The Socratic Turn : Knowledge of Good and Evil in an Age of Science

__The Socratic Turn__ addresses the question of whether we can acquire genuine knowledge of good and evil, right and wrong. Reputedly, Socrates was the first philosopher to make the attempt. But Socrates was a materialistic natural scientist in his youth, and it was only much later in life—after he had rejected materialistic natural science—that he finally turned, around the age of forty, to the examination of ordinary moral and political opinions, or to moral-political philosophy so understood.Through a consideration of Plato's account of Socrates' intellectual development, and with a view to relevant works of the pre-Socratics, Xenophon, Aristotle, Hesiod, Homer, and Aristophanes, Dustin Sebell reproduces the course of thought that carried Socrates from materialistic natural science to moral-political philosophy. By doing so, he seeks to recover an all but forgotten approach to the question of justice, one still worthy of being called scientific. The Socratic Turn addresses the question of whether we can acquire genuine knowledge of good and evil, right and wrong. Reputedly, Socrates was the first philosopher to make the attempt. But Socrates was a materialistic natural scientist in his youth, and it was only much later in life--after he had rejected materialistic natural science--that he finally turned, around the age of forty, to the examination of ordinary moral and political opinions, or to moral-political philosophy so understood. Through a consideration of Plato's account of Socrates' intellectual development, and with a view to relevant works of the pre-Socratics, Xenophon, Aristotle, Hesiod, Homer, and Aristophanes, Dustin Sebell reproduces the course of thought that carried Socrates from materialistic natural science to moral-political philosophy. By doing so, he seeks to recover an all but forgotten approach to the question of justice, one still worthy of being called scientific.--Book jacket. Cover 1 The Socratic Turn 2 Title 4 Copyright 5 Dedication 6 Contents 8 Introduction 12 PART I 26 Chapter 1. The Problem of the Young Socrates 28 Chapter 2. What Is Science? 36 Chapter 3. The Prospects for Matter in Motion 56 Chapter 4. Noetic Heterogeneity 72 PART II 84 Chapter 5. Teleology 86 PART III 104 Chapter 6. Science and Society 106 Chapter 7. Dialectic 117 Conclusion 155 Notes 158 References 206 Index 222 Acknowledgments 228