There are alot of famous stories about Socrates, but here’s a very appropriate one for 2011:
A wise person travelled to the Oracle at Delphi to ask who was the wisest person in Athens.
“Socrates, of course.”
Of course Socrates refused to believe this, because the result of all his philosophical inquiry had pointed out his own ignorance. Socrates then proceeded to speak with the brightest people in Athens to point out how ignorant he really was, and made a startling discovery by accident:
Although the people he met with were all very intelligent, none of them were fully aware of that which they didn’t yet know– as demonstrated by a willingness to speak decisively about topics which they possessed no real knowledge of.
Thus, Socrates was, in fact, the wisest person in Athens, not because of his great intelligence, but because he was actually aware of his ignorance.
This artificial sense of confidence is what closes people off to the vast sea of knowledge that is available.
