MM#276--The Internal Socrates, The Honorable Adversary

Welcome to the Theory to Action podcast, where we examine the timeless treasures of wisdom from the great books in less time, to help you take action immediately and ultimately to create and lead a flourishing life. Now here's your host, david Kaiser.

Hello, I am David and welcome back to another Mojo Minute. Last week, we talked about the Socratic Method and as it applied to thinking critically, especially about the Middle East and especially about how I go about doing my research for these podcast episodes. Thank you to one of the listeners for that question. This week we're going to talk about the Socratic Method in other cases as well. Now to do so, we're going to continue with our guide and author, who is Ward Tharnsworth, and his book is the Socratic Method, a practitioner's handbook Fantastic book, if you like. Anything we're talking about here in terms of the Socratic Method, this is the go-to book, so I highly recommend it. Breaks down everything all about the Socratic Method. Now, one place we absolutely see the Socratic Method put into use is in a court of law, and that is important. Why? Because in a court of law, you are trying to get to the truth. You have two parties that are vying to understand what exactly happened, what is the truth in a particular case. So let's go to Ward and let's pick up the book on this very detail. Going to the book, the cross-examination there is another moving part. When you ask Socratic questions, how open-ended they are, sometimes Socrates will ask questions that might be answered in a hundred different ways. He wants to know what his partner thinks After. The exchange starts out very easy. Then his partner settles on a claim, its edges get clarified and Socrates bears down on it. The questions are no longer open-ended, they're often of the yes or no variety. Would you admit to X? Can we agree on Y? The dialogue becomes an effective cross-examination. The legal scholar John Wigmore called cross-examination get this the greatest legal engine ever invented for the discovery of truth. Socrates evidently thought the same was true in philosophy. Let me say that again. John Wigmore, a legal scholar, called cross-examination the greatest legal engine ever invented for the discovery of truth, and Socrates evidently thought the same was true in philosophy. Let's keep going. Consider the roles in which a cross-examination is done. The roles in court and in a Socratic dialogue are similar in many ways. First, all questions have to be answered as long as they aren't out of order. You can't say I'd rather not say. Second, the witness in court is supposed to tell the truth, and that is a role in a Socratic inquiry too. Say what you think. Third, the interrogator can ask leading questions, in other words questions that imply their answers or questions that imply their answers. Isn't it true that? Or wouldn't you agree that Leading questions leave no room for answers that evade? They force the witness to confront a particular point. Cross-examination thus allows witnesses to be probed, their weaknesses shown, their secrets found out. These properties make it a superb device for testing the truth and beliefs of a witness or of anyone else. The Socratic method is a superb device for testing the truth and the beliefs of the witness or of anyone else. That is fantastic, kathleen. Thank you is a great negative wisdom right there. Excellent, in fact. Let's keep rolling. Later on, ward helps us to understand why that same adversarial system is a good thing. Going back to the book, the adversarial system, here's another way to look at the point that was just made. Cross-examination in court generally happens when questioning a witness called by the other side. The lawyer and the witness have an adversarial relationship. Adversarial behavior is nothing unusual and doesn't require a literary role model, and it typically isn't constructive when you're working with a partner. But adversarial thinking, that is, an adversarial approach within your own thinking, isn't usual at all and it is very constructive. Ah, now that is different. We went from the court of law and that adversarial approach to being cross-examined witness to lawyer or adversarial lawyer. But then we brought it in-house. Ward challenges us to think about an adversarial approach within our own thinking. Did you catch that? But adversarial thinking, that is, an adversarial approach to your own thinking, isn't usual at all. And is very constructive. Oh really, now? What does he mean by that? Let's go back to the book. Most of us interpret the world to confirm what we already think about it and what we wish were true. Cognition probably evolved to convince ourselves and others that whatever helps us is for the best. Or maybe there are other reasons for motivated reasoning, confirmation, bias or our countless other forms of chronic misjudgment. In any event, searching them out is not a favorite activity of the mind left to itself. So chronic questioning is a remedy. It is needed for the sake of good government. There has to be an opposition party within the self, something that argues against what you feel, that you know. The internalized Socrates amounts to an honorable adversary. Holy smokes, holy smokes is right, that is good stuff. The internal Socrates is an honorable adversary. It is the remedy to help you question yourself and your assumptions, to get to the bottom of the truth. Kind of like that phrase you can have your feelings but you can't have your facts, and that much idiotic phrase that is said often these days there is your truth and there is my truth, but there is no the truth. It is just rubbish. Facts over feelings, folks, facts over feelings. The world is not all relative. There is a truth and in order to live a flourishing life we have to discover and search out that truth. So let us learn that Socrates would be proud of us if we questioned our own assumptions and beliefs and thought critically through those answers that we give ourselves. You know that internal Socratic method isn't a bad phrase. So in today's Mojo Minute, let's put the inner Socrates to work. When we do, we will live much closer to the truth, and by living much closer to the truth we will be living a flourishing life. Little PS here, a little teaser In our next Mojo Minute we will put the Socratic method to full use in a very important practical example. Thank you.