Socrates Convictions - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 5 Words: 1577 Downloads: 1 Date added: 2019/08/06 Category People Essay Tags: Socrates Essay Did you like this example? In this essay I evaluate according to Socrates, must one heed popular opinion about moral matters? Does Socrates accept the fairness of the laws under which he was tried and convicted? Would Socrates have been wrong to escape? In my evaluation I explain Socrates decision to accept his conviction, and that popular opinion will likely do great damage to the spiritual/mental/moral well-being, and if he would have decided to escape his life of virtue would end with that decision. Socrates was born 469 B.C. his father Sophroniscus, was an Athenian stone mason and sculptor. Socrates followed his fathers footsteps and practiced it for many years. His mother Phaenarete was a midwife. Athenian law required men to serve in the service at this time. Socrates also serve as a civilian soldier as an armored infantryman, known as the hoplite. Which is a soldier with a shield, long spear and face mask, where he participated in three military campaigns in the Peloponnesian War, at Delium, Amphipolis, and Potidaea. Socrates was known for his bravery saving the life of one of his Generals. Being in the military you learn the principles of honor, loyalty, duty, respect, courage, fearlessness and it changes a persons life that does not already have those attributes. I would think that Socrates instilled these attributes also through combat and brotherhood for one another. Especially instilling courage and selflessness during saving the lives of his peers. Those traits stayed with him the rest of his life. Once the trial had ended, he compared the trial to his military experience. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Socrates Convictions" essay for you Create order Socrates had an ordinary Greek education and gave most of his time to philological interests. He is thought to be the first moral philosopher, of the tradition of thought. The character of our soul, where virtues are found, are more important for our lives than our bodies or external conditions. That the quality of the soul decides is the aspect of our lives, for the good or the bad. He says that if we want to do well in this world, we must take care of our soul. That we must want to get the virtues to change our souls better and live our lives for the better. To get these virtues we must have knowledge of how the act in the best interest of any way of life. That if you act badly its because of your incomprehension of how to act and why. Socrates, a citizen satisfied with his faithfulness to Athens, engaged in discussions and dialectic on essential questions of ethics, politics, religion and education. He went against the traditional knowledge of the elites. Socrates did not offer his teachings as a way to support his family, he took no payments. He just wanted to give the people of Athens the knowledge for them to think through and give them the opportunity on how to manage their lives. Once the uncertainty of a disturbed age in Athens, due to economy crashing and men coming home from the foreign and civil wars dead, the population starved and the political scene in turmoil, that brought Socrates to the hemlock. Other than follow the lead of his persecutors, we should perhaps honor Socrates encouragement to know ourselves, to be independently honest, to do what we, not the next man, knows to be the right way to live our lives. Just because the majority has hatred for something does not mean you have to also, the roa r of the crowd so to speak, but to go hard as it might be towards the good life. Socrates states that, its not my crimes that will convict me, but instead, rumors, gossip; the fact that by whispering together you will persuade yourselves that I am guilty. In my opinion, this is true even in our society. People tend to listen to the word of the majority other than making their own minds up using the methods of reasoning to understand what makes them happy, which is the rule of living a good life. Because if you are sad and not happy your life would not be good. This comes in fact with our social media we have today, which is good on both sides of the table. One, we can practice our freedom of speech and get our message across. But on the other side, it tends to build up to changing someone elses mind due to the lack of knowledge someone has on that subject. This results in the people going with the majority and not thinking for themselves. In which he had angered the majority of the wrong people and led to his conviction. Socrates trial was completed in two stages, the first was to convict him of his crimes of not believing in the mythical gods, and corrupting the youth of Athens. The second stage was to sentence him to which was obviously death. The trial took nine to ten hours in the Peoples Court, the civic center of Athens. The jury consisted of 500 male citizens over the age of thirty. The magistrate questioned both Socrates and the accusers. He also gave all of them the opportunity to question each other. The three accusers had a total of three hours to present their argument. One of the accusers, Anytus was the driving force behind the prosecution of Socrates. In my opinion, to the relationship of Anytus son and Socrates. Socrates did not really try to defend himself but to lecture his accusers and the magistrate by using his method of Socrates paradox. Since Socrates was sitting around quite willing to wait his impending execution. His old friend Crito gives him many arguments to persuade Socrates to escape. The first was, what will people think? In the eyes of Socrates his friends could have a bad reflection on themselves if they helped him escape. That Crito was well acquainted with the Guard and could persuade him to let Socrates leave. But in the eyes of his friends the people of Athens would think they did not try to help him get out of prison. Was he just thinking about his friends finances because they were willing to provide or was it totally his own morals that held him from escaping? In my opinion after reading his dialogues, He had strong moral concepts of the laws of Athens and he understood those laws and wanted to respect them. Crito also thought if he stayed and went through with the sentence, he was just aiding his antagonists to unjustly wronging him, at the same time acting unjust himself. Socrates states that one is never just in doing wrong, even if it is for the right reasons. In other words, two wrongs do not make a right. He had made a commitment to obey the laws of Athens and has lived happily for many years under them. So, if he attempted to escape it would not only break his agreement, but also challenge the weight of the law. Wouldve Socrates been wrong to escape his imprisonment? He believes it would have been wrong to escape stating that he wasnt afraid of death, felt he would be no better off it in exile and said he was still a faithful citizen of Athens. This is an extremely moral and honest and unbelievably honest level of integrity. This belief is based on what we call the social contract theory of government today. Social contract theory states a persons moral and/or political obligations are dependent upon a contract or agreement among them to form the society in which they live. Socrates did not want to break his agreement with the laws of Athens. Socrates was also was true to his beliefs in the truth. He also believed that for him if death was like a sleep without interruptions or migration of the soul to another world it would be good for him. Because he says if its like sleep this would only be on night of eternity in a state of unconsciousness compared to other days of his life. He seemed to want to go to this place to reach new truths. Also, to find out who is wise, who pretends to be wise, who is not, and to continue his research and knowledge. Since he says that everyone already knows everything, they just have to recollect the knowledge. Thinking of this, makes me wonder if he thinks that going back to this state, he will receive the knowledge he is in search of. Socrates would have been labeled even if he had exiled to another Greek town. He would have gone against his morals and been disappointed the rest of his life living in hiding. He wanted even in the trial to continue his teaches and frankly despite his accuser s. Socrates mindset was that no one should listen to the popular opinion and listen to the intelligent, professional advice, and behave well. Socrates argues that if it is never good to do wrong, then you should never act illegally in the reaction of a wrong action. The statement from Socrates, for the unexamined life is not worth living. Here he meant if it refers to a life by rote under the rules of others without the subject ever examining whether or not he truly wants to live those routines or rules. According to Socrates, this type of life was not worth living. Rather than living an unexamined life, Socrates chose death.

Persuasive Speech About Beach Shop - 1106 Words

Introduction: -The reality The beauty industry. It s a great place. At least from our eyes. Here s the truth, those ads promoting the new beach wave hair spray , they re fake. Those models on the cover of magazines, they re photoshopped. Those billboards planted all around the city promoting the new highlighter, that have a photo of a girl with absolutely no perfections, IT S FAKE! Now, this may very well be no shock to some of us, maybe all of us, but you have to ask yourself, is there really an ugly side to the beauty industry? Get this, there is! Body 1: -Photoshop What is Photoshop? Google.com defines photoshop, as digital image editing software. It s something you can learn, something you can enjoy, maybe even a hobby!†¦show more content†¦Something needs to be done, not only to stop the disgusting meaning behind ads like this, but to show people, that slim, is not beauty. CNN Article, shows us that a study came out with unsurprising results. It showed that one in four people are depressed about their body image, about a third said, they would sacrifice a year of their life to get the ideal body, and almost half of the girls surveyed, think that constant pressure to look good is the worst part of being a female. It s not just females either. Males are having to deal with the terrible beauty industry as well! Constant pressure to have abs, the perfect jawline, flawless skin. Its unbelievable! You would have to blind to think that this isn t a serious matter that has to be attended to ASAP! The constant pressure from these magazines, ads, billboards, and so on, don t make matters any better. THE WORLD NEEDS TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS! Body 3: -What are we doing about Photoshop? So, what is the world actually doing about Photoshop? CNN published an article titled, False beauty in advertising and the pressure to look good. 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Report on The Killer Angels Essay Example For Students

Report on The Killer Angels Essay Report on The Killer AngelsReport on The Killer Angels by Michael ShaaraWhen an author writes a book he has a message that he is trying to getacross to the reader. This message is called a theme. In The Killer AngelsShaaras theme was freedom for the slaves. The Northerners truly believed thatthe slaves deserved to be free, and their desire to set slaves free was the cause ofthe Civil War. Just before the Battle of Gettysburg, Colonel LawrenceChamberlain of the 20th Maine gave a speech to a group of mutineers. He toldthem that the war in which they were fighting was unlike any war in history. Thewar in which they were fighting was not for money, property or power. It was awar to set other men free.After the battle began, Sergeant Tom Chamberlainasked a group of prisoners why they were fighting. They gave no answer, butasked him the same question. Sergeant Chamberlain answered, To free theslaves, of course. The South, however, was against freeing the slaves. The entireCivil War, wheth er the people were for or against the idea, was about freedom. The Killer Angels was informative, very fascinating and I liked it. I likedthe book because I learned many things from it. Id never thought much about theimportance of the Battle of Gettysburg until I read The Killer Angels. From thisbook I learned many things. I learned that the Battle of Gettysburg was the turningpoint of the Civil War. Prior to Gettysburg, the South had won most major battles. At Gettysburg, however, the North gained its first major victory. From then on,the North continued to gain momentum, winning virtually every battle for thefollowing two years of the war. The Battle of Gettysburg exhausted both armies;greatly decreasing their reserves of ammunition and soldiers. The North had morethan twice as many men as the South, and since the North was industrialized, theycould replenish their supplies of men and ammunition fairly quickly. The South,however, could not replenish their supplies quickly because of the lack ofindustrialization and manpower. The supplies lost in the Battle of Gettysburgultimately lost the war for the South. I also learned that Confederate General Robert E. Lee was not a goodmilitary tactician. Evidently, he thought that, as in most of the previous battles,the Confederate army could win this one with a series of charges. On the secondday of the Battle of Gettysburg, Lee ordered the first charge. In this charge,Confederate troops would make an uphill attack in an attempt to take a ridge fromthe Federal army. With an uphill advantage, the Federal troops drove theConfederate army into retreat. On the third day of battle, Lee ordered a chargethat would take his army across more than a mile of open field. On the other sideof the field, however, Federal troops released a continuous bombardment ofartillery as the Confederate troops made their way across. The Federal armywiped out most of the Confederate troops before they were halfway across thefield. By the time the remaining Confederates reached the Federal army theirnumbers were so small the Federal army had no trouble defeating them. A good commanding general would have seen that both charges were hopeless. In bothcases the Federal troops had fortified vantage points, while the Confederate armyhad no sufficient protection. Had Lee seen this, he would not have ordered thecharges. Instead, he was too confident of the ability of his army and hisoverconfidence led him to defeat.Before I read The Killer Angels I knew that the Civil War brought manyfriends to fight against friends and family to fight against family. Until I read TheKiller Angels, I never realized that this was true even in the higher ranks. GeneralHancock of the Federal army and General Armistad of the Confederate wereextremely good friends. Before the war they served together in California, butwhen they war began they parted ways. Throughout the Battle of Gettysburg, bothgenerals were constantly asking for permission to go under flag of truce to theopposing army hoping to see the other. During the battle both generals werewounded, and they never got another chance to see each other. General Armistadwas mortally wounded, and in his dying words he asked a messenger to send hisapologies to General Hancock that it had to end the way it did.

Symbols And Characters Of Bread Givers Essays - Bread Givers

Symbols And Characters Of Bread Givers Symbols and Characters of Bread Givers. One of the significant features of Jewish history throughout many centuries was migration. From the ancient pre-Roman times to medieval Spain to the present days the Jews were expelled from the countries they populated, were forced out by political, cultural and religious persecution, and sometimes were motivated to leave simply to escape economic hardship and to find better life for themselves and for their children. One of the interesting pages of Jewish history was a massive migration from Eastern Europe to America in the period between 1870 an 1920. In that period more than two million Jews left their homes in Russia, Poland, Galicia, and Romania and came to the New World. The heaviest volume of that wave of Jewish emigration came between 1904 and 1908, when more than 650 thousand Jewish emigrants came to the US. The Eastern European Jews fled from pogroms, religious persecution and economic hardship. We can learn about those times from history text books, but a better way to und erstand the feelings and thoughts of the struggling emigrants is to learn a story from an insider, who herself lived there and experienced first hand all the challenges and hardships of the emigrants' life. Anzia Yezierska's novel Bread Givers is a story that lets the reader to learn about the life of Jewish Emigrants in the early Twentieth Century on Manhattan's lower East Side through the eyes of a poor young Jewish woman who came from Poland and struggled to break out from poverty, from tyrant old traditions of her father, and to find happiness, security, love and understanding in the new country. The book is rich with symbolism. Different characters and situations in the novel symbolize different parts of the emigrants' community and challenges that they faced. The characters range from the father, the symbol of the Old World, to the mother who symbolizes struggles and hopelessness of the women of the Old World, to the sisters and their men, who together represent the choices an d opportunities that opened before the young generation of the Jewish emigrants in the New World. The father of the storyteller, Sarah Smolinsky, is an orthodox rabbi, Mosheh Smolinsky, with rigid old-fashioned conceptions, who cannot or simply does not make an effort to realize himself in America and spends his days poisoning lives of his family by preaching his useless wisdom, marrying off his daughters to men they don't love and living off wages the daughters earn. Father's old-fashioned sexist views about women clearly represent the Old World with its outdated traditions, and life-crippling laws. Practically everything he preaches is contradicted by his actions and later proves to be false. For example, when confronted by his wife about unpaid bills, he preaches that money is not important and that spiritual life guided by God's laws should be a goal of every human. Yet, later, when the time comes to merry off his daughters, the only thing he cares about is money. He does not care about his daughters' feelings. Their desires and opinions mean nothing to him. He thinks that wo men are dumb and are not capable to pick a right spouse. He also thinks that they don't deserve to make a choice and their happiness in marriage is not important. He vies all women, including his Daughters and wife, as brainless slaves, who are born to serve their men. It says in the Torah, only through a man has a woman an existence. he proclaims. So he sees the marriages of his daughters simply as business transactions between him and the highest bidder. The goal of the transaction is to provide the new husbands with servants and give him, the father, a material benefit in the future. He calls Sarah hard heart and blames her for deserting him, not working in his store, and not sending him part of her wages. He says that she is selfish, heartless, and does not remember all the good things that he did for her. Again, his actions contradict his words. In real life he was the selfish, lazy tyrant who refused to work, who did not support his family in any way, who put all