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Socrates was a fool: A new take on Socrates

Passacaglia

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It's like he encouraged you to be reactionary......any fool knows that's the opposite of wisdom.
I disagree; many people are fools specifically because they are reactionary...usually in very selective ways that happen to benefit themselves at the cost of others. Of course, being reactionary is like being evil; nobody thinks of themselves that way, so reactionaries usually use terms like 'traditional values' to describe the rationalizations they've built up around their fear of change.

;)
 

Riva

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The truth is, as Darwin said, that which sustains life, peace, etc, not that which is factual.

Darwin said this? Out of all the people in the world, Darwin?

Maybe it was a metaphor, a coded message perhaps. However, he never sounded like a coded message guy.
 

GarrotTheThief

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Darwin said this? Out of all the people in the world, Darwin?

Maybe it was a metaphor, a coded message perhaps. However, he never sounded like a coded message guy.

He said the only truth is that which propagates life, or something to that effect. It's been a while since I've watched the lecture from University.
 

Studmuffin23

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I've been reading some old myth's like the Odyssey, Carl Jung, and listening to some lectures on social hierarchy and structure.

Socrates seems to have been a fool. He tries to disentangle the idea of gods without realizing that in general people don't have time to think too much about philosophy because they have to work so the myth's serve to keep order.

He pursued what he thought was good, truth, when in reality the truth was the society needed the myth to remain stable and so lives could be nurtured. The truth is, as Darwin said, that which sustains life, peace, etc, not that which is factual. We can talk about facts all day but this isn't wisdom.

The myths had a moral code which served to stabilize society, as they do today, for example we believe in many myths today such as that we have unalienable rights.

That's why Socrates was killed. He was a blight, and selfish fool, and devoted his brilliant mind to something profoundly absurd, attempting to dismantle the safety net of society.

There is not a single society which has not relied on tradition for stability. We can't buck tradition and be innovators without hurting more people than not. The ancient mind knew that deification of philosophy was what myth was and not literal belief. Socrates had no imagination.

If we look at the relationship of Uranus to Saturn symbolically we can see a floor plan for success when it comes to innovation. Learn the rules before you innovate or else you'll electrocute yourself. Safety first if you really want to be of use to society other wise it's just impulsive selfishness.

Sorry Socrates...today I shed my skin and am free of your corrosive attitude and I bath in my humanity and mystically participate.

So in short, you hate Socrates because he had a conscience.
 

GarrotTheThief

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So in short, you hate Socrates because he had a conscience.

no. I don't hate Socrates. That would imply i also love him and in truth I don't know if he was real or just a mythological figure. Either way, it doesn't really matter. No matter how wise a man or woman is he/she will be a fool and no matter how foolish he/she will be wise. It's cause things are process based.

Socrates was for the mind, and brain, and a good read...and he is actually a very soulful figure now that I've gone back and re-read some of his quotations. I would like to make this a palinode to the man who was really simply translating myth, or that of the soul, into logic, that of the mind.

Kudos to you.
[MENTION=22109]Evee[/MENTION]
 

Evee

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"Socrates was the chief saint of the Stoics throughout their history; his attitude at the time of his trial, his refusal to escape, his calmness in the face of death, and his contention that the perpetrator of injustice injures himself more than his victim, all fitted in perfectly with Stoic teaching. So did his indifference to heat and cold, his plainness in matters of food and dress, and his complete independence of all bodily comforts. But the Stoics never took over Plato's doctrine of ideas, and most of them rejected his arguments for immortality. Only the later Stoics followed him in regarding the soul as immaterial; the earlier Stoics agreed with Heraclitus in the view that the soul is composed of material fire."

Bertrand Russell
 

Mole

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"Socrates was the chief saint of the Stoics throughout their history; his attitude at the time of his trial, his refusal to escape, his calmness in the face of death, and his contention that the perpetrator of injustice injures himself more than his victim, all fitted in perfectly with Stoic teaching. So did his indifference to heat and cold, his plainness in matters of food and dress, and his complete independence of all bodily comforts. But the Stoics never took over Plato's doctrine of ideas, and most of them rejected his arguments for immortality. Only the later Stoics followed him in regarding the soul as immaterial; the earlier Stoics agreed with Heraclitus in the view that the soul is composed of material fire."

Bertrand Russell

What is fascinating is the similarlty between the Ancient Greek Stoics and American Puritans.

American Puritans have received a bad press in recent times, but it was American Puritans who made America, just as the Ancient Greek Stoics like Socrates made Western Philosophy.
 

AphroditeGoneAwry

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What is fascinating is the similarlty between the Ancient Greek Stoics and American Puritans.

That was exactly what I was thinking too in response to @Evee post. Except instead of puritans, I'd substitute early Christians perhaps.

This leads me to believe that there is a transcendent yearning for man to attain a place where the events around him do not affect him. Usually this is only attained by religion or spiritual pursuit. Since Socrates made a religion out of his philosophy, it makes sense.

I think of the apostle Paul, and many of the Christian martyrs, that withstood torture gracefully, right to their end.

It's a fascinating state to attain or contemplate.
 

Mole

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Religious Experience

That was exactly what I was thinking too in response to @Evee post. Except instead of puritans, I'd substitute early Christians perhaps.

This leads me to believe that there is a transcendent yearning for man to attain a place where the events around him do not affect him. Usually this is only attained by religion or spiritual pursuit. Since Socrates made a religion out of his philosophy, it makes sense.

I think of the apostle Paul, and many of the Christian martyrs, that withstood torture gracefully, right to their end.

It's a fascinating state to attain or contemplate.

Indeed, this is called religious experience. Or another way of describing it is trance level 4, which consists of four trances, all nested within each other, leading to the experience of interiority as reality.

The interiority of Socrates is called the Socratic Method and the interiority of the martyrs is called faith.

And both choose death rather than give up the reality of their interiority.

For, The Varieties of Religious Experience, by William James, written in 1902, click on http://www2.hn.psu.edu/faculty/jmanis/wjames/varieties-rel-exp.pdf
 

Evee

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What is fascinating is the similarlty between the Ancient Greek Stoics and American Puritans.

American Puritans have received a bad press in recent times, but it was American Puritans who made America, just as the Ancient Greek Stoics like Socrates made Western Philosophy.

That was exactly what I was thinking too in response to @Evee post. Except instead of puritans, I'd substitute early Christians perhaps.

This leads me to believe that there is a transcendent yearning for man to attain a place where the events around him do not affect him. Usually this is only attained by religion or spiritual pursuit. Since Socrates made a religion out of his philosophy, it makes sense.

I think of the apostle Paul, and many of the Christian martyrs, that withstood torture gracefully, right to their end.

It's a fascinating state to attain or contemplate.

There are practically no differences between the lives of the Stoics, and those of the Christian and Buddhist saints.
 

GarrotTheThief

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There are practically no differences between the lives of the Stoics, and those of the Christian and Buddhist saints.


Indeed. The force of the soul, or our true selves, bares itself upon us and pierces through matter like the bright white lights of a baseball stadium seen through the dug out.
 

Daenera

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I've been reading some old myth's like the Odyssey, Carl Jung, and listening to some lectures on social hierarchy and structure.

Socrates seems to have been a fool. He tries to disentangle the idea of gods without realizing that in general people don't have time to think too much about philosophy because they have to work so the myth's serve to keep order.

He pursued what he thought was good, truth, when in reality the truth was the society needed the myth to remain stable and so lives could be nurtured. The truth is, as Darwin said, that which sustains life, peace, etc, not that which is factual. We can talk about facts all day but this isn't wisdom.

The myths had a moral code which served to stabilize society, as they do today, for example we believe in many myths today such as that we have unalienable rights.

So you're saying he was too dumb to realize that people are too dumb to understand things rationally and need myths and tradition to do so, as well those two things being the only means to preserve peace?

(ancient person No.1:"Hey dude why did you kill that man?!"

ancient person No.2:"Because I don't believe in Zeus duh!"

ancient person No.1:"You all motherf*ckers need Zeus!")

He was a blight, and selfish fool, and devoted his brilliant mind

He was a selfish fool with a brilliant mind ...
1bgw.jpg


You two have a love-hate relationship don't you?

Sorry Socrates...today I shed my skin and am free of your corrosive attitude and I bath in my humanity and mystically participate.

Did you use his philosophy before instead of a soap?

I once tried to bathe in nihilism and became very disappointed when I came out as dry and dirty as before, so yeah I'm not doing that anymore. Can you give some tips on how to bathe in humanity? (if there's a way to do it without the necessity of shedding skin I'd appreciate the advice greatly,tnx in advance)
 
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