Socrates states what is at issue in the Philebus:

So, Philebus, for his part, says that what is good for every creature is enjoyment, pleasure and delight and anything in harmony with that general category. Whereas I contend that not these but understanding, reasoning, memory and their kindred, right opinion and true thinking, are better and more desirable than pleasure for all of those who are able to acquire them, and that they are supremely beneficial to anyone who can attain them now or in the future.

(11b-c, Horan's online translation)

The first thing to be noted is that Philebus' claim that what is good for every creature is questionable if there is a creature who is capable of thought and for which to think is better than pleasure. What may be good for many may not be good for all. On the other hand, what may be good for the one capable of thought will not be good for the many if they are not capable.

A bit later Socrates says:

Take understanding, knowledge, reason and anything else I proposed at the outset and declared to be good when I asked what good is.

(13e)

The question "what is good?" can be answered in many ways. Two that are given here are - pleasure and thinking. What had not been determined at the outset, however, is what the good itself, that one thing, is. There may be many or even an unlimited number of things that are said to be good. Unless we are able to determine at the outset what the good itself is the argument will not come to an end.

Interesting. I didn't know of this 'music-playing' Socrates. — Amity

A few quick comments:

Socrates says he has had this dream before and had always understood it to mean doing what he is always doing:

since philosophy is the greatest music.” (61a)

Now he thinks the dream meant:

make music in the popular sense of the word.

So he:

took whatever stories were to hand, the fables of Aesop which I know, and turned the first ones I came upon into verse.

Taking whatever stories that were at hand suggests that the content of music in the popular sense did not much matter.

The Greek term νόμος, from which we get the term 'norm', means custom, law, and also song (νόμος).

Socrates sings the song of the law. — Fooloso4

A song that he composes for Crito, but he does not write it down. It is not the equivalent of the written law. Perhaps there is a connection between Socrates taking Aesop, something already written and turning it into verse, and taking the law of Athens and turning it into music in the popular sense. In other words, a song for the many.

In the Phaedo, in response to his friend's fear of death Socrates says:

What you should do is to sing him incantations each day until you sing [charm] away his fears.

(77e)

Socrates' own music consists of arguments, but that will not do for the many who need to be charmed.

I would say language-games never reflect the facts. Rather, facts only get their sense within language-games. — Joshs

From Wittgenstein's Zettel:

Do I want to say, then, that certain facts are favorable to the formation of certain concepts; or again unfavorable? And does experience teach us this? It is a fact of experience that human beings alter their concepts, exchange them for others when they learn new facts; when in this way what was formerly important to them becomes unimportant, and vice versa. (It is discovered e.g. that what formerly counted as a difference in kind, is really only a difference in degree.

(352)

Expertise is relative, as is wisdom. — Amity

One problem is that if we are not experts or wise how can we evaluate whether someone else is? Socrates uses the example of a trainer. If he is able to improve someone's strength, endurance, and speed then we have good reason to think the opinion of the trainer regarding such matters is worth heeding.

What about Socrates? Was he guilty of corrupting the young? By the measure of the many who value the ancestral ways he was. His followers though will say that they have been made better. And yet, if they had been corrupted they might imagine they have been improved.

And it seems that Wittgenstein can never do wrong with many of his defenders. — schopenhauer1

I won't speak for anyone else, but as I see it, what is at issue is not agreement or disagreement but the strength of an interpretation. A problematic interpretation is problematic whether the interpreter agrees or disagrees with an author.

Who is the expert in Socrates' story? He is. — Amity

But he denies knowing anything noble and good (Apology 21d). We should be open to the possibility that no such expert exists. He does say that we should pay attention to some opinions but not others, but without knowledge on what basis can we determine which opinions are to be valued?

there is no reasoning with them. — GRWelsh

Sometimes other means of "persuasion" are necessary.

And besides, Socrates own doubt is the case here, and not whether Socratic philosophy has elements of doubt. — Pussycat

Unlike modern skepticism, Socratic skepticism is the condition that gives rise to and guides his inquiry. The Greek term skepsis means both doubt and inquiry.

I find that the painting of Socrates as a man devoid of doubt, with no fear of death, no regrets (presumably no guilt either) and looking forward to the afterlife (if any), very foreign to me — Pussycat

Some of his friends felt the same way.

Rather dogmatic, won't you think? — Pussycat

No. To the contrary skepsis informs his attitude to death. Philosophy as preparation for death is about what we do in life. We do not know what happens when we die. Our time here and now may be all we have. So how best to live it?

He asks endless questions without trying to draw these together into a comprehensive answer. In fact, he seems proud that he makes no attempt at theorising. — RussellA

The same was and is said of Socrates. The reason in both cases can be found in the preface to PI:

I should not like my writing to spare other people the trouble of thinking.

Some of the rhetoric I see related to Trump is disturbing. — GRWelsh

It certainly is, but part of the rhetorical strategy is to deny that the warnings are threats. "I'm not saying this is what I or we will do, but it is what will happen".

I don't think there will be civil war, but this is not to say there will not be violence and bullets. Two reasons I think things will not escalate to war is that the trumpster "patriots" are not significant enough in numbers or bullets.

Your focus is me and not the arguments — NOS4A2

This is exactly what @schopenhauer1 was talking about with his neologism the "TPF effect".

Doubt, or more precisely, knowledge of ignorance, is central to Socratic philosophy. Socrates was not plagued by doubt. On the contrary, he went to his death without fear, trusting that if there are rewards and punishment in Hades it is something he looks forward to. And if death is an endless, dreamless sleep he has no regrets about the life he lived.

You described my intentions — NOS4A2

Actually, I have often wondered what your intentions are. What you attempt to do and whatever your intentions might be in doing so are two different things.

you feign interest but resort to ad hominem. — NOS4A2

You make this accusation in response, or rather instead of responding to what you quoted.

In what way does your rejection of such things as the common good and your not believing in law miss the mark? In what way is it something other than your theme of:

radical individualist autonomy.

Please explain how questioning your political claims is resorting to ad hominem.

I’m afraid your mind-reading skills are as poor as your arguments. — NOS4A2

No mind reading necessary. No matter how you attempt to dress it up your arguments fall under two related themes: defending Trump and radical individualist autonomy.

Much nicer than what I came up with but did not say because I am pretending to be nice.

Fooloso4, is there a term for when someone willfully pretends like an argument was never made and you start over and over and over again from scratch? — schopenhauer1

A few come to mind, but ...

Are you a platonist? — NOS4A2

No, I'm a vegetarian. (Not really).

This is just an attempt to repackage your same old argument. In your attempt to defend your desire to benefit from society without taking any responsibility you introduce a "metaphysics" which is nothing more than an abuse of terminology that is already problematic enough.

There are two parts to my understanding of language: i) words have a use in the language game and ii) the language game has a use in the world. Wittgenstein deals with the first part, but ignores the second. — RussellA

He does not ignore the fact that a language game has a use in the world. The language game develops out of and is understood within the context of a form of life, which includes particular activities, such as building.

He proposes that the meaning of a word does not come from the thing that it is naming, in that the meaning of the word "slab" does not come from a slab in the world. — RussellA

Of course it comes from a slab in the world! The builder does not order him to bring a slab that does not exist. The assistant must know what kind of object he is to bring.

For this purpose they make use of a language consisting of the words “block”, “pillar”, “slab”,
“beam”. A calls them out; B brings the stone which he has learnt to bring at such-and-such a call. —– Conceive of this as a complete primitive language.

(2)

What makes it a complete language is that it does not consist simply in objects named but what is done with those objects. In other words, its use in the world.

Perhaps you can enlighten me. — NOS4A2

I have tried, repeatedly over many threads. More often than not I don't bother though.

Are you just playing at being obtuse or do you really not understand what is at issue?

What jungle? There is only a bunch of different individuals in the same place.

The difference is that a forest is not just a bunch of individual trees, it is a self-sustaining ecosystem.

What he didn't realize is that he was in a forest. There is a difference, but for the same reasons he would deny he was in a thicket.

If trees could talk there would be one in the forest claiming that there is no forest: "When I look around all I see are trees. No where does this fictitious entity a "forest" exist."

Well, as they used to say on American Bandstand, "Its got a good beat and you can dance to it". So I think this Plato guy just might have a hit or two in him.

If he succeeds it would be a Pyrrhic victory.

What I like about your view is that it makes me think. — frank

Sometimes when someone tells me that I apologize. (A serious joke.)

... the divine ... — Paine

We tend to impose our own beliefs and ideas on what this term means. I think it helpful to consider something Homer, who in the Phaedo Socrates calls the “Divine Poet” (95a) says. In the Iliad Homer call salt divine (9.214)

The first mention of law does not occur until 50a. It is also here that we find the first mention of the city.

The first mention of justice occurs earlier:

That’s right. And without going through them all, Crito, doesn’t the same issue arise in other cases too, and especially when it comes to justice and injustice, disgrace and nobility, good and bad, with which our deliberations are now concerned? Should we follow the opinion of the majority and fear it, or the opinion of one person, someone who is knowledgeable, and feel more shame and fear before him than before all the others put together? And if we do not follow him, shan’t we corrupt and maim that which we agreed is made better by justice, and ruined by injustice? Or is this nothing?

(47c-d)

Your take is a little unorthodox — frank

I don't know what might stand as an orthodox reading today but, to quote Marx:

Whatever it is I'm against it

(Groucho)

I take responsibility for my interpretation but I don't think there is anything there that is original.

We could definitely argue against the speech the Law has given, but it's clear within the context of this dialog that Socrates does accept what the law has said — frank

I think that it is clear that Socrates wants Crito to accept it. It is also clear that Socrates abides by the decision of the court. Before imagining what the law will say he was already convinced that to flee would be unjust and to return an injustice with an injustice is unjust. This is not the same as accepting the words he puts in the mouth of the law.

At the risk of stating the obvious, it is Plato who imagines what Socrates imagines the law would say. Socrates fashioning this argument to convince Crito is not the same as Socrates being convinced by the argument. From the perspective of the reader the question is whether Plato is trying to convince
us. If we can argue against the speech I think it likely that Plato's Socrates could have as well. What is at issue is not simply why Socrates did what he did, which admittedly is puzzling, but what philosophers who come after him have to think about and do. In this case it means, at least in part, to learn what Socrates did not, but Plato and Aristotle did, that is, how to speak to the city and the law.

A couple of reasons to think that Socrates did not put the law above justice. In the Apology he says he would not stop engaging in philosophy even if the law prohibits it. He also refused to comply with the Thirty and arrest Leon of Salamis.

These are the words I seem to be hearing, just as the frenzied dancers seem to be hearing the pipes, and the very sound of these words is reverberating within me, and makes me incapable of hearing anything else. — Horan translation

I don't think Socrates, who devoted his life to the truth based on giving a reasoned account, would be persuaded by words that resembled frenzied dancers and pipes.

... he has acquired an overwhelming obligation to obey the Laws because they have made his entire way of life, and even the fact of his very existence, possible. — IEP

His entire way of life is exactly what the law now demands he no longer practice.

The law claims:

... you have agreed, by your actions if not by your words, to live as a citizen in accordance with us
(52d) — Fooloso4

For much of his life, doing what he does and saying what he says was not prevented by the law. By its actions or lack of action the law agreed to allow him to engage in philosophy. — Fooloso4

The law has violated the terms of the agreement. But even so Socrates is unwilling to break the law.

It is true that Socrates was free to leave, but Athens was for him not simply where he lived. Although by leaving when that option was open he would not have broken the law, it would have broken his bond to the city which was not simply a legal one.

If we are to understand Wittgenstein we would do well to look at what he points to, what people do and say, and not posit theories. If I cut myself or hit my hand with a hammer I might say ouch even if no one hears it. If you ask why, "because it hurt" is as good an explanation as any other and better than many. Given than no one else is around it is obviously not to convey anything or communicate anything to anyone. It is only an observable behavior if someone observes it, but it is what we do whether it is observed or not.

But the speech Law has been giving (through Socrates) puts Law as the source of both Athens and Socrates himself. — frank

I think the law has it backwards. There would be no human nomos, that is, not simply laws and statutes, but custom or convention or norms, without men. Prior to cities there were families and tribes. If whatever the head or chief ruled was law then the distinction between the rule of law and the rule of men collapses.

Plato recognized the conflicting demands of the family and the city. This is why in the Republic the just city abolishes the family by hiding who one's biological parents and children are.

The distinction between just and unjust laws raises the problem of the source or standard of justice. The speech of the law, however, does not make such a distinction.

The ancient Greeks distinguished between nature (physis) and convention (nomos). If, along with the Stoics, we accept the claim that man is the rational animal, then to live according to nature is to live according to reason not according to conventions or norms.

It's hard not to see this as proto-social-contract theory. — frank

If there was a contract then what was the obligation on the side of the law? For his whole adult life Socrates practiced what he is now forbidden to do. Did the city break the contract? When the Thirty briefly came to power was there a contract agreed to or did the new law simply impose its power?

Society is the foundation of your existence, so you owe it obedience. — frank

Does this mean that we owe obedience even when there is a radical change to the laws of a society? Suppose a regime comes to power that abolishes private property and declares that we are all the property of the state without any human rights. Suppose further that it restricts emigration. What do we owe it?

It should be in your nature to support that which gives you life. — frank

Unless we are by nature slaves to the state and not free, then there must be limits to the demands of the state. If there is to be a social contract then one side cannot hold all the power.

... do not reckon children or life or anything else to be more important than justice — Horan translation

Justice (dike) is more important than law (nomos). Law is in the service of justice, but they can be in conflict. Consider, for example, the rule of the Thirty Tyrants in Athens. There can be unjust laws and unjust administration of the law. The speech of the law glosses over this problem.

those who rule there. — Horan translation

Gods, not men, rule in Hades. As the law says in this passage, Socrates was treated unjustly by Athens. It does not claim that he was treated unlawfully. But justly or not, for Socrates to disobey the judgment of the city would be unjust. More important than any specific judgment by the city is the preservation of the law. Unjust laws cannot be changed and made just if law is discarded.

According to the law, man in the service of justice rather than justice being in the service of man. But does the law overstate its case?

I don't think he refers to this divine force as a 'daemon'.
It is his daemonion, a 'voice' he hears. — Amity

You are right, he always refers to it as his daemonion. I have not paid much attention to this and do not feel qualified to say much about it. There is no consensus, however, as to who or what it is the voice of. Here is a brief discussion of his divine sign.

However, this latest made me wonder as to the importance of the use of the word 'slave'. — Amity

What is at issue can be seen if we put it in the form of a question: are the laws for the benefit of man or is man for the benefit of the laws?

(mastery of self?). — Amity

From the Phaedo:

For all wars arise on account of the possession of wealth, and we are compelled to acquire wealth because of the body, as we are slaves in its service.

(66c-d)

The presence of Socrates' daimonion? — Amity

Or rather, its conspicuous absence. It plays a significant role in the charges brought against Socrates in the Apology, where he is accused of believing in:

... other novel divine forces.

(24b-c)

Here Socrates claims:

I am, now and always, the sort of person who heeds nothing else but the reasoning that on reflection appears best to me.

(46b)

His daemon, however, does not provide any reasons when warning him against doing something.

I am sure that "ouch!" is a noun and/or the name of a behaviour. — RussellA

It is neither.

I don't know why you don't just ignore him. — T Clark

Maybe because the truth matters.

Changing his mind doesn't.

I say that the right people in the right positions to lead — ToothyMaw

This is the problem. There is no general agreement as to who the right people are.

But you have a moral obligation by virtue of all the good you could do ... — ToothyMaw

What some might consider good others might not.

But what do you think of the case Socrates' Law has made in Crito? Are you convinced or not? — frank

I am convinced of the importance of just law, but not that he is the slave (West translation) of the law. The Greek term is "doulos". I don't know why Horan translates it as servant, but possibly because a servant is able to leave (51d). This would be a kind of social contract, but there is no contract or agreement between master and slave. As the argument progresses this claim is dropped, in favor of the idea of an agreement.

Leaving this aside, we can consider the rest of the claim in this passage, that he is the offspring or son of the law. While a son may have an obligation to obey a father who is just and good, what is his obligation to a father who is not? The speech of the law does not make this critical distinction.

The distinction and blurring of the distinction between the law and the people who make, decide, and administer the law is also problematic.

As quoted above, the law, so to speak, washes its hands of the matter by admitting that Socrates was treated unjustly, only not by the law but by men.