Examining Socrates' Views on Just and Unjust Laws

Is there a such thing of unjust, and just laws? If these unjust laws actually exist, should one disobey these laws if unjust. These questions can be applied to Socrates, a wise philosopher, who is on death row, for disobeying the law in the novel “Five Dialogues”. revised by John M. Cooper. Socrates believes that if he broke an unjust law, then one should still be penalized for these actions, even if that law that is being broken is considered unjust. Socrates would rather die than to actually escape from his wrongdoing. Is Socrates theory of the situation infact not conclusive? In this paper, I will argue that Socrates’ argument of what is unjust and just is not persuasive, but he contradicts himself and his arguments, and one should not succumb

Is this not Socrates contradicting himself? He is explaining one should not listen to the majority of people, but then he’s essentially saying he cannot escape because he agrees to abide by the unjust law which was created by the majority of opinion (). For example, that is like someone saying “Oh, don’t listen that one person they’re bad influence,” but then that same person who just explained not to listen the person who is the cause of bad influence is not agreeing to what they are saying them. That is why his argument is not persuasive, because he does indeed contradict his own

For example, if a person comes down with the flu they can go to doctor and receive medicine to aid in their recovery. Just just like the body has been healed, can a soul not healed as well? Socrates states, it’s like the body being corrupted by disease, and in a lot of cases a disease can be cured with the help of a doctor, or even just some medicine. So yes, he may have been hurt for a while for committing this unjustly act, but over time he can heal and get better with the help of himself, or his companions. The next questions raised is Socrates followers potentially being put into the same situations as him, and my answer to that would be no. I think that argument is invalid, during the time of trial as Socrates was defending himself, not once did his followers come to his defense, which Socrates claims during his hearing. So by that one act that his followers couldn’t even stand up and defend him, it is unlikely that they would follow in his footsteps and reenact the same situation. But, just to entertain the idea, incase it was hypothetically to happen, then I don’t think it would cause this be uproar upon the City of Athens because, again as I stated before these people who are breaking the same laws as Socrates are escaping from the city, getting out of the City’s