Socrates is in prison awaiting execution, and he is doing something he had never done before: writing poetry. When his friends ask him why, he explains that he has always had a recurring dream, a voice that told him to “cultivate and make music” (Phaedo 60e). Socrates had always assumed that by “music” the dream […]
Plato
Epistemology as a Headache
“Boy, call Charmides and say that I want to introduce him to a physician, in relation to that ailment he told me he was suffering from yesterday.” Then Critias turned to me and explained, “In fact he said recently that he has a headache when he gets up in the morning, so what is to […]
The Dog Is Your Father
In Plato’s Euthydemus, a young man named Ctesippus is trapped by a sophist (paraphrased from Plat. Euthyd. 298e): You have a dog? — Yes, a mischievous one. And the dog is a father? — Of puppies, yes. So the dog is a father. And you have a father? — Yes. So you have a father, […]