Socrates does not teach. He interrogates.
His method—the elenchus (ἔλεγχος), from the Greek word for "refutation" or "cross-examination"—consists of taking what someone claims to know and showing that, under questioning, that knowledge collapses.
This is not sophistry. It is intellectual purification. Before you can build a theory, you must clear away false certainty.
How elenchus works
Socrates begins with a question: What is courage? What is justice? What is piety?
His interlocutor offers a definition. Socrates tests it by deriving consequences. If the definition implies something the interlocutor does not believe, the definition must be wrong. Revise and try again.
Laches: "Courage is standing firm in battle."
Socrates: "But what about a general who retreats strategically to win? Is he not courageous?"
Laches: "Yes, he is."
Socrates: "Then courage cannot simply be standing firm. We need a better definition."
This process continues until the interlocutor realizes they do not understand what they thought they understood. The goal is not humiliation. It is the recognition that genuine inquiry must begin with honesty about what we do not know.
Why Socrates says "I know nothing"
Socrates famously claims to know nothing. This sounds like false modesty, but it is not.
What Socrates knows is that most people—including those with reputations for wisdom—do not know what they claim to know. Generals do not know what courage is. Priests do not know what piety is. Politicians do not know what justice is. They operate with vague, unexamined concepts.
Socrates does not claim to have the answers. But he knows how to test proposed answers. And every answer he tests fails. This does not mean the questions are unanswerable. It means the people he questions have not thought carefully enough.
The claim "I know nothing" is actually a claim to know something important: the difference between real knowledge and mere opinion. Most people confuse the two. Socrates does not.
Socratic irony
Socrates often plays dumb. He approaches experts—sophists, politicians, craftsmen—and asks them to teach him. "You are wise," he says. "Explain it to me."
This is ironic, but it is not sarcasm. Socrates genuinely wants to know whether his interlocutor has genuine knowledge. By adopting the role of student, he puts the other person in the position of having to articulate and defend their beliefs. Most cannot.
Some readers find this irritating. Why doesn't Socrates just say what he thinks? Why the games?
Because if Socrates simply asserted his views, the other person would either accept them on authority or reject them out of defensiveness. Neither response involves genuine understanding. By forcing the interlocutor to work through the problem themselves, Socrates ensures that any insight achieved is earned, not borrowed.
Why Athens killed him for this
Socrates spent decades questioning prominent Athenians in public. He exposed generals who did not understand military virtue. He refuted politicians who did not understand justice. He humiliated sophists who charged money for teaching wisdom they did not possess.
Many found this intolerable. In 399 BC, he was charged with impiety and corrupting the youth. The real charge was simpler: he made powerful people look foolish.
He could have apologized, toned down his questioning, gone into exile. He refused. Philosophy, he argued, is not optional. "The unexamined life is not worth living." If Athens wanted to kill him for practicing philosophy, so be it.
They did.
Plato witnessed this. Every dialogue he wrote afterward is, in some sense, a response to that event—an attempt to vindicate Socrates and show why the method matters more than the man.