located bodies Ð two the discoursing body

	SocratesÕs words Ð what are they doing?
	Ð Socrates and dialectic

Slide 2

the city

	new spaces for meeting and talking
	for presenting oneself and oneÕs arguments
	for listening and countering
	... and for eavesdropping

the law courts

	forensic argument

the political assembly

	representing interests

the theater

the dialogue

	Socrates and dialectic

SocratesÕ method

	leading questions (49b)
	pursuing ethical inquiry
	working upon and eliminating contradiction
	arguing from particular cases, but apparently detached

the effect of SocratesÕ words

	rationality at any cost
	removing history
	words as transparent as possible - uncontaminated by life
	making the opponent acquiesce
	follow your line of reasoning in denying their own
	an agonistic ethos

the good life?

	reason = virtue = happiness
	in a denial of life as sickness
	his last words Ð ÒCrito - I owe a cock to Asclepius - please remember to pay the debtÓ Ð you made a sacrifice to Asclepius upon recovering from a disease
	is life so worthless?

Nietzsche on Socrates ...

	whence this equation Ð reason = virtue = happiness?
	why the absurdly fanatical rationalism? Ð even unto death?
	>> Twilight of the Idols

... Socrates was ugly!

	Nietzsche sees in SocratesÕ physiognomy an indication of pathology
	he was an ugly nerd, but found a way of exacting revenge and asserting his will
	his rationality was a last ditch expedient Ð a strategy
	dialectics as profoundly bad manners Ð Òwhat has first to have itself proved is of little valueÓ
	in an aristocratic system one commands and gives reasons only afterwards
	Ð so Socrates was ÒrabbleÓ, a clown and buffoon
	irritating, inspiring mistrust

Nietzsche on the pathology of reason

	Twilight of the Idols Ð
	ÒYou ask me about the idiosyncrasies of philosophers? ... There is their lack of historical sense, their hatred of even the idea of becoming, their Egyptianism. They think they are doing a thing honor when they remove it from history, sub specie aeterni Ð when they make a mummy of it. All that philosophers have handled for millennia are these conceptual mummies: nothing actual has escaped from their hands alive. ...Ó
	>> Twilight of the Idols

seriously though ... !

	Socrates and Plato are discoursing in the city of Athens

discourse

	the term is used here to mean located speech
	vital speech - located in community, history, life, the senses
	... one of the implications of the dialogue format

located bodies Ð two the discoursing body

	its words are not transparent, merely communicating
	but are dispersed
	in encounter and dialogue with others
	in specific historical, social, physical locations
	riddled with issues of asserting one over another
	tactically located Р interested

Slide 17