The Socratic method at your dinner table 

Strip away Athens and the technique is a conversational habit, portable and free. Four moves, in order.

Define the term. Most disagreements are about a word rather than about the world. When someone says a policy is unfair, or a colleague is unprofessional, or a film is overrated, ask what would count as the opposite. Not as a challenge, as a genuine request. Half the time the two of you discover you were arguing about different things, and the argument dissolves without anyone conceding.

Test the edge case. Take the definition you have been given and look for the instance it cannot handle, the way the archers who fight while retreating break the claim that courage means holding your ground. Edge cases are not gotchas. They are how you find out whether a principle is a principle or a description of the case that inspired it. Offer the example as a puzzle to be solved together rather than a trap, because the tone is what determines whether the other person thinks or defends.

Find the shared premise. This is the move most people skip, and the one that keeps the method from being a blood sport. Before pressing further, say out loud the thing you both already agree on, whatever it is: that the outcome matters, that the person involved meant well, that neither of you likes the alternatives. Every Socratic argument works by drawing consequences out of the other person's own commitments, which only functions if those commitments have been stated and accepted rather than assumed.

Let them arrive first. If you can see where the reasoning ends, stop talking. Ask the question that leads there and wait. A conclusion someone reaches in their own words is held; a conclusion delivered to them is resisted. This is the piece of the method that flatters nobody, because it means giving up the pleasure of being visibly right.

It is worth ending with the limits, since the story we have just told is not a success story for the technique's social prospects. The method makes people feel exposed, and the people most likely to be exposed are often the ones with the most standing to lose. It works badly on anyone who did not agree to be questioned, badly in front of an audience, and badly when the questioner already knows the answer and is performing curiosity. Used carelessly it is indistinguishable from bullying.

Used well it is the oldest tool we have for changing a mind without a fight, and its inventor was executed for practising it. Two and a half thousand years later, the horse is still large and slow, and still needs the fly.