FACTOID #53: If you thought Antarctica was inhospitable, think again - its land area is only ninety-eight percent ice. Reassuringly, the other 2% is categorised as "barren rock".
The Second Sophistic is a literary-historical term referring to the Greek showpiece orators who flourished from the reign of Nero until c.230 and who were catalogued and celebrated by Philostratus in his Lives of the Sophists (481). Orator is a Latin word for speaker (from the Latin verb oro, meaning I speak or I pray). In ancient Rome, the art of speaking in public (Ars Oratoria) was a professional competence especially cultivated by politicians and lawyers. ... Nero Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (15 December 37–9 June 68), born Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus, also called (50–54 AD) Nero Claudius Drusus Germanicus, was the fifth and last Roman Emperor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty. ... Philostratus, was the name of several, three (or four), Greek sophists of the Roman imperial period: Philostratus the Athenian (c. ...
Writers known as members of the Second Sophistic are Aelius Aristides, Dio Cocceianus, Philostratus and Herodes Atticus. Aelius Aristides (AD 117 - 181) was a Greek writer during the Roman Empire, considered an example of the Second Sophistic. ... Lucius Vibullius Hipparchus Tiberius Claudius Atticus Herodes, commonly known as Herodes Atticus (c. ...
See also:Sophism Sophism was originally a term for the techniques taught by a highly respected group of philosophy and rhetoric teachers in ancient Greece. ...
The Sophists are known today only through the writings of their opponents (specifically Plato and Aristotle), which makes it difficult to formulate a complete view of the Sophists' beliefs.
In the second half of the 5th century B.C., and especially at Athens, "sophist" came to be applied to a disorganized group of thinkers who employed debate and rhetoric to teach and disseminate their ideas and offered to teach these skills to others.
It is necessary to keep in mind that Plato and the sophists had severe ideological differences, and Plato might have benefited from modifying or slanting the original sophistic arguments when he presented them in his writings (ironically, a sophistic technique at work), or may even not have fully understood their arguments himself.