The Unexamined Life

Ask most people what Socrates was all about and they can either tell you about The Allegory of the Cave or quote what is probably his most well-known sound-bite, “The unexamined life isn’t worth living,” from The Apology. Some people even use that phrase as the tagline after their signature line on their e-mail account, that or “Follow your passion,” something Socrates never said. 

Listening to The Apology while running the Second Street Greenbelt the other morning, it occurred to me how much “The unexamined life isn’t worth living” has been taken out of context. Most people seem to use this phrase as a way to think about reviewing their life, actions, thoughts, and ideals in order to move on with their life, to build a better, more useful life. It’s a six word self-help mantra.

When Socrates said those words to his closest friends and confidants, his trial was over, he’d already been sentenced to death. He was telling--some of whom had encouraged him to seek exile, or even agree to stop teaching--that he had to keep at his task, the task of challenging the way Athens as a city was living its life. He had to, as he referred to it, continue to be a “gadfly” to the city, constantly irritating it. If he stopped, his life would not be worth living because he was not living as he knew he should, and those in Athens who refused to examine their own lives would also live lives that weren’t worth living. Better death than standing by and watching that happen.

500 Feet above the Frio River, Garner State Park

Thus, Socrates made a much broader, and more dangerous, statement than the sound-bite has room for. As I think about it, I’m not even sure that the sound-bite version of this quotation even means the same thing by “examine” as the Socrates does in The Apology. Socrates, as the quotation and his nickname implies, had little patience with those who fooled themselves. And his idea of self-help would have been a lot more demanding than ours.