Alcibiades I
120 discussion questions for the 2026 Diotimos reading edition of Plato’s Alcibiades I, with Stephanus references from 103a to 135e. Temperance translates sophrosyne.
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Questions for discussion
Love, ambition, and the divine sign12 questions+
Why has Socrates waited so long before speaking to Alcibiades?→ How does the divine opposition frame Socrates' approach?→ What does Alcibiades' treatment of his lovers reveal about him?→ Which of Alcibiades' advantages could support a claim to wisdom?→ Why does wealth seem less important to Alcibiades than his other gifts?→ What draws Alcibiades into a conversation with Socrates?→ Why would Socrates withdraw if Alcibiades were content as he was?→ What does the choice between greater power and death expose?→ Why would even supremacy in Europe fail to satisfy Alcibiades?→ How does Socrates' ambition for influence mirror Alcibiades' ambition?→ Why might Alcibiades now be ready to listen?→ What changes when Socrates requests answers instead of giving a speech?→
The right to advise12 questions+
What entitles someone to advise the Assembly?→ Must knowledge come from learning or personal discovery?→ Why would thinking one already knows prevent inquiry?→ How does Alcibiades' education fit his political ambitions?→ Why should expertise outweigh beauty, wealth, and birth?→ What does Alcibiades mean by the city's own affairs?→ How do the examples of wrestling and music test the word better?→ What do Socrates' hints reveal about his way of teaching?→ Why should an adviser be able to explain what makes a course better?→ Does public reluctance to admit injustice prove a concern for justice?→ What would count as evidence that Alcibiades understands justice?→ Do Alcibiades' childhood accusations show knowledge or confidence?→
Learning from others and answering for oneself12 questions+
Why does speaking Greek challenge Socrates' criticism of the multitude?→ Must a good teacher possess knowledge before teaching?→ Does disagreement necessarily reveal ignorance?→ How does naming things differ from judging their qualities?→ Why is agreement about health easier to imagine than agreement on justice?→ How does Socrates use Homer to question the multitude's wisdom?→ What does the reference to Alcibiades' father's death add to the argument?→ Who is responsible for a conclusion reached through questions and answers?→ Does Alcibiades' agreement make the diagnosis of his ignorance his own?→ Can justice and advantage be separated as Alcibiades proposes?→ Is persuading one person a fair test of the ability to persuade an assembly?→ Why might hearing oneself give an answer be especially persuasive?→
Justice, advantage, and ignorance12 questions+
Why does Alcibiades accept that every just action is honourable?→ What does rescuing a friend in battle reveal about honour and harm?→ Can the same action be good and bad in different respects?→ What does Alcibiades' refusal to live as a coward commit him to?→ Does distinguishing respects resolve the problem of honourable harm?→ Does the argument shift between acting well and faring well?→ Which step in the argument that justice is advantageous needs most defence?→ What does Alcibiades' wavering reveal, and what does it leave uncertain?→ Why does not knowing how to reach heaven cause no confusion?→ When does recognising ignorance lead to better action?→ Do all practical mistakes arise from falsely thinking one knows?→ Why is ignorance about the greatest matters especially dangerous?→
Education and worthy opponents12 questions+
How does the charge of ignorance alter Alcibiades' political position?→ Why bring up Pericles' association with wise men?→ Does the ability to teach reliably establish that someone knows?→ Is a teacher accountable for a pupil's failure to learn?→ What follows from Alcibiades' admission that he failed to pay attention?→ Why ask whom Pericles has actually made wiser?→ What does Alcibiades mean by considering self-improvement together?→ Why does the ignorance of his rivals make Alcibiades resist education?→ How does the naval analogy change the meaning of political competition?→ Why should Alcibiades measure himself against foreign kings?→ What distinguishes flattering a city from governing it?→ Can a useful fear be justified even before its grounds are established?→
Royal education and knowing oneself12 questions+
Does noble ancestry make excellence more likely?→ How does Socrates turn Alcibiades' pride in his family against him?→ What is achieved by contrasting royal births with unnoticed private births?→ What conception of a ruler shapes the prince's early upbringing?→ Why must a prospective king first learn to rule himself?→ How does the contrast between tutors expose a failure of care?→ What different ideals do Persia and Sparta represent in Socrates' speech?→ Why revisit wealth after Alcibiades seemed to value it relatively little?→ What does imagining Amestris' judgment make Alcibiades confront?→ Why let the opponents' women judge Alcibiades' preparation?→ What does Know yourself mean at this stage of the dialogue?→ How can Socrates claim special guidance while admitting his own need for care?→
Good counsel, friendship, and agreement12 questions+
Why is wanting to become a good man still an incomplete aim?→ Can someone be both good and bad without contradiction?→ Why must ruling people be distinguished from particular kinds of leadership?→ What defines the people whom a statesman is supposed to govern?→ Does calling political knowledge good counsel explain its special task?→ How does the analogy with health clarify the aim of governing a city?→ Why does Alcibiades identify the city's good with friendship?→ Does agreement through calculation resemble political agreement?→ What does family affection add to Alcibiades' account of friendship?→ Must people share expertise to love or agree with one another?→ Can doing one's own work create friendship without shared knowledge?→ Why is recognising one's confusion a reason for hope?→
What is the self?12 questions+
How might we mistake caring for our possessions for caring for ourselves?→ What is the point of distinguishing feet from shoes?→ Does making something better adequately define care?→ Why must we know what a thing is before knowing how to improve it?→ Is self-knowledge accessible to everyone or unusually difficult?→ What might it mean to investigate the self itself?→ Why begin the inquiry into the self with the present conversation?→ Must a user always be distinct from what is used?→ Does using one's body establish that one is different from it?→ Why does Socrates reject the body and the soul-body combination as the self?→ What remains unresolved after identifying the person with the soul?→ Does expertise about the body contribute anything to self-knowledge?→
The beloved soul and the mirror12 questions+
What changes when Socrates distinguishes loving someone from loving his body?→ What kind of beauty must Alcibiades now cultivate?→ Why does love of the people threaten to corrupt Alcibiades?→ What might education provide as an antidote to political corruption?→ What has the inquiry established about the proper object of care?→ Why use sight to explain the command to know oneself?→ What does seeing one's reflection in another's eye suggest about self-knowledge?→ Why must the soul look especially toward wisdom in another soul?→ What grounds the claim that understanding is the soul's most divine part?→ What does the extended comparison with a divine mirror add to the argument?→ Why identify knowing oneself with temperance?→ Why revise the earlier distinction between knowing oneself and one's belongings?→
Virtue, freedom, and the final promise12 questions+
Why should self-knowledge be necessary for governing others?→ What does virtue supply that wealth and military resources cannot?→ Must a ruler possess virtue before imparting it to citizens?→ How has the meaning of political success changed since the opening?→ Why does unrestricted power become dangerous without understanding?→ Why is being ruled by someone better preferable to ruling without virtue?→ Does identifying vice with servitude adequately explain freedom?→ Why does Socrates replace If you are willing with If God is willing?→ What changes when Alcibiades promises to attend upon Socrates?→ How does the stork image express the reciprocity of their love?→ How does caring for justice answer the ambition expressed at the beginning?→ What does Socrates' final fear leave unresolved about the power of philosophy?→