Socrates: How To Not Buckle Under Pressure
How to feel confident in ourselves in even the most devastating storm
Socrates sided with what he believed to be true rather than what he knew would be popular. Indeed, speaking to the jury that would convict him of impiety and ‘corrupting the young’, he stated:
“You know that I am not going to alter my conduct, not even if I have to die a hundred deaths”
The philosopher did not buckle before unpopularity and the condemnation of the state. He did not retract his thoughts because others had complained. Philosophy had supplied Socrates with convictions in which he had been able to have rational, as opposed to hysterical, confidence when faced with disapproval.
And so he met his end in an Athenian jail, his death a defining moment in the history of philosophy.
What can we learn from Socrates and how can we improve our lives?
What prevents us from knowing the truth?
- It is not only the hostility of others that may prevent us from questioning the status quo. Our will to doubt can just be as powerfully sapped by an internal sense that societal conventions must have a sound basis because they have been adhered to by a great many people for a long time.
- Other people may be wrong because they absorb the prevailing norms without testing their logic, not examining their beliefs logically.
- We follow the flock because we cannot conceive of ourselves as pioneers of hitherto unknown, difficult truths.
- We associate what is popular with what is right.
“In conversations, my priority was to be liked, rather than to speak the truth. A desire to please led me to laugh at modest jokes like a parent on the opening night of a school play… I did not publicly doubt ideas to which the majority was committed. I sought the approval of figures of authority and after encounters with them, worried at length whether they had thought me acceptable.” — Alain de Botton.
How relatable is this? For Socrates to face widespread ridicule and then to stay true to what he believed the truth is remarkable.
Key lessons
- What is declared obvious and ‘natural’ is rarely so. Statements should be analysed thoroughly.
- Errors in our thought and way of life can at no point and in no way ever be proven simply by the fact that we have run into opposition. What should worry us is not the number of people who oppose us, but how good their reasons are for doing so. Divert attention from the presence of unpopularity to the reasons for it.
- This does not mean there is a connection between being hated by the majority and being right. Instead, the validity of an idea or action is determined not by whether it is widely believed or widely reviled but by whether it obeys the rule of logic.
How to apply in your life
Socrates did only intend to help people conceive that others may be wrong but he offered a method — The Socratic Method of Thinking — by which we ourselves can determine what is right. This method lies in the idea that a correct statement is one incapable of being rationally contradicted.
The Method (Socratic Questioning)
- Locate a statement confidently described as common sense.
For example, being virtuous requires money (when Socrates was alive)
Acting courageously involves not retreating in battle
2. Imagine that the statement is false. Search for situations where the statement would not be true.
Could one ever have money and not be virtuous?
Could one ever have no money and be virtuous?
Could one ever be courageous and yet retreat in battle?
Could one ever stay firm in battle and yet not be courageous?
3. If an exception is found, the definition must be false or at least imprecise.
It is possible to have money and be a crook
It is possible to be poor and virtuous
It is possible to be courageous and retreat
It is possible to stay firm in battle yet not be courageous.
4. The initial statement must be nuanced to take the exception into account.
People who have money can be described as virtuous only if they have acquired it in a virtuous way. Likewise, some people with no money can be virtuous when they have lived through situations where it was impossible to be virtuous and make money.
Acting courageously can involve both retreat and advance in battle.
5. If one subsequently finds exceptions to the improved statements, the process should be repeated. The truth lies in a statement which seems impossible to disprove. Socrates believed that the product of thought is superior to the product of intuition. It is by finding out what something is not that one comes closest to understanding what it is.
Conclusion
Socrates’ method of thinking promises us a way to develop opinions in which we could, even if confronted with a storm, feel veritable confidence. Even when facing the frightening prospect that someone holds us to be wrong, we can take time to look behind the criticism and ask ourselves on what basis has this observation been made?
It seems that to divert attention from the presence of criticism to the reasons for it is the shift that is of most importance. In following the Socratic method we can dissect our beliefs, thinking of the objections to our position logically. Thus, we can no longer be silenced by impressive figures or proposing limply that we feel we are right without being able to explain why. We can come tantalisingly closer to the truth.
Day 9/30 Article Writing Challenge.
Check out Alain De Botton’s The Consolations of Philosophy which takes philosophy back to its roots: helping us save our lives.
