What is Philosophy.docx

CHAPTER ONE WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY? Key Terms Philosophy: Love of wisdom; the systematic, critical examination of the way in which we judge, evaluate, and act, with the aim of making ourselves wiser and more self-reflective. A more evocative, but less lucid, definition has been offered by Arthur Danto: Philosophy is the “brother of art and the sister of science.” Irony: A kind of speech or communication that assumes a double audience. The speaker appears to be addressing his ironic statement to a superficial audience, but he is, in reality, directing it at a second, or real, audience. “Without irony,” Hegel proclaimed, “there is no art.” Kierkegaard defines the ironist as one who has ‘stepped out of line’ with the prevailing assumptions of her age and “turned to face it.” Double Irony: A statement whose “real” audience is not the apparently real audience (which actually misses the speaker’s true point as well), but rather some third audience altogether, like a reader or some other outside observer. Socratic Method: A process of questions and answers by which we systematically reach deeper and deeper insights into the principles of truth and goodness. Ken Samples has isolated five characteristics of the method; as Socrates himself practiced it, the Socratic Method is skeptical, conversational, ‘definitional’ or conceptual, and contains elements of both deductive and inductive reasoning. Justice: The fundamental principles of right and wrong. Aristotle defines it as the art of ‘treating equals equally and unequals unequally.’ Justice is often divided into its several kinds in ethical discourse: retributive, distributive, compensatory, etc. Kosmos: The Greek word for world or universe. Cosmology: The study of the order of the world; a branch of astronomy that investigates the organization and structure of the entire physical universe, including its origins. Metaphysics: A subfield of philosophy which treats first principles. Typical metaphysical questions involve the existence of a deity, the nature of causality, and the mind/body problem. The word itself is sometimes said to derive from a mere accident, in which the text of Aristotle’s (untitled) treatise on First Philosophy was randomly bound after (‘meta’ in Greek) the volume entitled “Physics” in an early edition of the Philosopher’s works. Atomism: A cosmological theory, which claims everything in the universe, including the human soul, is composed of minute units of matter called atoms. The theory was first broached by Leucippus and Democritus in the Fifth Century B. C. E.; revived by Gassendi and Descartes, in the Seventeenth Century C. E., it served as inspiration for Boyle and ultimately for Dalton’s famous model. Taxonomy: The study of the general principles of scientific classification. Stoicism: From the ‘Stoa’ or painted porch from which the school’s founder, Zeno of Citium, expounded his doctrines. The philosophical school which claims that the natural world exhibits a rational order that can be explained solely by reason. Stoics are today best known for their ethical views, but their contribution to Logic (particularly Syllogistic Logic) was also very significant. The appeal of Stoicism must have been broad, as both slaves (Epictetus) and emperors (Marcus Aurelius) embraced it. Logos: The power of reason. The original Greek term harbors many meanings, most variations on the word “word,” and running the gamut from ‘logical proof’ to ‘fiction.’ As a philosophical concept, it first appears in Heraclitus, who famously claims, “The Logos is common to all.” In the Gospel of John, logos is translated as “the Word” of God. Natural Law: The concept that the universe functions in accordance with a rational idea of the proper form and order of its organization. Aquinas distinguishes it from human laws, eternal laws (i.e., laws of nature) and divine laws (i.e., those which are not discoverable by reason.) Empiricism: The theory that all human knowledge comes from the evidence of our five senses, and therefore we can never know more, or know with greater certainty, than our senses will allow. Perhaps the most famous exemplars of this view are Locke, Berkeley, and Hume, the so-called ‘British Empiricists.’ Rationalism: The theory that at least some human knowledge comes from reason, unaided by the senses, and therefore that we can know about things that the senses do not reveal to us and can know with greater certainty than the senses will allow. Descartes and Leibniz are both renowned Rationalists. Epistemology: The study of the mind’s capacity for knowing. Literally, ‘knowledge’ (episteme) + ‘theory’ (logos): major concerns of epistemology are the sources, criteria, and limits of knowledge. Rationality: The mind’s ability to present reasons, evidence, and arguments in support of our beliefs; the ability to deduce conclusions from premises. Universality: The concept that a statement, if true, applies always and everywhere. Objectivity: Being true to the way the world really is, not merely reflecting the inner nature of the individual subject . A functional definition would address the clarity of the task at hand and some criterion for assessing veridicality. The supremacy of objectivity as an epistemological virtue has been challenged from several quarters in recent years. Some Feminists deride the notion of the “objective” thinker or agent as surreptitiously gendered, and as early as the Nineteenth Century Kierkegaard proclaimed, “Truth is Subjectivity.” Key Figures Anaximander (611 B.C.E. to 547 B.C.E.): Greek philosopher; the successor and perhaps pupil of Thales. He claimed that the first principle (Arche) was not a particular substance like water or air but the infinite or indefinite (in Greek, the Apeiron, or the ‘boundless’). He is credited with producing the first map, and with many imaginative scientific speculations, for example that the Earth is unsupported and at the center of the universe. A translation of his surviving fragment runs as follows: “Whence things have their origin, thence also their destruction happens, as is the order of things, giving justice and reparation to one another for their crimes.” Anaximenes (~500 B.C.E.?): Greek philosopher, born in Miletus. He claimed that the first principle (Arche) and basic form of matter was air, which could be transformed into other substances by a process of condensation and rarefaction. This notion of successive change may have influenced Heraclitus, and is explicitly criticized by Parmenides. Aristotle (384 B.C.E. to 322 B.C.E.): Greek philosopher, scientist, and physician, born in Stagira, Macedonia. In 367 he went to Athens, where he was associated with Plato's Academy until Plato's death in 347 B.C.E. In 342 B.C.E. he was invited by Philip of Macedon to educate his son, Alexander. After Alexander’s death, Athenian resentment resulted in a charge of impiety being brought against Aristotle; unlike Socrates, whose resolve is shown in Plato’s Crito, Aristotle fled to Chalcis rather than, as he said, allow ‘Athens to sin twice against Philosophy.’ Aristotle's writings represented a large and varied output over virtually every field of knowledge: logic, metaphysics, ethics, politics, rhetoric, poetry, biology, zoology, physics, and psychology. The bulk of the work that survives actually consists of unpublished material in the form of lecture. Beattie, James (1735 to 1803): Poet and essayist, born in Laurencekirk, Aberdeenshire, NE Scotland, UK. After working as a schoolmaster in Fordoun he became a master at Aberdeen Grammar School, and in 1760 professor of moral philosophy at Aberdeen. He is primarily remembered for his long poem, The Minstrel. A colleague of Reid’s and an advocate of common sense, he combated the skepticism of Berkeley and Hume and was rewarded with a royal pension by George III. Berkeley, George (1685 to 1753): Anglican bishop and philosopher, born in Kilkenny, Ireland. He studied at Trinity College, Dublin, where he remained until 1713. In his most important books he developed his celebrated claim that esse is percipii—"to be is to be perceived"—that the contents of the material world are "ideas" that only exist when they are perceived by a mind. His remaining work was divided between questions of religious reflection and social reform, an example of which was his (unrealized) dream of founding a seminary for colonists and Native Americans. Descartes, René (1596 to 1650): Rationalist philosopher and mathematician, born in France. He developed the major features of his philosophy in his most famous work, Meditations on First Philosophy. In this work he argued that God must exist and cannot be a deceiver; therefore, his beliefs based on ordinary sense experience are correct. He also argued that mind and body are distinct substances, believing that this dualism made possible human freedom and immortality. In other work, he virtually founded analytic geometry, and made major contributions to optics. Du Bois, William Edward Burghardt (1868 to 1963): Editor, historian, sociologist, political activist, author. A Massachusetts native, Du Bois was shocked and profoundly affected by the racial segregation in the South, which he experienced firsthand while attending Fisk University from 1885-88. After receiving a Ph.D. from Harvard in 1895, he studied black life in the Philadelphia ghetto and wrote The Philadelphia Negro (1899). Du Bois served as a professor of economics, history, and economics at Atlanta University from 1898-1910, during which time he published his collection of essays The Soul of Black Folk (1903), which called for the African-American middle class to mobilize against bigoted racial policies. Freud, Sigmund (1856 to 1939): Developed psychoanalytic therapy technique, born in Freiburg, Moravia (now Príbor, Czech Republic). He studied medicine at Vienna, then specialized in neurology, and later in psychopathology. Finding hypnosis inadequate, he used the method of "free association," allowing the patient to express thoughts in a state of relaxed consciousness, and interpreting the data of childhood and dream recollections. He became convinced, despite his own puritan sensibilities, of the fact of infantile sexuality, a theory which isolated him from the medical profession. In 1900 he published his major work, Die Traumdeutung (The Interpretation of Dreams), arguing that dreams are disguised manifestations of repressed sexual wishes (in contrast with the widely-held modern view that dreams are simply a biological manifestation of the random firing of brain neurones during a particular state of consciousness). In 1902, he was appointed to a professorship in Vienna. Out of this grew the Vienna Psychoanalytical Society (1908) and the International Psychoanalytic Association (1910). Hegel, Georg (1770 to 1831): Idealist philosopher, born in Germany. He studied theology at Tübingen, and in 1801 edited The Critical Journal of Philosophy in which he outlined his system with its emphasis on reason rather than Romantic intuitionism, which he attacked in his first major work, The Phenomenology of the Mind. His approach, influenced by Kant, rejects the reality of finite and separate objects and minds in space and time, and establishes an underlying, enveloping unity, the Absolute. The quest for greater unity and truth is achieved by the dialectic, positing something (thesis), denying it (antithesis), and combining the two in a synthesis which contains a greater portion of truth in its complexity. (Note: this terminology, although helpful in explicating Hegel’s Dialectic, is seldom mentioned explicitly in Hegel’s own work; its prevalence may, in fact, stem from the work of Fichte.) Heidegger, Martin (1889 to 1976): Philosopher whose work is variously described as Existentialism or Phenomenology. As a child he was destined by his family for the priesthood, but as a teenager an encounter with Brentano’s work awakened a persistent philosophical impulse. Long interested in Husserl’s thought, he later became Husserl’s friend and assistant, and eventually succeeded him as chair of philosophy at the university of Freiberg (although he subsequently appeared to disavow his connection when his flirtation with Nazism was at its height). His unfinished Being and Time, which must rank as one of the greatest works of philosophy in the Twentieth Century, was dedicated to Husserl, although he had already begun to seriously differ with the master’s thought by the time of its publication in 1927. In 1933, he joined the Nazi party (whether it was from self-interest, a sincere commitment to the party’s goals, or simply as a perceived acquiescence to the trend of his own philosophy is a topic still hotly debated). If self-interest was the motive, Heidegger failed miserably, being considered insufficiently ideological by the Nazis, who sent him to dig ditches in the last years of the war, and then later deemed too much of a Nazi by occupation forces, who banned him from teaching. Heidegger’s work is generally divided into “early” and “late” periods, with the former centering on the themes expounded upon in Being and Time, and the latter marked by an abiding interest in Pre-Socratic thought, as well as a newly poeticized mode of discourse which attempts to let “Being” speak in its “own” voice. Hume, David (1711 to 1776): Philosopher and historian, born in Scotland, UK. He studied at Edinburgh, and took up law. In his masterpiece, A Treatise of Human Nature (1739-40), he consolidated and extended the empiricist tradition. His views became widely known only when he wrote two volumes of Essays Moral and Political (1741-2). He wrote the posthumously published Dialogues concerning Natural Religion in the 1750s. His atheism kept him from receiving professorships at Edinburgh and Glasgow, and he became a tutor, secretary, and keeper of the Advocates' Library in Edinburgh. Jesus Christ (? to 33): The central figure of the Christian faith, whose nature as "Son of God" and whose redemptive work are traditionally considered fundamental beliefs for Christians. The title Christ (Greek) reflects the belief that Jesus was the Messiah (the anointed one) of Jewish tradition. His ministry stressed love of neighbor over the dominant focus on laws and traditions held by the Jews of his time. After his execution at the hands of the Romans, his followers spread his message throughout the known world and turned what had been a Jewish sect into a separate religion. Kant, Immanuel (1724 to 1804): Philosopher born in Germany. He became a professor of logic and metaphysics in 1770. His main work, now a philosophical classic, is Critique of Pure Reason in which he provided a response to the empiricism of Hume. Kant followed this over time with two other “Critiques,” one of which (Critique of Practical Reason) deals with moral theory and another (“Critique of Judgment”) centering on aesthetic questions. A significant later work, worthy of mention, is his “Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone.” For those interested in a somewhat more approachable picture of Kant’s ethical theory than is offered in the Second Critique, “Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals” is recommended. Leibniz, Gottfried (1646 to 1716): Philosopher and mathematician, born in Germany. In 1700 he persuaded Frederick I of Prussia to found the Prussian Academy of Sciences in Berlin, of which he became the first president. A man of remarkable breadth of knowledge, he made original contributions to optics, mechanics, statistics, logic, and probability theory. He wrote on history, law, and political theory, and his philosophy was the foundation of Rationalism. He was involved in a controversy with Isaac Newton over whether he or Newton was the inventor of integral and differential calculus; the Royal Society formally declared for Newton in 1711, but the matter was never really resolved. His “Monadology” is rightfully considered a masterpiece of Metaphysics. Locke, John (1632 to 1704): Philosopher, born in England. He studied at Oxford, and in 1667 joined the household of Lord Ashley, later first Earl of Shaftesbury, as his personal physician and adviser in scientific and political matters. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1668. His major philosophical work, the Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689), accepted the possibility of rational demonstration of moral principles and the existence of God, but its denial of innate ideas was important in starting the tradition of British Empiricism. Lucretius (50 B.C.E. to ?): Roman poet and philosopher. His major work is the poem "On the Nature of Things," in which he tried to popularize the philosophical theories of Democritus and Epicurus on the origin of the universe, rejecting and condemning religious belief as the one great source of human wickedness and misery. Without Philosophy, Lucretius declared, “all life is a struggle in the dark.” Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121 to 180): One of the most respected emperors in Roman history. When he was 17, he was adopted by Antoninus Pius, who had succeeded Hadrian and whose daughter Faustina was selected for his wife. He was made consul in 140, and he discharged his public duties with great conscientiousness, at the same time devoting himself to the study of law and philosophy, especially Stoicism. Peaceful by temperament, his reign witnessed constant wars, and permanent peace was never secured. He was idealized as the model of the perfect emperor. Plato (428 B.C.E. to 347 B.C.E.): Greek philosopher, probably born in Athens of a wealthy family. Little is known of his early life, but he was a devoted follower of Socrates. He traveled widely, and then he founded his Academy at Athens, where Aristotle was his most famous pupil. He remained there for the rest of his life. His many dialogues are usually divided into three periods. The early dialogues have Socrates as the principal character engaged in ironic and inconclusive interrogations about the definition of different moral virtues. In the middle dialogues, he develops his own positive doctrines, such as the theory of knowledge as recollection, the immortality of the soul, and, most importantly, the theory of forms (or "ideas") which contrasts the temporal, material world of "particulars" (objects merely of perception, opinion, and belief) with the timeless, unchanging world of universals or forms (the true objects of knowledge). The Republic also describes Plato's celebrated political utopia, ruled by philosopher-kings; a more dystopic version is to be found in his “Laws.” Rorty, Richard (1931 to 2007): American Pragmatist philosopher. Although Rorty began his career as an Analytic philosopher, his study of Dewey led him to an eventual position which can be called “Post-Analytic.” Perhaps because Rorty’s Analytic chops were so respected already, his turn towards newer, and arguably more subtle, modes of investigation, as manifest in his Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, caused a sensation of sorts in academic circles. (This work was also one of the first published books of its kind to bear the author’s smiling image on its cover, a choice which added to Rorty’s unofficial “philosopher-as-rock-star” status.) As his thought progressed, Rorty turned increasingly towards considering thinkers who fell quite outside the mainstream of Analytic philosophy (e.g., Foucault, Derrida, and, most pertinently, Heidegger). His final writings dealt with progressive politics, and religion in public life. Russell, Bertrand (1872 to 1970): Philosopher and mathematician, born in Wales, UK. He studied at Cambridge, where he became a fellow of Trinity College in 1895. Concerned to support the objectivity of mathematics, he pointed out a contradiction in Frege's system, published his own Principles of Mathematics (1903), and collaborated with Whitehead in Principia Mathematica (1910-13). After 1949 he became a champion of nuclear disarmament. One of the most important influences on modern analytic philosophy, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1950. Socrates (469 B.C.E. to 399 B.C.E.): Greek philosopher, born in Athens. Little is known of his early life. According to Plato, he devoted his last 30 years to convincing the Athenians that their opinions about moral matters could not bear the weight of critical examination. His technique, the Socratic Method, was to ask for definitions of such morally significant concepts as piety and justice, and to elicit contradictions from the responses, thus spurring deeper enquiry into the concepts. He was convicted of charges of impiety and corruption of youth by zealous defenders of a restored democracy in Athens, sentenced, and executed. Aside from Plato’s dialogues, his life inspired two works by Xenophon and a scabrous rendering in Aristophanes’ “The Clouds.” Thales (? to 555 B.C.E.): Greek natural philosopher, regarded as the first philosopher, born in Miletus. His journeys took him to Egypt and Babylon, where he acquired land-surveying and astronomical techniques, and apparently predicted the solar eclipse in 585 BC. None of his writings are extant, but Aristotle credits him with the doctrine that water is the original substance (Arche) from which all things are derived. Diogenes Laertius tells a fanciful tale of his meteorological prowess being used to amass a fortune in the olive oil business—not, as Thales says there, because wealth is desirable inherently, but to show that a wise man could be rich, if he so chose. Whitehead, Alfred North (1861 to 1947): Mathematician and Idealist philosopher, born in England, UK. He studied at Cambridge, where he was senior lecturer in mathematics until 1910. He then taught at London (1910-14), becoming professor of applied mathematics at Imperial College (1914-24), and was then professor of philosophy at Harvard (1924-37). He collaborated with his one-time pupil, Bertrand Russell, in writing the Principia Mathematica (1910-13). The Principal Philosopher: Socrates Socrates, as the saying goes, needs no introduction. He is our one great authentic hero, and we cannot do better than to start off an introductory course in philosophy by introducing him to our students. But there are two other reasons why I chose to begin with Socrates, and you may find one or both of them useful in your teaching. First of all, Socrates was a doubter, a questioner, a poker of holes in hot air balloons. He may have been a political conservative in the terms of his day, but he was and remains our most thoroughgoing intellectual radical. Students come to philosophy from physics, history, or economics courses where they are expected simply to absorb facts and theories without doubt or hesitation. The raising of questions, they are given clearly to understand, is for advanced graduate students or other professors. We want our students to throw off that habit of mind, to ask questions and raise objections from the very first day that they walk into a philosophy class. What better way to encourage them than by starting right off with a portrait of the greatest debunker, doubt-raiser, and question-asker of them all? But my second reason for choosing Socrates as lead-off man is, in a way, even more important: Socrates had a sense of humor! He made jokes, he poked fun at stuffed shirts, and he exposed the inflated rhetoric of the established figures of his day. Students desperately need to learn that ideas can be fun, even funny, that there is no contradiction between profundity, significance, and importance on the one hand, and wit, irony, and humor on the other. To help things along, I have spent several pages in the text explaining the nature of irony in general, and Socratic irony in particular. The complexities of the Theory of Ideas can come a bit later. First, let the students understand that even the greatest of philosophers had a sense of humor. Incidentally, by the time your students have grasped the basic structure of irony, they will have had their first lesson in the distinction between appearance and reality. The central purpose of Chapter One is to explain to the students some of the sorts of intellectual inquiries that have gone under the heading “philosophy” in the past two and a half millennia. Students tend to assume that there is just one set of questions to which philosophers address themselves, the only differences among them coming in the answers they give to the questions. This introductory chapter should help them to see that there are many different kinds of questions that philosophers have asked, as well as many different answers that they have given. The purpose behind including some brief selections dealing with contemporary astronomy and physics is to show students that the most ancient philosophical questions are still alive. It is often said that philosophy started out including just about everything, and that as each set of questions got itself organized and sorted out, it split off from philosophy to become an independent field. That makes philosophy sound like a holding company for immature or undeveloped questions. I would rather like students to realize that even after a field develops as far as physics has, it still confronts “philosophical” issues which a philosopher can help to deal with. Suggested Lecture Outlines for Chapter One A Prefatory Note: The typical semester runs fourteen or fifteen weeks. If we assume a standard three-times-a-week fifty-minute class format, then with vacations, snow days, exams, building seizures, the homecoming game, and whatever, an introductory course in philosophy will meet perhaps forty times. On average, therefore, if you use the entire text, and do not assign anything else, you will spend between four and five class meetings on each chapter. In this Manual, I will include suggested lecture outlines for three lectures or so for each chapter. My assumption is that class discussion, especially on the contemporary applications, and whatever additional material you wish to introduce, will fill out the remainder of the class meetings devoted to each chapter. (In some cases, of course, the course will be a large lecture with weekly discussion sections led by graduate students. In that case, the lecture outlines sketched here may suffice for the entire semester.) These lecture outlines are merely suggestions, based on my own experiences in the classroom. I hope you will treat them as an expendable resource, altering or rejecting them at will, but possibly finding them an aid to your own lesson planning. One word of advice to young instructors just starting out: Do not be dismayed if you fail to get through everything on your lesson plan. That is simply a sign that your class has gone well! Remember, you know what you failed to cover, but your students do not. Lecture One: A First Encounter with Philosophy I. Introduction to the Course Housekeeping details: Meeting times, textbook, written work, discussion sections, office hours. Determination of the grade. (Telling students right away how their grade will be arrived at reduces anxiety and allows them to listen to you!) II. What Is Philosophy? Brief definitions of philosophy—pursuit of wisdom, analysis of concepts, rational self-examination, etc. Remember: Even good students have NO idea what philosophy is when they walk into an introductory course. Heidegger believes that to ask what Philosophy is, is to philosophize already; this suggests some of the self-reflective strangeness of the discipline, and begs a good question: How will we know it, then, when we find it? (Teachers familiar with Meno’s famous paradox in the dialogue which bears his name may wish to introduce the passage in question (80d) here as an example of the sort of difficulties we face when we philosophize.) What drew you to philosophy? Don’t be afraid to personalize your introduction. Use whatever actually attracted you to the subject as a hook. The history of the subject—a brief indication of how long it has been around (2500 years!), how many different questions it raises, etc. Note: Wolff focuses exclusively on Western Philosophy and reactions to it from parties who, though historically marginalized, still embrace the very values they confront. In fairness, the teacher might wish to say a few words about the Eastern Tradition, even if it is simply to justify excluding it (for the sake of simplicity, say, or in deference to that tradition which is closer to the intended students of this text). III. Philosophy as an Activity Philosophy is an activity of questioning, examining, and calling into doubt, not an accumulation of facts. The only way to learn philosophy is to do it. Again, the “Meno” can serve to broach this idea. As his initial question proves, Meno is basically a vacuum sucking up ‘conventional wisdom,’ prettily phrased; in a sense, the drama of the dialogue consists precisely in Socrates striving to dislodge this viewpoint, and replace it with one of shared investigation spawned by wonder. The special role of class discussion in a philosophy course. Compare learning philosophy to learning to play tennis. Only those who get out on the court and risk looking foolish by swinging at the ball ever get better. Sitting on the sidelines dressed in gorgeous tennis togs gets you nowhere if you don’t try to play. Again, philosophy is an activity first and foremost. The aggressive, argumentative character of philosophy. Stress to the students that vigorous debate—even with the professor—is the instrument for finding truth in this game. Remind students that Socrates cared enough to give his life—not so much for the ‘answers,’ but for the right to keep on questioning. Lecture Two: The Life and Death of Socrates I. The Story The political background in Athens. The teacher may wish to note that Socrates’ supporters, if not necessarily Socrates himself, were radically undemocratic in their political views; a glance at Plato’s “Seventh Letter” should help clarify the situation for students. The story of the trial. The role of Meletus, Anytus, and Lycon, and their constituencies, merits mention. Which constituency do individual students feel they belong to— politicians, poets, business persons, or philosophers? The last night of Socrates’ life—The Phaedo and the discussion of immortality. The teacher may wish to caution students to read the “Phaedo” with the same light touch with which it was written: Socrates himself calls it a “song’” and the fact that Plato declares his own absence at the event suggests the possibility of mythopoeticizing. If the teacher wishes to follow up this line of thought, she may wish to address the Theseus myth which frames the discussion as a whole, showing Socrates as the hero who, with the thread of argument, slays the bogey of the Fear of Death and thereby ‘rescues’ his companions, as Theseus did from the Minotaur. II. Socrates’ Defense of his Life—The Apology The conception of the polis, the health of the polis, the need for honest critics of public affairs who will recall a community to its ideals. The contemporary parallels with modern-day America. A pressing instance of the struggle between those who would ‘conserve’ traditional societal values and those who criticize them can easily be found in the debates surrounding security from terrorism vs. preservation of traditional liberties; debating the propriety of questioning authority in times of crisis is similarly relevant to today’s climate. The role of reason in the examined life. Philosophy as rational critique, not merely an expression of uncritical private opinion. Mere opinions, I tell my students, are of biographical interests only, but considered judgments are the stuff of philosophy. The objectivist presupposition-critique will arrive at the truth, which is the same for all persons, no matter where they start. Note: the teacher may wish to caution students that such a rigid standard is not always presumed, even by philosophers. III. The Role of a Teacher Socrates as midwife (The “Theatetus”): no one can teach anyone else wisdom. This idea, too, can be illustrated through reference to the slave boy episode in the “Meno.” If the teacher is inclined, she may discuss Kierkegaard’s famous argument in the “Philosophical Fragments” which presses this assumption to its logical conclusion, and thereby develops a negative definition of Christianity by default. Socratic irony: its structure, and function in the activity of the philosopher as teacher. Different audiences, different levels of understanding, different stages in the journey toward wisdom. The underlying pathos of Socrates’ life: in the end, his own pupils misunderstood him, for they thought he could teach them wisdom, and they thought his death deprived them of an essential precondition for wisdom—except, of course, Plato, upon whose testimony this claim rests. A question worth pondering: How lonely was Socrates? Lecture Three: Cosmology versus Moral Philosophy The Two Traditions of Philosophical Activity (Note: There is a tradition of dividing philosophy’s subject matter into three: Epistemology, Metaphysics, and Morality. Wolff conflates the first and third, and there is nothing wrong with this, as long as the somewhat idiosyncratic nature of his distinction is acknowledged.) Cosmology—the study of the universe, and Moral philosophy: the life of the polis, the concern with politics, moral questions, the human experience. The contrast between the two sorts of activities. The different sorts of people drawn to one or the other. As Wolff points out, Socrates admits to an early fascination with cosmological questions, before coming to conclude that the ‘proper study of man is man.’ But Plato, and Aristotle immediately after him, obviously had passionate interest in both aspects of philosophy. Even Descartes, who publicly disavowed any discussion of ethics in his “Meditations,” still penned his “Passions of the Soul.” Ultimately, one might argue, one’s cosmological views condition one’s moral outlook, and vice versa. Appearance and reality: the distinction, its role in both lines of philosophical activity, its importance for the whole history of philosophy. One instructive comparison might be between Heraclitus and Parmenides. On the face of it, it’s hard to imagine two viewpoints more disparate (the first appears to argue for change in all things, and the second against the possibility of any change whatsoever). However, both are united in pushing thought past the simple ‘appearances’ in search of a deeper ‘reality.’ II. Cosmology The early cosmologists—atomism, and the search for the elements of nature. Democritus and Lucretius. It has been argued that Lucretius’ work is a sustained battle against ‘superstition’ (religio, in his parlance). If so, then the tie between cosmological and moral concerns is again shown to be tight; “The Nature of Things” is metaphysics in the pursuit of happiness. The relation of pre-Socratic cosmology to modern scientific investigations. Atomic physics and the search for elementary particles. The Big Bang theory of the origin of the universe. Note: Recent scholarship has diffused somewhat the old picture of Pre-Socratic philosophers as primarily proto-scientists; for a more nuanced view, see G. Vlastos’ collected articles on early Greek Philosophy. III. Moral Philosophy The conditions in fifth-century Athens that gave rise to moral philosophy. The sophists in early Athens. Moral relativism. Although Wolff includes part of Thrasymachus’ speech in the “Republic,” he does not offer any detail about Sophists in general. The teacher may wish to mention that the term, outside of Plato, is not necessarily pejorative. Pythagoras, the Seven Sages, and even the legendary Orpheus were deemed sophistes. Although the term came to mean, in Aristotle’s view, a person who makes money by means of fraudulent wisdom, some sophists were men of true discernment and philosophical acumen. Hegel, in fact, considered them prototypes for the philosophes of the Age of Enlightenment. Some contemporary critics see in them the inspiration not just for moral relativism, but for non-foundational epistemology, a philosophic doctrine of some subtlety. The central tenets of Plato’s moral philosophy: the role of reason, the existence of objective moral norms, the relation between moral principles and a theory of human nature. Although Wolff’s text does not address this, the teacher may wish to recall that in some of Plato’s dialogues (e.g., “Symposium” and “Phaedrus”) consummate virtue is not attained by reason, but by the more mystical faculty of “love.” Lecture Four: The Epistemologists of the Modern Classical Period I. Introduction The new science of the seventeenth century, its role as background for the new concern with a theory of knowledge. The Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century and the emergence of individualism. It may seem odd to couple the Reformation with scientific philosophy, especially that of the Rationalist variety. After all, for Luther, reason is “the Devil’s Whore,” and salvation can only be found in a faith which, from the perspective of many, is based in the absurd (see Quintillian, among others). However, the argument can be made that by weakening religious restraints, the protestant reformers inadvertently paved the way for scientific advancement, the like of which they could not have foreseen. Individualism is sometimes thought to be discernible I, the Protestant notion of ‘the priesthood of all believers.’ Descartes’ Meditations as the first distinctively modern work in philosophy. Its modernity can perhaps be seen most clearly in the author’s desire to prove to, and by, himself the ‘truths’ which an earlier age would have ascribed to authority. A striking metaphor for this is found in the structure of the argument itself: Descartes first proves his existence, and then God’s. II. Empiricism versus Rationalism The central theme: an analysis of the structure and nature of the human mind can reveal the limits of possible knowledge. The role of conceptual analysis in the pursuit of a theory of knowledge. David Hume and the empiricist attack on the claims of rational metaphysics. The empiricist principle that all knowledge derives from sense experience. The rationalist emphasis on the role of reason in scientific knowledge. The important role of mathematics as a model of true knowledge. Rational metaphysics and the attempts to know the nature of the universe as a whole. The interplay between the new science and philosophical arguments. As Galileo famously declared, the book of nature was written in the language of mathematics. Despite his deserved fame as a mathematician, Descartes’ own philosophic masterpieces are not the clearest examples of the Rationalists’ infatuation with math; the teacher may wish to introduce brief excerpts from Leibniz’s “Monadology” or, better yet, Spinoza’s “Ethics,” to exemplify this tendency. Remember, also, that Plato pioneered this mindset, as the slave boy episode there shows; although it may be intended in jest, Plato later takes ‘recollected’ mathematical expertise as proof of the immortality of the soul! III. The Stalemate between Empiricism and Rationalism The strengths and weaknesses of each side: rationalism gives a more plausible account of the structure of modern science, but empiricism accords better with our understanding of the way in which we first acquire knowledge. Immanuel Kant’s Critical Philosophy as a late eighteenth-century attempt to resolve the frozen conflict between the empiricists and the rationalists. While a full-blown investigation of Kant’s Critical Theory is certainly not called for here, some mention of his attempt to synthesize the two schools seems appropriate. The teacher may wish to confine her remarks to the famous claim in the First Critique that, although all our knowledge does arise from experience, it does not reduce to it. As a way to tie the ‘Two Traditions’ together in the person of Kant, the teacher may wish to recall his statement in the Second Critique that “two things fill the mind with ever-increasing wonder and awe… the starry heavens above me and the moral law within…” IV. Wrap-Up: The Limitations of the Western Philosophical Tradition Enlightenment opinions about Africa and Race: Hume, Kant, Hegel. W. E. B. Du Bois and “the problem of the color line.” Alternative views of Western Civilization and the experience of modernity. (Optional) Feminist challenges to the dominant story of Western Philosophy. Goals for Students and Teacher Primary Goals: Introduce the students to some of the fundamentally different approaches to philosophy, and help them to understand what philosophers have been trying to find out. Show the students how the great mainstream of early modern philosophy, from Descartes to Kant, unites the two traditional approaches, the study of the human condition and the study of the universe, into a single epistemological investigation of the knowing mind. Encourage students, right at the beginning of the semester, to adopt an independent stance, to ask questions and raise doubts, and to show them that arguments are the proper tool for expressing those doubts. Secondary Goals: Explain the nature of ironic communication, and thereby help students to a more subtle insight into the uses of language. Acquaint students in a summary way with the broad sweep of the history of philosophy, so that they have some sense, however minimal, of the shape of its development and growth. Raise some of the issues, such as the distinction between appearance and reality, or the possibility of knowledge, or the standards of morality, that will be taken up in more detail later in the semester. Suggested Teaching Techniques Have an “irony” contest. Ask students to bring in examples of ironic communication from everyday life, or to make up examples. Analyze them as class exercises. If any of your students are taking physics or astronomy courses, have them bring in their textbooks. Then see whether you can find, in those texts, examples of the sorts of philosophical problems dealt with by the early cosmologists. Do the same thing with students who are studying psychology. Question: Can the science of psychology answer the sorts of questions that Descartes, Hume, and Kant were asking? Why? Why not? If your class is small enough, perhaps you can stage a debate on some philosophical issue. It doesn’t matter what the topic is, and you shouldn’t require the participants to do a great deal of library research in preparation. The point of the debate is to hammer home two fundamentally important points: There is no official line, no single right answer in a philosophy class. Students on both sides of the issue have an intellectual right to adopt and defend their positions. BUT merely having an opinion is not good enough. No matter which side a student is on, he or she must be prepared to give reasons for his or her position, to offer arguments, and to answer arguments from other points of view. Parroting the teacher is not good enough either. Even if a student ends up agreeing with his or her teacher, or with Socrates or Kant, he or she must still be ready to say why he or she agrees. If you can get these last two points across to your students at the beginning of the semester, you will have won half the battle of teaching introductory philosophy. 5. It is never too soon for your students to begin writing: philosophy is as much a written as a spoken art (increasingly so, regrettably, since the time of Socrates). There are many ways to involve the students in writing that do not require a great expenditure of either the class’s or the teacher’s time. Ask students to: a) Write a brief journal entry at the beginning of the class expressing their anticipations for the upcoming session; five minutes before class ends, ask them how their expectations have been met (evaded, exceeded, etc.) Keep a ‘double-entry’ notebook; first, the student should reflect on the course material, and later, she should write reflections on her reflections. This way the student can challenge themselves while charting their own growth as students of philosophy. Take copious marginal notes in their texts. The next day, students should reduce these notes to manageably brief, coherent series of thesis statements. Spend a few minutes in class ‘inventing’ possible formal essays (in schematic form) on the topic of the day’s class. Many of these options require little time on the teacher’s part, especially as most can be graded (if so desired) on a simple check/plus/minus basis. Ask students to form into groups of manageable size (about five students works best, in my experience) and assign each group a simple task such as those which follow. The dynamics of small groups often produces surprisingly good responses, and helps students in forming a support/study group—something which freshmen often lack, especially. Besides, this is the pattern established by Socrates in the agora so long ago! Assign groups to: Take a particular portion of the day’s text as their special focus, and present that material in a relaxed dialogue with the rest of the class. Socrates’ discussion with Thrasymachus, for instance, would be a good candidate for this approach. Propose questions which they would like the teacher or the class to discuss, and write the three most important questions on the board. The group should be prepared to say why they consider these three questions the most important. By addressing these questions, the teacher shows that she considers the groups’ questions significant, and touches on the student’s actual concerns and issues with the material. Play the ‘Believing/Doubting’ game; each group is given a controversial thesis, and asked first to argue in its support, and then argue against it. Possible theses for this chapter include, “Justice is the interest of the stronger,” “All morality is relative,” “Science is the surest approach to truth,” or “Objectivity is an unrealizable goal.” Essay Questions Socrates famously claimed, "the unexamined life is not worth living." What, exactly, do you think he meant us to examine? What form should this examination take? Do you think he was right? Socrates, who practiced philosophy in the marketplace in Athens more than 2000 years ago, claimed that there were universally valid principles of thought and action. Does the fact that we still understand and value his thought suggest he was right? Why or why not? Socrates held that the first step to wisdom was to admit one's ignorance. How can ignorance be a form of wisdom? What does this suggest about the practice and content of philosophy? Socrates concerned himself with the nature of man, while Thales studied the organization of the cosmos. Yet, both Socrates and Thales are considered philosophers. Why? What did they have in common? The author writes, "there is a 'philosophical' component to virtually everything we do." What exactly does he mean by this? Would Socrates have agreed with him? Do you? The British Empiricists and Continental Rationalists believed that the best way for us to come to know the world is to explore the sources and nature of knowledge itself. Why did they think this would be a productive approach? What sorts of questions could their project be expected to answer? Hume wrote that the path to success in philosophy is "to leave the tedious lingering method" philosophers had used until then, and "instead of taking now and then a castle or village on the frontier, to march up directly to the capital or center of these sciences, to human nature itself." Explain exactly what Hume was proposing, and why he thought it might work. Philosophical insights and truths are said to share the three qualities of rationality, universality, and objectivity. The author suggests that philosophical truths need not be universal, though. Why does he think this? Do you agree with him? Do you think that philosophical truths should be rational and objective? Socrates used the Method named for him to teach about such things as the nature of justice. Yet, he was himself famously "ignorant" of the answers to the questions he posed. How, then, could the Socratic Method yield any philosophical insights? The author suggests that a true African-American philosophy would focus on what Du Bois calls "second-sight.” What does he mean by this? What do you think of his proposal? Could anyone besides African-Americans contribute to such a project? Richard Rorty argues that a philosopher’s moral character does not really help in evaluating his philosophical position. But is this really true? Many of Socrates’ followers, for instance, founded their faith in his philosophic enterprise on his evident moral excellence, as shown in his behavior during his trial and eventual execution. Why shouldn’t a philosopher’s ability (or inability) to live up to the standards he or she sets in discourse be relevant to evaluating the merit of their philosophy? If Heidegger’s Nazism serves to discount his philosophical insight, doesn’t Newton’s belief in alchemy likewise serve to discount his theories concerning Physics? Why or why not? If mistaken outlooks are sufficient warrant to discredit philosophical positions, which positions can we trust with certainty? Or should we be skeptical of all philosophical enterprises whatsoever, given mankind’s obvious fallibility?