I haven’t read phaedrus in a while, but I think that interpretation is taken a little out of context. It’s better to say reading and writing, alone, would encou

I haven’t read phaedrus in a while, but I think that interpretation is taken a little out of context. It’s better to say reading and writing, alone, would encourage these things. There’s this theme in Plato that power isn’t the end all be all. By that same logic, reading/writing were a technology that gave you power. Specifically the ability to record/recall things. Plato/Socrates argue that power alone gives you as much ability to achieve bad as it does good. Then they go on to argue that it’s wisdom that allows one to know what is good bad, thus wisdom is critical in all things. So, that’s why it’s says that in phaedrus, probably haha. It’s not that controversial actually, and not the sky is falling kind of thing. Socrates was just really particular about the pursuit of truth being sort of like the singular focus to achieving good, and the rest were important but had to follow from there. Parenthetically, I’ll add, he also seemed to believe that working out your body was just as important and necessary to being a philosopher.