Essay Clouds vs. The Apology

In his defense, Socrates claims over and again that he is innocent and is not at all wise, “…for I know that I have no wisdom, small or great.” Throughout the rest of his oration he seems to act the opposite as if he is better than every man, and later he even claims that, “At any rate, the world has decided that Socrates is in some way superior to other

Socrates was a man who spent most of his time talking to people. He would ask them hypothetical questions, and make them think for themselves about the true answer they believed in, by serving as a guide for the conversation. Many people, including the accusers, believed that while Socrates did this, he was serving as a Sophist. A Sophist is a person who talks to people, and teaches them how to argue a point, whether the point is right or wrong. A Sophist would collect money for this lesson, and go on with their teachings (Xenophon 42). This accusation is inaccurate because Socrates did not collect any money for his conversations with people. Instead, Socrates was a very poor man, who happened to have rich friends. Talking to these people was a way for Socrates to try to spread his way of life to the Athenian's. He enjoyed conversing with people about ethical issues, and moral beliefs. In his argument, Socrates refutes Meletus' charge that he corrupts the young. One crucial point deals with the idea of Socrates as a paid teacher. This would imply that Socrates was actively seeking students and teaching "corrupting" ideas. This plays a part in the argument, by Meletus, that Socrates has deliberately corrupted the youth. Socrates says that, "the young men who follow me around of their own free will, those who have most leisure, the sons

By comparing himself to the Greek hero Achilles before the jury in Plato’s Apology, Socrates attempts to portray himself as a hero of equal merit to Achilles and others of similar standing. By selecting the greatest of the Classical Greeks to compare and contrast himself to in his argument, Socrates surreptitiously urges his audience to view him as being of the same caliber as Achilles. This not only authenticates Socrates’ claims, but also exhibits his disconnect from earlier forms of thought. Essentially, Socrates attempts to display himself in the same light as his predecessor Achilles through their shared aspiration to do what they deem to be right in addition to their

Socrates was a revolutionary thinker. He brought new ideas and processes of thought to Athenian society and his work still has its place in the world today. However during his time, his ideas were not always thought of as a good thing. Many viewed him as a corrupting influence on other people and accused him of forcing his ideas upon others. Perhaps most frequently the center of controversy was his thoughts on theocracy and piety as seen in the Plato’s Euthyphro. Socrates also appears at the butt end of Aristophanes’ comedy Clouds, where he is satirically ridiculed and seemingly corrupting the youth of Athens in his school, the Thinkery. Although virtually completely seen as a positive influence now, in ancient times, Socrates may have

Socrates was a great thinker and debater dedicated to truth. He spent his golden years walking the streets of Athens in pursuit of wisdom. Socrates lived the destiny that was revealed to him in the Oracle. He created and perfected his own cross-examination technique; we today know it as the Socratic Method. He was thorough and unrelenting. His subjects were often humiliated. Socrates would methodically disprove anyone he thought was wrong. In his eyes, most of the people he interviewed were blind. It did not matter if one was wealthy and influential or if they were young and impressionable. Socrates could question anyone and turn him or her inside out. Unfortunately, he did so without regard to the

In the Apology Socrates is a very simple man he is Plato’s favorite character based on his personality of appearance. To convey his ideas about honesty and rightness. The peculiar of a method applied in Apology is about an argument which Socrates used to expressed by Plato in The Apology (Steven 29p) uses to defend himself in the course of a court-martial. Plato’s Apology is an example of how Socrates speech makes at the trial in which he is charged with not recognizing the gods recognized by the city, The complaint of Socrates is based on fear people of the man’s thinking which inspires the youth by original ideas and exposure of the ignorance and corruption in the unawareness and dishonesty in the upper circles of the state. Socrates

When Strepsiades’ lack of education was made evident by his misunderstanding of the simple topics that Socrates tried to teach him originally Socrates did not just give up on trying to educate him, but instead found something that he did know well and taught him more about it. Then encourages him to do some internal contemplating on his own before learning more (Clouds 637-395). This example of Socrates good character shows him not giving up on a student who was not quite cut out for learning such topics that him and the other sophists studied. Instead he seems to hope that any man, even those who weren’t meant to be educated, could learn if they so had the desire to. Although he was unable to truly teach or help Strepsiades learn the inferior argument that he wanted to learn to avoid his debts, Socrates still did try to help him understand. Even though Socrates knew that Strepsiades was not at a level where he could fully comprehend the lesson, Socrates still tried to help him get into the right mindset of thinking that would help him to solve his problems (Clouds 740-780). This led to Socrates coming to the conclusion that Strepsiades was too old, lacked the memory, and was too set in his old ways to learn this new lesson himself. In turn Pheidippides was sent in place of his father to learn the inferior argument, and was successfully taught by Socrates this time. The way that Socrates helped, or tried to

Though defeated on this point, he's not yet satisfied with Socrates' argument, and sticks by one of his previously stated views which held that injustice is more profitable than justice. However, he shrinks back and seems no longer able to speak for himself after Socrates refuted his argument on justice. Despite his withdrawal from the argument throughout the rest of the Republic, his early ideas help lead Socrates farther on his search for justice through the construction of a hypothetical just city. In describing the education of the guardians of this city, Socrates discusses the need for a balance between gymnastics and poetry. He relates how too much gymnastics lead the spirited part of someone to be overtightened and hard. "He'll be museless and hate discussion" explains Socrates. This hardness and hate for discussion reminds us of the actions of Thrasymachus at the beginning of the argument defining justice. Thrasymachus becomes an example of a "badly tuned soul" that Socrates goes on to describe.

The interactions that the two authors had with Socrates created a motive for each’s objectives and thus modeled their works differently. The playwright Aristophanes was much old than Plato and his work, The Clouds, was released when Plato was very young. At that period many “average” less sophisticated older citizen scoffed at Sophists’ allegedly perverted and warped logic. Aristophanes work fits that genre. Aristophanes had little

It is to fulfill some such function that I believe the god has placed me in the city” and further claims his works were for the betterment of the people in his state, never to have charged a fee to teach and never to have been a madman as portrayed by the play of Meletus, Aristophanes, a portrayal of him walking on air and a series of nonsense. From an alternate perspective the Apology is more or less a dissection of the journey motif in a narrative as it explains the process of how Socrates arrived at his ill fate of death and condemnation by his peers, mirrored by other forms of storytelling like Shakespeare’s literary works.

At the elderly age of seventy, Socrates found himself fighting against an indictment of impiety. He was unsuccessful at trial in the year 399 B.C. The charges were corrupting the youth of Athens, not believing in the traditional gods in whom the city believed, and finally, that he believed in other new divinities. In Plato's Apology, Socrates defends himself against these charges. He claims that the jurors' opinions are biased because they had probably all seen Aristophanes' comedy The Clouds. The Socrates portrayed in Aristophanes' Clouds is an altogether different character than that of the Apology. The two different impressions of Socrates lead to quite opposite opinions with regard to his guilt. In The Clouds,

In the Apology set in Ancient Greece, we are presented with Socrates on trial. Written in a dialogue form it is an account of the defence of Socrates. This essay will seek to look at the crimes Socrates is accused of and why he is accused of them. In looking at Plato’s Apology this paper will seek to show the background to this trail in Ancient Greece its historical and social context. This paper will look at the key events and actors by briefly examining their accusations. The paper will also draw upon defence made Socrates and look at the philosophical meaning of the trail and the relevance’s Apology offers

Maybe here he draws the conclusion that people are just not ready for his way of thinking and that philosophizing is not a part of their democracy. He in a way condemns them by saying they will be held responsible for “having killed Socrates, a wise man” (38c). He admits that he lost the trial only because he did not say what “would have been most pleased to hear”, suggesting that he could if he wanted to, but that would make him unworthy of what he has been standing for all these years. “I much prefer to die having made my defense speech in this way than to live in that way,” (38e) says Socrates referring to exile and having to live as a stranger from one city to another and be unaccepted for who he is. Possibly, his decision has something to do with the fact that Socrates was aged 70 at the time of the trial. There is now no way for him to develop much further and to try and establish himself, all he has left now is simply standing his ground until the end. With the Apology of Socrates the theory about Socrates not being able to defend himself falls, as there is an enormous discrepancy that the person who could make unjust speech sound just could have not defended himself properly if he wanted to. The point is he did not want to and did not need to do it.

Next, let’s consider what it meant to be a philosopher in Athens. Socrates started his philosophical career as a natural scientist, exploring how the world worked from a lens other than that of religion. Although Socrates began to stray away from this philosophy and focuses more so on the individual, Aristophanes portrays him and his students solely as natural philosophers. We can see how ridiculous Aristophanes thinks this area of study through his dialogue on page 123 when Strepsiades says the following, “[Turning to another group with their heads fixed on the ground and their behinds in the air.] But what are they doing over there who are so stooped over?” Socrates’ student replies, “They are delving into Erebus under Tartarus.” This not only illustrates how little respect Aristophanes has for the science and its impiety, but equally important, it also shows the reader how Socrates is corrupting the youth of Athens.

The writings of Plato compare Socrates to various everyday beings which he represents. In the "Apology" tells the story of the trial of Socrates and the various people who testified to his being a danger to the society and that he was guilty of corrupting Athenian youth. In