Socratic Ignorance Research Articles

Landscapes of Sociotechnical Imaginaries in Education: A Theoretical Examination of Integrating Artificial Intelligence in Education

AbstractThe vision of integrating artificial intelligence in education is part of an ongoing push for harnessing digital solutions to improve teaching and learning. Drawing from Jasanoff and Hasse, this paper deliberates on how sociotechnical imaginaries are interrelated to the implications of new technologies, such as AI, in education. Complicating Hasses’s call for the development of Socratic ignorance to consider our predispositions about new technologies and open new prospects of thought, this paper revisits postphenomenology and Feenberg’s critical constructivist theories. While embracing the notion of Socratic ignorance, this paper stresses the importance of developing a nuanced understanding of technology that realizes its lack of neutrality and supports the creation of a deeper understanding of how knowledge is produced, deployed, and interpreted in the digital age. Thus, this paper argues that an amalgam of Hasse’s call for advancing Socratic ignorance combined with postphenomenology and critical constructivism can support students in developing a critical understanding of technology and opening new landscapes of imaginaries.

Socratic Ignorance and Platonic Knowledge in the Dialogues of Plato, written by Sara Ahbel-Rappe

Socratic Ignorance and Platonic Knowledge in the Dialogues of Plato, written by Sara Ahbel-Rappe

How do we interpret questions? Simplified representations of knowledge guide humans' interpretation of information requests

This paper investigates the cognitive mechanisms supporting humans' interpretation of requests for information. Learners can only search for a piece of information if they know that they are ignorant about it. Thus, in principle, the interpretation of requests for information could be guided by representations of Socratic ignorance (tracking what people know that they do not know). Alternatively, the interpretation of requests for information could be simplified by relying primarily on simple knowledge tracking (i.e., merely tracking what people know). We judged these hypotheses by testing two-and-a-half-year-old toddlers (N = 18), five- to seven-year-old children (N = 72), and adults (N = 384). In our experiments, a speaker asked a question that could be disambiguated by tracking her state of knowledge. We manipulated the speakers' visuals to modulate the complexity of the ignorance representation required to disambiguate their questions. Toddlers showed no tendency to appeal to representations of Socratic ignorance when disambiguating questions (Pilot S1). Five- to seven-year-olds exhibited a similar pattern of results, and they performed better when information requests could be disambiguated using simple knowledge tracking (Studies 1a-1b). Adults used representations of Socratic ignorance to interpret questions, but were more confident when simple knowledge tracking was sufficient to disambiguate information requests (Studies 2–3). Moreover, adults disambiguated questions as if speakers could request information about things that they were ignorant of, even when speakers had no reason to know about their ignorance (Studies 3–4). Thus, the interpretation of requests for information rests primarily on simple knowledge tracking—and not on representations of Socratic ignorance—a heuristic that reduces processing costs.

The Last Animal

In this essay, I argue that Socrates adopts a philosophical stance of indifference that is particularly unique to the Protagoras. The peculiarity stems from Socrates’s (or perhaps Plato’s) significant interest in dealing with Protagoras as a certain kind of thinker rather than merely a sophist in general. The stance of indifference is shown to be a dramatic reaction to the attitude sophists like Protagoras take toward philosophical problems, specifically, thinkers who understand solutions to philosophical problems as commodities. The stance is shown to anticipate certain Academic skeptical methods, to embolden Socratic ignorance, and shore up defenses against the sophistic insecurity of needing to succeed for the sake of success. This stance is elaborated upon in three specific aspects of Socrates’s dramatic portrayal culminating in a re-reading of the poem of Simonides and the myth of Prometheus and Epimetheus. I resist readings that try to see the Protagoras as a simple takedown of sophistry or as a catalog of platonic doctrine, and instead treat Protagoras as a “philosopher in decline,” a significantly dangerous type of thinker who is savvy enough to repurpose genuine insight for the sake of easy answers to immensely difficult problems.

Mortal Democracy and Plato’s Apology

The Apology is often read as showing a conflict between democracy and philosophy. I argue here that Socrates’s defense critically engages deeply political Athenian conventions of death, showing a mutual entanglement between Socratic philosophy and democratic practice. I suggest that Socrates’s aporetic insistence within the Apology that we “do not know if death is a good or a bad thing” structures a critical space of inquiry that I term “mortal ignorance;” a space from which Socrates reapproaches settled questions of death’s appropriate place in political life, ultimately prompting a partial transformation of Athenian democracy. I argue here that Socratic mortal ignorance supports a self-reflective politics of death, one which produces many potential responses and accepts the impossibility of closing off death’s meaning in any final sense—an aporia suitable for the unending, precarious work of democratic politics.

Hans Jonas on the perils of progress and the recovery of Metaphysical speculation

Hans Jonas’s establishment of an ethics of responsibility entails the simultaneous rejection of the modern notion of progress and the recovery of a form of “metaphysical speculation” that aids man in his search for an objective standard of value. Looking mostly at Jonas’s philosophical biology in The Phenomenon of Life and Mortality and Morality, this paper shows how Jonas’s thought on value judgments rests upon his critique of progress and science. The ethics of perfectibility and progress, Jonas shows, leads to a predicament in which the modern mind must navigate between the dangers present in the hubristic hopes of technological progress and the nihilism he finds in the thought of Martin Heidegger. Jonas’s philosophical biology serves as a critique of these positions that opens up an alternative orientation toward nature—one that grounds not only the ethics of responsibility but the uniquely human activity of reflection. The critique of progress serves, then, as a propaedeutic to the ethics of responsibility and the recovery of an image of man as the reflective animal. Such a recovery of metaphysical speculation from the dogmas of the physical sciences helps encourage a “new humility” in the face of man’s technological power. Jonas hopes to replace man’s desire for self-overcoming with the fear that his “Promethean immoderation” will lead to the biosphere's destruction. This fear acknowledges the limits of man’s knowledge and is thereby accompanied by a posture of Socratic ignorance and the reengagement with the philosophia perennis. That is, a less hubristic ethical theory depends upon a modest philosophical stance toward the whole. Only on the grounds of this epistemological modesty can we hope to proceed into the future with both caution and wisdom.

Socratic Ignorance and Business Ethics

Socrates’ inquiry into the nature of the virtues and human excellence led him to experience Socratic ignorance, a practical puzzlement experienced by his recognition that his central life commitments were conceptually problematic. This practical perplexity was not, however, an epistemic weakness but a reflection of his wisdom. I argue that Socratic ignorance, a concept that has not received scholarly attention in business ethics, is a central aim that business practitioners should seek. It is what a truthful, thorough, and courageous inquiry into their professional roles and commitments leads to. It wakes them up from the moral complacency engendered by organizations, forcing them to become much more critical of their day-to-day activities and more intentional about living virtuously. It curbs the corrupting potential of authority positions and prevents the tendency of subordinates to routinely conform to sanctioned norms and expectations. Finally, it opens up novel and creative moral avenues and provides a promising model to deal with the conflicts posed by our globalized and increasingly polarized world.

Sócrates sobre ser bom

The main aim of this paper is to present an interpretation of what Socrates understood by being good for a human being. Starting from the evidence in the Symposium that Socrates himself was a phronimos and sophron person, I seek to show how Socratic ethics is centered on the thesis of the (1) identity of virtue and knowledge, which I articulate with the theme of (2) Socratic ignorance, and (3) the role of Socrates as an educator, to display how Socrates attempted to help people to improve themselves. In order to explore the core of Socratic moral thought, I take into account Penner’s explanation of Socratic intellectualism endorsing his description of what being good for a person means, but not following his conclusions. Then I argue that even if Socrates had held moral beliefs and been to a certain degree wise and virtuous, the moral knowledge, virtue, wisdom or the science of the good that only the gods completely master should not be ascribed to him. Socrates often made profession of ignorance. In the Apology , the knowledge that he admits to having and that makes him wiser than the others is “human wisdom”, that is, the recognition of his own ignorance and, in general, human ignorance about how to live well. Endowed with this self-knowledge, Socrates assumed the educational task to try to free people from the worst ignorance: not to know and to think that you know. Through philosophy practiced as examination by refutation ( elenchos ), he did his best to lead his fellows to self-knowledge, to take care of their souls, to dedicate themselves to phronesis , truth, and perfection of soul, in sum, to be prudent; this is the only way in which a person would do well, be good and happy. Keywords: Socrates, virtue, knowledge, being good.

Socratic Ignorance and Platonic Knowledge in the Dialogues of Plato, written by Sara Ahbel-Rappe

Socratic Ignorance and Platonic Knowledge in the Dialogues of Plato, written by Sara Ahbel-Rappe

Socratic Ignorance and Platonic Knowledge in the Dialogues of Plato by Sara Ahbel-Rappe

Reviewed by: Socratic Ignorance and Platonic Knowledge in the Dialogues of Plato by Sara Ahbel-Rappe Michael Erler Sara Ahbel-Rappe. Socratic Ignorance and Platonic Knowledge in the Dialogues of Plato. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2018. Pp. 296. Cloth, $90.00. Rappe's book argues for a "contemplative" understanding of Socrates and proposes to distinguish between an "outer Socrates," the one who strives for definitions and denies being wise, and an "inner Socrates," who exemplifies a wisdom that consists in self-investigation. The introduction, "Socratic Ignorance and Platonic Knowledge," presents Socrates as being part of the western "esoteric tradition"—as Rappe calls it—in so far as he stands for an initiation to philosophy that is in essence self-knowledge. According to Rappe, this esoteric tradition is not to be confused with dogmatic or ironic esotericism (as in, respectively, the Tübingen school's and Leo Strauss's readings), but stands for a "lived experience" (x). Nine chapters follow. Chapter 1 highlights some essential elements of what Rappe calls "Socratic philosophy" and shows in what sense virtue and self-knowledge are related. Chapter 2, "Socratic Receptions," discusses the "archaeology of Socratic representations" from Plato to Hellenistic times and suggests that there even is room for a Neoplatonic interpretation of the figure of Socrates. Chapter 3 discusses the problems that Charmides raises concerning the knowledge of knowledge and stresses the importance of focusing on the intellect as the essence of our true self. Chapter 4, "Euthydemus: Native and Foreign," deals with the practical implications of the concept of a knowledge of knowledge and describes how the elenchus of the dialogue helps to distinguish between what is 'me' and what is 'mine.' Chapter 5, "Alcibiades I: The mirror of Socrates," focuses on the 'self' as an essential in Socrates's performance in the dialogues. Chapter 6, "Lysis: The Aporetic Identity of the First Friend," identifies the proton philon in that dialogue as a form of the good and discusses its relation to the self, which—as Rappe claims—must be impersonal (Rappe draws here a comparison with the Upanishads.) Chapter 7, "From Virtues to Forms in the Phaedrus," discusses the myth of the discarnate soul and the importance of Socratic self-knowledge as condition for knowing the forms or ideas. In chapter 8, Rappe tries to show that, in Theaetetus, Plato promotes a Socratic concept of wisdom "free of all objects of knowledge" (xxi). She relates this "Socratic emptiness" with teachings of Buddhism. Chapter 9, centred on Parmenides and Apology, analyzes the Apollonian claim that he who knows that he has no wisdom is the wisest of all. Finally, the concluding part reminds the reader of the many facets of the persona of Socrates in the dialogues and argues that this persona functions as a paradigm and model for emulation. The questions that Rappe raises are interesting and her analyses are thought-provoking. One can easily agree with many theses in the book. Indeed, introspection and self-knowledge function as a leitmotif in the dialogues. Even the late Philebus regards the lack of ability to analyze and judge for oneself as the essence of the laughable, and the unmasking of this self-delusion, that is, the call for introspection, is the topic of many dialogues. It is also true that the puzzlement of the reader of the dialogues mirrors the puzzlement of Socrates's interlocutors. This puzzlement is meant to inspire him or her to start a self-investigation; it is therefore part of Socrates's philosophical caring for the soul (epimeleia tes psyches). Finally, it is right to stress the importance of Socrates's performance in the dialogues. Plato himself, one might add, suggests taking into account both the performative and the argumentative aspects of the dialogues: in Phaedo, the narrator is asked to tell both "what was said and what [End Page 339] was done" (58c). However, this means both that one should not separate the two aspects, and that one should not neglect the doctrinal part. I am not convinced that the "inner Socrates" stands for a "doctrinal emptiness." After all, Socrates claims that "invincible reasons" prove his thesis that no one errs willingly (Gorgias 509a...

Уявна зустріч при вході до храму Аполлона в Дельфах: самопізнання і самолюбність у Йогана Ґеорґа Гамана і Григорія Сковороди. Порівняльний аналіз

At First, the article analyses Hamann’s path to self-knowledge and self-love as a path of Socratic ignorance, which is indeed the highest form of knowledge. For Hamann Socrates is the predecessor of Christ, and Socratic ignorance (I know that I know nothing) is the path to divinization. Subsequently, it is pointed out, how Hryhorii Skovoroda explains the path of self-knowledge and self-love. To illustrate this thought, he makes use of the Ovidian Narcissus myth. Concerning the figure of Narcissus, Skovoroda distinguishes the following three aspects: 1. The Egyptian Narcissus, 2. The Hebraic Narcissus and 3. The Christian Narcissus, i.e. Jesus Christ. These three aspects and corresponding assertions of the Bible designate Skovoroda’s path to divinization. Finally, it points out similarities between Hamann’s and Skovoroda’s understanding of self-knowing and self-love and their fundamental impact for the philosophy of Franz von Baader and his criticism of modern subjectivism.

Schleiermacher in the Kierkegaardian Project: Between Socratic Ignorance and Second Immediacy

Abstract In this paper I identify Schleiermacher as an intermediary between the two stages of the religious set forth in Concluding Unscientific Postscript. Gesturing toward categories integral to the Kierkegaardian project at large, I also argue that he occupies a pivotal role between Socratic ignorance and second immediacy. These schemata uncover answers to a dilemma that has recently been articulated: whereas Kierkegaard administers highest praise to Schleiermacher at the beginning of his pseudonymous authorship, he becomes inexplicably hostile toward him at the end of his life and authorship.

The Bloomsbury companion to Socrates

List of Contributors Preface 1. The Quest for the Historical Socrates Robin Waterfield 2. Socratic Irony Iakovos Vasiliou 3. Socratic Philosophizing David Wolfsdorf 4. Socratric Metaphysics William J. Prior 5. Socratic Ignorance and Types of Knowledge Keith McPartland 6. The Priority of Definition Hugh H. Benson 7. Socratic Eudaimonism Naomi Reshotko 8. Socratic Moral Psychology Thomas C. Brickhouse and Nicholas D. Smith 9. Socrates on Love Suzanne Obdrzalek 10. Socrates' Political Philosophy Curtis N. Johnson 11. Socratic Theology and Piety Mark L. McPherran 12. Socrates' Religious Experiences John Bussanich 13. The Politics of Impiety: Why was Socrates Prosecuted by the Athenian Democracy? Mark Ralkowski Notes Bibliography Index

Hegel’s Revival of Socratic Ignorance

G. W. F. Hegel is stuck between a rock and a hard place in the history of moral philosophy. On one hand, he is frequently regarded as an infamous critic of Kantian moral individualism. From the standpoint of Kierkegaard's Socratic revival, Hegel is seen as ignoring or even suppressing the individual in favor of a 'systematic' form of philosophy. This paper addresses both criticisms by reconstructing Hegel's unique contribution to the history of moral philosophy. Refusing to reduce Hegel to a foil for either Kant or Kierkegaard reveals his own inheritance of a Socratic ethic. I argue that Hegel revives a long-suppressed form of moral and practical philosophy: the Bildung of one's self-understanding that involves both self-knowledge and self-transformation. Understanding the way in which Hegel resurrects and reinterprets this conception of moral philosophy requires that one pay attention to the close connection between his systematic method and his unique version of skepticism.

Whatever Became of the Socratic Elenchus? Philosophical Analysis in Plato

AbstractReaders who are introduced to philosophical analysis by reading the early Platonic dialogues may be puzzled to find that Plato, in his middle and late periods, largely abandons the style of analysis characteristic of early Plato, namely, the ‘Socratic elenchus’. This paper undertakes to solve the puzzle. In contrast to what is popularly called ‘the Socratic method’, the elenchus requires that Socrates, the lead investigator, not have a satisfactory answer to his ‘What is F‐ness?’ question. Here is the bind. Part of what motivates the elenctic inquiry is the natural assumption that one cannot identify F‐things unless one has a satisfactory analysis of what it is to be F. But to test the adequacy of suggested analyses of F‐ness one needs to be able to identify counterexamples. Together these two points present us with a ‘catch‐22’, which is something the ‘paradox of inquiry’ in the Meno brings out. In the Theaetetus Plato makes clear that, although the elenchus, including Socratic ignorance, can refute philosophical theses arrived at by other means, it cannot, by itself, give birth to viable philosophical theses. Its legitimate role is therefore only propaedeutic.

O Sócrates de Platão e os limites do intelectualismo na ética

Minha intenção é a de mostrar como uma leitura cética dos diálogos socráticos de Platão permite explicar alguns impasses nos quais resulta a interpretação dogmática desses diálogos. Enumero aqui, de maneira programática, os elementos que permitirão sustentar que, nos diálogos de juventude, Platão desenvolveu uma lógica que conduz a uma posição forte sobre os limites do conhecimento e do intelectualismo. Essa interpretação se inspira em traços dominantes do ceticismo de Arcesilau (séc. III a.C.). Mostrarei como os diálogos de Platão podem ser lidos como a inspiração por trás da posição de Arcesilau quando este afirma que seria preciso suspender o julgamento e, na falta de certeza, seguir o que é razoável (eulogon). De uma parte, o estudo do estatuto paradoxal da ignorância socrática e do papel do oráculo na Apologia permite discernir o funcionamento de uma lógica propícia a gerar aporias. De outra parte, a análise do problema da virtude-ciência no Protágoras e no Laques permite exibir os mecanismos de uma argumentação cuja conclusão é a impossibilidade de defender hic e nunc uma ética estritamente intelectualista.

The End of History

The theory of the end of history suggests that radical social and political change has reached its dialectical conclusion in the globalization of neo-liberal capitalism and that reformism is now key to the modification of problematic social relations. Given that the critique of global economy remains more or less absent from the reformists’ account, it is unlikely that this strategy will ever produce social justice. In the first section of the article I use Donald Rumsfeld’s theory of knowledge and non-knowledge to show how contemporary reformism misrecognizes the essential relationship between economy and social and political inequality. This discussion leads to the conclusion that the problem with the contemporary politics of reformism resides in their realism and consequent lack of imagination and raises the question of the revolutionary potential of a politics of idiocy. Finally the notion of Socratic ignorance is employed to think about a new form of political hope to oppose the contemporary hegemony of the politics of reformism that shield neoliberalism from revolutionary critique.

The Morality of Wonder: A Positive Interpretation of Socratic Ignorance

This essay argues that there are several positive aspects of Socratic ignorance which have received insufficient scholarly attention: that Socrates’ claim not to have knowledge of the ‘highest things’ raises the possibility that there is a body of truth to be discovered along these lines; that this possibility invigorates Socrates with a sense of wonder; and that several specific moral requirements can be generated from wonder and the knowledge of one’s ignorance.

The Virtues of Socratic Ignorance

Plato's Socrates denies that he knows. Yet he frequently claims that he does have certainty and knowledge. How can he avoid contradiction between his general stance about knowledge (that he lacks it) and his particular claims to have it?Socrates' disavowal of knowledge is central to his defence in theApology. For here he rebuts the accusation that he teaches – and thus corrupts – the young by telling the jury that he cannot teach just because he knows nothing. Hence his disavowal of knowledge is important to Socrates. Why does he make this claim? And how then can he justify engaging in any philosophical activity at all?

Socratic Inquiry and PoliticsSocrates and the State. Richard KrautTimes Literary Supplement. Gregory Vlastos

Richard Kraut's important and impressive book is the best available discussion of the Crito and of Socrates' political views and, in several ways, the best available book on Socrates. It consists of three parts of unequal length. Chapters 1-6 discuss the speech of the Laws in the Crito and their arguments to show why Socrates ought to obey the verdict of the court that has condemned him to death. Chapter 7 discusses Socrates' attitude to democracy in relation to his general political outlook. Chapter 8 discusses the nature and extent of Socratic ignorance. One of the questions in chapter 7 is raised by the Crito, but the arguments of this chapter are independent of those of the first six. The arguments of chapters 6 and 7 are more closely connected, and I will comment on the connections below. Discussion of the Crito occupies two-thirds of the book. But the last two chapters are especially provocative and important and are more tersely written than the first six; so I will comment fairly fully on some aspects of them, while omitting some details of Kraut's account of the Crito.