PHIL 101L Notes

Socrates
 470-399 BC
 Born in Athens
 “1st western world philosopher”
 Fought war
 Question the wisdom of people
 Plato's mentor
 Renaissance brought return of philosophy and hunt for knowledge
 “True wisdom is the knowledge of how little you know”
 Martyr for cause of truth
 Apology of Socrates- Plato's account of Socrates' defense at trial
 Apology = defense
 Socrates-Plato-Aristotle-Alexander the Great
 Citizens had legally enforced religious duties (ancient Greece)
 Socrates had daimon
 Socratic method- ask person questions until they say a contradiction proving they don’t
know what they claim to know
 “I am wiser than that fellow because neither of us, I dare say, knows anything of great
value, but he thinks he knows a thing when he doesn’t.”
 Unexamined life is not worth living



How philosophy can save your life
 How ancient Greek philosophy inspired modern CBT, how through CBT people have
access to the therapeutic wisdom of ancient Greeks
 Anxiety from drug use early on
 CBT invented by American psychologist Albert Ellis from New York
o Trained as a Freudian psychoanalyst in the 1950s
o Looked for other ways to understand emotion