While Socrates arguments may be sound in his opinion, I'm not sure if I agree with them. Just because of the good laws of the state benefited Socrates and helped him in his upbringing, it doesn't mean that he has to remain completely loyal to them for his entire life. His main point about never returning an unjust act with another makes sense to a degree, but only if you agree with his view that the soul is the only thing that matters and not the body. While I understand that point, I don' think every unjust act ruins the soul. Some acts such as telling a white lie in some situations are
In Antigone, by Sophocles, The characterization Creon proves the quote to be true through his irrational decisions and edicts. His abuse of power is shown through Creon by forbidding anyone to give Polyneices an honorable burial and not listening to the prophet Teiresias. When Oedipus, King of Thebes, dies, his throne is left for his two sons Eteocles and Polyneices. When Eteocles refuses to share the throne, the two brothers go to war. Both are killed in the struggle for power.
He then leads up to his main objection of this definition by means of stating that even though men and gods love that which they think is noble and good, and hate that which is opposite to those things, not everyone thinks this way about all things (Plato, 7). This being in the nature of things that are considered to be good by a group of people, can be hated by others, and this would also apply to the gods, for not everyone thinks the same. Socrates then uses a good example concerning the gods to better prove his reasons. He states that even though Euthyphro's decision to proceed against his own father may seem agreeable to Zeus, but not to Cronos or Uranus, and that there may be other gods who have these differences of opinions (7). Concerning
Socrates’ Trial and Death Athenians were humiliated by the lost battle against Sparta. Athens was stabilizing and recovering from the defeat while Socrates, being much of a critic, found himself in trouble after politically expressing his views on the new democracy. When someone's opinion does not match that of the majority, does that make them wrong? In ancient Athens around 400 BC, the majority of a 501 member jury believed so. A person with beliefs and principles should be allowed to express his/her thoughts because he/she can visualize something which others may not.
This led to constant warfare between the leagues formed by the Greek city-states and Macedon. Around 221 BCE, Phillip V of Macedon took power of the Macedonian throne. He was considered to be the last Greek ruler who was militaristically and politically capable of uniting all of Greece. However, in 218 BCE, he allied with Carthage, which was a big mistake to his plans. This led to the breakout of wars between Rome and Macedon in a series of skirmishes.
It was a group of democratic city-states. Since Athenians were already democratic they decided to let Athens be the capital of Greece and run government issues. Once Athenians start to tax other city-states Sparta grows weary of the Athenians rule. This is what started the Peloponnesian Wars between Athens and Sparta (other city –states also helped). Now just like in the first war Sparta couldn’t do it alone; so they asked the Persians to help conquer Athens.
The helots had revolted following an earthquake and had taken up position in the strategic stronghold of mount Ithome. Epilates saw Sparta as a rival and enemy and Cimon managed to persuade the assembly to send a force to help. On arrival the Spartans regretted asking the Athenians and sent them home. Thucydides said this was because of the bold and evolutionary ideas of the Athenians that led to this idea. Thucydides said that the Athenians returning home were deeply offended with this treatment by the Spartans and said it is not what they deserved.
In his commentary of Xenophon’s ‘Hellenica’, George Carkwell argues that Sparta originally lost her power from 394 BC, after the naval victory of the Persian and Greek fleet. The combined Persian and Greek fleet was under the command of the Athenian Conon and Pharnabazus. They defeated the Spartan navy led by Pisander. Following this significant defeat, Spartan ‘harmosts’ were expelled through the Aegean and this led to the Lacedaemonian maritime empire being virtually
1.28.1; Paus. 7.25.3; Hdt. 5.71). This was a political crisis, both because of the attempted coup by an upstart and because of his murder by the arisocrats—he had claimed the goddess’s protection, which ought to have been respected. Whether this crisis brought about subsequent political changes we cannot tell, but it certainly left its mark on Athenian politics.
It is apparent on how the Ancient Athenians executed Socrates after the series of attempts of his followers to destroy Democracy. It is also a Democracy of the Sword because of the Ancient Athenians view war as a necessity to protect Democracy, which they claim to be the model government for other Greek City-States to follow but eventually these wars destroyed Democracy. The Democracy of the United States of America during the 20th century, as I see it, is a Democracy of principles in a sense that Ideologies are dominant in the United States. There are four dominant Ideologies namely: liberal, conservative, libertarian and populist. I tend to think that the United States view the world as a political area and it is just a mere battle of principles of state governance.