Socrates is perhaps the first moral philosopher in the history of Europe. In his system of ideas, knowledge and wisdom are elements linked to good, while ignorance is evil (a belief also adopted by his disciple, Plato.

In this article we will see what Socrates’ epistemological theory was and how it was linked to morality. But first let’s start by briefly reviewing the life of this Greek philosopher to better understand why he thought the way he did.

Who was Socrates?

Socrates was born in the city-state of Athens in the year 469 B.C. . It is known that he participated in the Peloponnesian War against other Greek cities, among which Sparta stood out, and that on his return he devoted himself to Athenian politics. In this way he had the opportunity to get used to debating and developing complex ideas through dialogue, something that would later serve him to develop his philosophical enquiries.

Years later, when his father died, he inherited an amount of money that allowed him to live without the need for paid work. It was this fact that made it possible for Socrates to become a philosopher.

Socrates quickly began to gain visibility as a public figure on the streets of Athens. This thinker challenged people to defend their most fundamental beliefs to their ultimate consequences , and by posing questions that the other had to answer he showed that these ideas were not as well founded as they seemed at first. This led to a growing following, students who listened to their conversations.

The influence Socrates gained made the authorities wary of him, and eventually they accused him of corrupting the young, for which he was sentenced to death. Socrates ended up committing suicide by drinking hemlock in 399 B.C.

Socrates’ epistemological theory

These are the main aspects of Socrates’ epistemological theory. Not only was it one of the first attempts to create a philosophical system of epistemology in the West, but it also served as a starting point for thinkers as important as Plato .

1. The need to know what good is

The main objective of human existence, which gives meaning to life, is to live following the path of good . By definition, the good is a vector that tells us which actions are desirable and which are not.

2. The good is an absolute concept

Both good and evil are concepts that exist independently of us. Whether we think about them or not, whether we exist or not, good and evil are there , and they say something about who we are even if we are not aware of it.

3. Philosophical inquiry is necessary

As a consequence of the above, it is necessary to investigate through philosophy to go beyond the simple idea that the good exists and to know exactly what its form is. Since in order to act in the right way it is necessary to know reality, Socrates establishes an equivalence between good and wisdom .

4. The rejection of preconceived ideas

To arrive at the idea of good, we must question everything we think we know to see if it is really based on true ideas. To do this, Socrates resorted to a principle of knowledge called mayeutics .

What is mayeutics according to Socrates?

Socrates believed that although many of our beliefs are false, by questioning them we can come closer to the truth.

Mayeutics is a form of dialogue in which each statement is replicated with a question that forces the sender to further develop his ideas. In this way, it can be checked whether it has no vulnerable sides or whether it is really just an intuition, an easily falsified belief.

As Socrates defended the value of mayeutics, he showed no enthusiasm for long speeches or for the possibility of writing books , but preferred the dialogue developed in real time as a tool for creating knowledge. This idea was taken up by other intellectuals later on, although his disciple Plato, despite sharing many ideas with him, did not follow his master in that respect (and in fact took it upon himself to leave Socrates’ ideas in writing, since the latter did not do so).

What does “I just know I don’t know anything” mean?

For Socrates, this declaration of intent was a way of expressing the importance of basing knowledge on questioning everything that seems obvious. Questioning ideas may seem simply a way of undermining theories, but it can also be seen as the opposite: a way of strengthening them and making them really correspond to reality through constructive criticism.