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The Philosophy of Socrates

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Date: 
Thursday, September 7, 2017 - 7:00pm to 9:00pm

The Jefferson Center will be sponsoring a mini-micro course on the philosophy of Socrates, like an OLLI course except free – given by Philip Neujahr. This will consist of four class meetings, each lasting no more than two hours, on the Thursday nights of Sept. 7, 14, 21, and 28 from 7:00pm to 9:00pm (at the latest) at the Jefferson Center in the Ashland Historic Armory at 208 Oak Street, Suite 101. Each meeting will be devoted to the discussion of a “Socratic” dialogue of Plato, in this order: Laches, Euthyphro, Apology, Crito. These are all short and very readable works and are, in Phillip’s judgment, the most useful dialogues for our purposes to give us a knowledge of Socrates’ philosophy and his mission in life.
Philip Neujahr, a long time Jefferson Center supporter and member, has been studying and teaching this material for some time now. He received a B.A. in philosophy from Stanford U. in 1965 and a Ph.D. in philosophy from Yale U. in 1973. He then taught philosophy for 35 years in Atlanta, GA before retiring in 2008
For the Laches Philip recommends the translation by Rosamund Kent Sprague (Plato, Laches and Charmides; Hackett Classics), and for the other three (in one small volume) he recommends the translation by G.M.A. Grube (Plato – Five Dialogues: Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Meno, Phaedo; Hackett Classics). These books are available from Amazon and are cheap (can be acquired from amazon.com for a total of $23.61 with shipping). For the first meeting on Sept. 7 – it would be best to have read the Laches.
Please contact Philip at philipneujahr@yahoo.com if you desire more information and also to sign up for the class.