Hey folks! As we get into Clouds, what moments are coming across as strange or interesting? What’s the play telling you about the author’s take on the problems of Athens?

The problem associated with Socrates is change. they feel like change means that the new generation is selfish, and Athens is losing its tradition. to them Socrates and Thinkery going against what they believe in is a threat to tradition and Athens because they are afraid of change and want to stick to what they always been used to.

I think they're trying to represent Socrates' supposed corruption in the Thinkery. He contradicts the belief in gods like Zeus, and Phedippedes tries to seek him out to learn the weakest discourse and thus save himself from his debts.

What stood out to me was how the play and interactions in this chapter brings forward the idea that those of Athens and the thinker are losing core Athenian customs, making the young men arrogant and ignorant, believing they are wise and intellectual. Aristophanes is showcasing his dislike for the new ideologies and philosophies of the young Athenians. This projects the author's idea that Athens must return to the traditional ways of their people, seeing the "old ways" as the more respectable way of living their lives.

Something striking about clouds is how Strepsiades, the old man, desperately tries to learn "Unjust Speech" so he can avoid paying his debts. The Thinkery teaches people how to twist logic, not to find truth, but to win arguments, even when they’re wrong. It’s bizarre, funny, and dark all at once. Overall, Clouds is criticizing Athens for losing touch with traditional values like honesty, responsibility, and respect for the gods. Aristophanes seems worried that flashy intellectual trends like sophistry and new philosophies are leading young Athenians astray. Making them lazy, disrespectful, and overly clever without real wisdom.

The detail that caught my attention is when Socrates and Strepsiades argue about what makes it rain. Socrates states that the Olympian God Zeus doesn't exist; instead, Vortex is their god. Strepsiades argues where the thunder comes from, and Socrates explains that the rain is a natural cause of science. I think Aristophanes' play is trying to show how Athens is in a state of corruption and Thinkery is trying to destroy Athens old ways of thinking about reality. I think Aristophanes also wanted to show how just and unjust arguments at the Thinkery happen to make the audience believe what the characters in the play want them to think about Athens.

A strange part is that even though Aristophanes makes fun of the new thinkers like Socrates, he still kind of understands their ideas. But he also wants people to go back to old values and get rid of the new ones which just shows that he thinks the new teachers ( the Sophists ) are hurting young people in Athens. He even refers to them as devils which is a strong word that just explains how he feels about the new teachers and how he thinks that they are wrong, especially for the younger people of Athens. This is reasonable because he seems like someone who doesn't like change, because it's scary and new and could go against everything you agree with, and having to adapt to that can be hard.

A passage I found interesting was when Socrates and Strepsiades were arguing about the proper gender for some words and Strepsiades' solutions to dismissing his debts. Socrates was getting frustrated with Strepsiades' inability to remember and understand the information he's told. I thought that as a teacher, Socrates would have more patience with Strepsiades, but he gave up on teaching him any further. I was confused about the part where Socrates asks Strepsiades to list male names. Strepsiades tells Socrates some names but then he ends up saying "she" instead of "he"(lines 685-694), I read the footnote but I'm confused if this part was Aristophane making a joke or maybe highlighting something else?

The problems represented by "Socrates" at the thinkery challenges a threat to conservatism in Ancient Athens. To question the "reality" around them. Which, I think, is the one thing that the real Socrates and "Socrates" have in common. To question the world around you, was important like food for the soul. The real Socrates is quoted as famously saying, "the unexamined life is not worth living". And it represented the frightful ideas of modernity to Ancient Athens and to Cloud's playwright Aristophanes. Granted, this is a much more comedic telling of Socrates philosophical thinking and potential teachings. But the playwright puts a spin, and "Socrates" represents the threat to questioning silly things like the difference between the sex of a chicken or whether or not the Grecian gods exist. Aristophanes is essentially pointing to the real Socrates and calling him an idiot for questioning such obvious things like the existence of the gods, such as Zeus, and the sex of a chicken. I wonder then, if Socrates posed such a threat to Ancient Athenian conservatism- why did Aristophanes choose to write a comedy, watering down the intelligence of Socrates, rather than a drama of a man, "Socrates" who posed a real threat to Athenian youth and traditional values?

One of the things that really struck me in Section 3 was when Socrates, suspended in a basket, says that he's "walking on air" because that's what he thinks about approaching the truth. I found this both funny and shocking—it's just such a ridiculous picture, but also a nice way of describing how disconnected from reality philosophers can become. I laughed at it, but it also made me think about the way Aristophanes views philosophy.

The way to depict Socrates in Clouds is definitely impressive: For example, he explains about thunder that "Clouds are full of water and collide, they’re so thickly packed they make a noise," (384th line) which highlights that he rejects the understanding of natural phenomena as the result of divine will, and instead attempts to explain them through human reason and logic. Rather than viewing phenomena such as lightning simply as the divine wrath of Zeus, he shows an attitude of attempting to explain them in terms of more physical causes and laws. This is both a challenge to the mythological interpretations prevalent in Greek society at the time and part of Aristophanes' satirical portrayal. Aristophanes criticizes his attitude as ridiculous and unrealistic, and portrays him as a satire. I am curious about other ironic depictions of Socrates by Aristophanes, and I am going to seek out the author's intent of the way of depictions of Socrates.

One of the pieces of writing that really stood out to me in Section 4 of Clouds was when Strepsiades starts complaining about how expensive his son's lifestyle is and how he's swimming in debt because of it. What really stood out to me was how desperate he becomes to fix the situation—so desperate that he'll enroll in Socrates' "Thinkery" just to learn how to argue himself out of owing debts. I was taken aback by this because it shows how far people will go to avoid responsibility, even if that means contravening their own conscience.

One part that stood out to me in Section 4 was the argument between Better Argument and Worse Argument. It surprised me how Worse Argument openly defends dishonesty just to win debates. It made me think about how easily cleverness can be used in the wrong way.

I think Aristophanes was warning people about valuing argument and intellect over actual wisdom and ethics. The Thinkery feels like a place where people lose touch with real life and right and wrong.

I’d like to know more about how people back then felt about this version of Socrates, did they take it as a joke or something more serious?

The part that struck out to me as I read through this week's reading is the conversation between Strepsiades and his son. Strep speaks exactly like fake Socrates repeating the same manner of speaking and rhetoric that fake Socrates used. Pheid is angry and baffled at his fathers new way of thinking. Aristophanes is using this interaction to show how he believes that Socrates is turing sons against fathers. To Pheid his father is deluded and has been influenced to commit blasphemy. This is another way to show how those who listen to Socrates become unable to think for themselves. Strep doesn't even resemble himself he doesn't sound smart he sounds arrogant. It struck out to me because it was a mirror image of the fake Socrates and Pheid turned into the parent. Its like when a child is influenced by the wrong crowd the parent has to reign the child in and teach them to think for themselves. Pheid has taken this role with his father. This scene was basically to show the effects of the corruption of fake Socrates.

I would like to know if this is where Pheid turns into the voice of reason? We know his behavior before shows how the fake Socrates creates destructive youth. Pheid not caring about the debt he raked up and being reckless shows this however in this section he's depicted as the voice of reason. Is this showing Pheid becoming smarter than his father? Also does Strep actually believe what he is saying or is he just emulating fake socrates? lastly did the ancient Athenians hate all philosophers or just Socrates?

In Clouds, the Thinkery is a school run by Socrates. This Thinkery is conveyed as a place where ideas and philosophical debates happen. Often times this creates concerns because it is showing out of the box thinking. Socrates is shown as somebody who is more concerned with his abstract ideas than the real world. This shows that thoughts like this can end up detaching you from the reality of real life. In this play, it shows that unchecked intellectualism can end up, disregarding, social norms, and standards of societiy’s thinking.