Socrates Without Plato / Ömer Aygün (Galatasaray University)

In this presentation, I will explore how Socrates appears in non-Platonic sources and ask what this tells us about Socrates, but, even more interestingly, about Plato. I will do so by reviewing the treatment of Socrates in Laks & Most's 2016-2017 collection of Early Greek Philosophy which I claim is heavily anti-Platonic, but unfair and unconvincing. The presentation will offer us a more judicious and multi-faceted image of Platonic Socrates. This Platonic image of Socrates is, I shall argue, much less refuted than corroborated by non-Platonic images of Socrates.

Ömer Aygün is an assistant professor at Galatasaray University. He is a specialist of Plato and Aristotle. His book The Middle Included - Logos in Aristotle appeared in 2017 at Northwestern University Press. He is currently working on a new Turkish translation of Plato's Republic.