The Learn Tracker
...life-long learning: structured, organized, searchable...
924
Lectures Watched
Since January 1, 2014
Hundreds of free, self-paced university courses available:
my recommendations here
Peruse my collection of 275
influential people of the past.
View My Class Notes via:
Receive My Class Notes via E-Mail:

VIEW ARCHIVE

Contact Me via E-Mail:
edward [at] tanguay.info
Notes on video lecture:
Kierkegaard's Admiration of Socratic Irony
Notes taken by Edward Tanguay on January 17, 2017 (go to class or lectures)
Choose from these words to fill the blanks below:
Euthyphro, seduce, lawyers, talking, enlighten, figure, active, 399, special, courthouse, church, execution, wiser, father, specific, critical, enemies, fee, Apology, comfortable, Copenhagen, rhetoric, refutes, learn, god, conclusion, Oracle, general, amusing, irony, contradiction, Danish
•
the central focus of attention in most of the concept of Kierkegaard's            is Socrates
•
Kierkegaard was not only interested in the concept of irony, but in the              of Socrates
•
Socrates (469-       BC)
•
the dialogue The                is an account of his trial
•
the dialogue The Phaedo is an account of his final hours and his                    by drinking hemlock
•
spent much of his time walking around the city                with people
•
found people who claimed to know something about some specific area of knowledge and asked them about it
•
claiming to be ignorance on the matter, he begged his discussion partners to                    him on whatever topic they claimed to know something about
•
what is known as Socratic irony usually appears at the beginning of these exchanges when Socrates gets his interlocutor to explain something to him or give a definition of something
•
one can see this illustrated in the dialogue, the                   
•
Socrates goes to the                      at Athens to stand trial for the charges raised against him
•
he meets an acquaintance, Euthyphro
•
Euthyphro says he is bringing charges against his own             
•
something very unusual
•
Socrates saw the immediate                           
•
instead of pointing out this contradiction, he points out that there must be something he has not understood, and that Euthyphro must have some special knowledge into this matter
•
this sounds like a compliment in the ears of Euthyphro who fails to see the irony in it
•
Socrates then                every answer that Euthyphro givse
•
Euthyphro suddenly runs off, claiming to have an urgent appointment
•
Socrates is disappointed since he thought he was going to            something about piety from Euthyphro
•
Socrates' irony is a key factor in this process
•
Kierkegaard was fascinated by this practice of Socratic irony
•
he saw in his own              society of the 19th century people like Euthyphro
•
they claimed to have knowledge about things about which they were in fact ignorant
•
Aporia
•
Greek word for being at a loss, or being unable to answer
•
Socrates leads his interlocutors into a state of aporia in the course of his dialogue with them
•
aporetic dialogue
•
one of Plato's dialogues which ends with no definitive                     
•
usually when one writes a treatise
•
the goal is to express a thesis
•
to establish a                  point
•
but Socrates doesn't establish anything at all
•
all that the reader has learned is a number of definitions are incorrect
•
no positive definition survives the process of                  examination
•
Socrates method appealed to Kierkegaard
•
he enjoyed seeing in Socrates a thinker of negativity
•
"the fact that several of Plato's dialogues end without result has a far deeper reason than I had earlier thought. It makes the reader self-            ."
•
Socrates makes other people reflective
•
sophists
•
traveling scholars of                 
•
gave lessons to the sons of rich families for a fee
•
claimed to be able to teach useful skills
•
public speaking
•
logical reasoning
•
argumentation
•
               knowledge of various fields
•
had a reputation of                today
•
they were eloquent speakers who could              people with language
•
Socrates was associated with the sophists
•
one of the arguments against him was that he made the weaker argument the stronger
•
Socrates rejects this
•
he claims not to know anything and so he doesn't teach anything
•
he says people come to see him because they find it                to interrogate people in his own special way
•
since he doesn't teach anything, he doesn't demand a       
•
Kierkegaard knew people who were like the sophists
•
they claimed to know something about Christianity
•
taught it while benefiting materially from their positions in the             
•
enjoyed a                        life
•
Kierkegaard found it deeply problematic
•
attracted to Socrates' method to undermine these self-satisfied and overly confident people
•
Socrates made people feel publicly humiliated
•
some of his                raised charges against him
•
when asked why he does this, Socrates tells of a story of a friend of his who went to the Oracle of Delphi
•
the              was a revered religious institution
•
it was believed that the god Apollo spoke through the priestesses there
•
the state would go to the Oracle to see if a proposed plan would prosper
•
Socrates' friend asked the Oracle if there was anyone wiser than Socrates
•
the Oracle said there was nobody wiser
•
Socrates was perplexed
•
he could think of nothing about which he had                knowledge about
•
he considered other people wiser than he about numerous things
•
questioned each expert which exposed that they knew very little for sure about their areas of expertise
•
Socrates came to the conclusion that he was            in the sense that he at least knew that he didn't know
•
in contrast to the others who claimed to know things that they didn't know
•
Socrates was not a positive knowledge but a negative knowledge
•
he felt it was his duty to go around Athens and test people on their claims of knowledge
•
uses the image of a gadfly
•
constantly irritates a horse by buzzing around and occasionally landing on it here and there
•
"I think, the god attached me to the city, the sort of person who never ceases provoking you and persuading you and reproaching each of you the whole day long everywhere I settle."
•
the gadfly of Athens, who performs a beneficial although irritating function of keeping people from falling into complacency
•
keeping them on their guard with their respect to their knowledge
•
he does this as following a command of the       , a religious duty
•
Kierkegaard relished this vision and saw his own task as similar
•
through of writings, he could become the gadfly of                     , keeping his countrymen from falling in into complacency

Ideas and Concepts:

Vocabulary learned via tonight's Kierkegaard class:

"aporia [ἀπορία], n. impasse, lack of resources, puzzlement, an expression of doubt.

Plato's early dialogues are often called his aporetic dialogues because they typically end in aporia. In such a dialogue, Socrates questions his interlocutor about the nature or definition of a concept, for example virtue or courage.

Socrates then, through elenctic testing (cross-examining, testing, and scrutiny for the purposes of refutation) shows his interlocutor that his answer is unsatisfactory.

After a number of such failed attempts, the interlocutor admits he is in aporia about the examined concept, concluding that he does not know what it is.

In Plato's Meno, Socrates describes the purgative effect of reducing someone to aporia:it shows someone who merely thought he knew something that he does not in fact know it and instills in him a desire to investigate it."
Kierkegaard's regard of Socrates, via tonight's Søren Kierkegaard course:

"Socrates' method appealed to Kierkegaard, as he saw in Socrates a thinker of negativity and admired the fact that several of Plato's dialogues ended without result, which made the reader self-active. Kierkegaard saw in Socrates' method an approach that made people reflective.

Kierkegaard knew people in his own society in Copenhagen who were much like the sophists of Socrates' time. The sophists were traveling scholars of rhetoric who gave lessons to the sons of rich families for a fee. They claimed to be able to teach useful skills such as public speaking, logical reasoning, argumentation and general knowledge in various fields. They typically had a reputation that lawyers often have today, i.e. eloquent speakers who could seduce people with language.

Socrates was often associated with the sophists, and one of the arguments against him was that he made the weaker argument the stronger. But Socrates rejected this. Unlike the sophists claimed not to know anything and so claimed not to teach anything. And since he claimed not to teach anything, he didn't charge a fee. He said that people came to see him converse with others because they found it amusing to watch him interrogate people in a way that reduced seemingly experts to people who apparently knew very little.

Kierkegaard saw himself as a kind of Socrates among the sophists of his time. These were people who claimed to know much about Christianity and taught it while benefiting materially from their positions in the Church, and thus enjoying a comfortable life, which Kierkegaard found deeply problematic. The Socrates' method was for Kierkegaard a way to undermine these self-satisfied and overly confident people."
Introduction to Kierkegaard
Kierkegaard's Admiration of Socratic Irony