My views of wisdom have changed dramatically since the first time I wrote on them. In that work I said I believe that “Whatever the reason may be to consider a person wise, with no doubt it has taken quite a bit of time before they accomplished this great achievement.” On this point I erred because I now believe wisdom can come at any age, but exactly what is wisdom? In that original paper I wrote that wisdom is “knowledge”, it is “experiences”, it is being “happy” and it is learned or developed with “time.” In most of these ways I erred, and I would know like to refer to some of Plato’s dialogues that have allowed me to discover exactly what it is and is not that I have learned regarding wisdom.
In Plato’s Crito and Phaedo we are given the relationship of the good life and philosophy. It is only through philosophical wisdom that we can achieve the good life. However, in order to achieve the good life one must be a philosopher which takes training and the ability to know what, truly, wisdom is. Choosing philosophical contemplation as the main occupation of being leads to the good life, but how does one become a philosopher? In Plato’s other dialogues, the Eurythro and Meno he attempts to answer what wisdom is and it has dramatically changed my views on the topic. To make it simple, Eurythro does not change. He and Socrates carry out an entire dialogue and Eurythro is still determined to sue his father in court and use his special insight into the gods as his justification for doing so, since Zeus killed his father Chronos. Socrates tells him he will be humiliated but he does not change his mind and goes off at the end determined to go to court against his father who, by Athenian law, was justified in the death of one of his slaves. In Meno, Meno thinks he knows everything about virtue. He has made great speeches on virtue. However, after having his dialogue with Socrates he under
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