Socrates' "Mirror For The Mind" Will Transform Your Thinking

What if another person could act as a mirror for your mind? In this thought-provoking conversation with philosopher Donald Robertson we delve into Socrates' timeless insights on wisdom, self-awareness, and the art of questioning. Discover how Socrates used deep dialogue to uncover life’s most fundamental truths and what he meant by an eye that can see itself.

Transcript

The following is a clip from a conversation I recorded with Donald Robertson,

A cognitive behavioral psychotherapist and renowned expert on Stoicism.

Donald specializes in bridging ancient philosophical wisdom with the modern psychology to enhance resilience,

Emotional clarity,

And well-being.

Enjoy.

So I think really,

Fundamentally,

One of the things that we get from Socrates is the idea that we can learn by observing other people's thinking.

And it's difficult for us to critique our own thinking because we have these biases and blind spots.

But if we critique other people and we can do it in such a way that we see them as kind of analogous to us,

We in a sense have a kind of empathy for people that we're debating with or engaging in philosophical dialogue with.

You know,

We think this guy keeps making the same errors,

But maybe I do that as well sometimes.

Right.

He,

One of my favorite dialogues is the first Alcibides where Socrates tries to explain what the maxim that's engraved on the pillar outside the temple at Delphi means.

The most famous philosophical maxim,

Or Delphic maxim,

There were many of them,

But the most famous is ''Gonothai seouton'',

Which means ''know thyself'',

And has a profound effect on Greek philosophy.

Socrates seems to keep coming back to that.

And he says,

To know thyself,

He clearly thinks of as a kind of definition of wisdom.

He compares it to an eye that can see itself,

Which is a really powerful and kind of evocative image.

Right.

He says,

Imagine the God,

The God Apollo is commanding your mind to know itself,

Says ''know thyself''.

Imagine he commanded your eye to see itself.

He says this to Alcibides.

Alcibides says,

I guess you'd need like a mirror or something.

And Socrates says,

Well,

What would be the mirror for the mind?

And what he's implying or insinuating is that another person with whom you're engaging in a collaborative philosophical discussion would be like a mirror for your mind.

And that would be like the eye being able to see itself.

Like you learn something about yourself by engaging very sincerely and very deeply in a debate with other people about what Socrates likes to describe as.

I think some of the most profound things that Socrates says are just like him often saying quite simple things.

Right.

So the very fact that he keeps,

He tends to refer to some of the things he's talking about is the most important things in life,

Like the highest things he says.

What he's implying is that one of the distinctive things about the dialogues that he's engaging in is that he keeps bringing the subject back to the most fundamental questions,

Such as what is wisdom?

What is good for us?

What is bad for us?

You know,

What is the goal of human life?

What does human fulfillment consist of?

What is the nature of justice?

You know,

These absolutely like fundamental questions about how we should live our lives and the things upon which we should place most value.

So when we ask those really deep questions and a really sincere dialogue with other people,

We learn more about ourselves.

But I think to me,

My interpretation of what's going on in the course of Socrates' life is that he says in the Apology that initially when the Oracle said,

No man is wiser than Socrates.

And he thought,

I need to go and check this out.

I find it hard to believe.

So I'm going to see if I can find someone that's wiser than me.

What he says that he initially did was to seek out people that were known for wisdom.

And when he questioned them,

He found now that mainly that makes us think of the sophists,

Because like the Greek word sophistis means an expert or someone who claims to be wise.

The sophists were basically people who literally went around claiming to be wise or claiming to be enlightened.

And their followers claimed that they were.

So Socrates went,

OK,

I guess I should speak to these guys,

Right?

Protagoras,

The first famous sophist,

Was literally referred to as the wisest man alive.

So Socrates went to him and was like,

OK,

Can you explain what virtue is and how it can be taught and stuff like that?

And when he questioned him very thoroughly,

He found that Protagoras struggled to answer some basic questions and he contradicted himself and he tied himself in knots.

So Socrates thought,

Maybe these guys aren't really that wise then.

And I'm only wiser than them because I at least realize that I am ignorant of the answers to these questions.

But there's something else going on here,

Which is Protagoras and some of these other guys became annoyed with Socrates and kind of evasive.

So Plato often portrays them wanting to change the and kind of trying to,

You know,

Misdirect Socrates launching into prepared speeches and kind of getting other people to step in for them in the conversation and things like that.

So being kind of evasive,

Right?

And Socrates says that he was surprised to find that sometimes he spoke with people who had no reputation for wisdom and found that they exhibited more wisdom than people who were famous wise men,

Right?

So just like humble tradesmen and things like that.

Socrates spoke to prostitutes and slaves and,

You know,

All sorts of people.

But I think part of it,

What he's implying,

And maybe this is even stated explicitly in one of Plato's dialogues,

That people who claim to be wise are unsuited to philosophical discussion because they have too much of a reputation to defend.

So that prevents them from ever admitting that they're wrong,

Right?

So you could point out the contradictions in their thinking and the gaps in their reasoning.

They're just going to get defensive when you do that and change the subject,

Right?

Or try and gloss over it because they've basically poisoned the dialogue by investing their reputation in maintaining the appearance of wisdom,

Right?

The appearance of wisdom is more important to them than real wisdom,

And that's going to make them highly evasive.

It's going to make them resist ever having their errors being pointed out to them.

So Socrates increasingly turned to a group of individuals that nobody considered to be wise,

And those were the youth of Athens,

Who seemed much more open to being interrogated by Socrates and having their errors.

That's why I think that it's sometimes said he looks like over time,

Some spend somewhat more time talking to younger people,

You know?

And I think it's because he initially went,

Right,

I'm going to go straight to the people that are called wise,

The wisest men alive.

And then he thought,

These guys are useless to talk to because they're so defensive because they have to protect their reputation.

Whereas slaves,

Prostitutes and young people have got nothing to lose.

So if I ask them how they define justice,

And then I kind of point out that there's maybe a flaw in their definition or there's a contradiction,

They're more willing to accept that and to have another go and revise what they're saying and to keep the conversation going.

You know,

They don't have a reputation to protect.

So they provide a better mirror for my soul.

Someone who claims to be wise is like a clouded mirror.

It's not much good.

You know,

Someone who has more intellectual humility is going to provide a better mirror.

Yeah,

I can actually see that a lot in the,

When I train Jiu Jitsu,

Sometimes when people get a black belt,

It's like they,

They just,

They're no longer open to learning from the lower belts.

And it's like,

They've got to always maintain this authority when you talk to them.

Whereas someone who's a white belt,

They just like,

I don't know anything.

Like we,

We both don't know anything.

And I really respect the black belts that still act like they don't know much,

You know,

And they've got lots to learn.

Socrates avoided that.

Sometimes the way I explain it is that he always avoided setting himself up as a teacher.

Like he didn't charge fees.

Whereas the sophists charge huge fees,

Right?

So they're financially invested in maintaining a reputation.

He didn't make any money from teaching.

He never claimed to be a teacher.

He avoided saying that he was a teacher,

Avoided,

He denied being wise.

And ironically,

What he does is cast himself more in the role,

Not of a teacher,

But of a student,

But of an exceptional student.

Like,

I guess you could say he's kind of got a beginner's mind or whatever it would be another way of maybe putting it,

But he casts himself much more in the role of a kind of eternal student.

And he would be a bit like,

You know,

At the same time,

It's almost humorous,

Like how annoying Socrates can be.

But at the same time,

Kind of,

You know,

That's part of his character and this is what makes him inspiring.

But it's like you went to a lecture by a famous public intellectual and it's really expensive.

And there's like hundreds and hundreds of people,

Maybe thousands of people that went to see them.

And there's one guy in the audience that keeps is asking them really difficult,

Really penetrating questions,

Right?

And some people might start to turn around and think,

Some people in the audience might think,

This guy's kind of annoying.

Just let him get on with it.

We all paid to come in here.

But other people,

The audience might be divided.

There might be other people in the audience that think this guy's questions are more interesting than this dude's answers.

Right.

And it's almost like Socrates is like this guy at the back that everyone's starting to turn around and watch and say,

This dude's questions are better and more interesting than the expert at the front giving the answers.

Yeah.

But there would be people who hated him for that.