Socrates also turned away from scientific observation and concentrated more on what might be achieved by raw thought. However, he never wrote any books and what we know about him is largely due to Plato and to Aristophanes who portrayed Socrates, unflatteringly, in two plays. He is remembered now primarily for three reasons: his conviction that there is an eternal and unchanging ‘absolute standard’ as to what is good and right, the belief that all nature works towards a purpose, which is the apprehension of this ‘standard’; that to discover this standard one must above all know oneself; and
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