Virtual Socrates Colloquium – Francisco Gonzalez: “Teleology’s Socratic Origin and Legacy”

The International Society for Socratic Studies is pleased to announce the schedule for the Virtual Socrates Colloquium 2025-2026.

You can see the schedule –HERE

Notice that there is no need to register and all you need to do is join the following Zoom link:
https://eu01web.zoom.us/j/63132371340?pwd=nQwGxammbjajdzRSM9ZQXsCLoqfS2C.1
Meeting ID: 631 3237 1340
Passcode: 088283
The International Society for Socratic Studies is pleased to invite you to a lecture by Francisco Gonzalez (University of Ottawa), on the 23rd of April at 18:00 (Rome Time), entitled

Teleology’s Socratic Origin and Legacy

Abstract:
The term ‘teleology’, since its coinage in 1728 by Christian Wolff and until the present day, refers to the view not only that there are final causes, but 1) that these final causes are objects of a divine intelligence and therefore ‘purposes’; 2) that these purposes serve human beings exclusively or predominantly; 3) that these purposes are foreign to material nature and need to be imposed on it from without. Stated even more briefly, teleology is the view that there are final causes in nature, but that nature is neither their agent (divine intelligence) nor their beneficiary (human beings). Teleology as thus understood has proven one of the most influential ideas in Western thought. But where did it come from? My argument is that its inventor was Socrates, at least the Socrates portrayed consistently in this regard by Plato (particularly in the Phaedo) and Xenophon (Memorabilia I 4 & IV 3). Furthermore, I argue that teleology was a uniquely Socratic idea, its full acceptance in antiquity not extending beyond the Socratic circle. Even Plato needed to modify Socratic teleology (in the Timaeus), and the Stoics did so even more radically; Aristotle rejected it completely in his Physics, as did, perhaps surprisingly, Plotinus. The reason for this negative reception is that Socratic teleology represented a rejection of natural philosophy itself in favor of ethics, so that natural philosophy needed to be saved from it. Ironically, Socratic teleology had a long life after antiquity through a kind of mashup between Plato’s Timaeus and a misinterpretation of Aristotle, only to be rejected by natural philosophy all over again in the modern period. The full story cannot be told here. The goal is simply to return to Socrates the credit, or the blame, for a revolutionary idea.

Bio:
Francisco J. Gonzalez is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Ottawa in Canada. He has published extensively on Plato, including the books Dialectic and Dialogue: Plato’s Practice of Philosophical Inquiry (Northwestern University Press, 1998) and Plato and Heidegger: A Question of Dialogue (Penn State Press, 2009). His recent work has focused more on Aristotle, with articles on Metaphysics Θ and final causality. He has also published recently Human Life in Motion: Heidegger’s Unpublished Seminars on Aristotle as Preserved by Helene Weiss (Indiana University Press, 2024) and Heidegger and Aristotle (Cambridge University Press, 2026). He also has articles on other areas of Ancient philosophy (Socrates, Plotinus) and Continental philosophy (Gadamer, Levinas, Ricoeur).