Study On Socrates And Sophists

No matter how maverick Socrates was, he was often mistaken for a sophist during his lifetime. However, after the unremitting efforts of his disciple, Plato, Socrates had gradually gotten rid of the identity of a sophist, and he was finally placed as the opposite of sophists. The result is that there has been a striking contrast between the notoriety of sophists and the immortality of Socrates from the era of Plato. Although many scholars of later generations including Hegel, such great philosopher, have tried to rehabilitate sophists, the differences between Socrates and sophists can still not be blotted out. In this paper, the essential differences between Socrates and sophists(esp. the educational objective) are intensively being studied based on the similarities between them.Except for the introduction and closing words, this article is mainly divided in five sections. Chapter one is the analysis of the Socrates in Aristophanes’ the clouds. Chapter two and three roughly discuss what has Socrates done and what have sophists done, respectively. Chapter four is the discussion of the similarities between Socrates and sophists which is on two aspects, one common topic about language and the educational method. The most vital part of this whole article, the chapter five, is the essential differences between Socrates and sophists, including the educational method, whether the virtues can be imparted or not, the educational objective and the influence.Being different from any other comparisons, this article starts with the view of Aristophanes, a celebrated comic poet lived in the contemporary with Socrates, instead of directly starting with the theme of comparison. The article studies Socrates by citing the classical comedy, the clouds, as the starting point of the whole article, and then gets down to the comparative analysis between what Socrates did and sophists did. This paper does not completely deny the historical significance of sophists. It also gives sophists appropriate affirmations and then based on them gets down to the comparison. But what I would like to point out is that this paper is still committed to find out and study the essential differences between Socrates and sophists.