Mr Socrates
Mr Socrates
The archetypal philosopher of ancient Athens.
Socrates always claimed that he knew nothing. For this, the oracle of Delphi (after which the DelphiLanguage is named) proclaimed that Socrates was the wisest of all men.
MrPlato was a student of Socrates and much of our information about Socrates comes from him. Socrates wrote nothing himself: the very idea of writing things down ran contrary to his philosophy.
MrAristotle, who was a student of Plato, attributed the discovery of definition and induction to Socrates. These ideas have turned out to be quite useful in ComputerProgramming, among other things.
His eponymous contribution is the SocraticMethod (elenchos) of critical thinking. The dominating school of thought in Socrates' time was that of the sophists. The sophists taught the art of debate and rhetoric to their students so they could defend their dogma from criticism. But Socrates' method cut through the HandWaving and exposed the lack of foundations in the beliefs. Then, as now, this did not go down well with the "wise". In particular, the young of the city quickly picked up SocraticMethod and embarrassed the older men with it.
This course of events led to Socrates' trial and execution by his being ordered to drink hemlock.
More information on Socrates' life, death, and legacy can be found at:
As far as I know, MrSocrates is a fiction by MrPlato, at least have not heard by other sources ..
What other sources have you read? Aside from what we know of him from Plato, much of our information about Socrates comes from another pupil of his, Xenophon, in his history of later Greece. He is also mentioned in a contemporary play by Aristophanes, and doubtless several other sources I don't know about.
He gets a little note in Thucydides too. There's a couple of things we can safely infer about him if we do a little SqlQuery? on all four sources (select foo join quux, whatever):
The feeling started when I read Joseph Heller's Picture This (fiction). I think that many fictional characters over time become as real as really living people. For example the only documented reference to Jesus in Flavius Josephus Jewish Antiquities has been proved to be heavily corrected by Christian copiers in the 3rd or 4th century. Still millions of people believe that Jesus existed. It might be incorrect to say that Jesus or Socrates did not exist, but I believe that almost all that people think about them is fiction.
And I have feeling that many fiction stars will become indistinguishable from real after some time. Like, Shvejk, KnazjMishkin?, JevgenyOniegin? or Cartman. [please correct to right English transcription]
Probably it's OffTopic, but I have even heard rumors from history and philosophy scientists that Medieval times were fiction.
Yes, it's true. Recently unearthed records reveal the late Roman Christian emperor Theodosius declared the year immediately following 376 "The Year 1,000". An impatient sort of chap, apparently he expected to hasten Jesus' return this way. Theodosius ordered his biographers to record an extra 733 years of history, but they didn't do a very good job of it, which is where we get boring stories like the ones about Clovis and the Franks. Modern historians don't like to spread this around because it makes the history books too difficult to manage.
More likely you heard that the Middle Ages are an indistinct period of history, without any sharp demarcations from what happened before and after? On the whole, historians are a reasonably skeptical lot, and rarely take ancient sources at face value. Herodotus is our best source for the Persian wars, but other evidence suggests that he made some significant mistakes. Fictional characters are usually separated out, to the point where some real people are probably labeled as being of uncertain existence.
Things aren't nearly as bad as some pundits would like you to believe. Socrates' life is well known, and most details are almost certainly correct, though his arguments were probably not quite was Plato quoted them as. Jesus is much more questionable, as most of the sources about him seem to trace back to his followers, and there is in fact considerable debate about his existence among academics. Also remember ancient sources are often better than one might expect, as the existence of the Mycenaean civilization, long held to be a fiction of Greek authors, proves.
"Almost certainly correct" and "more questionable" ... what tommyrot. Most people can't agree on what time of day it is, or who to blame for that lousy restaurant where we ate lunch. The notion that historians are more or less objective than you and I is so much twaddle. Socrates may have existed, may have said some of the things attributed to him, or may have done neither. Likewise Jesus. Believe what pleases you and never let the books get in the way unless there's empiricism to back 'em. And here there ain't.
Yeah, right. It's impossible to be empirical about history. The stories about Etruscans in Rome are quite possibly just stories, despite Etruscan artifacts and graves and inscriptions saying "Hi, I'm Etruscan" found all around the city. [This was the only Latin they ever learned. Stupid Etruscans.] That Ugarit was burnt to the ground by invaders is pure speculation, despite the remains being covered in soot and baked clay and completely lacking any valuables even before excavation. The fact that Darius has a tomb covered in information about what he did as Emperor doesn't prove there was an Emperor named Darius. The existence of the Roman Empire is a distinct possibility but it's hard to be confident about it.
Many people may have trouble remembering the time of day, but newspapers don't seem to get it wrong that often. There is a wide spectrum in confidence levels between none and perfect. Most people who claim history is unreliable don't seem to get that, and don't seem to understand just how much skepticism and empiricism is involved in historical work.
As for Theodosius falsifying several centuries ... sounds like someone's been reading their Orbis Tertius a little too closely. Then again, nothing really interesting did occur at that time ...
See: ThreeOldGreeks
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