Sócrates, nacido en Atenas hacia el 469 antes de nuestra era, es considerado la figura que cambió por completo la historia de la filosofía. Solo has de ver cómo lo hemos situado las generaciones posteriores. Hemos creado un antes y un después radical.
All schools and earlier thinkers are known as the pre-Socratics. They have nothing in common. They are illustrious mathematicians like Pythagoras or thinkers such as Thales of Miletus. But Socrates, so to speak, changed the rules of the game. He gave philosophy its very purpose.
Until then, thinkers tackled all kinds of scientific topics, such as celestial movements, distances, or the composition of matter. It was already a step forward. Before the appearance of the first philosophers or sages, everything was left to the decisions and actions of the gods. Now, at least, other origins or explanations were sought through reason.
But it was Socrates who took an interest in a more worldly line of thought, focused on the here and now of the matters that affect us as a society. But mind you, worldly doesn’t mean easy. It doesn’t mean the topics were trivial. They were issues that affect us far more directly.
La filosofía baja a la tierra
“Socrates was the first to bring philosophy down from the heavens, to place it in the cities, to introduce it into households as well, and to compel it to deal with life and manners, with good and evil,” summarised the philosopher Cicero, almost four centuries later.
The Romans, great absorbers who knew how to take in and adapt all Greek culture, knew and revered the figure of Socrates. Through them, who translated the master’s disciples, such as Plato and Xenophon, we have been able to know his work, since Socrates himself wrote not a single line.
It is said, at the very least, that his appearance was peculiar, which led many to mock him. But he possessed such an intellect that he could dismantle any argument put forward against him. He spent his days interrogating his fellow citizens. “The unexamined life is not worth living,” he would say. Through those questions and counterquestions to their answers, he makes them see that what they believed with such certainty is not so.
His method of questioning is so robust that it remains unaltered. Today philosophers, psychologists, and the scientific world continue to regard the Socratic method as a source of inspiration and as a means of approaching truth. This is explained in the book The Practical Philosophy of the Classical Thinkers (Editorial Kairós), where its authors emphasise how useful it can be for us.
The Sage Who Knew Nothing
In the book, one of Socrates’ most famous stories is revived. The disciple Chaerephon had gone to the Oracle of Delphi to ask the priestess whether there was anyone more intelligent than Socrates. The priestess told him there was not.
When Chaerephon related this to Socrates, he was surprised by the answer and wanted to verify its truth. So he began asking his fellow citizens if they were more intelligent.
He started with a politician famed for his wisdom. When, from his answers, he demonstrated that he did not know as much as he claimed—and he told him so (Socrates was a bit of a windbag)—the other almost beat him to a pulp.
From there, Socrates concedes that he is at least wiser than that politician. “I for one admit that I know nothing; this man does not even know that he does not know,” he is said to have proclaimed. It has since popularised the expression “I only know that I know nothing,” which, while not literally spoken in any dialogue, well summarises his thinking.
And this forms the basis of his method. Socrates begins from his supposed ignorance to question others and have them tell him what they think on any topic. Socrates treats everything: virtue, justice, piety, love, friendship, good governance…
Socrates Begets a Great School
Cicero, in the treatise with which we opened the article, explains that he was struck by Socrates’ way of arguing, the variety of topics, and the power of his mind. That way of conversing, especially as immortalised by Plato, opened the door to many philosophical schools.
One could say that with Socrates arrives one of the earliest divisions of science. He moves away from explaining nature and focuses more on language, ethics, and civic life. He asks us how to live and does so with uncomfortable questions, questions that force us to rethink our answers.
The philosopher Fernando Savater, one of our guiding voices today, has repeatedly argued that philosophy, when it truly matters, arises from everyday perplexities: what happens to us and we do not understand, what we argue about, what we fear, what we desire.
That great path we continue to ask ourselves about today — what does it mean to be just, to be brave, or decently so? — began with Socrates’ first great step.
