Blog #81 - Critique of Top Western Philosophers

In the article, "Philosophy 101," we surveyed six major philosophers and came up with some modern-day applications / examples of their ideas. What you should do with this blog is review their ideas and pick which one you think has the most problematic views, whether their philosophy can apply to today, or if you think it doesn't make sense.  Explain why.  

I. Ancient Greece 

A. Plato - he believed in the idea of the perfect form, that there is a perfect concept for everything (person, horse, chair, etc.) and that everything manmade or natural on Earth is an imperfect copy of that perfect form (In the picture to the left, you have a photo of a chair, a definition of a chair printed out, and an actual chair - each one is a chair but they each have different degrees of reality to them - the farther away from the ideal form they are, the less perfect they are). 

- Plato felt that achieving this perfection would be impossible but it would be important to live a good life by striving for perfection. 




B. Aristotle - Some of his ideas included deductive reasoning (that we might see in cop/mystery movies or forensics TV shows), the Golden Mean (choosing between two extremes), and the feelings of catharsis or an emotional cleansing. Aristotle was also one of the first true scientists of the ancient era who had the means to study and catalogue numerous plants and animals. 

- With the Golden Mean, Aristotle might feel today that a balance should be struck somewhere between being totally in touch with one's friends through social networking and cutting one's self off completely. 

- Here's an interesting website about a concept called the Overton Window - the points along the scale (if you mapped out the spots between one extreme and another) at which the public is willing to accept an option. 


II. Modern Philosophy 

C. Rene Descartes - He is the father of modern philosophy and started many snowballs rolling downhill, but the one we focused on here was the idea of dualism, the mind and body are separate and not linked. An example the article gave was that if you died in a dream, you wouldn't die in actuality. Movies like The Matrix and Inception deal fully with this mind / body dualism. Descartes is also known for the statement "I think, therefore I am" in which in order to exist, you must first think. Quite a concept! (See link for a further elaboration on different types of dualism).


D. David Hume - This Scottish philosopher improved upon some of Descares' ideas like skepticism (that we cannot truly ever be sure of something b/c it might not reoccur - the article uses the example of a bottle breaking when knocked off of a table). Part of the reason that this type of skepticism exists is b/c of the randomness of life and the infinite number of variables that play into it (later to be called the chaos theory in Jurassic Park or the butterfly effect). Lastly, there's the post hoc fallacy, or to believe that because we see two things occur together, one must have caused the other. Let us say that one morning I get up and turn my coffee machine on, but at the same time, the dishwasher starts up. Does that mean that X (turning coffee machine on) causes Y (dishwasher turns on)? No, not necessarily. 



E. Immanuel Kant - One of his biggest ideas was the categorical imperative, or in other words, putting yourself to a moral test for each of your actions. You should consider what would happen if everyone followed your course of actions and how that would impact society. Applying this standard to all of your actions would be the key to living a righteous life. If you cheat on taxes, then you are expecting everyone to cheat on their taxes.  

- Also, perception matters, and it differs for everyone. We can never fully perceive what we perceive b/c we are not that object which we perceive. 





F. Georg Hegel - Hegel had an idea that had been around for awhile but he refined it to something called absolute spirit - a network that connected every thing to ideas, people and other things around the universe. Hegel also came up with an idea called zeitgeist(German for time-spirit) where peoples' thoughts are guided by the political and cultural atmosphere of a specific time in history. For instance, our time period represented the angry Populist revolt, originally seen in the 1890s when farmers revolted against big business and economic inequality, is seen today in the Tea Party or Trump populism or the left-wing populism of Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. 



Your Job: Pick one of these philosophers and critique his major ideas.  Make sure you include some details and explanation from the article (and Google Doc notes that we compiled) in your response. 

Minimum 300 words for your answer.  Due Wednesday 3/20 by the beginning of class.  

Blog #62 - Reactions to Henry Poole is Here

Pick one of the following topics and write about it based on your own personal experience 

1. You can’t go to the past to fix the present.” - Esperanza said when Henry visited his parents' house. Agree or disagree? Why?

2. Noam Chomsky said: "As soon as questions of will or decision or reason or choice of action arise, human science is at a loss" 1.

Patience quotes him in the movie, and then follows it up with these lines: "It means that not everything needs an explanation. Sometimes, things happen b/c we choose for them to happen. I chose to believe."

Is she saying that because she believed the miracle on Henry's wall to be true, then that made it true? Or is she saying something else? If you could choose for one thing to come true / exist, what would that be and why?

 

3. During the dinner date, Dawn said to Henry as he tried backing away from getting closer to her was: "I know you're gonna die. But all that either of us have is right now, and we should pay attention to that." We talked today about how Henry might be feeling selfish and keeping people out w/ the way he's acting. But when he said, "I am paying attention." And that's why he can't do this (meaning fall for Dawn, go where the date will eventually lead ). Did Henry stop being selfish there for a moment? Or did he revert back to himself again? Why?

4. I get the feeling that Henry senses that there are greater forces at work, somehow helping him, coming to heal him, yet he feels unworthy of this sense of grace. Why he feels unworthy, I don't know. Maybe it's not unworthy, maybe it's pride or stubbornness in his own beliefs that life has just dealt him an awful hand. Maybe he has accepted this fate, for lack of a better word, and decided to deal with it in his own way despite a higher power demanding an audience. What do you think of this idea?

5. There's got to be a reason why Patience is named Patience. What about the name Esperanza? It's Spanish for Hope. what made me think about Hope (besides the Obama-themed poster of Henry) was when he was about to destroy the wall and he yelled, "Hope can't save you!" And the last of the virtues would be Love symbolized by Dawn and Faith by Millie (who was the first one to test the validity of the wall).

Henry, on the other hand, would symbolize the seven deadly sins - sloth, gluttony, lust, greed, anger, envy and pride. A stretch? Maybe. How would he symbolize the seven?

6. Do you think Henry symbolizes Descartes' skepticism of one's senses?  Or does Henry go beyond that to a total skepticism of everything: religion, senses, peoples' good intentions, etc. until he finally discovers that he's not going to die?  Why?


7. "Everything happens for a reason."  When Esperanza talks to Henry about her old boyfriend, Leo, and how that she prayed to God to give her a sign that Leo was o.k., how does the sign on Henry's wall signify an answer to her prayers?  

Due Thursday, April 25 by class.  (200 words minimum).

Blog #55 - Which Hellenist philosophy works for you?

I kept wondering how Hellenistic philosophy applied to today's world as we briefly discussed it on Wednesday.  I didn't have a lot of time to really go in depth with it, so I included summaries and bumper sticker slogans that could apply, but I still didn't feel like it was enough.  So, I thought, why not dig into this school of thought on the blog?

First, Epicureans - as we explore most philosophy (and most likely religions as well), there seems to be a denial of pleasure or the association that pleasure is at best, a necessary evil. The philosopher, Epicurus, said that the "best sort of life...is one that is free from pain in the body and from disturbance in the mind. That sounds a rather negative credo for a 21st-century devotee of the good life."  There are so many pleasures out there in life that we have been told to stay away from or "wait until you're older."  And, in fact, Epicurus "condemned all forms of over-indulgence, and recommended a simple diet."  But, as you become an adult and temptations increase, where do you draw the line?  Was Epicurus right to withdraw into his garden with friends and live a simple life of pleasure?  How can that work in today's fast-paced, interconnected society?  Do you pull a Henry David Thoreau on everyone and go to live in the woods, simply?  Or is there something in between completing dropping out and total hedonism?

I found an interesting article online: "Epicurus Exonerated": http://moreintelligentlife.com/story/epicurus-exonerated  All the quotes above are from this article. 

Stoicism - When I think of this, I mentioned the British palace guards who tourists like to mess with and try to get them to smile.  But stoicism is much more than that, especially when dealing with such an uncertain, violent world.  This particular quote from Marcus Aurelius, one of the last great Roman emperors, could fit perfectly in our time period:

“I shall meet today ungrateful, violent, treacherous, envious, uncharitable men. All of these things have come upon them through ignorance of real good and ill… I can neither be harmed by any of them, for no man will involve me in wrong, nor can I be angry with my kinsman…” - Marcus Aurelius

Stoicism doesn't mean standing idly by while crazy stuff happens.  I think, in many ways, it has to do with the ways in which you react (or don't react) to all the sensationalist news, Chicken-Littles, and Boys-Who-Cried-Wolf out there in the media.  If we believed everything we saw and heard about our world that's dangerous, we'd never get our kids immunized for fear of them getting autism, we'd never buy certain brands of products b/c of an email circulating the globe about the product's danger, and we'd certainly never leave the house. 

This article, "The Modern Wimp's Introduction to Stoicism", is rather crude but funny and tries to dispel the notion that being stoic means not flinching when boys get punched in the groin: http://www.primermagazine.com/2010/live/introduction-to-stoicism 

This article talks about how to be stoic: http://www.stoics.fsnet.co.uk/#BeStoical 

 - However, do we ignore all of the warnings out there about impending doom?  Too many people ignored the oncoming freight train of death that was attached to the subprime mortgage bubble, and you see where that got us in 2008.  Too many people were busy making too much money to listen to the Pollyannas saying, "hold on a minute!"  And sometimes, sifting through the town crier's messages, isn't there just the call for moderation?  If global warming isn't happening exactly as Al Gore said it would, what's wrong with cutting back on our dependence on foreign oil and driving more fuel-efficient cars?  What's wrong with getting involved more with the 3 Rs - recycle, reuse, and reduce?  I don't know who is correct in the global warming debate, nor do I care, but there can't be anything wrong w/ America reducing its carbon footprint. 

Cynics - the ancient Greeks who followed this school of thought often rejcted materialism and strove to live life simply. Cynics today, however, at least the word cynic, generally dismiss peoples' good intentions as having ulterior motives. There is a strain of persistent disbelief and irrational thought that can lie in the cynical outlook today. With the number of politicians and celebrities that have lied to us while embracing the opposite of what they hold dear, while corporations say one thing and do the other, and our government fails to follow through on its promises, it's no wonder Americans didn't become full blown cynics before the Vietnam War and Watergate in the 1960s and 70s.

 - Has cynicism led to an unhealthy belief in conspiracy theories?  When common sense or persistent, reasoned questioing can poke holes in most of the conspiracies almost immediately, why do they still continue to stay alive?  Should we believe in our politicians and leaders and their promises, or just expect them to let us down again? 

Some comments in this paragraph come from: http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-cynicism.htm

Skeptics - this school is probably the most easily applicable to today's world because of our almost religious belief in modern science, which practically demands a skeptical viewpoint of the world.  And in many ways, having a healthy skepticism is helpful for a scientist, philosopher, and in general, being an intelligent human being with all the flood of bogus news out there. 

Where skepticism differs from cynics is that with cynics, you've already lost before the battle has begun.  You will not be able to convince your opponent, rhetorical or otherwise, of any good intentions, etc.  If you win, the cynic will probably claim that the game was rigged, and if they win, you weren't a worthy opponent.

I believe that a healthy skepticism in today's life means many things, but I find it hard to explain it w/o resorting to cliches.  "I'll see it when I believe it."   "Proof is in the pudding." 

Craig Damrauer's print from "Modern Art" which
I think sums up the art cynic in all of us.

However, I always leave room for belief if something has been proven correct.  This can extend to just about anything in my life.  I sometimes fear that skeptics have been cast as those who don't believe in anything, and maybe that is where the confusion lies w/ cynicism. 


Your job: Pick one of the four Hellenist schools of thought and explain in 250 words or more how it applies to your life.  If you're having trouble just sticking to one school of thought, or you take issue with something I've said here, then by all means, jump into the fray!

Blog #30 - Your Favorite Hellenistic Philosophy?

Since it appears that the world will end soon (see below), we might as well find a philosophy with which to face the oncoming destruction of our very existence. The great Roman Cicero had said "that to study philosophy is nothing but to prepare one's self to die" and this is because, as Michael de Montaigne stated:

"study and contemplation do in some sort withdraw us from our soul, and employ it separately from the body, which is a kind of apprenticeship and a resemblance of death; or else, because all the wisdom and reasoning in the world do in the end conclude in this point, to teach us not to fear to die" 1

In the face of the coming apocalypse (if we're left behind after the Rapture on May 21, 2011 or the latest baloney with the end of the Mayan calendar on Dec. 21, 2012), how should we face the next 1.5 to 3 years?

Cynics believe: ‘What good is philosophy if it never moves you to criticize your comfortable habits and actually change yourself for the better?’ Cynicism was conceived of as a way of life unbeholden to social convention or political demand, that is, a life lived according to nature. (This phrase is a recurring theme in debates among the Hellenistic philosophies.)

For Cynics, nature is the opposite of society’s conventions and norms. All that the ordinary social herd is interested in is getting on in this world. They flatter, they beg, they posture. Such people think that they are better if they can throw a big fancy party! ‘How shallow! How fleeting! How ridiculous!,’ say the Cynics. These people have lost touch with nature. 2

Here's a song by Extreme called "Cynical":

"And whatever you do / someone's done it first / though it's sad but true / this us just another verse / if you can't take it with you / then what's the use? / I never saw a u-haul / being pulled behind a hearse."

Skeptics: Pyrrho of Elis (c. 365/360-275/270 BCE) was the first celebrated Skeptic. He was said to have accompanied Alexander to India. His philosophical position was that we can only know how things appear to us, and we can’t rightly resolve disagreements as to what appears. This is all very disturbing. Wouldn’t it be better just to suspend judgment and live according to probable opinion and custom?

- "Skeptics aimed to undermine the supposed certainties of all their other philosophical competitors. While this might seem to limit it to making only a negative contribution, Skepticism did at least provide a voice for humility and tolerance, even if the Skeptics themselves did not always practise those qualities." 2

Epicureans: "Epicurus modified the materialistic philosophy of the 5th century bce atomists, Leucippus and Democritus. Everything is composed of matter, more specifically, of atoms moving in a void. For the most part, they move in regular ways. Their principal movement is to fall down in straight lines. (How ‘down’ can be identified in a void is a problem that the Epicureans did not clarify.) However, occasionally atoms ‘swerve.’ From these irregular movements, atoms began to collide and clump together. and the universe we know through our senses began to form. The movements and interactions of atoms suffice for a complete explanation of the world. The swerve is also the basis of Epicurus’ defense of free will.

- "Epicurus takes this absence of a cosmic purpose to mean that pleasure is the only good. Indeed, pleasure is the meaning of the good. The Greek word translated as ‘pleasure’ is the root of the English word, hedonism. Hedonism is the view that pleasure is the highest good." 2

Editor's note: If this quote to the left attributed to Epicurus can be accurately pinned to him, then maybe there's more than just the anti-hedonist attitudes like Cicero's that this school has had to endure. It could most definitely have come from a church that had tried to solidfy itself over the centuries.

Stoicism: "your average Hellenistic Joe Schmoe feels his life running away from him in fifty directions—but God has got it together. There is a pattern to it all, despite what Epicureans will tell you. There is a grand plan—no—a perfect plan, behind the seemingly haphazard affairs of life, a logos." (<--Bust of Zeno, the founder of Stoicism) 3

- "Unfortunately, as the world is entirely material and perfectly ordered it is also thoroughly determined. Thus, it is also correct to name the divine as fortune. The earlier Stoics put a brave spin on this, and said that the plan evidenced divine providence, a reassuring God. Later Stoics, who must have been a bit discouraged by suicides, exiles and the like, thought that the plan was more like an impersonal, implacable fate.

- "The Stoics argue that, since every person has logos, the natural law is a universal law for all people, irrespective of ethnic background and political allegiance. Our true citizenship is not with any particular city and its parochial little customs. We are all citizens of the city of the world—the cosmopolis. The Roman Empire adopts Stoicism as the official ideology, exactly for this view." 2

Now that we've looked at the main schools of Hellenist philosophy (heck, throw in NeoPlatonism in there w/ ol' man Plotinus in there too), how will you face the end?

1. In essence, which one of these five is your favorite (or as someone expressed to me a couple of days ago, "can I do my least favorite?") and why? Explain how it might help you with dealing with daily life and face an uncertain future.

2. Also, please discuss a little about why you think America seems to be obsessed with the end of the world right about now (this should only be about 1/3 of your blog).

3. Does this kind of end of the world talk bother you or do you dismiss it or a little of both? Why?

250 words due Tuesday, January 12.

Sources:

1. http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/montaigne/montaigne-essays--5.html

2. http://people.bu.edu/wwildman/WeirdWildWeb/courses/wphil/lectures/wphil_theme04.htm

3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hellenistic_philosophy

Blog #22 - Skepticism - The right approach to life?

Let's get this out of the way first.

26-20 OT MSU!!!

Woooooooooooooooooooooo!

In class yesterday, we discussed more Hellenistic philosophy (a rehash of Greek ideas as philosopher Will Durant stated, really nothing new) especially the new branch of Skeptics led by Pyrrho and NeoPlatonism. The Greek noun, skepsis, means examination, inquiry or consideration. Apparently, the main thing that leads people down the road to skepticism is the wide range of disagreement on issues that are so fundamental to us: for instance, how much about the natural world can we really know or discover? The second question concerns the idea of making judgements whether in our day to day lives or on larger moral matters. 1

(Coach Dantonio says, "Wolverines, the road to Ann Arbor is THAT way.")

With skepticism, we have a very pessimistic (in this editor's opinion) outlook on life, but one I sort of agree with. I don't think that we'll ever know the total sum of knowledege or everythin there is to know about our natural world, mainly b/c it's so vast and constantly changing. But I also believe in the unconquerable mind / spirit of mankind to overcome the limits of its own ignorance and discover new things, cross new frontiers, and leap over boundaries that were thought never to be reached. If this seems contradictory, then so be it.

To quote Wikipedia on Pyrrho:

"The proper course of the sage, said Pyrrho, is to ask himself three
questions. Firstly we must ask what things are and how they are constituted.
Secondly, we ask how we are related to these things. Thirdly, we ask what
ought to be our attitude towards them. Pyrrho's answer was that things are
indistinguishable, unmeasurable, undecidable, and no more this than that, or
both this and that and neither this nor that. He concluded that human senses
neither transmit truths nor lie. Humanity cannot know the inner substance of
things, only how things appear."

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyrrho

His approach to things sounds like modern nihilism (all values are baseless, believe in nothing, have no loyalties and see no purpose in life maybe other than to destroy). Friedrich Nietzche was the most popular proponent of this school of thought - “Nihilism is . . . not only the belief that everything deserves to perish; but one actually puts one’s shoulder to the plough; one destroys” (Will to Power). 2

Also on Friday, near the end of class, as we discussed what a soul is, we got into the concept of good and evil and making a judgement on right and wrong. Some of you voiced the concept (much like the Sophists in ancient Athens) that we can't make a judgement on individuals b/c even though they might have done wrong / evil, that person might have been thinking he/she was doing something good at the time. Immediately, we took the worst / best example of modern world of evil (Hitler and the Holocaust) and discussed the logic of not applying the concept of evil to what he and the Nazi party perpetrated on Europe during World War 2. We also used the concept of killing - is it ever justified? I defined a few cases in which I thought it was: self-defense, war (not innocents), and a couple of others I'm not remembering right now. Death penalty? In deciding whether or not to kill, I am exercising my judgement.

So, we have questions concerning our outlook on life.

1. Do we believe in the limits of the human mind, or the opaqueness of the universe? Or is there a different option?

2. Do you feel that it's important to use your judgement not only in just your day-to-day life, but in choosing your lifestyle (earth friendly?), or in deciding much larger matters like right and wrong or good and evil? Why?

-- if you answer no ->(At what level do you think your judgement should stop? Why?)

Due before class begins, Tuesday, October 6th. 200 words minimum.

Plus, you need to read The Middle Ages, Renaissance and Baroque chapters by the end of this coming week (October 5-9).

1. http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/s/skepanci.htm Ancient Greek Skepticism - Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

2. http://www.iep.utm.edu/nihilism/ Nihilism - The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy