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WORKSHOP III: Socratic Method

By Don Finkel

Divide up into groups of six (six is the minimum). As usual, appoint a scribe and a clock-watcher. The scribe should be prepared to make a formal presentation to the class during Part III after lunch.

Part I (70 minutes)

For Part I the group of six must subdivide into pairs. Each pair will work on a separate dialogue from the following: Laches, Euthyphro, Republic I. During Part II, the group of six will re-form, share the results of their work, and work together on further questions.

Divide into pairs based on your preference for working on one of the three dialogues. One member of the pair should be a scribe, the other a clock-watcher. The scribe will report the results to the group of six.

1. (40 minutes) Individually, read through your notes, underlinings, and marginalia for the dialogue you are working on with an eye to detecting the crucial features of "Socratic method." By "Socratic method," I mean what Socrates does with his interlocutors--the characteristic "moves" he makes, the typical questions or kinds of questions he poses, the typical responses or kinds of responses he gives, his tactics and strategy. As you read your notes and underlinings, make new notes which extract the features of Socrates' method in this dialogue.

Now, working together, generate a list of the crucial features of method contained in your dialogue. For each item on the list, note one passage from the dialogue which illustrates it (include the Stephanus number and a sentence or two which describes the passage).

2. (10 minutes) (a) Re-arrange the items on your list to put them in the order which will make for the clearest presentation of your conception of Socratic method (in this dialogue) to a larger group.

(b) Add whatever general principles or comments are necessary to supplement your list, so that the list (with illustrations) and general comments together will constitute a structural description of your conception of Socrates' method in this dialogue.

3. (10 minutes) Read over the structural description of method you have just created. Based on this description--and only this description, what seem to be Socrates' aims? That is, what are the end or ends for which this method is the means?

4. (5 minutes) Temporarily forget your answer to question 3 above. In thinking about this dialogue as a whole, and the impression it made on you when you read it, what seemed to be Socrates' aim or aims in this dialogue?

5. (5 minutes) Compare your answers to questions 3 and 4 above, and refine, if necessary, your answer to 3 in the light of your answer to 4.

Part II (45 minutes)

Re-group with the two other pairs from your group of six. Remind each other who was selected to be the scribe and who the clock-watcher for the group.

1. (20 minutes) Each pair present their structural description (their answers to questions 2 and 5, using the illustrations from question 1 to flesh out the response to 2). After each of the three presentations, the other four members should ask questions of clarification until they are clear on the pair's conception of Socrates' method in the dialogue in question.

2. (15 minutes) Based on what is common or what seems most significant in the three structural descriptions of method that you have, generate a new structural description of Socratic method, general enough to fit all three dialogues. As before, the description should include an ordered list of items, whatever general principles or comments are necessary to round out the description, and, in addition, the one best textual illustration for each item (drawn from the earlier research in Part I), Your scribe will be presenting this description (as well as the response to question 3 below) to the whole class during Part III.

LUNCH BREAK: It should now be about noon. Take an hour for lunch and be back in Lib. 2116 by 1:00.

Part III (90 minutes)

1. (1 hour) Each of the groups will present their structural description of Socratic method to the class and answer questions of clarification. We will then compare the different descriptions and see how much commonality there is among them, looking also for interesting differences.

2. (30 minutes) Questions for class discussion:

a. [5 minute pause to review Ion]: Is there anything that Socrates does in the Ion that should lead us to add to or modify our conception of Socratic method?

b. [5 minute pause to review Euthydemus]: Is there anything that Socrates does in the Euthydemus that should lead us to add to or modify our conception of Socratic method?

c. [5 minute pause to review Apology]: How does our conception of Socratic method square with the Apology? That is, to what degree and in what ways does Socrates' account of his life and "work" accord with what we have seen him doing in five dialogues?