, rather than the later answers being more justified - they are all, for Socrates, merely beliefs of the interlocutor. He considers an argument against constructivism but says that it wrongly relies on a simple account of what a belief is for Socrates. A problem with such reliance is that, in the dialogue Georgias, Socrates attributes to Polus the belief that he [Polus] would prefer to suffer injustice than do it, which Polus denies. "Socrates here includes among Polus' beliefs not only those doxastic phenomena on the basis of which Polus is disposed to act, and which Polus thinks he has, but also those which are deducible (whether Polus recognizes it or not) from those phenomena Polus is disposed to act on or thinks he has." Also / But: "Thrasymachus' belief that justice is virtue is deducible from other beliefs that Thrasymachus recognizes that he has. Nevertheless, Socrates is unwilling to employ such a belief as a premise in his elenctic argument until he has come to show Thrasymachus the deduction. Not only must the interlocutor believe the premise before it can be employed in a Socratic elenchos, but the interlocutor must also recognize that he believes it."  Article moves on to Aristotle on Socrates. Aristotle says Socrates is concerned with definition. "Of the 14 Socratic dialogues, six are primarily definitional: Euthyphro, Charmides, Hippias Major, Laches, Lysis, and Republic I, while three others contain substantial definitional sections: Protagoras 312c-314d, Gorgias 449a-466a, and Meno 71d-79e." Benson says: "It is nearly certain that in pursuing his 'What is piety?' question, for example, Socrates is not asking for the meaning of the word 'piety' (or better the meaning of the word hosiotes). He is certainly not asking a question that could be answered by using a dictionary. He is asking the same sort of question that scientists ask when they ask 'What is water?' and discover the answer 'Water is H2O'." A real definition, not a nominal definition; "but it might be less anachronistic to maintain that Socrates is after the essence or essential nature." "Socrates requires that answers to his 'What is F-ness?' question be co-extensive with F-things. Socrates puts this by maintaining that answers to his 'What is F-ness?' question must be in (Meno 73a1-3), through (Meno 74a9), common to (Meno 73d1), over (Meno 75a4-5), or had (Meno 72c6-d1) by all and only F-things." "Why does Socrates devote so much time to seeking answers to his 'What is F-ness?' questions from his interlocutors? It was once a commonplace to answer this question in part by appealing to Socrates' belief that definitional knowledge, i.e. knowledge of the answer to a Socratic 'What is F-ness?' question, was prior to knowledge of anything else about F-ness.Thus, Euthyphro cannot accurately claim to know that prosecuting his father for murder is pious, if he fails to know what piety is, nor can Meno claim to know that virtue is teachable, if he fails to know what virtue is." Some recent commentators are of the view "the priority of definitional knowledge… is simply too implausible to be attributed to the likes of Socrates." As Peter Geach puts it, ""We know heaps of things without being able to define the terms in which we express our knowledge." Benson responds, "While it is true that Socrates never states his commitment to the priority of definitional knowledge explicitly and in full generality and while there are hints in the text that can be understood as arguing against this commitment, when all of the passages are put alongside one another, interpretations seeking to avoid such a Socratic commitment begin to look ad hoc, partial, and forced. Attributing to Socrates the fully general priority of definitional knowledge view begins to look like the best explanation of the variety of texts."   "What the attribution of the priority of definitional knowledge to Socrates indicates is not that he is committed to an implausible view, but that he is committed to a stronger conception of knowledge than the ordinary one." (In a footnote, Benson refers to the objection that a commitment to this priority contradicts Socrates' claim to lack knowledge, and defences against it.)
Reference. Hugh H Benson. 2011. Socratic method. In Donald Morrison (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Socrates. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.