The phrase "socratic method (or discourse)" is by now an umbrella term
covering a host of different techniques with a family resemblance to each
other. Even in the socratic dialogues there is not always any prior
knowledge of the knowledge that lies at its end unless you include finding
out that you do not know. Socrates of course claims to know this and took
this as the first step toward positive knowledge. In the early so-called
Socratic dialogues the result is rarely if ever some positive knowledge.
I agree however that what is needed is what you call an open dialectic.
However this dialectic would have as part of the process not just questions
and answers but participants would point out difficulties in the answers
forcing a person or members of the group to a more adequate answer that
answers the difficulty or contradiction. That in fact is how I envision the
process in the email context.
A basic problem I find in the original method is Socrates seems to
assume that there are ultimately precise definitions of terms such as
"courage"
"virtue", "piety" etc. that could theoretically be arrived at using the
Socratic method. I doubt it. It is not surprising Socrates is able to
demolish any definitions offered.
Cheers, Ken Hanly
P.S. There is a digest version of Pen-l I believe. Traffic seems to have its
ups and downs..perhaps there are short term Kondratiev waves! If it becomes
too bad a limit of x posts a day could be imposed with an automated
Philosopher QUeen to reject the x plus oneth post..One of the rules of email
discourse is as follows: IF thou shouldst leave thy computer for more than
one day, thou shalt send to majordomo a command to the effect to postpone
pen-l or something to that effect. You can always go to archives if you want
to see what you missed.
> No one has raised what seems to me to be the major difficulty in
> encouraging widespread conversation and dialogue on PEN-L: incredible
> amounts of over-posting. God help the poor soul who goes away for a
> weekend, and returns to a mailbox full of hundreds of PEN-L e-mails
> accumulated over the space of three+ days. It takes hours just to try to
> figure out what is substantive, and what is not. Perhaps it is because no
> political points could be scored from such an observation, perhaps it is
> because the list of the guilty is long and from all quarters, but no one
> has mentioned this problem. Short one liner contributions are a problem
> primarily in the way they contribute to this immense volume; it is
> obviously a lot easier to produce many of them than to produce many more
> lengthy and considered pieces. Bottom line: one should be able to
> participate in a listserv and still have a life which is not dedicated to
> 24 hours a day in front of a computer.
>
> IMHO, Socratic discourse is more of a complex phenomena than has been
> indicated here. It provides a model of a conversation, a dialogue, as a
> basis of learning, and by contrast to the didactic, lecturing mode which
> predominates at the post-secondary level of education, it is much
> preferable. The problem with the Socratic discourse is the assumption that
> one party to the discourse -- the teacher -- entirely controls it, and is
> in possession, prior to the actual conversation, of the knowledge which
> lies at its end. In short, the dialectic of the Socratic discourse, like
> the Hegelian dialectic, is closed, with a pre-given, teleological end.
What
> is needed, of course, is an open dialectic in which the knowledge end is
> not pre-given, and in which all sides to the conversation share a
> fundamental equality in terms of an understanding that they can learn from
> each other in a common pursuit of knowledge. This means, of course, that
> there is nothing wrong, per se, with the e-mail response which simply
poses
> a question; the key point is simply that the question must be genuine, and
> part of a larger commitment to egalitarian dialogue and conversation.
>
> Leo Casey
> United Federation of Teachers
> 260 Park Avenue South
> New York, New York 10010-7272
> 212-98-6869
>
> Power concedes nothing without a demand.
> It never has, and it never will.
> If there is no struggle, there is no progress.
> Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation are men
who
> want crops without plowing the ground. They want rain without thunder and
> lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its waters.
> -- Frederick Douglass --
>
> .
>
