Socrates
The teacher, the trial, and the problem of telling the two of them apart.
Socrates wrote nothing. Nearly everything we know of him arrives through Plato, which creates the hardest source problem in ancient philosophy: where does the historical teacher end and the student's invention begin? Socrates' influence on Plato is total — and so is Plato's influence on the Socrates we have.
These essays cover the man, the method, the trial and the hemlock, and the long problem of telling the two philosophers apart.
26 essays, listed alphabetically.
