So even now I continue this investigation as the god bade me—and I go around seeking out anyone, citizen or stranger, whom I think wise. Then if I do not think he is, I come to the assistance of the god and show him that he is not wise. Because of this occupation, I do not have the leisure to engage in public affairs to any extent, nor indeed to look after my own, but I live in great poverty because of my service to the god.

— Socrates, Apology 23b

Even if you acquitted me now and did not believe Anytus, who said to you that either I should not have been brought here in the first place, or that now I am here, you cannot avoid executing me, for if I should be acquitted, your sons would practice the teachings of Socrates and all be thoroughly corrupted; if you said to me in this regard: “Socrates, we do not believe Anytus now; we acquit you, but only on condition that you spend no more time on this investigation and do not practice philosophy, and if you are caught doing so you will die;” if, as I say, you were to acquit me on those terms, I would say to you: “Men of Athens, I am grateful and I am your friend, but I will obey the god rather than you, and as long as I draw breath and am able, I shall not cease to practice philosophy, to exhort you and in my usual way to point out to any one of you whom I happen to meet: ‘Good Sir, you are an Athenian, a citizen of the greatest city with the greatest reputation for both wisdom and power; are you not ashamed of your eagerness to possess as much wealth, reputation and honors as possible, while you do not care for nor give thought to wisdom or truth, or the best possible state of your soul?’ Then, if one of you disputes this and says he does not care, I shall not let him go at once or leave him, but I shall question him, examine him and test him, and if I do not think he has attained the goodness that he says he has, I shall reproach him because he attaches little importance to the most important things and greater importance to inferior things. I shall treat in this way anyone I happen to meet, young and old, citizen and stranger, and more so the citizens because you are more kindred to me. Be sure that this is what the god orders me to do, and I think there is no greater blessing for the city than my service to the god. For I go around doing nothing but persuading both young and old among you not to care for your body or your wealth in preference to or as strongly as for the best possible state of your soul, as I say to you: Wealth does not bring about excellence, but excellence makes wealth and everything else good for men, both individually and collectively.”

— Socrates, Apology 29c-30b

Socrates, according to himself, was a man appointed by the gods themselves to be the conscience of Athens. If you’re anything like me then your gut reaction to reading words like this, at least for some small part of you, is something like: “Who the hell does this guy think he is?” I know this tends to be my reaction to people in the modern world saying similar things. It seems to me that people who say things like this tend to be either con men, delusional, or both. So what makes Socrates different? Or is he different?

The next thing I always find myself doing in my debates with myself is defending Socrates from the charge of arrogance. “He’s not arrogant,” Me #2 will say, “he just takes his life’s work very seriously. There really is a lot of rot and moral degeneracy in fifth century Athens, and someone has to point it out, dammit.” Me #1 responds, “And how could one man have the gall to think he’s the one who could do that. Surely that’s the height of arrogance, to think you are the one man capable of and responsible for pointing out the moral failings of your entire city.” And thus the rabbit hole of Socrates’ character continues.

Then Me #3 finally steps in and says, “Both of you shut up.” The bottom line that Me #3 wants to get across can be best expressed by an analogy.

Let’s say a man comes to you and says he can show you a way to make a million dollars. Or better yet, a million Bitcoin. He lays out the strategy, shows you how it worked for him, and demonstrates the whole process to you. First off, it’s most likely some kind of pyramid scheme or other such scam, but let’s pretend for a moment that this man can somehow prove to your satisfaction that this is all totally legal and legit. There’s just one problem: the guy is an arrogant bastard.

Remember, in this scenario we’ve already said that this man’s money-making strategy is proven to your satisfaction to be completely above board and legit, and also proven to work. If you implement this strategy, you are guaranteed to get rich. But since the guy telling you about the strategy is an arrogant bastard, you would of course turn down the opportunity, because who would want to take advice from someone like that? Right?

No, of course not. It would be silly to turn down the proposition on those grounds. You might possibly have other good reasons for turning down the proposition. Maybe you would view the prospect of having that much money as something akin to being offered the One Ring, and you think it would be corrupting. Maybe you’re already satisfied with the financial situation you have and don’t see a need for more. Maybe you just don’t trust yourself to handle that amount of money responsibly. But those reasons are all completely separate from the temperament of the man making the offer. If you don’t have any other reasons for turning down the proposition, turning it down on the grounds of the arrogance of the man making the offer would be nonsensical.

So why then do some of us reflexively spend so much time thinking about and debating Socrates’ personality, namely his arrogance or lack thereof? The thing Socrates offers, as he says in the Apology, is arguments to persuade us to care for the best possible state of our souls above all else, and if Socrates’ arguments from other dialogues are correct, this is something much more valuable than a million dollars, or even a million Bitcoin. If this is what he offers, and his offering is valid, why would we ever want to turn down the offer on account of his possible arrogance?

But, you might say, how do we know the offer is valid? This is where we depart slightly from the above analogy, because maybe we don’t know for sure if Socrates’ strategies will work, and now we come to the point. My point is that these ought to be the questions we ask when reading Plato: Are the arguments valid? Is Socrates speaking things that are true and valuable? I think the process of contemplating the contents of Socrates’ discussions is the process that leads to the betterment of one’s soul, and the very act of neglecting this process in favor of discussing and debating the personality or character of Socrates himself is the same as rejecting the offer for the betterment of one’s soul.

The bottom line is that I think it’s a waste of time to think about Socrates’ arrogance, or lack thereof. Talking about the validity and contents of his arguments is a much better use of time and energy. Which of course brings up the question: Why am I writing this right now? I should probably finish up and get back to reading Phaedo.