Socrates - Existential Comics

A philosophy webcomic about the inevitable anguish of living a brief life in an absurd world. Also Jokes

Socratic Emergency

Plato: "Socrates, come quick, there is an emergency! "
Socrates: "What is it? "
Plato: "Something terrible has happened down at the agora."

Plato: "Someone is claiming to know something! "

Socrates: "Noooooooooooooooo!"
Plato: "Noooooooooooooooo!"

Socrates: "We have to do something. To the Socratesmobile!"

Plato: "Socratesmobile? What is that? "

Socrates: "That's just what i call it when i make these four slaveboys carry me around."

Socrates, four slaves carrying him: "Faster! People are being wrong as we speak!"

Plato: "Can i ride Socrates? "

Socrates: "No, wisest men in Athens only, read the sign!"
Description: there is a sign on the site that says "wisest men in Athens only".

Protagoras: "...and that's why I know..."
Description: Socrates interrupts him by punching him, then continues to kick him on the ground.

Plato: "Socrates, what are you doing? I thought you were going to engage him in a dialogue to try to teach him why he was wrong? "

Socrates: "Nah, I tried that for like 40 years, turns out it doesn't work."
Plato: "And punching does?"

Socrates: "No, but it is more satisfying."
Plato: "I know he was wrong, but that seems a bit harsh."

Socrates, narrowing his eyes: "Did you just say that you “know” he was wrong? "
Plato, backing off: "Socrates, no, please, i just meant..."

Description: Socrates is now kicking Plato on the ground.

It was around that point that Plato realized an ultimate truth in philosophy: he was freakin' jacked and didn't have to take anyone's shit.

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/406

The Unexamined Life

Socrates: "also check out my onlyfans where subscribers can see me contemplating the pure forms of beauty."

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/400

Socrates Through Time

Socrates: "Everyone in Athens is stupid. I'm traveling to the future when people will have learned more so i can have someone smart to talk to for once."

Description: Socrates enters a phone booth and time travels to the future.

Socrates: "Ah, the future! Through the dialectic process of philosophy, they all should have become so wise and understand the truth!"

Socrates, the year 1300: "Burning heathens? This is stupid as hell. Why haven't people gotten any smarter?"

Socrates, the year 1932: "Mr. Hitler, your ideas are dumb as shit, have you considered that?"

Socrates, the year 1970: "This is what they are calling philosophy!?"

Socrates, present day on a computer: "Great, finally! An Agora the size of the Earth, where the best ideas can flourish."

Person: "And this is what's called a “comment section”, it allows an open dialogue across the earth."

Description: Socrates stares at the computer in shock and disbelief.

Socrates: "Do you happen to have any hemlock on you?"

If i could travel back in time i would give Hitler a printout of the wikipedia page of logical fallacies to help improve his critical thinking abilities, thus preventing the Holocaust.

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/395

Philosophy at the Olympics

Announcer: "Welcome back to the Olympic games, our next event: philosophy."

Announcer: "First up, Thales. He had a poor showing last Olympics with his “everyone is made of dirt” theory. Let's see if he can do better today. "

Thales: "Everything is made of...water."

Announcer: "Alright, let's go to the judges. Not a bad score, surprisingly."
Description: Scores show: 8.1, 9.2, 8.8

Announcer: "Next up is Zeno of Elea. Let's see what he has to say."

Zeno: "If Achilles had to catch up to a tortoise in a race he'd first have to reach the spot the tortoise was at."

Zeno: "But the tortoise will have moved, so then he'd have to reach that spot next, but it will have moved again, thus he could never catch up with it. Motion is impossible."

Announcer: "A bit similar to his “an arrow would have to go halfway” thought experiment from last Olympics, or his “Achilles has to catch a snail” from the year before. Looks like the judges agree."
Description: Scores show: 7.2, 8.0, 7.6

Announcer: "Okay, here comes Socrates, let's see if he can follow up on his Gold Medal performance at the last games."

Socrates: "Everything all these guys just said is total bullshit."

Announcer: "And the crowd goes wild!"

Announcer: "A perfect score, he really is the wisest man in Athens, and it's not even close!"

Announcer: "Socrates wins gold yet again."

Socrates, standing on the podium: "Yes! Socrates rules!"

"But what really does it mean to be the best? It fuckin' rules, that's what it means."

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/388

Philosophy Anonymous

Socrates: "Hello, my name is Socrates, and i am a philosophy addict. "

Socrates: "But then again, what really IS an addiction?"
Wittgenstein: "I think it's any compulsive activity."

Socrates: "Ahh, but what is the actual difference between compulsion and genuine willing?"
Wittgenstein: "Well..."

Aquinas: "Alright everyone, settle down, that's enough of that. Wittgenstein, your turn to speak."

Wittgenstein: "I've been philosophy free for five years, but last night i had a relapse. I had some friends over to watch sports..."

Wittgenstein: "I just kept asking them to try to come up with a definition that includes all games and excludes all non-games. Before I knew it I had developed a new theory of language."

Schopenhauer: "I too had a relapse. I was at a restaurant and I overheard someone telling their date that all morality is obviously subjective."

Aquinas: "So what did you do, Schopenhauer?"
Schopenhauer: "I pushed him down the stairs! Ha."
Aquinas: "you...what?"

Schopenhauer: "Yeah, and her too because she was chewing too loud. Wait...this is rageaholics right?"

PERSON: "You...what?"

"Am I addicted to pushing people down the stairs? Well, that all depends, define 'stairs'."

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/378

Socratic Love

Socrates love is when you love asking questions more than you love not drinking hemlock.

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/373

Diotima Teaches Socrates Love

Socrates: "Wise Diotima, I have a question about the nature of love, and I've heard that you are learned in its ways. "
Diotima: "Certainly, Socrates, i will now initiate you into the greater mysteries of love."

Diotima: "he who wishes to know the nature of love should love first one fair form, and then many, and learn the connection of them; and from beautiful bodies he should proceed to beautiful minds.

Diotima: "And then to the beauty of laws and institutions, until he perceives that all beauty is of one kindred; and from institutions he should go on to the sciences."

Diotima: "Until at last the vision is revealed to him of a single science of universal beauty, and then he will behold the everlasting nature which is the cause of all, and will be near the end."

Diotima: "And in the contemplation of that supreme being of love he will behold beauty, not with the bodily eye, but with the eye of the mind"

Diotima: "This will bring forth true creations of virtue and wisdom, and be the friend of God and heir of immortality. "

Socrates: "Okay, uh, that's cool i guess, but actually my question was: “can loverboys still be attractive if they've grown beards?”"

Oracle of Delphi: "also, no one is Athens is hornier than Socrates."

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/363

Socrates Invents Western Civilization

Plato: "Hey Socrates,what are you doing?"
Socrates: "Oh...not much, Plato, just
laying down the foundations
of Western Civilization for the
next few thousand years."

Plato: "Oh, cool, can I take a look?"
Socrates: "Of course."
Description: It is just a piece of paper that says "everyone is an idiot"

Plato: "That's your entire idea?"
Socrates: "No, uh...I have other ideas too."

Socrates: "See? Here's the good part."
Description: it now says "everyone is an idiot except for Socrates."

Plato: "Socrates, this isn't anything. No one is going to read this."
Socrates: "You just don't get it!"

Socrates, throwing away the paper: "In fact, i just decided that my ideas can't be written down. It's more about having discussions."

Plato: "So what does that mean?"

Socrates, storming out the door: "It means I have to go tell everyone that they are idiots to their face. That's REAL philosophy!"

Plato: "Somehow I get the feeling that this isn't going to end well...."

"Oh and also, if you ever write any of this down, Plato, make sure to record how much I like gay sex."

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/344

Socrates the Cop

The other cops don't know how ignorant they are of what justice really is.

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/274

Philosophy Job Interview

This is exactly how interviews go for philosophy professors and no one can convince me otherwise.

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/272

Socrates 101

"A bad teacher you say? Well, it sure seems like you know a lot about 'badness'. I agree, you do know about that one, because you are a bad student."

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/223

Diogenes and Plato

By the way, if you are being bullied in school, the advice you will often get from your parents and teachers is to ignore them and they will stop. This is bad advice. Trust me, if you bite them, that will be the end of it.

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/219

Philosophy Infomercial

"But wait, if you order in the next 15 minutes, we'll throw in a Existentialism for free! You'll be in profound, inescapable despair in no time!"

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/196

Emo Socrates

Emo Plato: "If you are in a cave with a bunch of happy people, and you go outside and discover how sad everything is, you are obligated to go back into the cave and totally bum everyone out until they are just as sad as you."

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/192

Socrates Gets Socrates'd

"Man, I can see why they wanted to kill me."

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/177

Jury Selection

If you've noticed any characters appearing and disappearing, it isn't because the artist is lazy, it is because an evil demon is deceiving you.

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/155

Socrates on the Lake

Although on second thought, what even is the nature of "winning an argument?"

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/153

Athenian Park

"What are you doing with that tranquillizer gun?" "Tranquillizer gun? This is a hemlock gun."

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/145

Socratesman

"What, is it in present day or ancient Greece?" "Uh...another power that Socratesman has is time travel..."

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/137

Wise or Not Wise

"But Socrates, what will you do with the million?" "I'll tell you what I'll do, two Athenian boy lovers...AT THE SAME TIME!"

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/128

Good Cop, Pragmatist About the Nature of Truth Cop

In the end the jury decided that truth was more about a coherence between ideas themselves, and also that Socrates was a dick, so we might as well kill him.

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/115

Gottfried Leibniz and the Quest for the Holy Grail

The French guy is being played by Voltaire, of course.

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/108

The "Apology"

It's pretty shocking that Socrates's strategy of giving a 30 minute speech on why all the people who were about to judge him were stupid idiots didn't work out for him

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/100

A very spooky philosophy Halloween

Camus came dressed as himself, because what is really scary is how sexy he is.

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/104

Hypatia of Alexandria and the Seven Presocratics

Later on, Socrates forgot that he poisoned the apple, and ate it himself. Plato had to make up this whole story about an apology, because it was just too embarrassing.

Permanent Link to this Comic: https://existentialcomics.com/comic/95