Socrates (469-399 BC)

"I am the wisest man alive, for I know one thing, and that is that I know nothing."

Who was Socrates?

Socrates was a philosopher in Athens, Greece, and is considered to have greatly influenced Western Philosophy. He didn't leave any written work, so what we know about the man comes from the writings and works of those like Xenophon, and his pupil, Plato. Along with educating the young with his beliefs, Socrates had also worked as a stone mason, and also served in the Peloponnesian War. What Socrates is best known for nowadays is probably the Socratic Method, which is a series of questioning that provokes critical thinking, and exposes contradictions, eventually leading to an answer.

Character-Along with being considered the wisest person of his time, Socrates also proved himself to be a man of action, and not just words. During the Peloponnesian War, he was said to have served very courageously. As well, he refused to accept payment for his teachers. In my opinion, what's most striking is that when Socrates was faced with death when officials claimed he was corrupting the youth, Socrates chose to die (and he refused to escape) rather than alter his beliefs.

Rating: 10

Success-It's difficult to really determine success for Socrates. He is considered one of the best philosophers of all time, and his beliefs influenced people through teachings of students like Plato. However, during his time, he was not very well received by the parents of his students, nor the government.

Rating: 7

Positive Contributions-While his method of questioning, the Socratic Method, is commonly used in law schools today, philosophy isn't something that really changes lives. His works didn't cure an illness or free people, though it did change people's way of thinking.

Rating: 5

Impact-Due to the times that he lived, and the fact that he didn't write down any of his teachings, Socrates' impact was limited to Athens, Greece. Indirectly, his beliefs would be spread throughout the western world.

Rating: 4

TOTAL RATING: 7.9 (1st of 1)

Intro to the Greatest Person of All Time

Welcome to the Greatest Person of All Time blog!

Before I begin explaining what this blog is about, let me tell you a little about myself. I am someone who just completed his first year of college, and am working my way towards a history major. I say that so that people realize that I'm no history expert, but just am interested in it and study it. One reason I would say that I'm interested in history is because of the fact that I have a fascination with people. I enjoy observing (not to sound creepy) and learning about people, like what they do and why they do it. I just love learning about people!

On a personal note, what I find myself obsessed with is greatness. I know it sounds kind of obvious, because who doesn't want to be great? Who goes through there entire life saying, "Boy, I hope I'm a failure." Where I think I differ is that where people might say that they want to be a great basketball player, or a great student, or a great chef, and so on, I want to be considered a great person.

With that said, this blog tends to combine history, people, and greatness all into one. I'm going to take a lot at historical figures who are deemed great! A reason that I find history so important is that it gives us a lesson for moving forward in the future. Key figures throughout history allow us to learn about them and even admire them. I believe that throughout our lives, it is important to have role models, people to want to be like, whether that be someone we know personally, or in this case, notable individuals in history. Hopefully through reading this blog, people will learn about some great figures in history and maybe even find someone that they'll want to learn more about and look up to.

Now, not being a historian or expert history guy, I'm not just going to pick random people from history that I think would be defined as great. Rather, I'm going to talk about people listed on this website:
http://www.sybervision.com/People/index.htm

This website focuses on a set of audio books called, you guessed it, The World's 100 Greatest People CD Audio Collection! Just to be clear, I haven't listened to the audio books, nor do I actually own them. I'm just using them as a starting point.

Now of course, greatness has many definitions from person to person. For the purpose of this assignment, I'm going to rate a person's greatness on this criteria:

Character (50%)-This is a big one for me. Simply, character matters. If we want to be like someone we consider great, we don't want to be like someone who is dishonest or cowardly. We're looking for someone of high integrity, hard working, and other admirable traits.

Success (15%)-When we tend to mention someone and associate them with the word "great," we tend to associate them with being successful in some area. Whether we call someone a great businessman or a great artist, for someone to deemed great, they have to be successful at what they do.

Positive Contributions (20%)-Now, it's one thing to be great, but people can be great at bad things. One could argue that Hitler was great at leading Nazi Germany or DB Cooper was a good plane hijacker, but those aren't exactly positive things. To truly be great, it's best to be great at something important. As well, being something like a baseball player isn't the same as being a president.

Impact (15%)-Who does the flowers of greatness impact? It's one thing to impact a community, but it's another thing to impact the world. How far does the success of someone reach?

For all of these categories, I'll rate each person on a scale of 1-10, with the higher number signifying a higher degree of greatness.

The Audio Collection provides 100 people, and as I have over 3 months of summer vacation, I'm planning on focusing on a person a day. Many of these people are those who I know almost nothing about, or never even heard of, so I can't say that I can provide the most in-depth, detailed, and accurate information. This is just meant to be a fun exercise.

On a final point, I want to mention that this is an attempt to find the greatest person of all time on a historical scale. Greatness differs from person to person, depending on the context of a situation. In my mind, the greatest person of all time is probably none of the above. In fact, there's no one person who can be considered the greatest person of all time. From person to person, the greatest person might be a grandma, or a teacher, or maybe just a friend. I just hope that everyone has someone they consider great and will want to be like!

MC