Every household should have a copy.
Interested in argument? Try this.
Interested in Stoicism? Try this.
Interested in law? Try this or this.
Interested in rhetoric? Try this or this or this.
Interested in chess? Try this, and also this, or visit the online version here.
Welcome to the webpage for The Socratic Method.
The Socratic method is one of the timeless inventions of the ancient world. It is a path to wisdom and a way to think more intelligently about questions large or small. It is an antidote to stupidity, to irrationality, and to social media.
This book explains the Socratic method in detail: what it is, where it came from, and how to carry it out. The chapters teach the elements of the method step by step. They illustrate how to create Socratic questions of your own. They show how the teachings of Socrates produced the philosophies of Stoicism and Skepticism. The book also explains how the Socratic method can be put to work in the classroom, and it offers Socratic rules of engagement for talking about politics and other hard things. The Socratic Method is a complete guide to the practical use of a great idea.
Order the book at amazon.com here.
What people are saying about the book:
A great success. There is nothing like it. —A. A. Long, Dept. of Classics, University of California at Berkeley; author of Epictetus: A Stoic and Socratic Guide to Life.
Ward Farnsworth’s brilliant new book, The Socratic Method, offers powerful insights into the most important and effective means for discovering the truth, or at least coming closer to it, in education, politics, business, and everyday relations. Building on the wisdom of Socrates, Farnsworth makes clear not only why Socratic discourse is essential, but also how to undertake such discourse in a positive and affirming manner. This book offers essential lessons to anyone seeking to preserve American democracy. —Geoffrey R. Stone, Edward H. Levi Distinguished Professor of Law, The University of Chicago.
Many of us refer casually to the Socratic method and some of us think we practice it. But is only when reading Ward Farnsworth’s learned and inspiring book that one can begin to appreciate the profundity of Plato’s teaching and understand how its lessons are just what is needed in a world where invective and hasty judgments seem to have replaced deliberative reasoning and rational argument. —Stanley Fish, author of Winning Arguments.
Ward Farnsworth’s The Socratic Method deserves attention from scholars and lawyers and teachers of law—but, really, from anyone who wants to practice clear thinking. The book rests on a firm foundation of scholarship and then goes on to do something at which few such scholarly works succeed: it is useful for ordinary readers. —Paul Woodruff, Dept. of Philosophy, University of Texas at Austin.
A group of bad American movies has unfortunately associated the Socratic method of inquiry and teaching with a bullying style of teaching. But the Socratic method was something very different to Socrates, and is something that remains at the heart of serious intellectual honesty. Ward Farnsworth’s important book is not only impressively erudite in its mining of classical sources, but is also the best account we have of what the Socratic method really is and why we dismiss or caricature it at our peril. —Frederick Schauer, David and Mary Harrison Distinguished Professor of Law, University of Virginia.
A wonderful book. It is elegant, erudite, but wears its pedagogical virtues so lightly as to never come off as pedantic. —Rebecca Goldstein, author of Plato at the Googleplex.
A beautifully written, immensely thoughtful, and multi-faceted book. Ward Farnsworth offers a fresh understanding of the Socratic method as it’s represented in Plato’s early dialogs, then shows how it can be internalized as a way of bettering intelligence. —Henry Abelove, Professor Emeritus of English, Wesleyan University.
