Is there anything I should read/know before attempting to read

>>8565061
Greek.

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Start with the Egyptians and Pythagoreans

>>8565063

As someone who actually reads Greek fairly well this is nonsense. Plato is a beautiful writer and you will lose lots of the beauty in English but the ideas are not such that they can't be translated to English as long as you have a good edition.

OP I'd dive in, you should know something about the history of the times but even wikipedia would suffice.

>>8565061
Nope, just go for it. Read the trial & death of Socrates sequence first.

>>8565061
Mythology and at least Homer is probably a good idea, since he makes plenty of references, though it's probably not "necessary".

>>8565061
Just Do It (TM) and don't listen to faggets.

Homer - Iliad
Homer - Odyssey
Hesiod - Works and Days
Hesiod - Theogony
Aeschylus - Oresteia
Aeschylus - Seven Against Thebes
Aeschylus - Prometheus Bound
Aeschylus - Persian
Aeschylus - Supplian Women
Sophocles - Oedipus the King
Sophocles - Oedipus at Colonus
Sophocles - Antigone
Sophocles - Electra
Sophocles - Ajax
Sophocles - Women of Trachis
Sophocles - Philoctetes
Euripides - Cyclops
Euipides - Alcestis
Euipides - Hecuba
Euipides - Bacchae
Euipides - Orestes
Euipides - Andromache
Euipides - Medea
Euipides - Ion
Euipides - Hippolytus
Euipides - Helen
Euipides - Iphigenia at Aulis
Aristophanes - The Birds
Aristophanes - The Clouds
Aristophanes - The Frogs
Aristophanes - Lysistrata
Aristophanes - The Knights
Aristophanes - The Wasps
Aristophanes - The Assemblywomen
Herodotus - The Histories
Thucydides - The Peloponnesian Wars

>>8566053
all that trouble, and you didn't even list "iphigenia among the taurians." fucking psued.

>>8565061
opie, there is nothing you need to read before plato. here's a suggested reading order (assuming you're not familiar with him):
>apology
>crito
>phaedo
>charmides
>laches
>lysis
>euthyphro
OR a copy of "five dialogues" and go from there. it really depends on whether you want to read his complete works or not.

in his lesser-known dialogues (like philebus), plato anticipates aristotle's metaphysics and REFUTES it. amazing that people still give credit to aristotle.

>>8566094
Why on earth would you read apology before euthyphro

>>8566100
because the apology is the self-introduction of socrates and frames the entirety of his encounters with people like euthyphro and thrasymachus?

if you have a problem with it, take it up with edith hamilton, who compiled my edition of plato's complete works.

>>8565074
good translations such as ...

>>8566094
Thank you, this will be helpful

>>8566053
Sheesh, I'll make sure to finish Homer at least. Had the books on my shelf for a while but never finished, depite enjoying them quite a lot. At least I've read most of Sophocles.

>>8566240
The guy who made that long list is memeing you. There is some interplay between Plato and the dramatists, but it's not so intense that you need to read all the playwrights before Plato.

Maybe bounce around and definitely get a taste of each writer, but don't worry about drama too much.

>>8566019
It's absolutely not necessary. Although, in general, he should read Homer & the myths because they partake in the good.

>>8566240
>Euthyphro
>Apology
>Crito
>Phaedo
Is the correct order for the first four, as someone else pointed out. Simply because that's the order that the events described occur in temporally. Then you can read what interests you from there. I'd stick to the early dialogues to start. Obviously Republic is mandatory. I really like Symposium too. Read the Hackett published translations as well.

>>8566240
opie, i agree with what [>>8566266] said—it is absolutely unnecessary to have even more than a cursory knowledge of homer's epics and greek mythology. having said that, you still should read homer and (i think bulfinch's, most say hamilton's) mythology because they, as the above poster alluded to, display examples of goodness, courage, and wisdom.

the only gods who feature in plato significantly are athena, apollo, and psyche—so i revise my earlier statement and say that you should at least be familiar with the myths and history of these three.

good luck, man. as they say, all of philosophy (as well as christianity and islam) is a footnote to plato

>>8566266

>Although, in general, he should read Homer & the myths because they partake in the good.

You mean the Homer that Plato wanted banned in his ideal commonwealth?

>>8567492
Yes, that Homer.

>>8567492
It gives you an idea of the society Plato happened in. When you understand that your standard Greek was a wannabe Odysseus, you can understand why they would want Sophists to teach them how to dupe people.

I recommend OP read Aristophanes' The Clouds after 3 or 4 dialogues to see how others in Athens reacted to them.

Everyone seems to agree: bust through Euthyphro, the Apology, Credo, and Phaedo first, then branch out.

>>8565061
I can't understand why anyone would read Platon other than a historian who is trying to grasp the Ancient Greek society.
Nothing he said is worth of note today.

>>8567870
I can't understand why anyone would read this anon's post other than a shitposter who is trying to grasp the art of baiting.
Nothing he said is worth of note today.

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You won't understand Plato if don't start with the Neolithics OP.

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A bit too late.

>>8568535
>forces them to agree

the hell

>>8568575
He needs to say yes, certainly and I agree so he can develop the topic further.

>>8568594
needs them*

>>8565061
If you have some knowledge about socrates, early greek history and maybe about the pythagoreans, you will be fine. Start with Platos Repubilic, it is considered to be a good starting point for all of western philosphy in general, although Wittgenstein might disagree with it.

>>8568597
they are dialectical topics, they HAVE to be developed by progressive assent/negation through logical inference, it's not a political thing

plato's style of argumentation in the dialogues is inspired partly by socrates and likely partly by geometers' elaboration of principles, for instance by zeno and neopythagoreans

most of plato's characters and settings are more along the lines of "two of the thirty tyrants who were famously impious, being sophists in their youth about the definition of piety" or some shit, not just "here's hopnpopalous jerking off socrates"

>>8568575
Going off absolutely no proof at all to back up my claim, I have a hunch that all of what socrates said actually did come from his mouth, the only thing that Plato changed was the reaction of the people. You can't have a bunch of dialogues with people telling Socrates repeated to "shove off" or else the idea itself might get misinterpreted.

>>8565061
You obviously want to read the pre-Socratics and then everything from Socrates

Socrates was Plato's mentor after all

>>8568500
>he didn't start by studying Chimpanzees

Tragic.

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>>8568760
Quite frankly this is not even b8

>>8565061
Nothing. Just realize you'll be no better for reading them.

>>8565066
this

>>8566194
Robin Waterfield's work with OWC is good, and it has a lot of notes.

>>8566266
>Obviously Republic is mandatory
I'm currently reading the Republic and am at the part with the allegory of the cave. I'm just wondering if it's reasonable to skip the section detailing the education of the philosopher kings. I've read everything so far, and most of the stuff delineating the composure and machinations of the "moral community" he propounds isn't terribly convincing or enjoyable to read. I know that the community is allegorical and that Plato wasn't retarded enough to think that his conception would be viable, but I feel like I've read about it enough and understand it enough -- such as its analog in the tripartite mind, which I do find feasible -- to the point I can skip the bit on educating the philosopher kings. Am I wrong to think this? Am I misconstruing what I've read? Am I retarded?

>>8569213
you're a pleb, just stop reading

>>8569245
Enlighten me, please.

>>8566053
remove Seven Against Thebes, Persian, Suppliant Women, Elctra, Women of Trachis, Cyclops, Alectis, Orestes, Andromache, Ion, Hippoyltus, Helen, Iphigenia at Aulis, and Birds.

I recommend reading a brief analogy on the Lyrical poets after Homer and Hesiod up to Pindar, but don't bother trying to read all or most of their fragments of them, and only read a few odes of the latter (there's generally a few that stand out in most recomm) just to get a sense of poets as entertainers.

Plato wrote his works in the 4th century, and refers to (and was likey affected by events in the late half) so I suggest for the Historians you read Herodotus -> Thucydides > Xenophon. Preferably Landmark editions, as they will guide you throw every insignificant settlement all the above writers mention and give some pretty interesting commentary on each history and include a bunch of essays on the topics and questions on stuff that aren't answered in the histories (such as government structures, how war and war tactics were really carried out, essays on prominent figures; in the case of Xenophon, they include relevant segments from Diodorus's Universal History segments and Hellenica Oxyrhynchia fragments that contrast with Xenophon accounts).

>>8569361
Also, here's what the Historians I just mentioned covered in their histories
Herodotus: his reliable and consistent account starts at the late-mid 6th century to the end of the 2nd Persian War (570 - 479)
Thucydides: 479 - 411
Xenophon: 411 - 462

>>8566053
I'm sure these are public domain. Would reading them for free on kindle be a wise choice?

>>8569254
The allegory of the cave is perhaps one of the most important moments in western philosophy -- the origin of most of our metaphysical and epistemological thought. While there were guys like Parmenides and Heraclitus before him, Plato's thought is the ancestor of the vast majority of western thought. Plato, when writing Republic, did not have the sole purpose of outlining an education system but rather a general inquiry into reality -- don't skip any of it, because it's all important.

>>8569491
Oh I didn't mean to imply I wanted to skip the allegory of the cave -- just the part concerning the how the philosopher kings would be educated. I suppose I was just being lazy by suggesting to skip that. I might as well since I've come this far.

Which dialogs would anyone recommend after reading his early ones and Republic? I think Symposium looks like it could be interesting, but I'd also like to be exposed to any more rigorous metaphysical thought that he has available.

>>8566194
Allan Bloom, Seth Benardete, Thomas Pangle, anything in the Focus Philosophical Library series.

>>8569213
Hm, I think you've got some sense of it (that Plato doesn't intend the project to be something to actualize in reality), but you may misunderstand some of the greater bearing of what's going on, such as what the city shows us about justice, the oddity of Socrates explicitly noting that the tripartite soul is partial and not fully true, and so on. The education of the philosopher-king is somewhat similar; there's very real philosophical bearing mixed up with oddities and impracticalities that need to be dealt with. Keep trying. The Republic repays re-reading.

>>8569498
After the Republic, maybe compare it with a reading of the Gorgias, which is concerned with Justice and Rhetoric. Afterwards, take a look at the Symposium, which seems to be somewhat contrary to the Republic, insofar as Justice and Spiritedness are downplayed in favor of Beauty and Eros. Follow that up with Phaedrus which has a relationship to the Symposium that the Gorgias has to the Republic.

>>8565061
Read Parmenides / Heraclitus before diving in with Phaedo and the epistemological / ontological parts of Politeia (books VI-VII).

>>8569498
The education of philosopher Kings is still important. If you got to the cave there's not much more of that left, anyways.

I'd recommend Symposium, Gorgias, Phaedrus for some good dialogues. If you're interested in metaphysics I think Timaeus has some good stuff relating to that.

After you read Plato read about Diogenes

>>8565061
No, the less you know the better (literally). Do not read any commentary.

What you have to understand about Plato is his method. He is not trying to teach you anything, so don't look for particular doctrines/teachings, because that is not what is important. The Dialogues of Plato are a kind of ritual of which the aim is a kind of purification of the intellect. He is trying to induce in your mind a state of suspension or confusion where you begin to question your understanding of the most basic ideas, so that your mind can achieve a state of contemplation where it perceives immediately its own activity and separability from matter. He is not trying to teach you anything in particular, what he is trying to do is to get you to understand or perceive your own spiritual nature so as to awaken in you a love of wisdom that will prevent you from ever being self-satisfied with your own understanding of things. That being said, no commentary on Plato is necessary or even possible really, because the dialogues take place in the realm of pure mind and so it is impossible to comment on them directly - they must be experienced directly.

Now, the second thing you must understand is that Socrates is not a troll. This is highly important. You must understand why Socrates is Plato's muse. The common, pleb misunderstanding of Socrates is that he is basically a know-it-all troll who considers himself wiser than everybody else, so he goes about arguing with people in order to bait and trap them, so that he can prove to them how ignorant they are and how clever he is. This is NOT AT ALL Socrates' intention. What you have to understand is that Socrates really and sincerely believes himself to be ignorant, the most ignorant man in the world. He is not merely "assuming ignorance" for the "sake of argument", or to trap stupid people. No. You have to understand why Plato takes such great interest in Socrates as a person - it's that he truly considers himself ignorant, and everybody else wiser than him, so he goes around asking people about their ideas in order to learn from them. Imagine if you woke up and understood that you don't know the first thing about the world, the reality you live in. So you abandon all your occupations and go around questioning people so as to gain an understanding of the world, only to find that upon questioning them, it turns out that, to your disappointment, nobody else really understand what's going on either. This is the existential state of Socrates, and it's the state of mind that Plato is trying to bring you into as well.

>>8571184
Thank you kind anon.

>>8571184
>>8571468

Yeah, to follow up on what 8571468, thank you anon. A beautiful summary

>>8571184
You should read commentary after reading him though. Cambridge Companion to Plato does a great job with regards to that, as to expect that you're already familiar with most of the dialogues on your own. And they deliver a bunch of good essays about dating his work, the historicity of Socrates and what dialogues might best reflect his actual views, Plato's transition of political thought, and, most importantly, what Plato could've meant with his Parmenides and the third-man argument presented in it that could've meant that he rejected his own theory of forms late into his career.

>>8571184
agreed, but i'd say that commentaries are good if a) they provide a deal of historical context of the time since many people tend to read ancient texts by 21st century lenses (not to say that those lenses are wrong but just not the same ones socrates and plato share) or b) if the reader has read the dialogue enough times that they *think* it means X and they need someone else with view Y to engage in dialectic with to then possibly make them experience socratic ignorance once again or just further their understanding of what is. but definitely reading him then reading a commentary is not the way to go about it.

>>8571184
How do you square your understanding of Plato as having something definite to teach with respect to thinking/mind and your claim that he's non-doctrinal? Further, why would Plato write SO MUCH if he had nothing substantial to impart, or only dozens of repetitions touching on the same basic idea instead of a number of subtle and difficult teachings?

>>8570777
who taught you?

>>8574064
He does have something to teach. What I meant was that his teaching is not so much contained in the text itself, as in the method. He believes that ultimately a man teaches himself, because the truth is already contained in his soul; so the purpose of the dialogue is to lead a man to reflect upon the truth which is already latent in himself.

>>8573238
>>8572507
This is the the thing though. The historical context, etc., is not really important to Plato's philosophy, which is concerned with ideas that are eternally true, and that transcend history and context.

>>8574942
Not really a "student" of anyone per se. Learned Greek at St. John's College. Have kept up with it since graduating.

>>8575282
>He does have something to teach. What I meant was that his teaching is not so much contained in the text itself, as in the method. He believes that ultimately a man teaches himself, because the truth is already contained in his soul; so the purpose of the dialogue is to lead a man to reflect upon the truth which is already latent in himself.
But doesn't this still ignore that he wrote so much material with such different approaches to what are sometimes the same subjects? I'm just contesting this notion that whatever Plato discovered can be ascertained without more careful focus on his writings. The criticism of writing, after all, isn't by Plato, but by a Socrates depicted in writing by Plato.

Further, how is it that you can claim the relevance of "Recollection," which is discussed in the way you allude to in two dialogues, to the rest of the dialogues, as if that a were a more fundamental doctrine to Plato then would ever seem apparent through a reading of his writings?

>>8575282
agreed on the point that true things are true regardless of when or where they have been said but not everyone will be familiar with the people/events he references. also, i view it as more of a ritual to make people from this day in a sense strip down their biases and try to think in a different mindset, a sort of prep for plato. people tend to be extremely close-minded. i've seen too many dismiss reading him because he is a "fascist" and our generation, at least for the most part, views that as a bad thing

>>8572507
How's the Cambridge Companion compared to other collections?

bumping for life

>>8566137
euthyphro occurs, chronologically, directly before apology, and most editions put it first

>>8568760
>and then everything from Socrates
Oh you glorious retard

>>8575301
εχομεν ομονοια. graduating class? what are you up to now?

>>8569213

>I know that the community is allegorical and that Plato wasn't retarded enough to think that his conception would be viable

You'd be wrong. That sort of idealistic tyranny had never actually been tried. Socrates, and virtually every one of his students, was strongly totalitarian and anti-democratic.

>>8566053
Fuck you

Not really. Start with Plato, move to Aristotle, then hop to Archimedes.

>>8580790
>triggered by a list

>>8568653

Wasn't Meno the dialogue where Socrates spoke to some acknowledged bigwig dickhead? I feel like a guy that vain probably did not just say "Yes, indeed" and "No, sir," to everything Socrates said.

>>8580761
2015. Uh, still readin' Plato. Et tu?

>>8581435
being taught by ancients here, moderns there. will make alumni weekend 2018 in the capital city. were you SF?

>>8581937
I was Naptown. Was just at Homecoming about a week ago.

>>8566137

>if you have a problem with it, take it up with edith hamilton, who compiled my edition of plato's complete works.

>Relying on a woman to get something right.

>>8582456
νοστος claimed. two years, networking breakfast, likely tallest one in iglehart.

>>8571184
first time 4chan has actually produced something insightful

>>8584940
there has been some pretty good Plato threads in the past.

>>8566137
I think one could defend something like the importance (maybe even centrality?) of the Apology to most of Plato's writings without deferring to Hamilton's judgements. The Euthyphro, Cratylus, Theaetetus, Sophist, Statesman, Crito, and Phaedo are all dialogues dramatically situated around the trial, and references appear in dialogues like Republic, Gorgias, and Meno. Even a dialogue as seemingly disconnected from the Apology as the Symposium is tied to it with sly revelation of Socratic impiety (Socrates's claim that Eros is not a god).

Of course, the dialogues can be read in many different orders, and the primary advantage of starting with the Apology is maybe to see how primary that experience of the conflict between philosophy and the city is throughout the dialogues generally.

>>8569400
>Thucydides: 479 - 411
>Xenophon: 411 - 462

you fucked up

>>8575392
Not that anon, but
>doesn't this still ignore that he wrote so much material with such different approaches to what are sometimes the same subjects
Why would a new path towards the same end speak against the idea that Plato tries to teach how to think?

>Further, how is it that you can claim the relevance of "Recollection," which is discussed in the way you allude to in two dialogues

Because the belief in "recollection" is what gives the other dialogues a purpose. Without belief that anything can be learned (or "recollected" from drawing on the immortal omniscient soul), every dialogue, every attempt at inquiry, would be checked by some sophist getting in Plato's face with "[subject] is not knowable; how can we know what we don't know; how can we know that we've come to know something when we don't even know what the thing is, thus leaving us unable to know when we know it if we ever by chance come to know it; and if we do know it how can we study what we know." In one dialogue Plato effectively says "shut up, the point is the inquiry, the belief that it CAN be inquired if never quite attained" (can find a citation for that if you want); the point of recollection is that it is the only thing vindicating these searches for vague and seemingly never-graspable ideas.

>as if that a were a more fundamental doctrine to Plato then would ever seem apparent through a reading of his writings?
This is why it's so often recommend to not JUST read Republic. The works all fit together (some more neatly than others of course), and not every part of Plato's methodology will be explained in every dialogue. How often is the nature and behavior Forms described? Not that often, but Forms themselves (Good, Beauty, Virtue, etc.) are prominent players in a lot of the dialogues. The onus is on you the reader to build an understanding of Plato's framework.

>>8587966
>Because the belief in "recollection" is what gives the other dialogues a purpose. Without belief that anything can be learned (or "recollected" from drawing on the immortal omniscient soul), every dialogue, every attempt at inquiry, would be checked by some sophist getting in Plato's face with "[subject] is not knowable; how can we know what we don't know; how can we know that we've come to know something when we don't even know what the thing is, thus leaving us unable to know when we know it if we ever by chance come to know it; and if we do know it how can we study what we know." In one dialogue Plato effectively says "shut up, the point is the inquiry, the belief that it CAN be inquired if never quite attained" (can find a citation for that if you want); the point of recollection is that it is the only thing vindicating these searches for vague and seemingly never-graspable ideas.

But again, doesn't that just dismiss the problem of the irony present in the dialogues? To be clear, I mean the fact that Socrates dissembles, and so makes it difficult if not ridiculous to accept certain positions he puts forward. Recollection in particular is an example of a doctrine that's more fraught with difficulty to accept precisely because the dramatic action of the dialogues in which it appears seems to undercut what we're to make of it somewhat. In the Meno, he introduces it with the language of mysteries, which we learn in that same dialogue that Meno is interested in (and we should be wary of his ready acceptance of recollection given his readiness to accept and his desire for "tragical" answers of the sort that Empedocles and Gorgias might give). As soon as the slave boy demonstration is over, we're also immediately presented with Socrates going back on the account, which ought give us pause (both because he offers a different explanation of what recollection accounts for, the presence of opinions in the soul, distinct from his earlier explanation that it accounts for knowledge in the soul, and his own more blatant wariness of it generally). In the other dialogue that focuses on recollection, the Phaedo, there's a definite series of ironies taking place throughout the dialogue given the similarity of the account of recollection and certain Pythagorean doctrines, oddness of the Phaedo being in part how much of it is Socrates trying to persuade two Pythagoreans of Pythagorean doctrines that they already ostensibly believe in.

To be clear, I think it's very agreeable to try to see the dialogues in their relations with each other, but I'm not persuaded that this specific kind of account gets at what the Platonic teaching, or rather, discovery is without ignoring some definite difficulties and peculiarities of the dialogues.

>>8575301
I'm seriously considering transferring to St John's, it sounds like a perfect fit for me. How did you like it?

What's the reading order for his work?

>>8588644
Well, I still carry that education with me everywhere, though with the cognizance that the tuition is too high, and that a big part of the program was self-motivated work. That said, I wouldn't choose anywhere else if I had the chance to do things differently.

Have you visited the school?

>>8571150

>Diogenes

Definitely the reddit of the the Greeks, beloved by pseuds, edgy af.

>look at this badass rude wise guy who lives like a bum! So fucking cool dude!

>>8589082
Strictly speaking, there isn't any, or rather, there isn't an order that's come down from Plato or his peers and students at the Academy. There are a number of different lists that have been suggested tho, and I'll just copypasta that shit from an older post:

The tetralogies of Thrasyllus:

1) Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Phædo
2) Cratylus, Theætetus, Sophist, Statesman
3) Parmenides, Philebus, Symposium, Phædrus
4) Alcibiades, 2nd Alcibiades, Hipparchus, Rival Lovers
5) Theages, Charmides, Laches, Lysis
6) Euthydemus, Protagoras, Gorgias, Meno
7) Hippias major, Hippias minor, Ion, Menexenus
8) Clitophon, Republic, Timæus, Critias
9) Minos, Laws, Epinomis, [Letters]

The Neo-Platonic reading order, set up by Iamblichus:

Alcibiades Major, Gorgias, Phaedo, Cratylus, Theaetetus, Sophist, Statesman, Phaedrus, Symposium, Philebus, Parmenides, Timaeus

Al-Farabi's suggested order of composition/inquiry:

Alcibiades Major, Theaetetus, Philebus, Protagoras, Meno, Euthyphro, Cratylus, Ion, Gorgias, Sophist, Euthydemus, Parmenides, Alcibiades Minor, Hipparchus, Hippias Major, Hippias Minor, Symposium, Theages, Rival Lovers, Charmides, Laches, Lysis, Phaedrus, Crito, Apology of Socrates, Phaedo, Republic, Timaeus, Laws, Critias, Epinomis, Menexenus, Letters

There's the more recent (developed within the last century and a half) order, based on an assumption of the order of Plato's supposed development:

Early: Apology (of Socrates), Charmides, Crito, Euthyphro, Gorgias, Hippias Minor, Hippias Major, Ion, Laches, Lysis, Protagoras
Middle/Transitional : Cratylus, Euthydemus, Meno, Parmenides, Phaedo, Phaedrus, Republic, Symposium,
Middle/Late : Theaetetus
Late : Critias, Sophist, Statesman, Timaeus , Philebus, Laws

Charles Kahn's order:

Ion, Hippias Minor, Gorgias, Laches, Meno, Charmides, Protagoras, Lysis, Symposium, Republic, Phaedrus, Parmenides, Theaetetus, Sophist, Philebus, Timaeus, Statesman, Laws

Catherine Zuckert's order:

Laws, Epinomis, Parmenides, Protagoras, Alcibiades Major, Alcibiades Minor, Charmides, Laches, Hippias Major, Hippias Minor, Symposium, Phaedrus, Ion, Clitophon, Republic, Philebus, Timaeus, Critias, Theages, Euthydemus, Lysis, Gorgias, Meno, Theaetetus, Euthyphro, Cratylus, Sophist, Statesman, Apology, Crito, Phaedo, Menexenus

Christopher Bruell's suggested introductory order:

Hipparchus, Minos, Alcibiades Major, Alcibiades Minor, Laches, Euthydemus, Hippias Major, Hippias Minor, Theages, Euthyphro, Apology of Socrates, Ion, Meno, Cleitophon, Menexenus, Crito

>>8589372
I haven't yet, but I do plan to visit before deciding

>>8589374

Fuck off, he's a total meme as a philosopher, but his trolling skills were superb.

Verse yourself in boypussy, tumblr is ideal for this.

>>8571184
You need to read Meno.

>>8589859
before phaedo especially since socrates pulls out the doctrine of recollection out of nowhere