Socrates Flaws

“I have flaws. What are they? I … sing in the shower. Sometimes I spend too much time volunteering. Occasionally I’ll hit someone with my car,” said by the fictional character Michael Scott on the acclaimed American television show, The Office. “I am the smartest man in the world because I know that I know nothing,” Socrates. He was a classical Greek philosopher, and is credited with founding Western philosophy. What do these two men have in common? To have a meaningful life, it is important to be humble about one’s place in the universe,to value knowledge, and to stay curious.

“Get smart. Stay in school. Go to more school. Do homework,” all of these recommendations have been metaphorically pounded down the throat of countless numbers of

Knowledge can be defined as an awareness or familiarity with a situation, subject, or fact in general. In his quote, Socrates portrayed that to admit ignorance in a society that treats confidence as if it is gold, is brilliance. To borrow a term from the dramatics, Michael Scott is the foil to Socrates. The politician that will win the campaign is the one who is, often times, the most confident. The doctor of whom many people will entrust with cutting them open is he who is most confident. It is safe to say that in most situations, it is best that the most confident has the better likelihood of getting the job/getting the patient/getting the seat in the White House, because the public would likely be upset if the president was nervous, or the surgeon’s hands were shaking when the patient met

He knew he did not know everything there was to know, but he wanted to learn as much as he could. To be smarter in one aspect of one’s life is to be smarter in several others; as my grandma always used to say when she was alive, knowledge is never wasted. She completed a degree in gerontology as she was getting older, just because she wanted to know what was happening to her. She was curious. To steal a quote from my history teacher, “The more you know the more fun life will be.” There is so much to study and to learn about, one just has to pick something, be curious about something, be an expert on something. Currently, all humans are unique, and therefore each person’s experience through life is different. To embrace this, and be curious, and be interested is to be engaged in life. It is to be an active human. This is what Socrates aimed to teach his followers: to be humble enough to admit ignorance is not a character flaw; however, to make no effort to reduce one’s ignorance is