Socrates Life

His opening paragraph describes the universe to be “made up of all things, and one God who pervades all things” or more simply everything is connected together and monitored by god. Everything in the world in our world works together to form a well-functioning society and that’s what he appears to be pertaining to. However, he adds to that by giving key things people must do in order to form a great society. Things like “[l]ov[ing] mankind”, “follow[ing] god”, and “remember[ing] laws rule all”, are a few simple things we must teach one another to create a better atmosphere for people to live in. Whoever goes against these is “fighting against the nature of the world” and harms everyone around them by in a sense not being a team player.

That everything that is written in that quote is the only things necessary for us to survive and that our lives will be better without all of the extra parts and all of the trumpery. I can’t really say that he is wrong. All of that extra stuff seems to lead to conflict. When you have a nice car, other people want your car and sometimes they will hurt you and steal your car so that they can be happy because they now have that car and now other people will be impressed that they have that car. You want to make more money so that you can buy nice things for yourself because you want to impress others and make yourself feel better from that. When you have a nice house it leads people to want that house and the things in the house and your life will be filled with conflict. You will live more happily knowing that you have only what you need and that the people around you care but will not intrude in the life you live, and that once you find a place where it is possible to get only what you need that you will forever be happy. The body is designed to survive and when you force it to do more than is necessary to survive, it becomes discontented with the way it lives and it requires more to make it happier and that you will have to get more and more until there is nothing left

Viewing the painting “The Death of Socrates” by Jacques-Louis David, one can perceive many different subject matters, both literally and metaphorically. The obvious is seen within the setting of the painting. The clear illustration of where the event is happening provides the onlooker with a glimpse into a different time and era. Conversely, the artist has taken the liberty to hide deep meaning inside the work of art through less apparent means. Symbolism through art work has endured from early works to contemporized ones, here is no different. Taking the two aforementioned into consideration gives us a glimpse into both the symbolic and factual significance of the occasion.

Many argue if politicians, and individuals acting in the public sphere are just individuals. In Socrates’ trial, he declares that living a public or political life is incompatible with living a just life. I agree with this point, for being just can be is not only seen as doing what is right, but also doing what one believes is right in an honest matter. Individuals in public life may choose to not speak the truth and play on words to flatter people to be favourable of them. When political figures flatter and have this undisputed favour, many do not act justly, within just interest, or within their own interest, but merely in the interest of what will gain them power by making compromises between the just and unjust.

According to Socrates, "living well" has a very vague definition. Using logic, Socrates debates with Crito whether or not he should attempt to escape the Athenian prison or face his accusers and be killed. Even though "Crito" is written with a dialogue, the actual context is a monologue given by Socrates exploring his choices he's faced with in the current moment. Living well is when one is a is not commiting an offense or evil against oneself or another. The reason for this vague view of the term "living well" is because it is all based on the perception of the person doing the actions.

By viewing the painting The Death of Socrates by Jacques-Louis David, Socrates’ loyalty to the Athenian government was far more important to him than his own death or friendship. He was more interested in teaching his students about his belief in reason and the law of justice before he died. Still, the students and friends were arguing with him and trying to convince him to renounce his teachings. Socrates was strong in telling his students how it was for the good of society that he drinks the poison hemlock. He was not going to change what he was teaching all along when he truly believed in the democratic Athenian government laws. Socrates’ loyalty to the government was much stronger than the ties of friendship or acquaintances.

Socrates is a widely renowned teacher, who has taught and demonstrated a variety of lessons that regard how he views the world. Socrates has described his view on morality, purpose, death, and the ultimate. He has spoken about these views through multiple texts including The Last Days of Socrates and they have been interpreted through the text Socrates by George Rudebusch. Through these worldviews, Socrates has given people the opportunity to expand their wisdom and question the world around them.

Socrates’ views of death as represented in “The Trial and Death of Socrates” are irrevocably tied to his beliefs of what makes life significant. For Socrates, life must be examined through constant questioning and one must hold the goodness of life above all else. Consequently, even in the face of the un-good, or unjust in Socrates’ case as represented in his trial, it would not be correct to do wrong, return wrong or do harm in return for harm done. Therefore, no act should be performed with an account for the risk of life or death; it should be performed solely on the basis of whether it is good and right.

He says we should think about how people really are in a given society and then determining what would be the best is the right way to go about it. He believes that this will help if we think about how people are in a given society because we are more selfish then we think. We need to look at what human beings are actually like. “By showing a moral code like this is would not reject entitlements in favor of the greater moral evil rule (Famine Relief and the Ideal Moral code pg. 823)”. Which helps his argument on entitlement. We are entitled to what we do with our body, our right to life, our life to property, and our negative and positive rights, which in his view cannot be

Socrates spent his time questioning people about things like virtue, justice, piety and truth. The people Socrates questioned are the people that condemned him to death. Socrates was sentenced to death because people did not like him and they wanted to shut him up for good. There was not any real evidence against Socrates to prove the accusations against him. Socrates was condemned for three major reasons: he told important people exactly what he thought of them, he questioned ideas that had long been the norm, the youth copied his style of questioning for fun, making Athenians think Socrates was teaching the youth to be rebellious. But these reasons were not the charges against him, he was charged with being an atheist and

The skepticism found within Socrates' logic leads us to realize that he has no claims that he has answers, yet he is living and dying for the ideal that "an unexamined life is not worth living." There is no point at which Socrates is looking for followers, much like a prophet would look for disciples, for his ideals appeal to reason, not faith. Although this may be the case, he has left his contemporaries, ancient and modern day philosophers, as well as any other students of his teachings in a complete paradox. For centuries, many have attempted to carve out a middle path between the severity of his claim on the examined life, and the predestined state of doubt that surfaces with the search for justice and virtue.

The problem with Socrates concerns the problem with the role of value and reason. Nietzsche believes that the bulk of philosophers claim that life is a corrupt grievance for mankind. Nietzsche reasoned that these life deniers were decadents of Hellenism, as a symptom of some underlying melancholy. For someone to paint life in such a negative light they must have suffered a great deal through the course of their own life. Furthermore, these no-sayers agreed in various physiological ways and thus adopted the same pessimistic attitudes towards life. Socrates was ugly, alike decadent criminals and by ways of these similarities was decadent as well. Nietzsche also claims ugliness as a physiological symptom of life in its decline supported by studies in phenology.

Socrates’ theory of the unexamined life would argue that that a life spent without self-examination was a life that was wasted. Socrates believed that a person should question their motives and what they valued in life. He believed a life spent pursuing material gain or power was a life that was not a life well spent. Instead Socrates believed that a person should constantly be looking inward. They should question their motives and better themselves by correcting any motives or actions that are not pure.

He argues that it is man’s responsibility to use this freedom to search for knowledge and enlightenment in order to get higher. It sounds as if he was saying God would be happier to see man reach perfection and would even admire man for being the creature who works on the creation of God the architect, and bring about changes.

He did not merely say that the unexamined life was not a noble existence or that it was the path of the less righteous, rather the unexamined life is just not worth living at all.