Philosophy Doesn’t Feed Me

But it does nourish me 🙂

So, I was nominated by my friend, Raynotbradbury, for the quote challenge, but she added a spin to it for us to pick an ancient philosopher for the quotes and to fill in any explanations we wanted.

The Rules:

• Choose the author or philosopher (it should be one from the Ancient Time).  Don’t know anyone?  Google it lol.  It shouldn’t be so hard.
• Choose 3 quotes of this author/philosopher.  The country of origin – doesn’t matter (Egypt, Greece…Italy).  Add any info or explanation if you like.
• Share those quotes and nominate 3 to 6 people.
• Oops, that’s not obligatory.
• The title for the post?  Choose something cool.  I know you are smart enough.

I really struggled with a title for this piece, I mean being “cool” is tough 🙂  I had put together an entire list I had to choose from.  But I like how the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence does nourish us, but not literally “feed” us.   And I explain the feature image and how I think it relates to the title below.

I chose the Greek Philosopher Socrates (470-399 BCE) for a number of reasons.

For one, he is credited with being one of the founders of Western Philosophy and with being the first moral philosopher.  For another, a quote of his from his trial for impiety and corrupting youth has stuck with me ever since I first read about him, “An unexamined life is not worth living.”  And for another, I was subject to the “Socratic Method” of teaching when I went through law school.

Because Socrates didn’t put any of his thoughts in writing, what we know of him is from the accounts of others, like Plato.  I suppose, if you live by the axiom of “I write, therefor I am” Socrates may not have existed and was but a mere metaphor of analytic thought, a tale of others 😊

Regardless, his teachings have endured for centuries.

The Quotes:

I threw in an extra one.  Actually, two counting the one above.

“The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.”
“Beauty is a short-lived tyranny.”
“The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.”
“He is richest who is content with the least, for content is the wealth of nature.”

I picked these quotes because I think they represent true wisdom.  We should live our lives humbly with open minds, recognizing that material and superficial pursuits have no real lasting value, acting honorably, and having immense gratitude for all we have and all that surrounds us.

Socrates is a powerful representation because he was put on trial and sentenced to death for his thoughts.  Did the Greek democracy have the thought police?  Apparently so.  Socrates called out and questioned prominent Athenians, logically defeating their views and policies and publicly humiliating them.  The powers-that-be charged him impiety (not believing in the Gods of the State) and with corrupting the youth.  Yes, that ancient democracy felt so threatened they decided they must put free-thinkers to death and not let that cancer of thought spread.

The concept of “impiety” (religious persecution) was one of the reasons the Framers of the U.S. Constitution built in freedom of religion.  Thus, no State-sponsored favorite gods.

The Socratic Method of teaching used in law school works like this.  We were given our assignments in advance of class and then grilled by the professors in the class room.  The idea was to teach us the adversarial process and how to think on our feet – skills we would need in the courtroom.  There are many a good tale of personal humiliation inflicted by the professors, but you learned to be prepared.

My Nominees:

Little Joy Affair

Writer’s Choice

In The Middle of Somewhere

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Photos:

Feature Image – DeGrazia – From the DeGrazia Gallery in the Sun.  I’m not sure what the title of this painting is, but it depicts an Eagle and Indian, although the Eagle is somewhat vulturesque.  Is the great bird going to devour the Indian and feed on him or nourish him with knowledge.  This could be an image from a vision quest, after all.  The Eagle represents the illumination of the spirit, healing and creation.

I don’t think the full image shows with the format of the blog, so here it is.

Socrates – There are so many pics of sculptures of Socrates on the Internet in the public domain out there that I have no clue that there is anyway to provide an accurate attribution for this photo.