Our text is King’s “The Letter from Birmingham Jail” – an “open letter” of April 16, 1963.I indicate where my commentary ends by using our writer’s avatar where the primary text begins:
Philosophy
121 posts
by Richard Feloni | Business Insider Nov. 24, 2017 Reid Hoffman is the billionaire cofounder of LinkedIn and one of tech’s most influential investors. Instead of a business education, he pursued his master’s degree in philosophy. He told us that the analytical thinking skills he learned have made him a better investor and entrepreneur. When students begin graduate studies in philosophy, they’re typically looking to explore the essence of existence — and suffice it to say, most are not getting on a path to riches. But one of Silicon Valley’s most influential billionaires, LinkedIn founder and Greylock Partners investor Reid […]
From George Anders 2015 column in Forbes magazine. Stewart Butterfield, Slack’s 42-year-old cofounder and CEO, whose estimated double-digit stake in the company could be worth $300 million or more. He’s the proud holder of an undergraduate degree in philosophy from Canada’s University of Victoria and a master’s degree from Cambridge in philosophy and the history of science. “Studying philosophy taught me two things,” says Butterfield, sitting in his office in San Francisco’s South of Market district, a neighborhood almost entirely dedicated to the cult of coding. “I learned how to write really clearly. I learned how to follow an argument […]
While considering what to study in my first year as an Undergraduate, I decided to take a few Philosophy courses. When informed of my decision, those I knew murmured, “Philosophy…what are you going to do with that?” Soon after my first year was complete, realizing that I enjoyed these courses and my intellectual curiosity was peaked and challenged, I decided that one of my double majors as an undergraduate was going to be Philosophy. The echoes grew louder as those I knew grumbled “Philosophy? What are you going to do with that?” After four years and a Bachelor of Arts […]
Huffington Post (08/15/13 | Updated 10/15/13) by Rabbi Shmuly Yanklowitz Researchers have shown that most students today are weak in critical thinking skills. They do poorly on simple logical reasoning tests (Evans, 2002). Only a fraction of graduating high school seniors (6 percent of 12th graders) can make informed, critical judgments about written text (Perie, Grigg, and Donahue, 2005). This problem applies to both reading and writing. Only 15 percent of 12th graders demonstrate the proficiency to write well-organized essays that consisted of clear arguments (Perie et al., 2005). Critical thinking and argument skills — the abilities to both generate and critique arguments […]
What Utilitarianism Is
According to the Greatest Happiness Principle… [hilite]the ultimate end[/hilite], with reference to and for the sake of which all other things are desirable (whether we are considering our own good or that of other people), [hilite]is an existence exempt as far as possible from pain, and as rich as possible in enjoyments[/hilite], both in point of quantity and quality; the test of quality, and the rule for measuring it against quantity, being the preference felt by those who in their opportunities of experience, to which must be added their habits of self-consciousness and self-observation, are best furnished with the means of comparison.
The selections come from Mill’s (1863) Utilitarianism.[blockylist tag=”Mill”]
This section of our text is selected from Book X of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics (Εθικη Îικομαχοι). Trans. W.D. Ross.Numerals styled like this are “Bekker numbers” deriving from the 19th century Bekker edition of Aristotle’s surviving works (Corpus Aristotelicum), still standard for references.I indicate where my commentary ends by using our writer’s avatar where the primary text begins:[blockylist tag=”Aristotle”]
For at least the next 200 years, weather forecasts predict shitstorms, with global temperatures now set to remain elevated for hundreds of years to come. The latest IPCC report explains that our emissions are nearing the point of no return. Even if industrialized nations switched to solar power overnight, it is now too late to fully reverse the planet’s course. Geologists have officially termed this new epoch, where the human species has irreparably shaped earth’s geological history, the
Anthropocene. Policymakers no longer have the luxury to decide how we might “stop” global warming. Instead, we have to figure out how we’ll manage amidst climate instability.
An iconic taxonomy of bias.
This Saint Thomas Aquinas selection comes from his Summa Theologica, PRIMA PARS, Second and Revised Edition, 1920; trans. by Fathers of the English Dominican Province. The William Paley selection is drawn from Natural Theology (1801).
John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty (1859: Harvard Classics Volume 25, 1909 P.F. Collier & Son).[blockylist tag=”Mill”]
Liberal politics – even those promoting the most liberal constitutions – conceive of humanity on an atomistic model (as egos concerned with Lockean individual rights), rather than a model which embraces the sociality of our species-life.
The toleration of those that differ from others in matters of religion is so agreeable to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and to the genuine reason of mankind, that it seems monstrous for men to be so blind as not to perceive the necessity and advantage of it in so clear a light.
I hold it to be an impious and an execrable maxim that, politically speaking, a people has a right to do whatsoever it pleases, and yet I have asserted that all authority originates in the will of the majority. Am I then, in contradiction with myself? A general law—which bears the name of Justice—has been made and sanctioned, not only by a majority of this or that people, but by a majority of mankind. The rights of every people are consequently confined within the limits of what is just.
from John Stuart Mill, On Liberty (1859).[blockylist tag=”Mill”]
The selection is Mary Midgley’s “Trying Out One’s New Sword,” from her Heart and Mind (St. Martin’s Press: 1981). Many thanks to Professor Midgley for permission to use this piece on thereitis.org.
The selection comes from Chapter 9 of Mary Wollstonecraft’s (1759–1797) classic, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), titled, “Of the Pernicious Effects Which Arise from the Unnatural Distinctions Established in Society.”
Our selections come from Volume 1 of Marx’s 1867 Capital, trans. Ben Fowkes (Penguin, 1976), 280, 381.
Our selections come from Book IV, Chapters 2 and 9 of Adam Smith’s 1776 An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, ed. Edwin Cannan (The Modern Library, New York, 1937), 649 – 51.
Our selections come from Chapters 2 and 3 of Peter Kropotkin’s 1902 Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution.
excerpted from Norman Swartz (1997), “Definitions, Dictionaries, and Meanings.”
Originally published in The Philosophical Review 60 (1951): 20-43. Reprinted in W.V.O. Quine, From a Logical Point of View (Harvard University Press, 1953; second, revised, edition 1961), with the following alterations: “The version printed here diverges from the original in footnotes and in other minor respects: §§1 and 6 have been abridged where they encroach on the preceding essay [“On What There Is”], and §§3-4 have been expanded at points.” Except for minor changes, additions and deletions are indicated in interspersed tables. I wish to thank Torstein Lindaas for bringing to my attention the need to distinguish more carefully the […]
by REBEKAH FRUMKIN, McSweeneys (19 May 2010) SOCRATES: Good evening, Glaucon. You look troubled. GLAUCON: I am, Socrates. SOCRATES: What worries you so? GLAUCON: Look at my kitchen floor. That brown scum is the stain of fowl livers. I spilled them earlier today and cleaned them up, but the stains remain. SOCRATES: I see. GLAUCON: The stains are attracting countless pests with their foul odor and bacteria. There is no way to clean them up. SOCRATES: Are you sure of that? GLAUCON: Yes. To do so, I would need some convenient means of cleaning and sterilization. SOCRATES: And you are […]
Links to passages Aristotle poses the question: How is happiness acquired? Aristotle’s definition of virtue Martin Luther King’s “an unjust law” Martin Luther King’s “difference made legal” Mill’s harm principle Mill’s utility interpreted in light of humanity’s “progressive being” Plato’s definition of courage Plato’s definition of justice Plato’s definition of temperance Plato’s definition of wisdom Plato’s articulation of might-makes-right Plato’s articulation of the challenge to justice Socrates’ daemon/voice Socrates identifies with Apollo Socrates on death Socrates on “obedience to god” Socrates on the examined life Some Vocabulary Ad hoc Ad hominem Ambiguity Appeal to authority Argument by analogy Begging the […]
Selections from Descartes’ Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting One’s Reason and of Seeking Truth in the Sciences are from Jonathan Bennett’s translation. Some words on his practices: “[Brackets] enclose editorial explanations. Small ·dots· enclose material that has been added, but can be read as though it were part of the original text. Occasional •bullets, and also indenting of passages that are not quotations, are meant as aids to grasping the structure of a sentence or a thought. Every four-point ellipsis . . . . indicates the omission of a brief passage that seems to present more difficulty than […]
Selections from Descartes’ Passions of the Soul is from Jonathan Bennett’s translation. Some words on his practices: “[Brackets] enclose editorial explanations. Small ·dots· enclose material that has been added, but can be read as though it were part of the original text. Occasional •bullets, and also indenting of passages that are not quotations, are meant as aids to grasping the structure of a sentence or a thought. Every four-point ellipsis . . . . indicates the omission of a brief passage that seems to present more difficulty than it is worth. Longer omissions are reported between brackets.”[blockylist tag=”Descartes” id=”4634″]
Thanks to Jim Pryor for this Guide to Analyzing Concepts.
Thanks to Jim Pryor for the Guide to Some Good and Bad Forms of Argument on which this one is based.
Thanks to Jim Pryor for this Guide to Vocabulary Describing Arguments.
Thanks to Jim Pryor for this Guide to Arguments.
Thanks to Jim Pryor for these Guidelines on Grades.
Thanks to Jim Pryor for these Guidelines on Writing a Philosophy Paper.
Thanks to Jim Pryor for these Guidelines on Reading Philosophy.
by Arthur Schopenhauer Unless suffering is the direct and immediate object of life, our existence must entirely fail of its aim. It is absurd to look upon the enormous amount of pain that abounds everywhere in the world, and originates in needs and necessities inseparable from life itself, as serving no purpose at all and the result of mere chance. Each separate misfortune, as it comes, seems, no doubt, to be something exceptional; but misfortune in general is the rule. I know of no greater absurdity than that propounded by most systems of philosophy in declaring evil to be negative […]
[blockylist tag=”Aristotle”]
This section of our text is selected from Books I-II of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics (Ηθικά Νικομάχεια). Trans. W.D. Ross. Numerals styled like this are “Bekker numbers” deriving from the 19th century Bekker edition of Aristotle’s surviving works (Corpus Aristotelicum), still standard for references.I indicate where my commentary ends by using our writer’s avatar where the primary text begins: [blockylist tag=”Aristotle”]
Thanks to Jim Pryor for this Creative Commons glossary.
Originally printed in Mind, 1905; text from Logic and Knowledge, ed. Robert Marsh, 1956.
The full Proslogium is available from The Medieval Sourcebook. The notes in the text are based on those of Paul Halsall, and the translation is David Burr’s. Special thanks to Gideon Rosen for the use of his commentary on Anselm’s argument.
by Willard Van Orman Quine (Review of Metaphysics 2:1, 1948). Reprinted in 1953 From a Logical Point of View. Harvard University Press.
Our translation of Descartes’ Meditations on First Philosophy comes from Elizabeth Haldane, The Philosophical Works of Descartes. Vol. II. 1934, pp. 32-3. [blockylist tag=”Descartes” id=”4634″]
Report from psychologists at Virginia and Harvard Universities tackles question of why most of us find it so hard to do nothing.
Eugene Goostman, a computer programme pretending to be a young Ukrainian boy, successfully duped enough humans to pass the iconic test
by Jessica Shepherd, The Guardian (19 November 2007) “A degree in philosophy? What are you going to do with that then?” Philosophy students will tell you they’ve been asked this question more times than they care to remember. “The response people seem to want is a cheery shrug and a jokey ‘don’t know’,” says Joe Cunningham, 20, a final-year philosophy undergraduate at Heythrop College, University of London. A more accurate comeback, according to the latest statistics, is “just about anything I want”. Figures from the Higher Education Statistics Agency show philosophy graduates, once derided as unemployable layabouts, are in growing […]
Nothing worth doing is completed in our lifetime; therefore, we are saved by hope. Nothing true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore, we are saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore, we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as from our own; therefore, we are saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness. ~Reinhold Niebuhr, The Irony of American History (1952)
by JC Sevcik, UPI, April 16, 2014 WASHINGTON, April 16 (UPI) — Oligarchy is a form of government in which power is vested in a dominant class and a small group exercises control over the general population. A new study from Princeton and Northwestern Universities concluded that the U.S. government represents not the interests of the majority of citizens but those of the rich and powerful. “Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens” analyzed extensive data, comparing nearly 1,800 U.S. policies enacted between 1981 and 2002 with the expressed preferences of average and affluent Americans as […]
Greg Stevens, Science Correspondent, The Kernel, Thursday, 10 April 2014 You can have an out of body experience right now, and it isn’t even that hard. Some people can do it more easily than others, and it may take a little practice. But it is something that anybody can do, and it can be done scientifically. Senses and the self Let’s start with a question: Where do you feel like the center of your “self” is right now? Most people feel like the center of their consciousness—the vantage from which they are experiencing the world—is somewhere behind their eyes. This […]
This piece was originally published in Michael E. Zimmerman, J. Baird Callicott, George Sessions, Karen J. Warren, and John Clark (Eds.), Environmental Philosophy: From Animal Rights to Radical Ecology (Prentice-Hall, 1993), pp. 253-267.
This piece comes from A Sand County Almanac (Oxford University Press, 1948).
This text is from Thinking Like a Mountain: Toward a Council of All Beings in John Seed, Joanna Macy, Arne Naess & Pat Fleming (New Society Publishers, Philadelphia, 1988). First published in Ecophilosophy 5 (Sierra College, California) and reprinted in Pantheism, Oikos, Awakening in the Nuclear Age, and several Australian journals.
Originally published in Environmental Ethics, volume 10 (1988), pp. 101-120. Thanks to David Abram for permission to post this piece here.
Our selections come from the W. F. Trotter translation (introduced by T. S. Eliot) (New York: Dutton, 1958) of Pascal’s Pensées.
Turing, A.M. (1950), “Computing machinery and intelligence.” Mind, 59, 433-460.
This translation of Descartes’ 1641 Meditations is from the 1911 edition of The Philosophical Works of Descartes (Cambridge University Press), translated from the Latin by Elizabeth S. Haldane.1 I indicate where my commentary ends by using our writer’s avatar where the primary text begins: Download an imperfect PDF of this page. [blockylist tag=”Descartes” id=”4634″]
by Andrew Ross, The Daily Beast (09.27.12). Millions of grads are saddled with unpayable student loans, yet colleges still say they’re a sound investment. NYU professor Andrew Ross asks if it’s time to stop repaying the loans. Straight talk about the crushing burden of student debt is everywhere—except the one place it should be: on college campuses themselves. Students, professors, and college administrators seem to be in denial. For students who have never managed their own finances before—certainly the vast majority of undergraduates—the silence isn’t so surprising. After all, they’re not required to pay a penny on their loans until […]
When we entertain therefore, any suspicion that a philosophical term is employed without any meaning or idea (as is but too frequent), we need but enquire, from what impression is that supposed idea derived? And if it be impossible to assign any, this will serve to confirm our suspicion. By bringing ideas into so clear a light we may reasonably hope to remove all dispute, which may arise, concerning their nature and reality. Let an object be presented to a man of ever so strong natural reason and abilities; if that object be entirely new to him, he will not […]
by SAMUEL SCHEFFLER. The New York Times, “The Stone,” September 21, 2013 I believe in life after death. No, I don’t think that I will live on as a conscious being after my earthly demise. I’m firmly convinced that death marks the unqualified and irreversible end of our lives. My belief in life after death is more mundane. What I believe is that other people will continue to live after I myself have died. You probably make the same assumption in your own case. Although we know that humanity won’t exist forever, most of us take it for granted that […]
Socrates Come then, what is “taking pains over oneself” — 128a for we may perchance be taking, unawares, no pains over ourselves, though we think we are — and when does a man actually do it? Does he take pains over himself at the same time as over his own things? Alcibiades I at least believe so. Socrates Well now, [hide]when does a man take pains over his feet? Is it when he takes pains over what belongs to his feet? Alcibiades I do not understand. Socrates Is there anything you can name as belonging to the hand? For instance, […]
Ah, my remarkable friend, listen to me and the Delphic motto, 124b “Know thyself”; for these people are our competitors, not those whom you think; and there is nothing that will give us ascendancy over them save only pains and skill. [hide]If you are found wanting in these, you will be found wanting also in achievement of renown among Greeks and barbarians both; and of this I observe you to be more enamored than anyone else ever was of anything. Alcibiades Well then, what are the pains that I must take, Socrates? Can you enlighten me? For I must say […]
[hide]Alcibiades But I am not sure I should be able, Socrates, to set it forth to you. Socrates Well, my good sir, imagine I am the people in Assembly; even there, you know, you will have to persuade each man singly, will you not? Alcibiades Yes. Socrates And the same man may well persuade one person singly, 114c and many together, about things that he knows, just as the schoolmaster, I suppose, persuades either one or many about letters? Alcibiades Yes. Socrates And again, will not the same man persuade either one or many about number? Alcibiades Yes. Socrates And […]
[hide]Alcibiades I think, Socrates, that the Athenians and the rest of the Greeks rarely deliberate as to which is the more just or unjust course: for they regard questions of this sort as obvious; and so they pass them over and consider which course will prove more expedient in the result. For the just and the expedient, I take it, are not the same, but many people have profited by great wrongs that they have committed, whilst others, I imagine, have had no advantage from doing what was right. Socrates What then? Granting that the just and the expedient 113e […]
Alcibiades But what if I cannot? Do you think I could not know about what is just and unjust in any other way? Socrates Yes, you might, supposing you discovered it. Alcibiades But do you not think I might discover it? Socrates Yes, quite so, if you inquired. Alcibiades And do you not think I might inquire? Socrates I do, if you thought you did not know. Alcibiades And was there not a time when I held that view? Socrates Well spoken. Then can you tell me at what time it was 110a that you thought you did not know […]
Socrates Now then: you intend, as I say, to come forward as adviser to the Athenians in no great space of time; well, suppose I were to take hold of you as you were about to ascend the platform, and were to ask you: “Alcibiades, on what subject do the Athenians propose to take advice, that should ? Is it something ?” What would be your reply? 106d Alcibiades I should say, I suppose, it was something about which I knew better than they. Socrates Then you are a good adviser on things about which you actually know. Alcibiades To […]
We should reflect that there is much reason to hope for a good result on other grounds as well. one of two things. it is the dead have no consciousness of anything, or, as we are told, it is really a change — a migration of the soul from this place to another. Now if there is no consciousness but , death must be a marvelous gain. I suppose that if anyone were told to pick out the night on which he slept so soundly as not even to dream, and then to compare it with all the other nights […]
I should very much like to say a few words to reconcile you to the result, while the officials are busy and I am not yet on my way to the place where I must die. I ask you, gentlemen, to spare me these few moments. There is no reason why we should not exchange fancies while the law permits. I look upon you as my friends, and I want you to understand the right way of regarding my present position. Gentlemen of the jury — for you deserve to be so called — I have had a remarkable experience. […]
35e There are a great many reasons, gentlemen, why this result — I mean — but the chief reason is that the result was not unexpected. but now it seems that if a mere thirty votes had gone the other way, I should have been acquitted. Even as it is, I feel that so far as Meletus’ part is concerned I have been acquitted, and not only that, but anyone can see that if Anytus and Lycon had not come forward to accuse me, would actually have forfeited his one thousand drachmas for not having obtained one fifth of the […]
— high-principled and patriotic as he claims to be — and after that against the rest. first again, as though it represented a fresh prosecution. Such is the charge. Let us examine its points one by one. First it says that I am guilty of corrupting the young. But I say, gentlemen, that Meletus is guilty of treating a serious matter with levity, since he summons people to stand their trial on frivolous grounds, and professes concern and keen anxiety in matters about which he has never had the slightest interest. I will try to prove this to your satisfaction. […]
After puzzling about it for some time, I set myself at last with considerable reluctance to check the truth of it in the following way. and pointing out to my divine authority, You said that I was the wisest of men, but here is a man who is wiser than I am. this person — I need not mention his name, but it was that I was studying when I had this experience — At any rate it seems that I am wiser than he is to this small extent, that I do not think that I know what I […]
[hide][/hide]103a Socrates Son of Cleinias, [hide]I think it must surprise you that I, the first of all your lovers, am the only one of them who has not given up his suit and thrown you over, and whereas they have all pestered you with their conversation[/hide] I have not spoken one word to you for so many years. The cause of this has been nothing human, but a certain spiritual opposition, 1 of whose power you shall be informed at some later time. However, it now opposes me no longer, 103b so I have accordingly come to you; and I […]
I was especially astonished at one of their many misrepresentations; I mean when they told you that you must be careful not to let me deceive you — the implication being that I am a skillful speaker. I thought that it was peculiarly brazen of them to tell you this without a blush, since they must know that they will soon be effectively confuted, when it becomes obvious that I have not the slightest skill as a speaker — unless, of course, by a skillful speaker they mean one who speaks the truth. If that is what they mean, I […]
Socrates’ interrogations lead to a condition the Greeks called ‘aporia‘ (literally translated, ‘perplexity’, ‘impasse’, ‘puzzlement’). Socrates himself refers to it as “the torpedo” and claims its “shock” is “of advantage,” intellectually speaking. But its tendency in the larger process is not only destructive. In Plato’s Meno, Socrates says of his befuddled young interlocutor that far from being harmed by the ignorance that resulted from our “causing him to doubt and giving him the torpedo’s shock,” he is “better off” for it: At first he did not know what [he thought he knew], and he does not know even now: but […]