Study questions week 5 PDF

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Alma Mendoza 1. In the Apology Socrates offers the horse-breeder analogy that goes as follows, “Or is quite the contrary true, one individual is able to improve them, or very few, namely, the horse breeders, whereas the majority, if they have horses and use them, corrupt them?” (Line 25b). Socrates uses this analogy to make his first point after Meletus accuses him of corrupting the young. He questions Meletus who are good influences to the young and Meletus responds that the people that practice law such as the jurymen, the audience, the council, and the assembly. The assembly is open to the men of Athens therefore; it can be any man that volunteers his service for the trial. Thus, Meletus is stating that everyone can make the youth good except Socrates. He uses this analogy to prove that not everyone can make the youth good, as not everyone can be a horse-breeder. The horse-breeder requires a set of skills to teach the horses and tame them. These horse breeders have a lot of training and if as Meletus states that anyone can make youth good except Socrates then would these good people be able to train the horses without any harm just by the fact that are labeled as good people. Socrates makes a point that not everyone can be a good horse-breeder because it requires a lot of training that does only come to people that are labeled as good. Thus, it is an equivalent to good people bettering our youth, it is not enough to be good, but you should able to questions the good life like he does and makes the youth question what a good life is and make it better. 2. Socrates believes that the highest form of activity is the intellectual/spiritual activity. I agree with him because this form of caring for our spirits or mind instead of so much our bodies. By doing this you are reflecting on what is going on in your life and what your consequences of your decisions. By reflecting and taking care of our spirits we feel happy and whole and that is what comes with reaching the highest form of intellectual/spiritual activity. A form of this exercise would be to practice the Buddhist learning’s because the purpose is to reach inner tranquility of our mind and be happy. Some of the major exercises are to practice reflection by journaling daily and reflecting on our day. The second is to mediate and the most important practice in Buddhism because our minds are constantly suffering with dissatisfaction of our lives and being preoccupied therefore, meditation serves as form of medicine to heal the mind from all the hardships as human beings we are put through. I think meditation is preferable to embodied activities because the purpose is to put the mind at ease in order to continue to solve problems and the cause and effect more clearly.

3. In Phaedo, Socrates states that physical desires such as such food, drinks, sex, and distinguished clothing and shoes. Socrates believes that as a philosopher you have to separate the bodily needs to focus on the needs of your soul. A

philosopher has to free the soul from the body as much as the philosopher can because it is a distraction. A man who is close to death specially does not care of the bodily needs because the soul needs to grasp the truth and it is tricked by the bodily needs. I agree with Socrates because when we experience things that make us uncomfortable or hurt us some of us tend to mask them with physical desires such buying distinguished clothing. Buying the clothing would be considered a form that our physical desire trick the soul into not thinking of the things cause the most discomfort, pain, and fear. Instead of reflecting on the pain we might feel by taking the time and browsing for the clothes as a form distraction and then actually wearing these items clothing serve as form to mask out pain and fears from others. The clothes we buy and wear lead to people making preconceptions of what our lives might be like and if we wear nice and fancy clothes people often associated with happiness and confidence thus, we continue to deceive the soul from things that are most important such as healing our soul by dealing with our unresolved fear and pain....