My name is Christina Hendricks, and I
teach philosophy at the University of
British Columbia in Vancouver, BC in
Canada. In this video I'll be explaining
some of the historical and political
background for Socrates and Plato to
help you better understand Plato's
dialogues.
This is video 2 of a 2-part series so
you might want to take a look at the
first video first. Socrates and Plato
lived through a war between Athens and
its allies, and another city state called
Sparta and its allies. The history of
this is important for understanding why
Socrates was put on trial and executed
by Athens. There were many ups and downs
in the war and some people in Athens
were critical of democracy because they
felt that it was too inconsistent, with
policies going one way and then another
as votes were swayed by rhetoric. Athens
finally lost to Sparta in 404 BCE. When
Athens lost the war a new government was
set up by Sparta called
the thirty tyrants. The thirty tyrants
were made up of people who were against
democracy and wanted to set up a rule by
a few, such as there was in Sparta at the
time. They executed some proponents of
democracy (over 1,000 people), took lands
from others. Many Democrats left Athens
during this time. Some of the thirty were
relatives of Plato, and Plato himself was
not a fan of democracy.
He thought that states should be run by
people who know how to run them, not
everyday citizens. Still he did not agree
with the thirty tyrants and criticized
them later. After only nine months the
thirty tyrants were overthrown by exiled
Democrats and democracy was restored in
Athens in 403 BCE. As stated in the first
video, Socrates seems to have walked
around Athens engaging people in
philosophical conversations, but the way
he went about this probably angered
people. In the dialogue called Euthyphro
you can see that he asks people to tell
them their views about something and
then he shows what is wrong with those
views, which probably made people angry.
It's important to remember that the
dialogues we're reading, though, are
fictional;
they were written by Plato and probably
didn't take place
as he wrote them. Still it may have been
that Socrates really did act like that.
In 399 BCE Socrates was put on trial in
Athens. The official charges were impiety
and corruption of the youth. Impiety
meant that he was charged with not
worshiping the same gods as the official
gods of the city. The corruption of the
youth charge could have referred to him
teaching young people false gods or
could have referred to him corrupting
them in other ways. In the account of his
trial written by Plato, Socrates says
that he went around the city questioning
the leaders of society and showing that
they weren't as wise as they thought
they were. And since young people would
follow him around and do the same, this
could be one way people thought Socrates
corrupted the youth. In addition Socrates
may have been thought anti-democratic.
One of the thirty tyrants was a student
of his, and one of his close friends was
a traitor to Athens--giving information
to Sparta. There's also historical
evidence that Socrates didn't think
people who know nothing about ruling
should have a say in government. At the
time of Socrates trial Athens was only a
few years past the rule of thirty
tyrants and democracy may have still
been seen as quite fragile; perhaps some
people were worried that his great
social influence on the young could have
included anti democracy. Though exactly
why Socrates was put on trial and
convicted is not historically certain,
what is certain is that after his
conviction he was executed by the state.
He drank a poison called hemlock and
died in prison. Thanks to Plato and a few
other philosophers, though Socrates'
philosophical activities and views have
continued on, and he's still considered a
very important figure in the history of
Western philosophy.
