influences of socratic philosophy on western civilization

A detailed Summary of influences of socratic philosophy on western civilization

In today's modern world, much of our own culture's beliefs and

morals are directly due to the impact of Socratic philosophy on

European thinkers, and therefore our own in the western world. This

philosophy, was based upon the thoughts of Socrates, who was an

Athenian philosopher and possibly the most enigmatic figure in the

To begin, after about 450 B.C., Athens was considered the cultural

center of the Greek world, and from then on, Athenian philosophy

took a new direction. In the past, the Greek world had experienced

ideas presented by the natural philosophers (or pre-Socratic, since

they were born before Socrates), which were the earliest Greek

philosophers, and were mainly concerned with the natural or physical

world and it's processes. This concept gives the pre-Socratics a

central position in the history of science.

After the pre-Socratics, emerged the sophists, whose name meant

in definition, "wise and informed people". The sophists were a group

of itinerant teachers and philosophers from the Greek hellas who

flocked to Athens, where they made a living by teaching the citizens

of Athens for money. Socrates himself had long been accused of

objective would be to allow his opponents to recognize the

man that an entire period of philosophy has is referred to as

appointed know-it-all", who took money for teachings which did not

questioned for 2,400 years. He would however not be the first or last

must lay in man's ability to reason. He therefore developed the

real understanding came from within, and cannot be imparted by

a rationalist. This concept was and is very influential to western

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Category: History

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