Socrates (c.470-399 B.C.) could usually be hound in the marketplace, teaching groups of young Athenian men. He taught by asking questions, not by lecturing, and all of his questions were meant to get his students to think more deeply about their ideas and beliefs. Most people, he thought, pretended to know much more than they really did. Socrates like to shock his listeners by declaring that he was the wisest man in Greece But then he went on to explain that he was "wisest" because he was the only one wise enough to know that he didn't really know anything.
A lovable man and a brilliant teacher, Socrates attracted many students. But he also made many enemies, including the parents of some of his students (who didn't like it when their children started to question them). In the year 399 B.C., he was put on trial, charged with corrupting young people and disbelieving in the gods of the city. Socrates might have told the court, "that daily to discourse about virtue .. is the greatest good of man, and that the examined life is not worth living." Socrates was found guilty and sentenced to death He was put in prison and ordered to commit suicide by drinking a powerful poison. Surrounded by his heartbroken students, Socrates carried out this act with great courage and calmness.
Socrates never wrote down his own thoughts and ideas. They have come down to us because one of his students, Plate (c 428-348 B.C), wrote about them. Inspired by Socrates, Plate went on to become a great philosopher - some would say the greatest form of two or more people talking to one another. In most of these dialogues, the main speaker is Socrates (although we do not know for certain which ideas in the dialogues are Socrates' and which are Plato's.)
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