Flowchart: Alternate Process: Tentative Schedule Week 1. 1. Introduction. Ancient Conceptions of Philosophy and Modern Approaches to Ancient Philosophy . a. How did the ancients conceive philosophy? b. What should we expect to learn from ancient texts? c. How should we read ancient philosophical texts? (What is special about ancient texts? How to read philosophy?) Reading: (There are no readings scheduled for the first session, but it would be convenient to start reading Apology and Alcibiades from Plato's volume in order to acquire some familiarity with Socrates' style.) Important terms: interpretation, argument, thesis, premise, conclusion, fallacy, deduction, valid, sound, generalization, induction, counterexample, refutation, consistency, reductio ad absurdum, ad hominem argument, … 2. The Examined Life. First Approach to the Question about the Good Life: How Should I Live? a. Socrates as paradigm of the philosopher. Why do some people hate Socrates and why do others admire him? b. Socrates’ conception of philosophy. c. Socrates’ favorite objects of inquiry and of care: wisdom, truth and the best state of the soul (= virtue). Reading: Apology. Important terms: eudaimonia, logos, elenchos, irony, aporia, psychę, aretę, belief (doxa), knowledge (episteme), expert, phronęsis, sophia, ... Week 2. 3. Know Thyself. Second approach to the question about the good life: What am I? a. How should I live? (cont.) b. The Delphic command. Why do Socrates’ interlocutors get angry? Kinds of ignorance. c. Socratic search for self-knowledge. Self-knowledge and friendship. Reading: Apology, Alcibiades. Important terms: hybris, oikeion, timę, philotimia, sophrosynę, body-soul dualism, psychę, philia, … 4. Love of Wisdom. Third approach to the question about the good life: can I become good? a. Can virtue be taught? Why is it important to know what virtue is? b. Socrates and the 'What is F?' question.Search for the definition of virtue. The aporetic section of the Meno as a model Socratic elenchos. c. Is the knowledge that Socrates searches attainable? The paradox of inquiry as a challenge to the Socratic method. Reading: Meno 70a-81a. Important terms: ‘What is F?’ question, one over many, aporia, epithumia, boulesis, , … Week 3 5. Is Wisdom Attainable? a. Plato’s solution to Meno’s paradox: recollection. Introduction to the Forms. b. The method of hypothesis. c. The Socratic project unveiled: virtue is knowledge. Reading: Meno 81a-100b, Phaedo. Important terms: Meno’s paradox, recollection (anamnesis), a priori, a posteriori, Form (eidos, idea), hypothesis, ... 6. Is Self-Knowledge Possible? a. Socrates’ second sailing: more on the method of hypothesis and recollection. More on the theory of the Forms. b. Body-soul dualism. Immortality of the soul. c. The obstacles of embodiment: constant threat of irrational desires. Fear from death vs. death as a cure. Reading: Phaedo. Important terms: participation, … Week 4 7. Love of Wisdom (II). a. A new approach to the question about the teachability of virtue: the sophist. Protagoras’ wisdom. The myth of Prometheus. b. Unity of the virtues. c. The denial of akrasia and the art of measurement. Reading: Protagoras (selec.) Important terms: sophist, akrasia, ... 8. Is Wisdom so Desirable? a. The rhetorician’s defense of the art of persuasion. Is success without wisdom possible? b. The politician’s defense of the practical life. Callicles’ attack on philosophy. c. Nature vs. convention. The public vs. the private. Socrates’ afterlife myth. Reading: Gorgias (selec.) Important terms: persuasion, pleonexia, physis, nomos, ... Week 5 9. Challenge against Justice. a. Why be just? Glaucon and Adeimantus’ challenge to justice. Thrasymachus’ argument. b. Plato on the first steps of moral development. c. City-soul analogy. Reading: Republic 1-3. Important terms: analogy, paideia, … 10. Moral Psychology and the Virtues. a. Parts of soul. b. Akrasia. c. Virtues of the soul and of the city. Reading: Republic 4. Important terms: mere, harmony, akrasia, enkrateia, agreement-model, control-model, ... Week 6 11. Philosopher Kings. a. The education of the philosophers. b. The Form of the Good. c. Review for mid-term exam. Reading: Republic 5-7. Important terms: … 12. Midterm exam, in class. Week 7 13. Aristotle on Wisdom. a. Kinds and levels of knowledge. b. Aristotle’s own history of philosophy. Criticism of previous thinkers, including Socrates and Plato. c. Theory of the four causes. Aristotle's defense of final causality in Physics 2.8. Reading: Metaph. 1-3, 6, Physics 2.1-9. Important terms: arche, empeiria, techne, cause, material, formal, eidos, morphe, efficient, telos, teleology, ... 14. Arguments against Plato’s Forms. a. Why did Plato need separated Forms? b. Some arguments against the Platonic Forms: argument from relatives, one over many, third man argument. c. Arguments against the Form of the Good in NE. Some considerations about method in ethics. Reading: Metaph. 1.9, NE 1.6. Important terms: separation, one-over-many, … Week 8 15. Substance. a. What is being? Senses of being. Notion of substance. b. Notion of subject. Matter, Form and the relation between them. c. Generation of substances. Reading: Metaph. 7.1-4,7-9. Important terms: ousia, essence, universal, genus, subject (hupokeimenon), hyle, morphe, ... 16. Potentiality and Actuality. a. Notion of dynamis. Distinction between rational and non-rational dynamis. b. Distinction between kinesis (change) and energeia (actuality). Reading: Metaph. 9.1-2, 5-7. Important terms: dynamis, entelecheia, kinesis, energeia, Week 9 17. On the soul (I). a. Nature of the soul. b. Kinds of soul. c. Perception. Reading: De Anima 1.1, 2.1-6, 11-12. Important terms: … 18. On the soul (II). a. Imagination (phantasia). b. Thought. c. On movement. Reading: De Anima 3.3-5, 10-11. Important terms: phantasia, nous, locomotive soul, ... Week 10 19. Aristotle on the acquisition of knowledge. a. Knowledge of universals and of particulars. b. Aristotle’s theory of definition. c. Aristotle’s solution to the paradox of inquiry. Notion of epagôgę. Reading: Post An. 1.1-4, 2.8-10, 19. Important terms: Meno’s paradox, universal (katholou), particular (kath’ekaston), … 20. Aristotle on the human good. a. Everything aims at some good. b. Kinds of lives. c. The human function. Reading: NE 1.1-5, 7. Important terms: ergon, ... Week 11 21. Virtues of character. a. Notion of habituation. Teaching vs. habituation. Learning by doing. b. Doctrine of the mean. c. Natural virtues. Unity of the virtues. Relationship between aretę and phronęsis. Reading: NE 2.1-7, 6.13. Important terms: hexis, ethos, habit, ... 22. Voluntariness. a. Issues about intention and motive. b. Praise and blame. Responsibility. c. Choice, deliberation and wish. Reading: NE 3.1-5 Important terms: intention, motive, hekôn, akôn, coincidental, prohairesis, deliberation, wish, ... Week 12 23. Practical vs. theoretical wisdom. a. Kinds of knowledge (II). b. Distinction between phronęsis and sophia. c. Aristotle on the best life. Reading: NE 6, 10.6-8. Important terms: … 24. Final considerations. Reading: TBA

PHL202 H5S   Ancient Philosophy

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Warning: This page does not correspond to any actual course. I've only built it as a proposal for my instructorship application.
Text Box: Marta Jimenez Application for PHL202 H5S Ancient Philosophy Text Box: Marta Jimenez Application for PHL202 H5S Ancient Philosophy Text Box: Marta Jimenez Application for PHL202 H5S Ancient Philosophy

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