Socratic Quotes

• Novels are the Socratic dialogues of our time. Practical wisdom fled from school wisdom into this liberal form.

  Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel

  Wisdom, School, Form

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• The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.

  Socrates

  Life, Wisdom, Being Yourself

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• The pre-Socratic Greek philosopher Parmenides taught that the only things that are real are things which never change... and the pre-Socratic Greek philosopher Heraclitus taught that everything changes. If you superimpose their two views, you get this result: Nothing is real.

  Philip K. Dick

  Real, Views, Two

  Philip K. Dick (1995). “The Shifting Realities of Philip K. Dick: Selected Literary and Philosophical Writings”, Vintage

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• The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.

  Socrates

  Wise, Wisdom, Philosophy

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• Think not those faithful who praise all thy words and actions, but those who kindly reprove thy faults.

  Socrates

  Faith, Wisdom, Thinking

  Socrates, Plato, Aristotle (1967). “Wit and Wisdom of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle: Being a Treasury of Thousands of Glorious, Inspiring and Imperishable Thoughts, Views and Observations of the Three Great Greek Philosophers, Classified Under about Four Hundred Subjects for Comparative Study”

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• I am a conservative. Quite possibly I am on the losing side; often I think so. Yet, out of a curious perversity I had rather lose with Socrates, let us say, than win with Lenin.

  Russell Kirk

  Winning, Thinking, Sides

  Russell Kirk (2014). “The Essential Russell Kirk: Selected Essays”, p.59, Open Road Media

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  He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have.

  Socrates

  Inspirational, Life, Happiness

  Socrates, Plato, Aristotle (1967). “Wit and Wisdom of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle: Being a Treasury of Thousands of Glorious, Inspiring and Imperishable Thoughts, Views and Observations of the Three Great Greek Philosophers, Classified Under about Four Hundred Subjects for Comparative Study”

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• Socratic question: all plans? Some? Which ones? How do they do so?

  Will Evans

  Entrepreneur, Plans

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• There are two threats to reason, the opinion that one knows the truth about the most important things and the opinion that there is no truth about them. Both of these opinions are fatal to philosophy; the first asserts that the quest for truth is unnecessary, while the second asserts that it is impossible. The Socratic knowledge of ignorance, which I take to be the beginning point of all philosophy, defines the sensible middle ground between two extremes.

  Allan Bloom

  Philosophy, Ignorance, Two

  "Giants and Dwarfs". Book by Allan Bloom. Chapter: "Western Civ," p. 18, 1990.

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  The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less.

  Socrates

  Motivational, Happiness, Freedom

  "Way of the Peaceful Warrior: A Book that Changes Lives". Book by Dan Millman, p. 162, 2006.

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• As I went through 'This Progress,' one of two performance pieces by Tino Sehgal that transform Frank Lloyd Wright's emptied-out spiral into a dreamy Socratic-purgatorial journey, the museum literally fell away. I was suspended in some weird nonspace.

  Jerry Saltz

  Journey, Museums, Two

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• The Socratic demonstration of the ultimate unity of tragic and comic drama is forever lost. But the proof is in the art of Chekhov.

  George Steiner

  Art, Drama, Forever

  George Steiner (1980). “The death of tragedy”, Oxford University Press, USA

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• Socrates ... is the first philosopher of life [Lebensphilosoph], ... Thinking serves life, while among all previous philosophers life had served thought and knowledge. ... Thus Socratic philosophy is absolutely practical: it is hostile to all knowledge unconnected to ethical implications.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Philosophy, Thinking, Firsts

  "The Pre-Platonic Philosophers". Book by Friedrich Nietzsche, G. Whitlock trans., June 5, 2006.

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• Next, to make them expert in the usefullest points of grammar; and withal to season them and win them early to the love of virtue and true labour, ere any flattering seducement or vain principle seize them wandering, some easy and delightful book of education would be read to them; whereof the Greeks have store, as Cebes, Plutarch, and other Socratic discourses.

  John Milton

  Children, Book, Winning

  John Milton, James Augustus St. John, Charles Richard Sumner (1872). “The Prose Works of John Milton ...: With a Preface, Preliminary Remarks, and Notes”, p.468

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• The Socratic maxim that the recognition of our ignorance is the beginning of wisdom has profound significance for our understanding of society. Most of the advantages of social life, especially in the more advanced forms that we call "civilization" rest on the fact that the individual benefits from more knowledge than he is aware of. It might be said that civilization begins when the individual in the pursuit of his ends can make use of more knowledge than he has himself acquired and when he can transcend the boundaries of his ignorance by profiting from knowledge he does not himself possess.

  Friedrich August von Hayek

  Ignorance, Civilization, Profound

  "The Constitution of Liberty". Book by Friedrich Hayek, Part I. The Value of Freedom, Chap. 2 : The Creative Power of a Free Civilization, 1960.

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• The Socratic manner is not a game at which two can play.

  Max Beerbohm

  Games, Play, Two

  'Zuleika Dobson' (1911) ch. 15

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• I always say I have a Socratic approach to most things that I do. I pummel people with questions, because I need to know what they're thinking, what they're trying to achieve, what they believe the final outcome is going to be.

  Tim Gunn

  Believe, Thinking, People

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• Contemporary philosophy illustrates Hegel's dictum that philosophy is its own time apprehended in thought, for in our age philosophy yields to the objectifying technical impulse and loses its ancient task of pursuing the Socratic ideal of the wisdom of the examined life.

  Donald Phillip Verene

  Philosophy, Yield, Age

  "Philosophy and the Return to Self-Knowledge". Book by Donald Phillip Verene, 1997.

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• There was a Socratic style of life (which the Cynics were to imitate), and the Socratic dialogue was an exercise which brought Socrates' interlocutor to put himself in question, to take care of himself, and to make his soul as beautiful and wise as possible.

  Pierre Hadot

  Beautiful, Wise, Exercise

  "La Philosophie comme manière de vivre: Entretiens avec Jeannie Carlier et Arnold I. Davidson" by Pierre Hadot, Jeannie Carlier, Arnold I. Davidson, Paris: Albin Michel, translated by Michael Chase, (p. 269), 2001.

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• I have a very Socratic approach - I pummel the designers with questions, so when I get them to step back from the work and look at it with me, they'll eventually see what I see, coming to it fresh and unencumbered. That's always very gratifying because they feel a responsibility and an ownership of a solution.

  Tim Gunn

  Responsibility, Steps, Looks

  "Tim Gunn and Cat Deeley on Good Hosts, Bad Reality Shows and Unfair Judges". Interview with Debra Birnbaum, variety.com. August 5, 2014.

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• Philosophy is an odd thing... There is no particular Socratic or Dimechian or Kantian way to live your life. They don't offer ethical codes and standards by which to live your life.

  Stephen Fry

  Philosophy, Live Your Life, Odd Things

  "Big Think Interview With Stephen Fry". bigthink.com. December 8, 2009.

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• Regard your good name as the richest jewel yoou can possibly be possessed of.

  Socrates

  Jewels, Names, Advice

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• The only analogy I have before me is Socrates. My task is a Socratic task, to revise the definition of what it is to be a Christian. For my part I do not call myself a "Christian" (thus keeping the ideal free), but I am able to make it evident that the others are still less than I.

  Soren Kierkegaard

  Christian, Tasks, Analogies

  Soren Kierkegaard (1959). “Attack Upon 'Christendom'”

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• Mann's Death in Venice actually contains a snippet of philosophy about the second question, when Aschenbach, collapsed in the plaza, engages in his quasi-Socratic, anti-Socratic, ruminations.

  Philip Kitcher

  Philosophy, Venice, Rumination

  Source: www.3ammagazine.com

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• Once in while a teacher may make a recommendation, it is usually after going through the basic Socratic method of trying to get people to figure it out themselves. A good teacher challenges your mind, your intellect, and your spirit.

  Frederick Lenz

  Teacher, People, Challenges

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