The Awakening Page 2

Socrates developed his own process of reasoning that stressed such things as the importance of fully examining a situation before acting and following an argument where it leads. This form of thinking was foreign to Athenians at the time; after all, Socrates was accused and convicted of corrupting the youth with his teachings. In The Clouds, Aristophanes portrayed Socrates as an eccentric and crazy man, claiming Socrates' thinkery examined things such as how many of its own feet a flea could jump, how it was easier to think in a hanging basket, and how thunder and farting were closely related. The Clouds provides a good indication of how Athenians viewed Socrates' teaching and reason through Aristophanis' depiction of Socrates. Aristophanies definitely does not portray Socrates in a sophisticated way. The Athenians were critical of his teachings; the negative depiction confirms that he had a new way of thinking that had never been seen before, thus it was easy to make fun of. These revolutionary teachings that opposed tradition and promoted thinking for oneself were not widely excepted and eventually led to accusations such as corrupting the youth.

In the Apology, Plato wrote about the trial of Socrates. Socrates' public portrayal of his speaking ability and reasoning was the first time he had the opportunity to have an effect on a large portion of the Athenians. Since his method had no standard to judge by, their was no concrete evidence of who was right or wrong. Socrates' was in a situation of where he could only refute rather than positively defend his methods. Although he lacked a true argument, he was able to sway some with his gifted ability to speak. The jurors were warned that he had "clever" speaking tactics (Apology, 63). After Socrates claimed that "I am not a clever speaker at all", he preceded to shoot a whirlwind of reasoned and logical statements to completely discount Meletus' accusation (Apology, 63). For example, he makes Meletus look like a fool when he gets him to claim that he alone was responsible for corrupting the youth. He also gets Meletus to say that he voluntarily corrupts the youth.

He then followed up by saying that if he did it voluntarily, he would, "risk getting back something bad," and that he should be corrected rather than punished (Apology, 75). Socrates seemed to have his defense under control, but then why was he not acquitted? He could only refute what others said because his methods were too general to argue for and had no true standard teachings that could be argued over. If his methods of following an argument and fully evaluating a situation stood true, he should have been able to convince the jury to let him go or at least not be sentenced to death.

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