Term
| True or False: The primary issue in the Crito is whether it is just for governments to put people like Socrates to death. |
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Definition
| False. (The primary issue in the Crito is about the obligation of human beings to be good citizens, taking into account both the benefits of citizenships, and the harm that politics can cause.) |
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Term
| At the beginning of Crito, Crito's standard for what a good human being should do is what? |
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Definition
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Term
| True or False: Crito seems insincere in saying that he is acting as he does, or wishes to, out of loyalty to his friend. |
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Definition
| False. (Crito seems to genuinely care about what happens to his friend. In fact, this seems to be the principle motive for his attempt to get Socrates to escape from jail. The difficulty he faces is in deciding what specific thing a good friend ought to do.) |
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Term
| At the beginning of Crito, how does Crito decide what is courageous and what is cowardly? |
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Definition
| Looking to the Opinion of the Public. |
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Term
| True or False: In the Apology, Socrates argued that the laws need not be obeyed because they have no authority behind them. |
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Definition
| False. (Socrates made no sweeping judgment of all laws in the Apology. What he argued was that all communities will be unjust at times, and that to be a completely just person he would have to disobey at times. But only when he was convinced that justice required him to disobey.) |
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Term
| What is the key issue in the Crito? |
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Definition
| Whether the laws or public opinion is a better guide for human action. (The question is which of these guides is more likely to lead to more happiness for individual human beings.) |
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Term
| What is the implication of the fact that Socrates demands proof that justice requires it before he will break the law, but does not demand such proof to violate public opinion? |
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Definition
| That the laws might be based on knowledge about justice. (The implication is that the laws might be right, so one would need to prove them wrong before disobeying them.) |
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Term
| True or False: Law and public opinion can disagree on how a person ought to act even when the laws are made by the majority. |
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Definition
| True. (Public opinion is the transitory and uninformed feeling of the people about something. It is not based on thought or study. But almost all systems of majority rule have mechanism that lead the people to think issues through, to study them before they make decisions. This may not make the decisions perfectly prudent, but it is likely to make them better than public opinion. |
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Term
| True or False: According to Socrates, the rules of justice vary according to the situation. |
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Definition
| False. (The particular actions of a just person will vary in different circumstances, but the principles which are applied do not. The difficulty is in, first, understanding those principles, and, second, applying them to the specific circumstances at hand.) |
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Term
| When Socrates asks Crito to apply the general definition of justice to the specific facts of the question as to whether it is unjust for Socrates to escape from jail, how does Crito respond? |
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Definition
| Crito does not understand. (This is very important, for it leads Plato's reader to appreciate the value of law for ordinary people.) |
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Term
| True or False: Crito argues that Socrates should escape from jail as a protest against the unreasonable laws under which Socrates was convicted. |
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Definition
| False. (Crito's reasons for wanting Socrates to escape have to do with friendship and public opinion. He seems to have given little thought to questions of justice. Neither he nor Socrates argues that breaking a law would be an appropriate way to try to change an unjust law.) |
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Term
| What does the case of Crito demonstrate? |
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Definition
| Philosophy needs an intermediary to make its wisdom accessible to men like Crito if that wisdom is to affect the lives of most men. (This is because most people cannot understand and apply the meaning of justice as well as the few wise can.) |
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Term
| True or False: Crito's confusion about how to apply the the principles of justice to the facts of a particular case means there is no hope for him to live well. |
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Definition
| False. (There are several possibilities for Crito to get guidance as to the requirements of justice. As presented in the Crito, the one that is most useful most of the time is the law.) |
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Term
| When Socrates says that he would be harming Athens if he escaped jail, what did he mean? |
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Definition
| His disobedience of the laws could lead to the destruction of the laws, which in turn, would be harmful to the people of Athens. |
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Term
| True or False: Crito cannot apply the abstract rules of justice to the facts of a particular circumstance to decide how a just person ought to behave. |
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Definition
| True. (In order to assist Crito with the difficulty, Socrates introduces the laws as a character in the dialogue, indicating thereby that the laws serve to explain to people what just behavior is in particular circumstances.) |
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Term
| What does Socrates' argument in the Crito suggests about imperfect laws? |
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Definition
| They ought to be obeyed because they are usually better than no laws at all. (Disobeying a bad law is destructive of the law and, for that reason, harmful to the community.) |
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Term
| True or False: The laws in the Crito insist that they do not make mistakes. |
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Definition
| False. (The laws admit that they are not perfect, but argue that this fact does not lead to the conclusion that they may be disobeyed. They base their claim to obedience on the fact that they do some good things, not on a claim that all the things they do are good.) |
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Term
| What does Socrates mean when he says that he would be breaking a contract by escaping prison? |
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Definition
| In accepting the benefits of the laws he has agreed to obey them. |
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Term
| True or False: According to Socrates in the Apology and in the Crito, there is no greater curse than anarchy. |
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Definition
| False. (Socrates never says that anarchy is the greatest evil. It is AN evil, however, because the community promotes the development of human beings.) |
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Term
| In the Crito, Socrates suggests that the appropriate tool through which wisdom about what will make people happy could be made to help most people is what? |
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Definition
| Law. (The argument in the Crito is that while laws are sometimes bad and at other times unjust in their application, people will end up being better off if they always follow them than if they don't.) |
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Term
| True or False: Crito bribed a guard to get in to visit Socrates. |
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Definition
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Term
| Socrates' concern for the stability of politics, as related in the Crito, reflects his beliefs that: |
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Definition
| The only chance that people like Crito have to live well is to be guided by the laws. (The laws of a community will certainly be imperfect to some degree, perhaps to a great degree. That is an argument for seeking to improve them. It is not an argument, however, that they ought to be destroyed, since with no laws and no community human beings would have no chance to live well.) |
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Term
| What does Socrates' argument in the Crito suggest about Antigone's argument in the Apology? |
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Definition
| It shows that Antigone was unjust in not considering the claims and needs of the city when deciding how to act. (Even in the rare cases where breaking the law would be the less unjust alternative, it remains unjust to break the law. Antigone is blameworthy because she does not acknowledge the fact. Although even if she had she still might have found it necessary and just to disobey the king.) |
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Term
| When does Socrates argues in the Crito that disobeying unjust laws is unjust, how can that be reconciled with his argument in the Apology? |
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Definition
| It can be reconciled if one realizes that sometimes one has to choose between unjust acts. (Socrates has to pick the lesser of two evils.) |
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Term
| True or False: According to the Crito, people should assume that the laws are just. |
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Definition
| True. (Although the laws will sometimes be imperfect, the argument of the Crito is that they will be a more dependable source information about how to act than an individual's judgment would be, since the individual is unlikely to understand the question thoroughly and since the individual is likely to be biased in hos or her own case.) |
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