¶ … Socrates' speech in Plato's Apology. It is this author's opinion that Socrates' position that the unexamined life is not worth living has validity. We will see that this is the case as we examine Socrates' spontaneous oration regarding virtue and how it can not be learned. Obviously, if the lives of these youths had been virtuous, then it might have been possible for them to learn this character trait and to prove Socrates wrong. This is the case because only when someone examines their life do they shake off their bigotry and raise their awareness to a higher level. As alluded to in the introduction, Socrates is correct that the unexamined life is not worth living. This is because only those people who struggle to resolve the contradictions in their life have an existence that is real. Those who do not are at best ignorant and at worst bigots who hate knowledge.

For this reason, one must look at the context of the Apology, in which the claim that the unexamined life is not worth living arises. This is in the context of the trial against Socrates which is based upon his being accused of heresy in corrupting the youth and therefore committing treason against the gods by unbelief. This is why he rejects the alternative of exile rather than death as a punishment (Plato).

However, if he did the above, he would have undermined everything that he had stood for. He firmly believed that anyone was capable of leading a significant and meaningful type of existence by way of the examination of his or her own ideas and life thoroughly. Socrates was wise because he never accepted something as a truth that was related to him unless he found evidence himself to back the statement up for himself. In this is the kernel of what made Socrates wise for he related "Well, although I do not suppose that either of us knows anything really beautiful and good, I am better...

I neither know nor think that I know (ibid.)."
The above is what sets Socrates aside from his accusers who maintained that they were wise and did actually know something. This leads into the general reason for his claim that is that ..." my reason simply is that I feel such conduct to be discreditable to myself, and you, and the whole state...if those among you who are said to be superior in wisdom and courage, and any other virtue, demean themselves in this way, how shameful is their conduct!" (ibid.) By thinking they have virtue, they show that they have none. By making the last statement, Socrates gives his general reason for making the claim that only a life that involves examination is worth living, for those fools who he is lecturing have obviously wasted theirs.

Socrates felt this way and believed it so much that he purposely structured his defense so as not to be acquitted, but to be condemned to death (Marrow). If he had been acquitted, he would have compromised his principles and would have been no better than his accusers. For Socrates, doing the right thing was worth more than living a lie. A man who is good for anything does not calculate the chance of living or dying. Rather he should be choosing the most obvious action and pursue virtue instead. In his life, Socrates pursued the high ground and never ceased from practicing and teaching philosophy, even if it meant his death. For this reason, Socrates is a martyr in the field of philosophy and he pursued arete (excellence), not as some abstract principle, but as a way of life. Socrates did not die in vein because his quest (and this speech) laid the foundations of Western ethics and philosophy (ibid.).

The best argument against the position is to ask an obvious question that many people neglect which is, was Socrates actually guilty? According to the late Dr. Allan Bloom in a special lecture on the foundations of philosophy from his early career in the 1960s, he raises…