Many are tempted to think of Socratic dialogue itself as the art of dialectic, and to some extent, it is. Socratic dialogue is a form of dialectic thinking, but dialectic thinking is not merely Socratic dialogue, as some have surmised. But it is the beginning, and even this dialectic art does not get its due in academia.
While practically every course you will take in college will draw some of its legitimacy or origin from the ancient Greeks, few (if any) actually practice the art the ancients taught. > While academics are quite fond of > calling their method ‘Socratic’ - as if to add an air of moral > legitimacy to their teaching (even as they sometimes twist that method to > their own ends that usually have less to do with advancing truth > than advancing their authority over students). Questioning the authority of so many > experts is practically unheard of, even in graduate programs where > one might expect it, let alone in undergraduate programs, > where there is too often a virtual dearth of true dialectic dialogue.
And not only is this postmodern conundrum unnecessary, but seen holistically, ecologically, the diversity of our perspectives would prove to be our greatest blessing. Dialectic reasoning understands that two heads are > better than one for the same reason that two eyes perceive depth that one eye alone cannot. In a world so hostile to relativism, the fact that we all see the same world differently is made to seem the source of so much conflict, rather than the rich source of deeper understanding it could be...if we took to heart what this master science – “the science of all sciences,” Socrates called it - what the ancients were actually trying to teach.
It’s always seemed strange to me that I got all the way to college not knowing what a fallacy is. But it’s beyond strange – suspect even – that my students still make it all the way to my class in the small northern Wisconsin community college where I teach philosophy, with almost no idea that there is a difference in good and bad reasoning, in sense and nonsense, or even in truth and deceit (especially since a good portion of their education comes by way of media, advertising, and public relations campaigns). Naturally, our young respond to this with what Socrates calls misology and misanthropy[1] - the generalized distrust of both ideas and people that comes of hearing false things too often called true. When young minds are educated by way of words used in less than true senses (e.g. love as desire, friendship as mutual exploitation, intelligence as mere calculation, etc.), they understandably lose heart, and can suffer lifelong cynicism. Philosophy is well aware of the power of true words, but words used badly can as easily lead to evil as to good. Meanwhile, we’ve given them none of the tools to defend against the manipulation of empty rhetoric, and then we wonder why we’re all so confused and even depressed, steeped in BS as we are.
And since empty rhetoric is unlikely to better anyone’s condition,[2] we can’t help but give our young just what we got - which is virtually no exercise in using the mind for what it’s really good for! Even logic – a skill with which we are born, is short-shrifted as a tool of manipulating truth, so they learn to argue only to win, rather than to understand or be understood. They may not even realize when they’re lying or being lied to, because they probably don’t ‘believe in’ truth at all. So how could they tell the difference is the mere appearance of something, and the real thing? And then, as if to deliberately fix this habit into permanence, we say this is human nature – as if it has nothing to do with how we’ve been educated.
Socrates scolded the sophists who teach this way for fighting over words “like puppies fight over meat,” and turn young minds off to ideas altogether, and actually “make them hate the whole business when they get older."[3] He himself would have been turned off, he says, if he hadn’t had "so deep a passion" as to adhere him to the exercise of philosophic inquiry all his life.[4]
On Intelligence and the Difference in Being Smart and Wise
Which brings us ultimately to a rethinking of what ‘intelligence’ really means; what is the difference in being ‘smart’ and being ‘wise’? Since anything that can be done, can be done well or poorly, let us conceive, at last, what it means to think well. Is it not high time that we learn to idealize and explore what the mind is really good for – as the ancients did – not just the abstract ‘mind’, but every individual mind, which has its own virtue and excellence to discover and develop.
This method illuminates the complex but comprehensive system of interaction between mind and world that eludes a more reductionist/materialist conception. The suggestion that knowledge is relative leads predictably to the error of pure relativism and the mistaken sense that in a “trackless sea of relativity”(*Alan Watts) one opinion is just as good as any other -- which leads many to the subjectivist fallacy, that this is what they were taught, this is their world view, they have as much right as anyone to their world view, and a flat out refusal to consider the views of others, or that anything about their own view might actually be wrong. Too much certainty that we already know as much as we need to and have nothing to learn from those who disagree with us is simply active ignorance. This problem arises frequently in class discussions, presenting itself as cynicism and denial of anything meaningfully called ‘truth.’ This impasse, which is the source of so many culture wars, including our postmodern conundrum, is resolvable by an integration of the subjective and objective aspects of reality.
This 'dialectic' way of thinking makes for a conception of education that would be inclusive of all voices, which was part of the reason that that the ancients favored it, especially as the first democracy was taking form. It was clear to these ancients that such multileveled deliberation was necessary to prevent power from falling into the hands of those who are in love with it. The insight that two heads are better than one, and so on, was key to the foundation of participatory democracy, when each and every voice actually had power, to the extend that it could influence the thoughts and voices of others.
In the interest of democracy, and with this dialectic method in mind, we might encourage a method of empathic learning and communication that promotes argument for the sake of mutual understanding, rather than for the sake of winning. Dialogue such as we have conceived of it is the first step toward war, which need never happen if dialogue were more effective in helping us reconcile our differences. As it is, we fight over words, Socrates laments, the way puppies fight over scraps of meat. And the price is that young minds are turned off altogether and remain strangers to the subtle reasoning that is needed to understand and reconcile ambiguity and conflicting points of view.
The fact that we all see the same world differently ought to lead us to the conclusion that we need the points of view of others in order to see more of the whole truth. By helping us to recognize the fact that there is something meaningfully conceived of as the 'whole truth', dialectic reasoning compels us to admit, when we come upon another with whom we disagree, that it is, arguably, the point of the view of the other that we ourselves need most.
In this way, dialectic thinking promotes personal responsibility for self-expression, and a better understanding of the ‘butterfly effect’ of every individual voice. We each and all have something to contribute to the whole of truth, after all, and therefore, we each have responsibility for the effects of the voice we do or might express. In this we come to understand that everyone is a teacher, just as everyone is a student. Indeed, since one person’s knowledge is another person’s blind spot, misunderstanding is merely an opportunity for mutual growth through dialectic exchange of perspectives.
And yet, this natural diversity of perspective seems to be the source of growing and increasingly violent conflict. Understanding this better could take us a long way toward reconciling and resolving the conflict that inevitably arises from the complexity of our subjective knowledge.
The need for interpersonal and intercultural sensitivity is apparent at every turn, and arguably, there is not a social problem we face that is not caused in some measure by a failure of empathy. * And yet we live in a world that discourages the natural skills necessary for healthy communication by encouraging us all to strive to find a single truth, against which all others are defined as wrong. Because the lenses through which we view the world and the concepts with which we frame our knowledge are all relative to the experience through which we learned it to begin with, and because we have yet to recognize a conception of ‘reality’ that dignifies and tethers subjective variation, we find ourselves at odds at every turn with all the rest of those traditions who are equally bent on winning the truth.
Herein is where the failure of humility too begins -- in the assumption of the singularity of truth and the superiority of one’s own conception of truth over others. In such a circumstance, participants in any given discussion view themselves as adversaries, and admitting agreement seems tantamount to losing. In this way, we have been conditioned into communication patterns that are actually violent in their effects. No wonder misunderstanding is so prevalent in our world and conflict so increasingly harsh, since we have not learned to stretch our minds to take in the points of view of others and to do the dialectic weighing that is necessary. This is a problem the dialectic art can help us allay.
It is, arguably, precisely the assumption of superiority of our own conception of truth that currently threatens to destroy us all. Still, the more we actually look through one another’s eyes, the more we may begin to see that there is indeed a single truth -- which we nonetheless all see differently. Recognizing this is perhaps the best incentive we could hope for to encourage peace through constructive dialogue.
The further case can be made that our psychological well-being and happiness itself depends critically upon our individual willingness to take the view of the other, especially in argument, because from the receiving end, the golden rule would have us see most situations from more points of view than just our own, which is our habit. When this dialectic form of communication is instead our habit, then we will have realized our highest human excellence, the ancients would say – which is not a perfect end, it is rather a perfect process.
Socrates tried to teach (with little success in the case of the slave owner, Meno) that we turn beliefs to actual knowledge only by the tethering process of good reasoning.
“All nature is akin, and the soul has learned everything, so that when a man has recalled a single piece of knowledge - learned it, in ordinary language - there is no reason why he should not find out all the rest, if he keeps a stout heart and does not grow weary of the search, for seeking and learning are in fact nothing but recollection."[5]
Dialectic thinking has the potential to help us understand and discover the true beauty of our individuality. It would also promote intellectual humility, empathy, and curiosity, and to encourage an advanced understanding of what it means to truly ‘know’ something – which is, as Socrates cautioned, a target we never truly reach once and for all. We can always enhance our understanding incrementally by stretching our minds to incorporate the points of view of others, perhaps especially those we might least expect to learn from. Indeed, our worst enemy might well be our best teacher. (repeat?*)
Thus, philosophy, in its truest sense, turns out to be the ability to see the connections between things and between people. * Dialectic reasoning understands that two heads are better than one for the same reason that two eyes perceive depth that one alone cannot. In a world so hostile to relativism, the fact that we all see the same world differently is made to seem the source of so much conflict, rather than the rich source of deep understanding it could be...if only we understood what the ancients were trying to tell us. It is by this dialectic process of gathering new perspectives that the human mind grows. And since no one ever completely understands anything, there is always incentive to listen, to learn, and to ask questions – for the whole truth comes to light only by all things considered. How can we expect the worlds poor and least advantaged to resolve their conflict if academics, among the worlds most privileged, cannot do it? What is war, after all, but failed dialogue?
I predict we would find this method and course of study, if widely practiced, would offer great hope for humanity, including practical advice about how to rise above the challenges of our age. While this healing dialogue can only begin with individuals, our educational methods can offer the setting and incentive by which we all might recall how ancient dialectic wisdom gives rise to the deep and mutual respect and understanding that can make friendship and mutual understanding a way of life. For the brief moment that democracy flourished in ancient Athens, Pericles said, her citizens did “not even hurt each others feelings.”(*)
This is the ideal that our collective ancestors would have us remember – peace on earth and good will toward others. An ideal to which we too aspire during certain times of the year, only to forget it when the season passes.
[1] (Plato, Pheado n.d.)
[2] (Plato’s Theaetetus168bc)
[3] (Plato’s Theaetetus168bc)
[4] (Plato’s Theaetetus169c) (Plato, Theaetetus n.d.)
[5] Meno 81d.
While practically every course you will take in college will draw some of its legitimacy or origin from the ancient Greeks, few (if any) actually practice the art the ancients taught. > While academics are quite fond of > calling their method ‘Socratic’ - as if to add an air of moral > legitimacy to their teaching (even as they sometimes twist that method to > their own ends that usually have less to do with advancing truth > than advancing their authority over students). Questioning the authority of so many > experts is practically unheard of, even in graduate programs where > one might expect it, let alone in undergraduate programs, > where there is too often a virtual dearth of true dialectic dialogue.
And not only is this postmodern conundrum unnecessary, but seen holistically, ecologically, the diversity of our perspectives would prove to be our greatest blessing. Dialectic reasoning understands that two heads are > better than one for the same reason that two eyes perceive depth that one eye alone cannot. In a world so hostile to relativism, the fact that we all see the same world differently is made to seem the source of so much conflict, rather than the rich source of deeper understanding it could be...if we took to heart what this master science – “the science of all sciences,” Socrates called it - what the ancients were actually trying to teach.
It’s always seemed strange to me that I got all the way to college not knowing what a fallacy is. But it’s beyond strange – suspect even – that my students still make it all the way to my class in the small northern Wisconsin community college where I teach philosophy, with almost no idea that there is a difference in good and bad reasoning, in sense and nonsense, or even in truth and deceit (especially since a good portion of their education comes by way of media, advertising, and public relations campaigns). Naturally, our young respond to this with what Socrates calls misology and misanthropy[1] - the generalized distrust of both ideas and people that comes of hearing false things too often called true. When young minds are educated by way of words used in less than true senses (e.g. love as desire, friendship as mutual exploitation, intelligence as mere calculation, etc.), they understandably lose heart, and can suffer lifelong cynicism. Philosophy is well aware of the power of true words, but words used badly can as easily lead to evil as to good. Meanwhile, we’ve given them none of the tools to defend against the manipulation of empty rhetoric, and then we wonder why we’re all so confused and even depressed, steeped in BS as we are.
And since empty rhetoric is unlikely to better anyone’s condition,[2] we can’t help but give our young just what we got - which is virtually no exercise in using the mind for what it’s really good for! Even logic – a skill with which we are born, is short-shrifted as a tool of manipulating truth, so they learn to argue only to win, rather than to understand or be understood. They may not even realize when they’re lying or being lied to, because they probably don’t ‘believe in’ truth at all. So how could they tell the difference is the mere appearance of something, and the real thing? And then, as if to deliberately fix this habit into permanence, we say this is human nature – as if it has nothing to do with how we’ve been educated.
Socrates scolded the sophists who teach this way for fighting over words “like puppies fight over meat,” and turn young minds off to ideas altogether, and actually “make them hate the whole business when they get older."[3] He himself would have been turned off, he says, if he hadn’t had "so deep a passion" as to adhere him to the exercise of philosophic inquiry all his life.[4]
On Intelligence and the Difference in Being Smart and Wise
Which brings us ultimately to a rethinking of what ‘intelligence’ really means; what is the difference in being ‘smart’ and being ‘wise’? Since anything that can be done, can be done well or poorly, let us conceive, at last, what it means to think well. Is it not high time that we learn to idealize and explore what the mind is really good for – as the ancients did – not just the abstract ‘mind’, but every individual mind, which has its own virtue and excellence to discover and develop.
This method illuminates the complex but comprehensive system of interaction between mind and world that eludes a more reductionist/materialist conception. The suggestion that knowledge is relative leads predictably to the error of pure relativism and the mistaken sense that in a “trackless sea of relativity”(*Alan Watts) one opinion is just as good as any other -- which leads many to the subjectivist fallacy, that this is what they were taught, this is their world view, they have as much right as anyone to their world view, and a flat out refusal to consider the views of others, or that anything about their own view might actually be wrong. Too much certainty that we already know as much as we need to and have nothing to learn from those who disagree with us is simply active ignorance. This problem arises frequently in class discussions, presenting itself as cynicism and denial of anything meaningfully called ‘truth.’ This impasse, which is the source of so many culture wars, including our postmodern conundrum, is resolvable by an integration of the subjective and objective aspects of reality.
This 'dialectic' way of thinking makes for a conception of education that would be inclusive of all voices, which was part of the reason that that the ancients favored it, especially as the first democracy was taking form. It was clear to these ancients that such multileveled deliberation was necessary to prevent power from falling into the hands of those who are in love with it. The insight that two heads are better than one, and so on, was key to the foundation of participatory democracy, when each and every voice actually had power, to the extend that it could influence the thoughts and voices of others.
In the interest of democracy, and with this dialectic method in mind, we might encourage a method of empathic learning and communication that promotes argument for the sake of mutual understanding, rather than for the sake of winning. Dialogue such as we have conceived of it is the first step toward war, which need never happen if dialogue were more effective in helping us reconcile our differences. As it is, we fight over words, Socrates laments, the way puppies fight over scraps of meat. And the price is that young minds are turned off altogether and remain strangers to the subtle reasoning that is needed to understand and reconcile ambiguity and conflicting points of view.
The fact that we all see the same world differently ought to lead us to the conclusion that we need the points of view of others in order to see more of the whole truth. By helping us to recognize the fact that there is something meaningfully conceived of as the 'whole truth', dialectic reasoning compels us to admit, when we come upon another with whom we disagree, that it is, arguably, the point of the view of the other that we ourselves need most.
In this way, dialectic thinking promotes personal responsibility for self-expression, and a better understanding of the ‘butterfly effect’ of every individual voice. We each and all have something to contribute to the whole of truth, after all, and therefore, we each have responsibility for the effects of the voice we do or might express. In this we come to understand that everyone is a teacher, just as everyone is a student. Indeed, since one person’s knowledge is another person’s blind spot, misunderstanding is merely an opportunity for mutual growth through dialectic exchange of perspectives.
And yet, this natural diversity of perspective seems to be the source of growing and increasingly violent conflict. Understanding this better could take us a long way toward reconciling and resolving the conflict that inevitably arises from the complexity of our subjective knowledge.
The need for interpersonal and intercultural sensitivity is apparent at every turn, and arguably, there is not a social problem we face that is not caused in some measure by a failure of empathy. * And yet we live in a world that discourages the natural skills necessary for healthy communication by encouraging us all to strive to find a single truth, against which all others are defined as wrong. Because the lenses through which we view the world and the concepts with which we frame our knowledge are all relative to the experience through which we learned it to begin with, and because we have yet to recognize a conception of ‘reality’ that dignifies and tethers subjective variation, we find ourselves at odds at every turn with all the rest of those traditions who are equally bent on winning the truth.
Herein is where the failure of humility too begins -- in the assumption of the singularity of truth and the superiority of one’s own conception of truth over others. In such a circumstance, participants in any given discussion view themselves as adversaries, and admitting agreement seems tantamount to losing. In this way, we have been conditioned into communication patterns that are actually violent in their effects. No wonder misunderstanding is so prevalent in our world and conflict so increasingly harsh, since we have not learned to stretch our minds to take in the points of view of others and to do the dialectic weighing that is necessary. This is a problem the dialectic art can help us allay.
It is, arguably, precisely the assumption of superiority of our own conception of truth that currently threatens to destroy us all. Still, the more we actually look through one another’s eyes, the more we may begin to see that there is indeed a single truth -- which we nonetheless all see differently. Recognizing this is perhaps the best incentive we could hope for to encourage peace through constructive dialogue.
The further case can be made that our psychological well-being and happiness itself depends critically upon our individual willingness to take the view of the other, especially in argument, because from the receiving end, the golden rule would have us see most situations from more points of view than just our own, which is our habit. When this dialectic form of communication is instead our habit, then we will have realized our highest human excellence, the ancients would say – which is not a perfect end, it is rather a perfect process.
Socrates tried to teach (with little success in the case of the slave owner, Meno) that we turn beliefs to actual knowledge only by the tethering process of good reasoning.
“All nature is akin, and the soul has learned everything, so that when a man has recalled a single piece of knowledge - learned it, in ordinary language - there is no reason why he should not find out all the rest, if he keeps a stout heart and does not grow weary of the search, for seeking and learning are in fact nothing but recollection."[5]
Dialectic thinking has the potential to help us understand and discover the true beauty of our individuality. It would also promote intellectual humility, empathy, and curiosity, and to encourage an advanced understanding of what it means to truly ‘know’ something – which is, as Socrates cautioned, a target we never truly reach once and for all. We can always enhance our understanding incrementally by stretching our minds to incorporate the points of view of others, perhaps especially those we might least expect to learn from. Indeed, our worst enemy might well be our best teacher. (repeat?*)
Thus, philosophy, in its truest sense, turns out to be the ability to see the connections between things and between people. * Dialectic reasoning understands that two heads are better than one for the same reason that two eyes perceive depth that one alone cannot. In a world so hostile to relativism, the fact that we all see the same world differently is made to seem the source of so much conflict, rather than the rich source of deep understanding it could be...if only we understood what the ancients were trying to tell us. It is by this dialectic process of gathering new perspectives that the human mind grows. And since no one ever completely understands anything, there is always incentive to listen, to learn, and to ask questions – for the whole truth comes to light only by all things considered. How can we expect the worlds poor and least advantaged to resolve their conflict if academics, among the worlds most privileged, cannot do it? What is war, after all, but failed dialogue?
I predict we would find this method and course of study, if widely practiced, would offer great hope for humanity, including practical advice about how to rise above the challenges of our age. While this healing dialogue can only begin with individuals, our educational methods can offer the setting and incentive by which we all might recall how ancient dialectic wisdom gives rise to the deep and mutual respect and understanding that can make friendship and mutual understanding a way of life. For the brief moment that democracy flourished in ancient Athens, Pericles said, her citizens did “not even hurt each others feelings.”(*)
This is the ideal that our collective ancestors would have us remember – peace on earth and good will toward others. An ideal to which we too aspire during certain times of the year, only to forget it when the season passes.
[1] (Plato, Pheado n.d.)
[2] (Plato’s Theaetetus168bc)
[3] (Plato’s Theaetetus168bc)
[4] (Plato’s Theaetetus169c) (Plato, Theaetetus n.d.)
[5] Meno 81d.