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Socrates offers four arguments for the soul's immortality: The Cyclical Argument, or Opposites Argument explains that Forms are eternal and unchanging, and as the soul always brings life, then it must not die, and is necessarily "imperishable". As the body is mortal and is subject to physical death, the soul must be its indestructible opposite.
Socrates believed that philosophy – the love of wisdom – was the most important pursuit above all else. For some, he exemplifies more than anyone else in history the pursuit of wisdom through questioning and logical argument, by examining and by thinking.
Socrates secures his interlocutor's agreement to further premises, for example "Courage is a fine thing" and "Ignorant endurance is not a fine thing". Socrates then argues, and the interlocutor agrees, these further premises imply the contrary of the original thesis; in this case, it leads to: "courage is not endurance of the soul".
The unity of opposites is the philosophical idea that opposites are interconnected due to the way each is defined in relation to the other. Their interdependence unites the seemingly opposed terms. Their interdependence unites the seemingly opposed terms.
The term dialectic owes much of its prestige to its role in the philosophies of Socrates and Plato, during the fifth and fourth centuries BC. Aristotle said that it was the pre-Socratic philosopher Zeno of Elea who invented dialectic, of which the dialogues of Plato are examples of the Socratic dialectical method. [4]
Socrates initiates a discussion about a topic with a known expert on the subject, usually in the company of some young men and boys, and by dialogue proves the expert's beliefs and arguments to be contradictory. [80] Socrates initiates the dialogue by asking his interlocutor for a definition of the subject.
Socrates asks Protagoras "in respect to what" Hippocrates will improve by associating with him, as, for example, he would improve in medicine by associating himself with a doctor (318d). Protagoras begins by saying that a good Sophist can make his students into good citizens by teaching civic virtue (πολιτικὴν τέχνην).
The dialogue depicts a conversation between Socrates and a small group at a dinner gathering. Socrates debates with self-proclaimed rhetoricians seeking the true definition of rhetoric, attempting to pinpoint the essence of rhetoric and unveil the flaws of the sophistic oratory popular in Athens at the time.