Socrates, and the Skeptical Craft

Francis Bacon identified with Socrates in many ways. Socrates famously claimed that he knew nothing, but at least he knew that he knew nothing. He used his method of refutation, the elenchus, to show others who claimed to be wise that they did not know, not even that they did not know. Socrates also contended that though he was barren of knowledge, he could help others give birth to new knowledge by using his elenchus. In Plato’s Gorgias, the demanding conditions for affirming knowledge of general principles which are generated by exploiting an elenchus or a method of refutation are examined with care. Following Gregory Valstos, we find that it has apparently fatal difficulties. Plato, Aristotle, and later all philosophers concurred that no technique that depends only on refutation could be shown to lead to an affirmative knowledge of principle. Elenctic failure led to the problem of induction. Francis Bacon found a new wrinkle in the Socratic method, explained in the chapter, giving us a clever technique still in use in some of the best modern science.