Maieutism is an old Greek idea that truth is innate within the mind. This is tied to Plato's ideal that the universe is based upon archetypes such as math, and that everything is a derivative thereof. Since the human mind is capable of reason, he considered it to be a higher reality than the physical world because it suggested to him that the mind, especially a reasonable mind, required less integrating to get to the root archetypes. Understanding of greater truths had to be obtained by reason alone, or the observation of one's own mind, because the universe around humanity is an illusion in comparison and untrustworthy. His answer to life's problems was to think about them and answers would eventually come.

I don't fully subscribe to this, because I think that the physical world is more than an illusion and a little thing called evidence has a way of showing people when they're wrong, but logic and reason are still required to understand those observations. From a little evidence, people can create much larger theories with broader implications. Is it possible that after some stimulation, the mind fills in all the blanks from then onward?

The word "maieutic", by definition, means "of or pertaining to the Socratic Method". In my experience, SM is an extremely effective way of learning and it has helped me perfect my knowledge of the universe. It stimulates my mind to discover new holes in my mental model for my worldview and fill them up. It makes me wonder if maieutism is a legitimate theory. This is something I've once thought about when I was about five years old or so. If I just thought hard enough, and if I was smart enough, I could figure out literally everything, except for stuff like what a random person was doing in India. The truth people have uncovered purely through math is staggering; authors like Stephen King "discover" their stories as if they're already existing; and Nikola Tesla successfully predicted how his inventions would work by running experiments in his head. It seems to me that there are some things that can me discerned purely through reason but other things, such as events on the other side of the world, that can't.

The idea still strikes me with some legitimacy, although it's not sound in my mind. It's still something I think about from time to time.

Your Honor,

Emperor Kraggh