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INTELLECTUAL LIFE
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26. AN INTELLECTUAL ON TRIAL
INTRODUCTION
When we ponder the array of intellectuals who added color and controversy to ancient Athenian life, we would be hard pressed to come up with a more famous name than Socrates (469-399 BCE). For three decades, he wandered the streets of Athens, teaching, ask- ing questions, forcing his audiences to think. His annoying (to the authorities! ) habit of investigating and sometimes casting doubts upon established modes of governance, religion, and education eventually caused him to be put on trial and ultimately condemned to death. The transcript of that trial, written by his disciple Plato, remains one of the most famous documents that has come down to us from antiquity.
KEEP IN MIND AS YOU READ
1. The Greek title of Plato's recounting of Socrates's trial, Apologia, is often translated as The Apology. However, we must be careful to remember that the word apologia neither connotes nor denotes an expression of regret or sorrow. Rather, it means "defense," and that definition precisely applies to the words Socrates spoke at his trial.
2. Modern juries are traditionally composed of "12 good men (and women) and true," but ancient juries--both Greek and Roman--regularly featured much higher num- bers. The jury that convicted Socrates, for example, had 501 members; many jury- men were elderly citizens who depended on the stipends they received for jury service as part of their retirement income. An odd number of jurors was selected to preclude tie votes. However, if some extenuating circumstance caused the absence of one or more jurors, thus creating an even number, a tie vote went to the defendant, and the case would be dismissed.
3. Stating the case against Socrates were three accusers, Meletus, Anytus, and Lycon. Apparently, they were very good at what they did; Socrates himself admitted that he was "almost carried away by them; their arguments were so convincing. "
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? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? gentlemen: In the original Greek, Socrates refers to the jurors as andres Athenaioi, "men of Athens. "
god at Delphi: The "god" is Apollo, who had an important shrine at Delphi, a remote location in the mountains, north of Athens. But why would Socrates call Apollo as a witness? According to translator Hugh Tredennick, the "explana- tion of its reply about Socrates is that it was well aware of his true character and ideals and thor- oughly approved of them. "
priestess: Apollo's pronouncements were conveyed via the priestesses who tended his temple.
professor of wisdom: The term is not to be taken literally; the Greek word that Socrates uses, sophos, simply means "a wise man. "
wisdom: Sophia in Greek, one of the elements of our word "philoso- phy," which etymologically means the "love of wisdom. "
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Document: The Trial of Socrates
[O]ne of you might interrupt me and say "But what is it that you do, Socrates? How is it that you have been misrep- resented like this [i. e. , that his accusers' charges were base- less]. Surely all this talk and gossip about you would never have arisen if you had confined yourself to ordinary activ- ities, but only if your behavior was abnormal. Tell us the explanation, if you do not want us to invent it for our- selves. " This seems to me to be a reasonable request, and I will try to explain to you what it is that has given me this false notoriety; so please give me your attention. Perhaps some of you will think that I am not being serious, but I assure you that I am going to tell you the whole truth.
I have gained this reputation, gentlemen [i. e. , the jurors], from nothing more or less than a kind of wisdom. What kind of wisdom do I mean? Human wisdom, I sup- pose. It seems that I really am wise in this limited sense. Presumably the geniuses whom I mentioned just now [other noted scholars, philosophers and teachers, including Georgias of Leontini, Prodicus of Ceos, and Hippias of Elis] are wise in a wisdom that is more than human; I do not know how else to account for it. I certainly have no knowledge of such wisdom . . . Now, gentlemen, please do not interrupt me if I seem to make an extravagant claim, for what I am going to tell you is not my own opinion. I am going to refer you to an unimpeachable authority.
I shall call as witness to my wisdom . . . the god at Delphi.
You know Chaerephon . . . a friend of mine from boyhood . . . [O]ne day he
actually went to Delphi and asked this question of the god: . . . whether there was anyone wiser than myself. The priestess replied that there was no one. "
[At this point, Socrates relates that he went on a sort of pilgrimage, to test the god's response to determine whether it was actually true that no one was wiser than he. He interviewed a number of people, including politicians, poets, crafts- men, and other professionals, and he came to the conclusion that indeed he could not find anyone who surpassed him in wisdom. He also discovered, much to his surprise, that some people who had great reputations as intellectuals failed to live up to those lofty reputations, whereas others, who did not enjoy similar esteem, were "much better qualified in practical intelligence. "]
"The effect of these investigations of mine . . . has been to arouse against me a great deal of hostility, and hostility of a particularly bitter and persistent kind, which has resulted in various malicious suggestions, including the description of me as a professor of wisdom. This is due to the fact that whenever I succeed in disproving another person's claim to wisdom in a given subject, the bystanders assume that I know everything about that subject myself. But the truth of the matter . . . is pretty certainly this: that real wisdom is the property of God [i. e. , Apollo], and this oracle is his way of telling us that human wisdom has little or no value. It seems to me that he is not referring literally to Socrates, but has
merely taken my name as an example, as if he would say to us, 'The wisest of you men is he who has realized, like Socrates, that in respect of wisdom he is really worthless. ' " [Tr. Hugh Tredennick. Plato: The Last Days of Socrates. (21-22. ) Penguin Books, 1954. Page numbers: 49, 52. ]
AFTERMATH
The conviction of Socrates could well have had a depressing effect on free speech and intel- lectual inquiry in Athens. A few years earlier (404 BCE), the city's democracy had been tem- porarily suspended, while a cabal of dictators--the Thirty Tyrants--held sway. Although the democracy was soon restored, the experience may have encouraged the harassment, and even prosecution, of free thinkers like Socrates. In any event, Socrates's famous student Plato left Athens shortly after the trial and did not return until some years later.
ASK YOURSELF
1. Do Socrates's words and arguments at his trial convey the impression that he really did surpass all others in wisdom and knowledge?
2. Socrates claims that his displays of knowledge inspired jealousy and even hostility toward him, because other people then assumed that he knew everything there was to know about a particular subject. He tried to deflect this hostility by claiming that "real wisdom is the property of God," and that "human wisdom has little or no value. " Are these arguments sensible? Believable?
3. Socrates was overwhelmingly condemned by the "men of Athens" who formed the jury. Why do you suppose he was unable to persuade them that he was innocent of the charges brought against him?
TOPICS TO CONSIDER
e Investigate further Apollo's oracle at Delphi. How long had it been in the business of supplying answers and information to pilgrims who visited it
An Intellectual on Trial
? ? ? ? ARISTOPHANES'S SATIRICAL PORTRAYAL OF SOCRATES
One of the 11 surviving plays of the Athenian comic playwright Aristophanes (ca. 445-380 BCE) was entitled Clouds, a satirical critique of the sophists in general and Socrates in particular. In the play, Socrates was por- trayed as accepting money for his teachings, founding a school, and corrupting his students by instructing them in deceptive methods of argumentation. None of these representations was strictly accurate; rather, they were exaggerations used to create an effective satirical portrayal.
Some historians think that the audiences interpreted the satire too literally, and therefore, they formed a dis- torted image of Socrates and his ideas. This, in turn (so the critics say), nurtured the climate of persistent and bitter hostility that Socrates claims surrounded him. However, the play was produced around 423 BCE, and Socrates was not put on trial until nearly a quarter century later; so it is difficult to imagine that Clouds had any direct impact on the decision to prosecute him. Furthermore, Socrates himself was reportedly in the audi- ence during a production of the play, and by all accounts, he laughed heartily at the scenes in which he was por- trayed. Apparently, he "got it. "
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with questions? What accounted for its credibility? How did the process actually "work"? That is, how did the priestesses gain the information they relayed to the questioner? Do you suppose that pilgrims truly believed this information came directly from the god, or were they at least somewhat skeptical?
e In his speech, Socrates mentions the reasons why he is being prosecuted: "corrupting the minds of the young, and of believing in deities of his own invention instead of the gods recognized by the state. " How plausible do these charges seem? Could an argument be made that Socrates's accusers were jealous of his intellectual acuity and therefore his ability to attract large and interested audiences to hear his teachings?
Further Information
Allen, Reginald F. Socrates and Legal Obligation. Minneapolis, 1880. Brickhouse, Thomas C. Socrates on Trial. Princeton, NJ, 1989. Reeve, C. D. C. Socrates in the Apology. Indianapolis, 1989.
West, Thomas G. Plato's Apology of Socrates. Ithaca, NY, 1979.
Website
Commentary on Plato's Apology of Socrates. http://www. friesian. com/apology. htm
Bibliography for Document
Tredennick, Hugh (tr. ). Plato: The Last Days of Socrates. Baltimore, 1954.
27. AN INTELLECTUAL WHO INVENTED MANY INGENIOUS DEVICES
INTRODUCTION
Archimedes, a resident of Syracuse (in Sicily), was one of the most brilliant intellectuals of the ancient world and certainly a foundational individual in the history of mathematics. He filled his long life (ca. 287-211 BCE) with remarkable accomplishments in geometry, engineering, and physics. He was an ingenious inventor who devised many offensive and defensive military weapons, as well as a device to help drain fields that had been flooded. His sudden insight into a difficult problem in physics occasioned his famous cry of Eureka! (literally, "I have found [it]. "), a word that he reportedly yelled as he ran home through the streets of Syracuse from the bathing establishment where the epiphany had occurred.
Archimedes famously boasted that if he were given a pole long enough, and a place to stand, he could move the world. If anyone could perform such a feat, Archimedes would have been that person.
KEEP IN MIND AS YOU READ
1. The document is excerpted, oddly enough, from Plutarch's biography of the Roman general Marcus Claudius Marcellus (d. 208 BCE). During the Second Punic War (218-201 BCE), Marcellus commanded a Roman fleet that was besieging Syracuse, then under the control of the Carthaginians, the bitter enemy of the Romans in that war. Plutarch devotes a fairly lengthy section of the biography to the exploits of Archimedes in that conflict, as well as the famous mathematician's other achievements.
2. Archimedes's fame had spread far and wide by the time of the Second Punic War. Marcellus had heard of him and had given orders that his life was to be spared once Syracuse fell, even though it was largely thanks to Archimedes's war machines that it had taken the Romans so long (about two years) to capture the city.
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? Document: Archimedes, a Man of "Lofty Spirit" and a "Wealth of Scientific Theory"
And yet even Archimedes, who was a kinsman and friend of King Hiero, wrote to him that with any given force it was possible to move any given weight. And emboldened . . . by the strength of his demonstration, he declared that, if there were another world, and he could go to it, he could move this. Hiero was astonished, and begged him to put his proposition into execution, and show him some great weight moved by a slight force. Archimedes therefore fixed upon a three-masted merchantman [i. e. , a cargo vessel] of the royal fleet, which had been dragged ashore by the great labors of many men, and after putting on board many passengers and the customary freight, he seated himself at a distance from her, and without any great effort, but qui- etly setting in motion with his hand a system of compound pulleys, drew her towards him smoothly and evenly, as though she were gliding through the water. Amazed at this, then, and comprehending the power of his art, the king persuaded Archimedes to prepare for him offensive and defensive engines to be used in every kind of siege warfare. These he had never used himself, because he spent the greater part of his life in freedom from war and amid the festal rites of peace; but at the present time his apparatus stood the Syracusans in good stead, and with the apparatus, its fabricator.
[Plutarch next describes the "offensive and defensive engines": large showers of stones and missiles, which fell from the sky with ear-piercing noise and speed. Shields were useless against these projectiles; they were relentlessly destructive.
Huge, weighted wooden beams were cata- pulted at the Roman ships. When one of these beams hit a ship, its force and weight immediately sank the vessel. Other weapons seized ships by the prow, with massive iron claws that pulled them up into the air, and then, when the ships were vertical to the water, they were released and sank when they crashed into the water. Still other ships were smashed against the cliffs when they were grasped by vari- ous kinds of machines. Another device could lift a ship completely out of the water and into the air, where it would
be twirled around until all its crew had been flung out of it, whereupon it was allowed to fall back into the water.
Marcellus tried to counter all this carnage by bringing forward a sambuca, a tall, water-borne structure that enabled soldiers to deploy on steep cliffs, towers, or other lofty landing points without having to climb them. The device was placed on top of a platform supported by eight large warships, lashed together.
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? King Hiero: King Hiero enjoyed a long reign as the king of Syracuse, from 270 to 216 BCE. The city flourished under his leadership, especially in the latter decades. He was also an author, having written several books on agriculture.
merchantman: The essayist Athenaeus [5. 40] provides the description of a famous ship built for King Hiero, under the general supervision of Archimedes. The ship contained enough wood to construct 60 tri- remes, no small feat considering that triremes were large and menac- ing battleships. Three hundred carpenters and their assistants were hired. Building materials were imported from Italy, Spain, and Germany. It was ultimately outfit- ted with amenities such as prome- nades, a gymnasium, gardens, and even a mosaic floor depicting scenes from Homer's Iliad. The huge ship was constructed on dry land, and when the job was finished, the problem remained of how to move such a large and cumbersome object from land to sea. To solve this problem, Archimedes designed a windlass that required only a small number of people to operate it. Athenaeus says that the device was an original invention of Archimedes.
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Marcellus was confident that the intimidation factor would be sufficient to discourage an attack on the sambuca, but he had not taken into account the genius of Archimedes, who had invented machines that could launch 50-pound boulders; three of these sent flying toward the sambuca scored either direct or near hits, such that the tower was shattered and torn loose from the ships.
Marcellus's next ploy was a nocturnal attack, with soldiers stealthily creeping toward the city walls, the hope being that Archimedes's long-range weapons would be ineffective against soldiers at such close proximity. But once again, Archimedes had outsmarted the Roman general, by directing volleys of stones and arrows thrown and shot down at the soldiers who were attempting to breach the walls. ]
At last the Romans became so fearful that, whenever they saw a bit of rope or a stick of timber projecting a little over the wall, "There it is," they cried, "Archimedes is training some engine upon us," and turned their backs and fled. Seeing this, Marcellus desisted from all fighting and assault . . .
And yet Archimedes possessed such a lofty spirit, so profound a soul, and such wealth of scientific theory, that although his inventions had won for him a name and fame for superhuman sagacity, he would not consent to leave behind him any treatise on this subject [of designing military weapons or any kind of practical invention, considering such things unworthy] . . .
And therefore, we may not disbelieve the stories told about him, how, under the lasting charm of some familiar and domestic Siren, he forgot even his food and neglected the care of his person; and how, when he was dragged [forcefully], as he often was, to the place for bathing and anointing his body, he would trace geometrical figures in the ashes, and draw lines with his finger in the oil with which his body was anointed, being possessed by a great delight, . . . a captive of the Muses. And although he made many excellent discoveries, he is said to have asked his kinsmen and friends to place over the grave where he should be buried a cylinder enclosing a sphere, with an inscription giving the proportion by which the containing solid exceeds the contained. [Tr. Bernadotte Perrin. Plutarch's Lives. (Marcellus 14, 17). Volume V. LCL, 1917. Page numbers: 473, 479, 481. ]
AFTERMATH
Archimedes could rightly be called a casualty of the Second Punic War, a victim of the collateral damage that occurred during that devastating conflict. Several ancient authors, notably Livy, Cicero, Valerius Maximus, and Pliny the Elder--in addition to Plutarch-- provide accounts of what happened. Livy writes: "[After the Roman blockade finally suc- ceeded in the capture of Syracuse] the city was turned over to the troops to pillage as they pleased . . . Many brutalities were committed in hot blood and the greed of gain, and it is on record that Archimedes, while intent upon figures that he had traced in the dust, and regardless of the hideous uproar of an army let loose to ravage and despoil a captured city, was killed by a soldier who did not know who he was. Marcellus was distressed by this; he had him properly buried and his relatives inquired for . . . " [25. 31; tr. de Selincourt] It appears that Archimedes was so focused on the mathematical problem that occupied him at the time that he was unaware of the approach of an armed and hostile soldier.
An Intellectual Who Invented Many Ingenious Devices
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? ASK YOURSELF
1. What do you think of the various weapons that Archimedes invented for the defense of Syracuse? Do they seem practical?
2. Archimedes lived and worked in Syracuse, on the island of Sicily, nowhere near Greece. Why, then, is he usually called a Greek mathematician?
3. What do you think of Archimedes's famous claim that, if given a place to stand and a pole long enough, he could move the world? Is that really practical, or rather, an empty boast?
4. What were the circumstances of Archimedes's death? What lessons are to be learned from that tragic event?
TOPICS TO CONSIDER
e Do some additional investigative work on King Hiero's famous ship. The dimensions seem so outlandishly gigantic as to be impractical; the state- ment that it contained 60 triremes' worth of lumber, in particular, appears incredible. Triremes were large, imposing ships; even one of them would have made an impression. Do you think that it would have been possible to build a ship as large and as heavy as one that Athenaeus describes?
e What were the specific circumstances under which Archimedes cried out the now-famous Greek word eureka? Eureka is also the state motto of California. Why is that word an appropriate motto for California?
e It has been said that Archimedes's mathematical theories and discoveries formed the basis for the branch of mathematics that today is called calculus. Is this statement accurate? Why or why not?
e What is the Archimedes Palimpsest? What is its significance? Further Information
Boyer, Carl Benjamin. A History of Mathematics. New York, 1991.
Pickover, Clifford A. Archimedes to Hawking: Laws of Science and the Great Minds behind
Them. Oxford, 2008.
Stein, Sherman. Archimedes: What Did He Do Besides Cry Eureka? Cambridge, 1999.
Website
Death of Archimedes. http://www. cs. drexel. edu/~crorres/Archimedes/Death/Histories. html
Bibliography for Document
Perrin, Bernadotte. Plutarch's Lives. Volume V. [LCL. ] London and Cambridge, 1917. de Selincourt, Aubrey. Livy: The War with Hannibal, Books XXI-XXX. Baltimore, 1965.
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28. AN INTELLECTUAL DEFENDS THE STUDY OF LITERATURE
INTRODUCTION
Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BCE) was the preeminent Roman lawyer of his time, or of all time, as some might argue. His career as an advocate spanned almost 40 years, and during that time, he argued many noted and controversial cases.
His courtroom speech on behalf of the poet Aulus Licinius Archias ostensibly turned on the twin issues of immigration and citizenship: Was Archias, a Greco-Syrian poet, living in Rome illegally, without Roman citizenship? (The case came up in 62 BCE, a couple of years after a law had been passed evicting all noncitizens from the city. ) Cicero used a two- pronged argument in his defense. The first argument was based on purely legal grounds: Archias held citizenship in the southern Italian town of Heraclea, and a treaty agreement between Rome and that town specified that any Heraclean citizen was thereby also a Roman citizen.
The second argument was more abstract. Cicero pointed out that Archias, as a poet and an intellectual, should hold a place of honor in Rome, and even if he were not a citizen, he should be granted citizenship on the basis of his literary attainments alone. Cicero noted that creators of literature had almost universally been held in high esteem, and that it would be absurdly illogical for the Romans to spurn a great poet who was already in their midst and desired to remain there.
KEEP IN MIND AS YOU READ
1. Before addressing Archias's situation, Cicero reminds the jury that he himself would never have attained his lofty status as a top-shelf lawyer without a keen interest in literary pursuits, and that it is to these literary studies that he owes his success. The unspoken conclusion: If literature can nourish and inspire Ciceronian-style attainments, it then makes eminently good sense for Rome to attract and retain as many skilled writers and thinkers as possible, including, of course, Archias.
2. This courtroom speech is unconventional by Roman legal standards. As noted above, Cicero divided it into two major sections. The strictly legalistic arguments presented in the first section would probably have sufficed for Cicero to make his case. The defense of literary pursuits in the second half may well have had more
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to do with Cicero's own self-image and intellectual lifestyle choices than it did with
the case on behalf of Archias.
3. The classical scholar N. H. Watts has described Cicero's speech in the following
glowing terms: "[The speech] contains what is perhaps the finest panegyric of liter- ature that the ancient world offers us: a panegyric that has been quoted and admired by a long series of writers from Quintilian, through Petrarch, until today, when it has lost none of its luster. "
Document: Cicero's Unconventional Speech
[E]ven if their [literary studies] aim were pure enjoyment and nothing else, you [the jurors, and perhaps others in the courtroom] would still, I am sure, feel obliged to agree that no other activity of the mind could possibly have such a broadening and enlightening effect. For there is no other occupation upon earth which is so appropriate to every time and every age and every place. Reading stimulates the young and diverts the old, increases one's satisfaction when things are going well, and when they are going badly provides refuge and solace. It is a delight in the home; it can be fitted in with public life; throughout the night, on journeys, in the country, it is a companion which never lets me down.
And indeed even if we ourselves were not capable of any inclination or taste for these pursuits, we ought all the same to feel admiration when we see such gifts exemplified in others. No one can have been so boorish and insensitive that he remained unaffected when Roscius recently died. Although he was an old man at the time of his death, we had a feeling that such a superb and attractive artist ought somehow to have been exempted from our common fate. And if such a man's mere physical comportment on the stage was enough to win the hearts of us all, surely we can- not be left indifferent by genius of a purely intellectual kind, with all its enigmatic motions and scintillations . . .
Many is the time. . . that I have listened to this Archias . . . many is the time I have listened to him impro- vising quantities of admirable verses about topics of the day without having written down one single letter before he spoke. Many times I have also heard him respond to demands for an encore by repeating the same subject mat- ter in an entirely new set of words and phrases. And as for his written works, the products of meticulous care and cog- itation, I have seen them accorded a degree of appreciation in no way inferior to the reverence felt for writers of ancient times. Should I not love and admire such a man, and deem it my duty to defend him by every means in my power?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? as brief and simple as usual: An ironic statement, considering that Cicero's cases were almost never brief nor simple.
chairman: The presiding judge (praetor) in this case is thought to have been Cicero's brother, Quintus Tullius Cicero. Apparently, a question of conflict of interest was not raised.
encore: Most likely, Cicero is referring to an informal public recitation, in which Archias, at the conclusion of his performance, was recalled by the audience for additional read- ings. During the first century CE and beyond, such public recitations (recitationes, in which both budding and established authors would read their works aloud) became both common and fashionable. Pliny the Younger remarks in one of his letters [1. 13] that in one particular year "there was scarcely a day throughout the month of April when someone was not giving a public reading. " [tr. Radice. ]
Ennius: Quintus Ennius (239- 169 BCE), the "father of Roman poetry," was a playwright, historian, satirist, philosopher, and poet, highly regarded in his own time and in later times, as the Ciceronian description of him indicates. He referred to himself as a man of three hearts, because he knew Greek,
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. . . whereas other arts need to be based upon study and rules and principles, poets depend entirely on their own inborn gifts and are stimulated by some internal force, a sort of divine spark with the depths of their own souls. Our great Ennius was therefore right to call poets holy, because they seem to bring to us some spe- cial gift and endowment which the gods have accorded them as a passport for this world. Even the most barba- rous of races has never treated the name of poet with dis- respect. How imperative therefore it is that you yourselves, with all your noble culture, should regard it as holy indeed! The very rocks and deserts echo the poet's song. Many is the time when ferocious beasts have been enchanted and arrested in their tracks as these strains come to their ears. Shall we, then, who have been nurtured on everything that is fine, remain unmoved at a poet's voice?
[Next, Cicero reminds his audience that many com- munities--at least seven--claimed that Homer was their own native son, and that Archias had already writ- ten several histories that celebrated the accomplishments and conquests of the Roman armies. Achilles's name would have been buried in the dusts of history had Homer not penned the Iliad, and Alexander the Great would never have been famous were it not for the Archiases of his own time, poets and historians who could record his deeds for posterity; immortality comes via the written word. ]
Cicero's concluding words: "I have made the state- ment of my case as brief and simple as usual; and I have the feeling that it has gained your approbation. I hope my digression . .