Socrates is a pretty important guy. He was the teacher of Plato, who taught Aristotle, who then proceeded to teach Alexander The Great. Socrates was undoubtedly one of the most influential philosophers ever to exist.

The most important contribution he made to the world was his Socratic Method of inquiry. This is used to look for ideas and dig deeper into a specific subject, to find new answers or perspectives.

Reason #1: Socrates never wrote a single thing.

Socrates never wrote anything. He liked to teach orally and hated writing. Therefore we don’t have a single text written by him. The only source we have on Socrates is what others wrote about him.

Since there is no original work of Socrates, a philosopher who lived around 2,500 years ago in Athens, it is pretty suspicious. Some say that

Plato made him up to demonstrate a point, to teach some lessons using him as a character.

The primary source of information we have on Socrates is Plato’s dialogues, which were translated, edited, and probably fictionalized a little bit. These were conversations that Socrates supposedly had with other people, along with the details of his trial and execution.

Other sources are not so credible like Aristophanes plays. Since he was a comedian and playwright, his writings on Socrates are not taken seriously.

Some of the sources seem to contradict each other. And since those writings were not specifically made to report and record Socrates’ life, none of them present an accurate enough description.

One thing we can observe is how Socrates has this in common with figures such as Jesus Christ, who never wrote anything about himself.

Some of these prominent historical figures didn’t care about their memory being preserved across time. Some historians even say they were all made up.

Reason #2: The Socratic Problem

In Plato’s Symposium we find an interesting opinion from Socrates friend Alcibiades:

“Well, there is a lot more to be said about Socrates… but I think that the most amazing thing about him is the fact that he is absolutely unique.

For there is no one like him, and I don’t think there ever was or will be.” -Alcibiades.

No one could live up to Socrates. Not even Socrates himself, which makes us ask if he ever existed at all or was just a mere fictional character created by Plato.

“We confront in the end a problem, the Socratic problem as this is known, one that can be stated in simple terms: despite all our knowledge about Socrates, little of substance can be affirmed without hesitation. Any trait associated with him, any idea attributed to him, can be contradicting by producing passages from various sources.” – Luis Navia (Socrates: A life examined)

Socrates is considered one of the most influential philosophers and human being to ever exist. Just like Buddha, Jesus, and Confucius.

Could it be that none of these men did ever exist?

The Socratic problem comes to being when we compare the primary sources we have of him: Plato, Aristophanes, Xenophon, and Aristotle.

All of these sources attribute different traits and ideas, which leaves us with facts and fiction, indistinguishable from each other. Our task is simple, yet almost impossible, to differentiate what was real and what was not.

Many respectable historians and philosophers denied that it was possible to know the “real” Socrates and that he would remain unknown and a work of fiction from us. However, some scholars believe that it is possible to acquire knowledge of the historical Socrates, although we may never be able to solve the Socratic problem.

Reason #3: Plato’s Republic

There’s a reason to believe that Plato used Socrates to express his ideas in his work “The Republic.”

Some assume that Plato was using the character of Socrates all the time, to express his views. Still, we don’t know for sure, and may never know.

We could be wrong, perhaps the sources contradict each other because they perceived Socrates differently. Maybe they saw another side of the man, and that’s what they described in their writings.

We can’t deny the possibility. Still, more work needs to be done before we can prove or disprove this theory.

More capacitated historians will analyze the problem in the future (I hope so) to determine whether this fabulous character was an invention or not.

What do you think? Let us know in the comments!