Those who would like to read Lady Mary Shepherd’s work online can do so:
An essay upon the relation of cause and effect
Essays on the perception of the external universe
Her essay criticizing Hume on miracles begins on page 325 of the latter work.
Today is the birthday of Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), an important early modern philosopher. Here are some Kant links that you might find interesting:
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Kant’s Philosophical Development
Kant’s Critique of Metaphysics
Kant’s Aesthetics and Teleology
The ACC Philosophy and Religion program is hosting a panel devoted on April 21st (Tuesday), at 7 pm in the Rio Grande Campus Gallery Theatre. The topic is Buddhism, and panelists will include David Zuniga of the Metta Zen Center and Carlene South of the Plum Blossom Sangha. This is a good opportunity to get a taste of Eastern rather than Western philosophy, and can serve as a small amount of extra credit for the Miscellaneous section of the portfolio.
Some people have been having difficulty bringing up the syllabus at the link on the sidebar. Here is an alternative syllabus link.
Some online resources on Thomas Aquinas:
* Saint Thomas Aquinas (SEP)
* St. Thomas Aquinas (Catholic Encyclopedia)
* Thomas Aquinas (IEP)
* Thomas Aquinas in English: A Bibliography
* Jacques Maritain, St. Thomas Aquinas
* G. K. Chesterton, St. Thomas Aquinas
Chesterton’s book is especially good for a light introduction.
If you’re the sort who likes to have specific things to look for while reading, here are some reading questions for Book I of the Consolation of Philosophy:
(1) Who are the characters of this dialogue?
(2) This dialogue has an unusual format. What is it? Why might someone choose to use this format?
(3) What is the narrator doing at the beginning of the dialogue?
(4) What is the disease with which Lady Philosophy diagnoses Boethius?
(5) What does Lady Philosophy mean by "the victory of an unjust death" in Book I, Prose 3?
(6) What is Boethius’ complaint in Book I, Prose 4? What is it in Book I, Meter 5?
(7) What procedure for treatment does Lady Philosophy suggest in Book I, Prose 6?
(8) Judging by Book I, what do you think the general argument of the Consolation will be?
Today we took a brief look at Aristotle’s discussions of change and causation.
For those who are interested in learning more about Aristotle, one of the greatest of the Western philosophers, here are a few resources. Because of Aristotle’s importance, there are a great many; for those who are interested primarily in the Aristotle’s views on change and causation, I have put an asterisk * by resources that are especially useful for understanding Aristotle on that particular topic.
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Aristotle’s Natural Philosophy*
Aristotle on Non-contradiction
Aristotelianism in the Renaissance
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Aristotle: Motion and Its Place in Nature*
Philosophy Bites
Various things I’ve come across online that are related to the Platonic myths we discussed in class.
The Divided Line
* A handout on the metaphor of the sun and the divided line (PDF)
* An analysis of the Divided Line passage.
* Another analysis of the Divided Line.
* Peter Losin, Plato’s Analogy of the Divided Line. A proposed interpretation of the Divided Line analogy, well worth reading for those who want an advanced discussion of it.
Allegory of the Cave
* Some notes on the Allegory (second page)from a lecture by Simone Weil (an interesting philosopher in her own right).
* Here is an animated version of the Allegory (slightly adapted), narrated by Orson Welles:
* The sun, the divided line, and the cave are found in Books VI and VII of Plato’s Republic, which can be found online.
The Myth of Thoth
The myth of Thoth (or Theuth) is less widely known and considered, although interesting in itself. The most famous (and controversial) discussions of it are by Jacques Derrida in his essay, "Plato’s Pharmacy," which is summarized here by Tim Spurgin.
I also recommend Thomas Szlezak’s book Reading Plato [Routledge (New York: 1999)] as well.
The myth of Thoth can be found in Plato’s Phaedrus, which can be found online.
Other Myths
With regard to the myth of the afterlife in Gorgias itself, I recommend that you take time to reflect about the analogies and disanalogies between the myth, Callicles’s description of Socrates on trial, and Socrates’s real-life trial and punishment.
Plato uses many other myths. J. A. Stewart’s The Myths of Plato is a handy (although somewhat out of date) online starting point for looking at them. Arguably the most famous myth other than the Allegory of the Cave is the myth of Atlantis, which we owe to Plato. It is first mentioned in the Timaeus (which is primarily about the nature of the world) but only developed in the Critias (which is incomplete); both the Timaeus and the Critias can be found online.
(Obviously all the editions of Plato that are available online will be older, usually nineteenth-century editions. There are newer and easier to read editions of every dialogue.)
I’ve had some students request a few more rules of thumb for recognizing what kinds of noncategorical propositions are represented by different constructions in English. It is important to keep in mind that these are only rules of thumb, and that there are occasional exceptions. You will have to think through every case individually. But these rules of thumb are often true:
Conjunction
And and but usually indicate conjunction. For instance,
I went to the store and I did not buy anything.
I went to the store but I did not buy anything.
Disjunction
Or often indicates disjunction (but not always). For instance:
I went to the store or I went home.
Either…or also usually indicates disjunction, although sometimes it indicates both a disjunction and conjunction. For instance:
Either I went to the store or I went home
is a disjunction if it is possible for both to be true. If it is not possible for both to be true it’s really an abbreviation for:
Either I went to the store and did not go home or I went home and did not go to the store.
This uses both conjunction and disjunction.
Conditional
If is the most common word indicating a conditional. For instance,
If I go to the store, I will buy milk.
Only if is also a common indicator. For instance:
Tom likes Mary only if Mary is smart.
You have to be careful about if and only if, because they are in a sense the reverse of each other. The following sentences do not represent the same conditional:
Tom is tall if Mary is short.
Tom is tall only if Mary is short.
The first says that if it is true that Mary is short, Tom has to be tall. The second says that if it is true that Tom is tall, Mary has to be short.
I’ve had a few students ask for examples of what’s done in Boolean and Fregean forms of logic. Here are some online articles that do a reasonable job of explaining them:
The Algebra of Logic Tradition
Frege’s Logic, Theorem, and Foundations for Arithmetic
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