The Modern Sophist
Suppose you were a young statesman or noble during antiquity. You had it made. You had access to the best foods, the finest wines, the most lavish properties, and servants at your beck and call. You’d also receive a top-notch education.
Instead of attending school with your peers, you’d have a team of private tutors and mentors to prepare you for a life of prominence — perhaps as a politician. Critical to your training would be rhetoric, the art of persuasion.
During the second sophism (4th century BC to 230 AD), while strolling the streets of Athens or Rome, you could expect to encounter rhetoricians passionately speaking about philosophy or current events. These sophists traveled about stating whatever they believed would garner the most thunderous applause (and most money). It’s easy to romanticize sophism or confuse it with education or philosophy, but sophism was entertainment.
Today, when we turn on the “news,” there’s a high probability that what we’ll hear isn’t an impartial, objective, truthful impression of the day’s events. Instead, we’ll likely be presented with emotive-language-filled opining from pundits — like the sophists of antiquity. The methods are the same, as are the goals. Just as pundits pander for ratings, so too did the sophists. Epictetus, one of the most famous Stoic philosophers, said of sophists, “rhetoricians thrive on praise which is vanity” and described the goal as “to win praise from his audience.”
Television pundits are easy targets. They amplify demagoguery in exchange for ratings. But another sophist threat has emerged— social media. Author Donald Robertson recently conducted a poll (unscientific), asking respondents whether they agree or disagree with the statement: “Facebook and Twitter are Robo-Sophists.”
I used to think social media was merely a platform, not unlike a street corner of ancient Athens where an orator might’ve lectured to the public. Robertson’s question, however, potentially elevates social media from passive venue to active participant.
Adam Fairhead asked, “should we say what gets the most likes, or what is right?”. An entire marketing field arose to maximize social media engagement based on algorithms and our obsession with adding followers, getting likes, and growing our “influence.” In a 2019 survey of 3,000 children asking what they want to be when they grow up, the most common answer from American kids was Youtuber. Thus, exploring social media’s role in modern society is critical.
In his book Plato: Protagoras, Nicholas Denyer noted of sophists, “whatever else they did or did not claim to know, they characteristically had a great understanding of what words would entertain or impress or persuade an audience.”
Key to the idea of a sophism is that the messaging (vocabulary and performance) is more important than the message, or as Donald Robertson said in his book How to Think Like a Stoic, “while they spoke a lot about wisdom and virtue, they didn’t necessarily live by those values. They were usually more concerned with competing against one another to win public applause for their knowledge and eloquence.”
In a sense, Social media has sophism woven into its very fabric through algorithms. Algorithms curate content based on your demonstrated beliefs and preferences to show you more of the things you “like.” As a result, opposing views are disputed with sophistry and gain momentum via likes and shares (like the claps of wealthy men listening to an ancient sophist), often spreading untrue information.
And like the ancient sophists, the messaging garners the most attention on social media, but the means have changed. As I scroll my feed, finding a well-composed argument or civil discourse is almost impossible. Unlike the long-winded professional rhetoricians of the past who’d go on for hours to demonstrate how clever they were, social media is chock-full of quick, emotion-fueling bites. The platform and eloquence might’ve changed, but the sophistry is alive and well.
Social media platforms gain value based on increasing user engagement. It’s in their best interest to facilitate as much interaction as possible — quantity over quality. With this in mind, algorithms bolster posts that score highly on engagement. The sophists realized that the most applause-generating speeches were full of misleading value judgments, exaggerations, and appeals to emotion — it seems the algos are following suit.
Unfortunately, calm and rational discussions weren’t fashionable during antiquity — little has changed after thousands of years in that regard. Recognizing that sophistry is alive and well is one thing — dealing with it is quite another.
Perhaps we can learn the best response to sophistry from Socrates — a real anti-sophist. Socrates concerned himself with the truth, appealing to reason, not rhetoric. But His detractors didn’t always take his methods kindly; in fact, it’s said that Socrates was regularly insulted and attacked for his views. We can learn a lot from Socrates, not just in his willingness to call out B.S., but in his methods of doing so calmly and patiently.
One example of Socrates’ temperance was when Aristophanes, a comic poet, wrote a satire, “Clouds,” that mocked Socrates and his beliefs. How did Socrates respond? Socrates said he didn’t mind because if they had genuinely recognized his faults, they’d be doing him a favor, whereas if their objections turned out to be unfounded, they were of no matter to him. I’m not Socrates, I can assure you, but his example is one we can all follow to foster an environment where disagreement is tolerated, and nuance is acknowledged.
Perhaps the most important thing we can do to stifle modern sophistry is not participate in it. This doesn’t mean you can’t express an opinion — only that you should do so rationally, in a way that doesn’t aim to invoke emotional responses that denigrate the discussion into a fight.
It also calls for abstaining from supporting views you agree with if the messaging is done with ill-intent. I often see posts that support a position I agree with, but if the argument isn’t sound or the messaging is unnecessarily instigating, I ignore it. I’ve unfollowed many friends and family members I often agree with directionally but not with their modus operandi.
The best defense against sophistry is to be a good example. We know that we will encounter mean-spirited, deceitful, angry people from time to time, so we shouldn’t be surprised when it happens. Let reason and action guide your arguments, not anger and mindless slogans.
Anger is harmful and should be avoided in discourse, as even the most well-intended lose their reasoning ability when overtaken by rage. When we’re angry, we say things we regret that cannot be unsaid.
It’s also important to remember that just as you think you are right, so does the other person. It is up to you to teach them. If you cannot teach them, bear them. We don’t all have to agree on everything.
Finally, give people the benefit of the doubt. When you can’t agree, try to see the other as misguided, not evil. We’re a part of a very noisy world, but making it louder isn’t virtuous and only perpetuates modern sophistry.
