ABSTRACT
As we said in the Introduction to this book, the Phaedo almost certainly does not provide an accurate account of Socratic doctrines. There are several reasons behind this claim. First, in his first speech in Plato’s Apology, Socrates plainly says that it is “the most shameful kind” of ignorance to think one knows what one does not know:
Later, in his third speech in the Apology Socrates declares that death might be one of two things – either complete annihilation, or else a migration to another place, where all of the dead are (Ap. 40c641c7). In the Crito, Socrates characterizes death as “going away to Hades” (Crito 54a9-10, 54b5) and imagines the personified laws of Athens warning him that if he is a law-breaker in this life, the laws in Hades will not receive him kindly there (Crito 54c7-8).
