“The debate that transpires in Gorgias, one of Plato’s early dialogues, written around 387 B.C., mixes elements drawn from actual debates with imagined dialogue representing the views of Socrates, Plato, and the famous Sophist Gorgias.” (Herrick, 58)
Plato’s dialogue, Gorgias, left me asking many questions. Does anyone know which elements in particular were drawn from actual debates verses Plato’s imagined dialogue? During this time period was it common to not only challenge someone’s ideas AND write his (because really during this time period almost all were male and not female scholars) supposed responses? Were the “mistakes” made by the sophists from an actual debate’s mistakes or did Plato imagine them as ways Socrates (but really Plato) could take on three sophists at once? The whole thing seemed strange to me even for a dialogue written in 387 BC…
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2 comments:
Good questions--I think Plato had his own agenda, and that makes me doubt the veracity of at least some of the dialogue.
I was thinking this same thing - it's quite easy to win an argument you're making up in your head.
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