I think we can go further, if we consider what it is like to read a Platonic dialogue. The dialogues are entertaining, but they can also be frustrating. Why are the people talking to Socrates, his interlocutors, letting him get away with apparently bad arguments? Why aren’t they asking him to explain certain points more fully? Above all, why do so many dialogues end in a frustrating impasse, with Socrates and his interlocutors agreeing that they haven’t achieved any insight into the topic at hand?
