The Socratic Method is a hoax

[TragicMonkey]

Yes, exactly. Unless you're selling the item. You tell someone the SM is effective, worth their time and effort, you're lying to them, hoaxing them, defrauding them (figuratively). You tell yourself it's effective, worth your time and effort, you're defrauding yourself.

That's my claim. It remains my claim regardless of what language you use, and regardless if you struggle to manage literal versus figurative usage. Taxonomical or definitional objections don't really touch the essence of my claim.

Maybe it's time to draft my monograph on the worthlessness of appeal to dictionary in a debate between peers.

Is there a name for a method in which one agrees with someone but does so in such terms the someone feels like they're being browbeaten and insulted? I'm not certain you need to quibble about how people speak with you, eventually they'll just stop entirely.

 

[Dave Rogers]

Is there a name for a method in which one agrees with someone but does so in such terms the someone feels like they're being browbeaten and insulted?

Yes, of course there is, it's a form of negging. I'm surprised that you of all people don't use it more.

Dave

 

[arthwollipot]

Doesn't excessively slander the blessed memory of Plato McPlatoface?

I am having real trouble understanding the thought process that comes up with a sentence like that in a context like this.

 

[theprestige]

I am having real trouble understanding the thought process that comes up with a sentence like that in a context like this.

Well if that's your only objection, I think we've reached a point of cordial agreement.

 

[arthwollipot]

Well if that's your only objection, I think we've reached a point of cordial agreement.

If what we're agreeing on is that Socratic questioning isn't a particularly effective way of winning a debate, then yes. I still maintain its usefulness in pedagogy.

 

[Roger Ramjets]

Maybe it's time to draft my monograph on the worthlessness of appeal to dictionary in a debate between peers.

It's not worthless. You only say that because you are wrong. A dictionary isn't the ultimate authority on what words mean, but it does provide a standard that documents their usage. Without a consensus on what words mean they are useless. Trying to win an argument by using a definition that nobody else does is both dishonest and lazy.

 

[Roger Ramjets]

I am having real trouble understanding the thought process that comes up with a sentence like that in a context like this.

Forget the context and consider the source, then you will understand.

 

[arthwollipot]

Forget the context and consider the source, then you will understand.

Is that intended as a subtle ad hominem? No, I was specifically questioning the process of reasoning behind it.

 

[Manopolus]

What function are you wanting the Socratic Method to perform? Perhaps we should be more explicit about that. Who claimed that it performs that function? Was it Plato or Socrates, or one of their later fanboys? Please quote the original source of your suggestion that it is supposed to serve a particular function before refuting vague claims that haven't even been properly identified.

Otherwise, we don't even know who you're arguing with, which risks tilting at windmills (straw man).


And yes, I can take a position on Socrates if you'd like. Historically speaking, it was an answer to solipsism, which basically said that you can't know anything and thus rhetoric is all that there is to work with. Thus, you should practice rhetoric rather than trying to know anything. The Socratic Method is anti-rhetoric. It exposes the shortcuts and asks the speaker to be more precise, more explicit. It's not a way to argue with people using only questions. It was a way to decline to take a position while sorting out the logic of the one making the argument.

So... it's not just another rhetorical device. It's explicitly anti-rhetoric. It's a way to expose the logic (or lack thereof), not a way to convince anybody of anything.

Based on what I gleaned from an admittedly rather negligent skim of the OP, I suspect that you're trying say that using a screwdriver to hammer in a nail is rather silly. I agree, but that isn't what screwdrivers were ever designed for, and neither did anyone suggest otherwise.

 

[acbytesla]

Wow! I think highly of the Socratic method.

It depends on how one approaches an argument. If it's your right and they're wrong. Then no, it doesn't work it all. But if done in a collegiale manner, it is the equivalent of peer review.

I try and tear my own arguments down and appreciate when others make the attempt.