The Applicability of the Socrates Method of Education in Education Today

Review article

Abstract

In the global world, changes that strike our educational system occur daily. In that matter, most of the traditional guidelines have been thrown away in order to strive towards new goals and methods, the external ones, which satisfy the continually changing labor market. The purpose of an individual in that kind of a system is to adapt in order to satisfy its needs while Socrates searches for happiness inside a man itself - a man possesses knowledge and wisdom for himself and his freedom, not others. With his method of dialectic speech, he seeks his truth and that of others and offers lots to think about. His teaching, which emphasizes love and desire for learning and real knowledge that leads to becoming an independent man, has been inspiring people for over twentyfive centuries, and it should be taken into consideration when thinking about youth, younger generations, and their future. In this paper, we are comparing and showing the differences in education today and the one in Socrates’ time. This paper highlights changes brought by the Bologna Declaration, but also the directionality in the labor market today, which makes the universities entrepreneurial centers. What does that mean for the knowledge economy we are striving for? Can we even state that we really are a knowledge society if we only aspire to knowledge that is dictated by the constantly changing labour market? We compare the knowledge to which we aspire with the knowledge which Socrates searches for and show the disadvantages of today’s educational system along the way. Here we offer Socrates’ ideas and opinions, which lead to possible progress towards genuine wisdom.