ENGL 298 B: Intermediate Writing Social Sciences   Autumn 2011, University of Washington

Reading Plato’s work has definitely shown me a whole new level of confusion. However, I feel like any new piece of literature may take a fair amount of time to understand. While I truthfully admit I do not fully comprehend his work. But, the two words that really stood out to me were  legitimate and persuade.

One of the main reasons that I chose legitimate is because one of the biggest points throughout the lecture when analyzing Socrates is what makes something legitimate and how do we define ones legitimacy. ” Consider that I tell you this because I would inform you about the origin of slander When I heard of this reply I asked myself: “Whatever does god mean? What is his riddle? I am very conscious that I am not wise at all; what then does he mean by saying that I am the wisest? For surely he does not lie; it is not legitimate for him to do so.”  Legitimate to me is what makes something official, or worthy of authority. In my opinion, authority can be identified in numerous ways such as title, law, position, etc. I find legitimate to place a lot of importance in the text because Plato tries to make the point that we do not know what makes something “legitimate.” The whole time that Socrates is defending himself, and telling his philosophy he makes it clear that we do not know what is really legitimate and who is to say what can be legitimate and what cannot.

For my second word choice, I used persuade. I felt like this was also very important and stood out because “The Trial and Death of Socrates” is a tragic story of a man who truly believes he is the wisest because he does not know everything. And so through his trial he attempts to persuade the jury people that although he is accused of preaching false knowledge, he really believes in his philosophy and his way of the gods. So he persuades the jury in his beliefs, however coming out with a guilty verdict. And in the end he realizes that through his death will come no harm to his children or to the city of Athens because he has done his job and he persuaded to the best of his ability and I think that was more than enough for him. ” Do not let Crito persuade you, rather than us, to do what he says.” And through moral obligation he did what was best in his eyes, and as he saw it,  through his death, his philosophy would still be known. That is why persuade was a word that stood out because his persuasion was was saved him in the end.