philosophy

Introduction to Philosophy (Philosophy 11) Fall 2016-2017 Professor Winther TAs Franklin, Raymond, Rule, Tibbets Tutor Coffin Paper #1 Prompt Due: October 13, 2016 at the beginning of class. See syllabus for policy on late papers. Any paper turned in after class starts is considered late. Please write a coherent, well-argued 2-page paper (single-spaced, minimum 10 pt. of a reasonable font, minimum 1 inch margins) applying 4 tools (from The Philosopher’s Toolkit) to the passage below (from Plato’s The Apology, pp. 43-44; 40c-41c). Please consult the “Writing & Reading Advice” section on your syllabus on how to write effective philosophy essays. Although all tools are fair game for the midterm, for this paper, please choose your 4 only from the list given below. In your essay, you might try to answer kinds of questions such as the following: Plato provides which alternative explanations? How does Plato justify each explanation, implicitly if not explicitly? Are these mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive alternatives? If not, which alternatives might be missing? (Do not use “alternative explanations” in your paper!) Your essay might be structured with an introductory paragraph and 4 paragraphs, one for each tool. You could also have a separate brief paragraph summarizing Plato’s argument, and an interesting conclusion. The best essays will also have a clear thesis, tying the analysis together, from an overarching, abstract perspective. What are you trying to argue? Why is your answer useful and fascinating? Why should we care?

“Let us reflect in this way, too, that there is good hope that death is a blessing, for it is one of

two things: either the dead are nothing and have no perception of anything, or it is, as we are told, a change and a relocating for the soul from here to another place. If it is complete lack of perception, like a dreamless sleep, then death would be a great advantage. For I think that if one had to pick out that night during which a man slept soundly and did not dream, put beside it the other nights and days of his life, and then see how many days and nights had been better and more pleasant than that night, not only a private person but the great king would find them easy to count compared with the other days and nights. If death is like this I say it is an advantage, for all eternity would then seem to be no more than a single night. If, on the other hand, death is a change from here to another place, and what we are told is true and all who have died are there, what greater blessing could there be, gentlemen of the jury? If anyone arriving in Hades will have escaped from those who call themselves judges here, and will find those true judges who are said to sit in judgment there, Minos and Radamanthus and Aeacus and Triptolemus and the other demi-gods who have been upright in their own life, would that be a poor kind of change? Again, what would one of you give to keep company with Orpheus and Musaeus, Hesiod and Homer? I am willing to die many times if that is true. It would be a wonderful way for me to spend my time whenever I met Palamedes and Ajax, the son of Telamon, and any other of the men of old who died through an unjust conviction, to compare my experience with theirs. I think it would be pleasant. Most important, I could spend my time testing and examining people there, as I do here, as to who among them is wise, and who thinks he is, but is not.

What would one not give, gentlemen of the jury, for the opportunity to examine the man who led the great expedition against Troy, or Odysseus, or Sisyphus, and innumerable other men and women one could mention. It would be an extraordinary happiness to talk with them, to keep company with them and examine them. In any case, they would certainly not put one to death for doing so. They are happier there than we are here in other respects, and for the rest of time they are deathless, if indeed what we are told is true.” Plato, The Apology (pp. 43-44; 40c-41c).

Tools (in no particular order; choose 4): analogies, intuition pump, induction, realist/non-realist, ceteris paribus, objective/subjective, principle of charity, false dichotomy, refutation, a priori/a posteriori, necessary/contingent, thought experiments, reductios, sufficient reason, horned dilemmas, abduction.

Plato and Aristotle, Raffaelo’s/Raphael’s “The School of Athens” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_School_of_Athens

Thank you and GOOD LUCK!