Socrates is somewhat similar to Confucius in China. He likes to teach young people, but there are no writings circulating. Today, we all understand their thoughts through the accounts of their students.

Socrates believed that the "heart" is supreme, and only the "heart" can grasp the true form and idealization. and sense objects merely have a tendency to approach this form.

For example, we can consider real triangles and abstract triangles. Real triangles refer to those specific individuals that are close to abstract triangles in our experience. The abstract triangle is an idealized object, an object of "mind" reflection.

Socrates is a representative of the so-called idealist philosophy. When he was framed and imprisoned by the Athenian dignitaries, he received news and had the opportunity to escape, but he did not choose to escape, and voluntarily stayed for trial. In prison, Socrates once used this example to refute the mechanical materialism of the time:

Since the Athenians thought it would be better to convict me, I also thought it would be better to sit here and stay and accept it. The punishment they fixed was better, for I swear, if I had not thought it a more just and honorable thing to accept whatever sentence the city handed me down than to run away, my bones and muscles would have been as good as some say. The best way is to go to Megara or Boeotia.

Socrates believed that everything was created and arranged by God, reflecting God’s wisdom and purpose. It is proposed that the most knowledgeable person is God, knowledge ultimately comes from God, and true knowledge is to obey God. Later Christian apologists often cited Socrates as an example of Greek philosophy as an ally of Christian theology.

Plato was a student of Socrates and the greatest representative of idealist philosophy. Plato's view of nature was deduced a priori from human needs and intentions, for example: God is good, the sphere is the most perfect form, therefore, the universe must be spherical.

The so-called a priori means before experience, which refers to knowledge that can be obtained without experience, such as: God is good, human nature is essentially good, etc.

Plato despised experiments and technology, but valued deductive sciences such as mathematics, and offered a large number of mathematics courses in his Academy.

Plato believed that sensory objects are constantly changing, and only the object "kind" (*** phase) of the heart remains unchanged. Therefore the Idea is the only reality and the individual is the shadow. Before the "mind" discovers the "kind", they have no reality. This view of Plato is called realism.

Aristotle was a synthesizer of knowledge in the ancient world and made important contributions in many fields. Aristotle was a student of Plato. He famously said: "I love my teacher, and I especially love truth."

In philosophy, he proposed the so-called nominalism, that is, recognizing the reality of sensory objects and at the same time recognizing the reality of "mind" objects. But Aristotle believed that individuals were the only realities, and "kinds" were names or mental concepts.

Aristotle valued individual research and experiments, while his teacher Plato valued the study of abstract ideas. From this perspective, Aristotle’s thoughts were more conducive to the emergence of modern experiments. science.

Socrates is called the Confucius of the West. This statement may have been originally said by Westerners who did not know Confucius well, but it can show that the two sages are comparable, for example:

1. The method Socrates usually uses is to first admit that he knows nothing, and through constant questioning, let the other party realize his ignorance, and then abandon his prejudices and start thinking again.

2. Confucius attached great importance to the rectification of names and was the first thinker to propose "rectification of names". In the past, the history of philosophy paid too much attention to the political significance of name rectification and ignored its logical significance. Correcting names should determine the meaning of the noun concept and distinguish the different meanings of different nouns. At the same time, Confucius was also the first person to invent analogy methods, such as "draw inferences from one instance", "consistently apply", "learn by analogy", "hear one and know ten", etc. Later, Mozi proposed "big taking" and "small taking". "Taking" and Xunzi's proposal of "pushing by analogy and comparing by analogy" are inseparable from Confucius' inventions.

Socrates' achievements in this area are even more outstanding. Aristotle said in "Metaphysics": There are two contributions that should be attributed to Socrates, namely definition and induction. Looking at Plato's dialogues, before Socrates debates with others, he always first explores the meaning and essence of concepts, allowing people to rise from the specific level of understanding things to the general level.

3. Confucius believed in Heaven with personality and will, and believed that he had received the destiny of Heaven and had a sense of mission. He said: "Since King Wen is gone, what's the point of Wen? The sky will lose Siwen, and there will be no dead, and there will be no chance for Siwen; the end of the world will fear Siwen, what will the Kuang people do?" When Confucius was imprisoned in Kuangdi , I don’t know what will happen to me in the future. But he said that after the death of King Wen of Zhou, wouldn’t it be up to me to inherit and carry forward all the culture of the Zhou Dynasty? If God's will is to destroy this culture, I, a person who will die later, will have nothing to do with this culture. But if God's will is not to destroy this culture, what can the people of Kuangdi do to me? His sense of mission is very charming, whether it is Zeng Zi's "A scholar must be ambitious, the responsibilities are long and the road is long", or Zhang Zai's "Establish a heart for heaven and earth, establish a destiny for life, carry on the unique knowledge for the saints, and create peace for all generations." , are closely related to the influence of Confucius.

Socrates also had a strong sense of mission. He compared himself to a "gadfly" and said: "God specially assigned me to Athens. This city-state is similar to a tall thoroughbred horse. Because of its body Too fat and lazy, I need the stimulation of the gadfly. God assigned me to Athens to perform the duties of the gadfly. "He regarded himself as opposing the government as no one else's responsibility. When the court asked him. He would rather die than give up his job: "Whether you release me or not, I will never change my behavior, even if I die!"

There are definitely similarities between the two. , they all teach tirelessly and speak without writing, but that should be the main thing. Let’s talk about the differences, because there are more differences than similarities, both in terms of life and thinking. Here are a few examples:

1. First of all, Confucius was not as lucky as Socrates. Although he claimed to have three thousand disciples and seventy-two sages, none of his disciples combined was as good as Plato. Yan Hui, his favorite, was malnourished and died earlier than him. In the end, there was only a thin volume of "The Analects" to record a few of his words and deeds, and not all of them were his alone.

Looking back at Socrates, the life image and ideological content he left behind are much richer. Later generations have witnessed: Socrates's immortality is inseparable from Plato. Even the key factor. Without the Socrates recorded by Plato, we would not have any interest in him, and Socrates' death would become an abstract symbol. Only by understanding his words and deeds can we know his greatness. As Mencius said: "When you praise his poems and read his books, do you know who he is? This is how you talk about his world." (Part 2 of "Wan Zhang") His greatness does not lie in his death. But to understand what he died for is to truly understand his philosophy. (You can refer to "Posterity's Misunderstanding of the Death of Socrates")

2. Confucius was very eager to enter politics, and served as the capital of the Lu State. Later, he traveled eastward to various countries, and finally retired when his official career was hopeless. And compile books and teach.

Socrates is the exact opposite. As can be seen in the Apology, Socrates said that he has been hearing a call since he was a child, and it would only prevent Socrates from doing it. something without ordering him to do it. It had prevented Socrates from entering politics. Socrates reflected: "I think this is quite right, because I can conclude that if I entered politics, I would be dead long ago and would not do any good for you or myself. (His student Plato But he spent his whole life seeking opportunities to enter politics. He once visited Sicily three times, hoping to realize his political ideals in Syracuse.)

3. Confucius left the State of Lu in 517 BC and defected to the State of Qi. After three years of development and becoming an official in Qi State, when he learned that Qi State official Yan Ying and others wanted to punish him, he quickly fled back to Lu State (in fact, Confucius was not a person who was greedy for life and feared death. He thought: "A man with lofty ideals. A benevolent person does not seek life to harm his benevolence, but kills himself to achieve benevolence.

"Seeing that some people judge Confucius based on Socrates and think that Confucius despised the law, but they don't know that there was no so-called law at that time, so how can they despise it? This kind of purely personal PK that completely ignores the social environment in which the two live is very strange. Ridiculous.)

In "Crito", we can see that Socrates refused to escape from prison when everything was ready, which was highly praised by later generations, the so-called sacrifice for justice. Etc. Although I wrote "Socrates' Character Flaws" about this, it does not mean that he was wrong to do so. It just means that he also has weaknesses in some aspects, which is inevitable for everyone.

4. Although the teaching methods of the two are somewhat similar, the content is completely different. Confucius taught people the six arts of etiquette, music, archery, chastity, calligraphy, and mathematics, and taught poetry, calligraphy, etiquette, and music. , Yi, Chunqiu, etc. are used as teaching materials, and he regards himself as the inheritor of the ritual and music civilization; the core of his ritual and music civilization is benevolence and forgiveness.