Course: Introduction to Philosophy (PHIL 201) — Instructor: Steve Naragon
Journal Questions
Note: The journal assignment has changed. You will need to write only eight (8) journals (instead of the original thirteen). Most students have already written the first three journals (the logic homework), which means you are now responsible for just half of the remaining assignments. I presume that this comes as a relief to most or all of you.
If you would like to tackle some of the remaining journal assignments for extra credit, then please mark those entries as "Extra Credit," since they will count in a different grade-category.
Journal entries
... are due at the beginning of class on the dates listed below, and should include the following at the top of the first page:
• Your name
• The date
• The author and title of the reading(s)
Other than the three logic worksheets, the body of the entry (about 500-800 words) should include:
(1) A very brief one-paragraph summary of the readings, focusing on those aspects of the readings that are relevant to your more detailed discussion.
(2) A discussion of the readings, based on the list of study questions. You may either write one paragraph for each of the questions (be sure to put the corresponding number at the beginning of the paragraph) or else devote the entire discussion to a single question. Feel free to use brief quotes from the reading, when this is appropriate, but keep the quotes brief, and remember that it is almost always best to paraphrase.
(3) A list of words that you didn’t know until you looked them up in a dictionary.
Please type your journal entries. The three logic worksheets can be printed out with your answers typed in (answers requiring diagrams will need to be filled-in by hand).
Grading
(5 points per journal entry)
Summary (0-1 pts)
Discussion (0-3 pts)
Glossary (0-1 pts)
For extraordinary efforts in any of these three areas, I occasionally add a point.
In the summary and discussion, I am interested primarily in your content (what you say, not how you say it) — but if the writing is too unclear (awkward sentences, poor word choice) or littered with mechanical problems (spelling, punctuation, sentence fragments, etc.), then the score will be lowered.
Thu, Sep 11
• “Analyzing Arguments” worksheet
Tue, Sep 16
• “Deductive Logic” worksheet
Thu, Sep 18
• “Inductive Logic” worksheet
Thu, Sep 25
• Plato, Meno (early 4th century BCE)
1. What is so bad about ignorance? Why might we want to escape from it?
2. Was Meno harmed or helped by Socrates? Explain.
3. What do Meno and his slave boy have in common?
Thu, Oct 2
• Plato, Crito (early 4th century BCE)
• Martin Luther King, Jr., “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” (1963)
1. If the demands of the state and the demands of your conscience come into conflict, which should you obey? How would Socrates answer this? How would King?
Thu, Oct 9
• Plato, “Ring of Gyges” (from The Republic; early 4th century BCE)
• Peter Singer, “The Prisoner’s Dilemma” (1981)
1. What does the Gyges story suggest about human nature? Do you agree with it?
2. What is the Prisoner’s Dilemma?
3. What does Singer’s discussion of the prisoner’s dilemma suggest about human nature?
Thu, Oct 16
• Ruth Benedict, “Anthropology and the Abnormal” (1934)
1. Why might you believe that what is morally right or wrong is decided by the preferences of one’s society? Is there any reason to believe that something might be right or wrong, regardless of our beliefs about it?
2. If morality is simply a reflection of one’s culture, and the truth of moral judgments is always dependent on each culture, then does it ever make sense to morally criticize another culture? For instance, for an American to criticize the Hutu’s in Rwanda for committing genocide against their Tutsi neighbors?
Tue, Oct 28
• John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism (1863) (selection)
• Ursula Le Guin, “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” (1973)
1. What does Mill mean by the quality of a pleasure? How does he show that one pleasure is “higher” than another?
2. Suppose you were a convinced utilitarian, and you found $100 found in the street. What would you do with it?
3. Do you agree that pleasure and pain should have the same value and disvalue, no matter where it takes place?
4. Why do you think people would leave Omelas? Would you leave or stay?
Tue, Nov 4
• René Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy, “First Meditation” (1641)
1. Descartes says that he will withhold assent from all dubitable beliefs. What does this mean, and why is he going to do it?
2. What causes Descartes to doubt his beliefs? Are these doubts justified?
3. We all believe many things, and we feel more certain of some of beliefs than of others. Of what beliefs are you most certain?Why?
Tue, Nov 11
• John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690) (selection)
1. Dogs can hear sounds that are too high for people to hear. Could there be sounds too high for any animal to hear?
2. What evidence do we have for agreeing with Locke (and Descartes) that qualities like color and taste exist only in our minds, and not in the objects that we routinely speak of as colorful or tasty? Do you agree with Locke?
3. If a tree falls in the forest, and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?
Tue, Nov 18
• René Descartes, Discourse on Method (1637) (selection)
• John Searle, “The Myth of the Computer” (1982)
• Stephen Law, “Could a Machine Think?” (2003)
1. Describe in your own words Descartes’ “two tests”. Do you think they are reliable?
2. What does Searle mean by “the real mistake is to suppose that simulation is duplication”?
3. Can Geena think? Explain.
Tue, Nov 25
• Raymond Smullyan, “Conversation with God” (1977)
1. Suppose you believe in God: what reasons do you have for believing in God?
2. And suppose you don’t believe: What reasons do you have for that?
3. Would it help to speak directly to God?
Tue, Dec 9
• William Paley, Natural Theology (1802) (selection)
• Sharon Begley, “Science finds Religion” (1998)
• Jim Holt, “Supernatural Selection” (2002)
1. What sort of God would be consistent with Paley’s analogy?
2. Evaluate the following argument: “The world resembles a garden; there is sufficient disorder in the world for it to resemble a garden overgrown with weeds; therefore, there must have been a gardener who created the garden, and then abandoned it.”
3. Briefly discuss: If I reject the findings of science, am I turning my back on God’s natural revelation?
Manchester College // Registrar // Department of Religion and Philosophy // Last updated: 25 Jul 2008