>One of the most famous ancient critics of philosophy was Aristophanes, a comic playwright. In his play "The Clouds", he mocks Socrates and portrays philosophers as ridiculous, impractical, and corrupting the youth. Socrates is shown floating in the air and teaching absurd things like how to make the weaker argument the stronger.

Modern equivalent of how insufferable it must have been to interact with socrates

>>24502639 (OP)
reportedly, Socrates himself found the play humerous, and laughed at it front row at one of its preformances

>>24502658
Aristophanes wrote the play in jest but Socrates’ intentionally stupid arguments actually have a point

>why would god destroy his own churches with lightning?
>why is it love when a father reprimands or hits a child but not when the reverse happens?
>How the fuck aren’t interest rates just usury?

Thousands of years later and these questions are unanswered.

>>24504155
Not only in jest, the thrust of the play is that there is something to Socrates' activities--see how much of a gross lecher Aristophanes makes of the Just speech, and the questions/contentions you quote are never really addressed by the rest of the play. The main problem with Socrates in the play, Aristophanes seems to be saying, is that he doesn't know enough about people to exercise the prudence necessary to know not to associate with scum like Strepsiades, that such people are the last people to try to speak openly with.

>>24502639 (OP)
I really liked the part in Clouds that was basically the earliest version of angel and devil on the shoulder where Right logic and wrong logic are debating common topics and Wrong logic is seemingly winning with clearer arguments so the right logic just has a hissy fit and impotently cusses at him.

Plato got his ass by making him a retarded fag in the symposium

>>24504178
BUURRRRRRRRRRRRRRP
HIC HIC
BURRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRP

>>24504169
>Aristophanes seems to be saying, is that he doesn't know enough about people to exercise the prudence necessary to know not to associate with scum like Strepsiades,

Yes, in that regard highly ironically, Socrates is depicted more as a natural philosopher mixed with a sophist rhetorician like Gorgias or something. Socrates never accepted money nor claimed to teach anyone. If you recall Apologia he says that people just follow him around and he says stuff and they listen.

>>24504199
Yes. Even Aristophanes subtly recognizes the difference between Socrates and the sophists--Strepsiades wants to pay Socrates, so excited is he to swindle his creditors--but Socrates has said nothing about payment. Socrates is genuinely curious to a fault.

>>24504169
>see how much of a gross lecher Aristophanes makes of the Just speech,

If you have ever read Plautus also by Aristophanes, right logic and wrong logic are basically there as well but remade as poverty and wealth with wealth as right logic (seemingly good on the inside but with a nasty core- sex, society, hierarchy, etc are ultimately undone when wealth emancipates the poor). Poverty in this play can be found analogous to Wrong Logic. Poverty is seemingly bad on the outside but it is supply and demand that keeps businesses and arts going and Poverty has all of these hidden qualities you don’t think about.

I see a big similarity between Plautus and the Clouds.