Notes for Class One, Aug. 28

1. Ideas define our place in the world, our relations to other people, the bases for what is fair and what is not fair, what is worth believing and what is not worth believing. We need these ideas; otherwise we are caught up merely in routines. We need to recapture the joy of understanding, of thinking hard about life. This is what philosophy encourages: the love of wisdom, the demand for knowledge of how we fit into the big picture and what we should do.

2. Studying the great philosophers helps in doing philosophy, especially in helping you to put your own ideas together--to offer alternatives that you otherwise may not have considered, and to test your ideas against objections. Always keep the inquiry real: that is, ask "Do I really believe that?" Western philosophy has its roots in the ancient Greek curiosity about the nature of the world and our place in it. Today it is still interested in understanding basic issues of human existence. This course is about developing the skills necessary to engage in such an inquiry.

3. Most students have not been exposed before to the formal study of philosophy (literally, "the love of wisdom"). Nor have they come into contact with philosophers, who they might suspect are absent-minded and out-of-touch with the real world, even though they think deep thoughts about "great ideas." Truth is, everyone engages in philosophical reflection; they just don't realize it.

4. What Is Philosophy About? It is about the big questions, such as whether there is a meaning to life, or whether God exists, or how we can know the difference between right and wrong or whether our actions are truly free. Even when philosophers disagree on the answers to such questions, they hope that their discussions clarify the issues and highlight useful techniques for pursuing the topics. These techniques are developed in doing philosophy--that is, in identifying basic issues, clarifying positions, justifying assumptions, and defending arguments against criticism.

For some people, doing philosophy is easy and natural; for others, it takes a lot of work. As with learning to play tennis or the piano, the only way to get good at it is to practice. That means studying how great minds approach the big questions and testing your own reasoning skills against theirs. You don't always have to agree with their positions, but you should be able to get better at showing why you disagree; and that means becoming familiar with how they think.

5. The goal of philosophy is to reflect on our beliefs, to state clearly and convincingly what we believe, developing the implications and complications of those beliefs. It includes the effort to see how these beliefs are connected with other people's views (including those of past philosophers) and how they might be defended against objections. It also includes the effort to coordinate different ideas into a single viewpoint: in short, as Socrates says, to examine life to make it worth living (even if it means acknowledging how ignorant we are), for virtue (doing something well) is possible only if one knows what one is doing (virtue is knowledge). In short, philosophy often is concerned more with clarification of the questions than giving answers.

6. We need to get beyond the buzzwords (words frequently used but seldom clearly understood--e.g. "freedom"), even if they are used to define who we are. The ways we do this are articulation (putting our ideas in clear, concise, readily understandable language) and argument (supporting ideas with reasons and overcoming objections): thus the two central questions in philosophy are what do you mean? and how do you know? By analyzing our ideas or concepts--breaking them down into their components--and synthesizing different ideas into a unified vision, we form a conceptual framework.

Conceptual frameworks that are all-embracing (e.g., in religion, science, art, morality, politics) frame or organize more specific concepts. Conceptual frameworks establish a set of values, a way of living (a life-style). In political or social terms, it is an ideology (a set of ideas about the nature of society and our political roles). The product of seeing the world in a certain way is a worldview or Weltanschauung.

7. The task of philosophy is to test those frameworks for depth and consistency. Though it is challenging and critical, philosophy is not negativistic. The aim is to articulate your ideas clearly; to qualify, develop, and justify your ideas (not just state opinions); and to propose imaginative and elegant responses to important questions or problems.

8. Why Is Studying Philosophy Valuable? To sharpen our minds: to see the assumptions, values, and criteria of our beliefs; to make better decisions and come up with better alternatives; to check our beliefs for consistency; to open ourselves up to toleration of other ideas and and to risk changing ourselves.

Philosophy helps us understand what it means to be a human being by allowing us to exercise our ability to think clearly. It provides us with practice in analyzing problems and coming up with different solutions. It emphasizes critical thinking: that is, it requires that we question beliefs and arguments in order to determine whether there are good reasons to adopt them. Reasons are good if they are consistent with everyday experience, seem appropriate to impartial third parties, take into account counter-examples, avoid implying unreasonable or undesirable consequences, and are at least as acceptable as other views.

So, if someone asks why you should study philosophy, you can say that it improves your critical-thinking skills and problem-solving abilities. In short, it allows you to practice being more reasonable. Or if you don't mind seeming unimaginative, you can say that you needed a course to fill a humanities elective.

9. The Basic Issues and Areas of Philosophy

• Metaphysics (the study of the nature of reality): What is the difference between appearance and reality? What is a person? Are human beings really free? Is there a God? Does life have a meaning or purpose?
• Epistemology (the study of knowledge): What does it mean to know something? How is knowledge different from belief or opinion?
• Axiology (the study of values):
• Ethics: Is There a Real Difference between Moral Right and Wrong?
• Social & Political Philosophy: Why Do We Have Social and Political Obligations?
• Aesthetics: What Is Art? What is Beauty?
• Logic (the study of reasoning): How Can One Tell Whether An Argument Is Justified, Believable, or Convincing?

In contrast to experimental sciences like physics or psychology, philosophy is less concerned with facts about the world or why people believe what they do. Instead, it investigates what those facts mean and whether people's beliefs are justified based on reasoned argument. Getting a specific answer to a question (e.g., is there an afterlife?) is thus not as important, from a philosophic standpoint, as determining whether a proposed answer to the question makes sense.

11. How Philosophy Is Different From Science, Law, and Religion

• Philosophy challenges the assumptions of science. It does not stop with what things there are; it also examines what it means to be and questions whether thinking in scientific terms is itself justified.
• Philosophy questions whether social beliefs and laws are justified. The sheer fact that a society has legitimated a practice through law does not insulate it from philosophic examination and critique.
• Unlike religion, philosophy does not depend on faith. Instead, it emphasizes understanding and defending one's beliefs. Philosophy does not aim at commitment or salvation.

These thinkers lives before the fourth century BC philosopher Socrates, so they are called "pre-Socratics":

• Thales of Miletos (c. 580 BC) was the first thinker in the West to provide a rational explanation of things.  By claiming that everything can be explained in terms of water, he proposes that there is a way to make sense of our experience of changes in the world.  Behind the appearance of change, he suggests, is something constant (a one behind the many) in terms of which everything is to be understood. This turn from myth to reason is significant in three ways: it focuses on a natural rather than a supernatural explanation, it suggests that reality is different from appearances, and it describes not only the fundamental nature of reality (as water) but also how things in nature change (as a result of internal forces).

• Anaximander of Miletos (c. 545 BC) disagrees with Thales about the fundamental material principle of reality because, he argues, it does not make sense to say that something that is the opposite of water--namely, that which is dry--must be explained in terms of water.  Instead of saying that any contrary must be explained in terms of its opposite, Anaximander says that the ultimate principle of being must have no discernible characteristics or properties: it is "the Unlimited" or "the Indeterminate" (the apeiron).  It is the substance of which everything is made but it is never experienced by itself.  It appears as various combinations of earth, air, fire, and water, whose changes are regulated according to rhythms or harmonies that correct the injustice created by extremes of contrary qualities such as hot-cold, wet-dry, rough-smooth, light-dark.
• Anaximander moves beyond Thales in two ways: he describes ultimate reality abstractly, in terms that are not tied to what one sensually experiences (thus elevating the mind over the senses); and he accounts for observed natural changes in terms of law-like necessity.

• Anaximenes (c. 545 BC)of Miletos (c. 545 BC) rejects Anaximander's notion of the Unlimited, claiming that since nothing definite can be said about something that has no discernible characteristics, nothing can be said about the Unlimited--even that it is the ultimate principle of sensible reality.  Air, on the other hand, does have identifiable characteristics and, like water, might be seen as having the capacity for different forms of material expression.  But more importantly, air gives life to living beings and is the formative force that "breathes" existence into inanimate beings as well insofar as things are differentiated in terms of how densely air is compacted: individual things are thus distinguishable insofar as they express the condensation or rarefaction of air.  Very fine air is fire, very condensed air is stone; wind, clouds, water, and earth are stages in between that indicate increasing condensation.

• Anaximenes' ideas contain three significant advances: First, his doctrine of condensation and rarefaction makes the distinction of things quantifiable and provides a mathematical basis for talking about nature.  Second, his hierarchical arrangement of reality indicates that there is a definite progression in nature and a reason why things are related to one another in an order of higher and lower forms of complexity.  Third, living beings are distinguished from inanimate beings in virtue of the rarefaction of air that defines them, not some supernatural soul or mystical force; and the condensation and rarefaction of their air is also what explains their activity.  By means of this third point, Anaximenes is able to join the quantifiable basis for distinguishing things to the force that moves them.

Other early philosophers proposed different explanations for understanding the logos or rationale of things. For example:

• Heraclitus believed that seeing the world in terms of its constant patterns of change (like fire) was central.
• Democritus suggested that the world was comprised of atoms.
• Pythagoras claimed that everything is ultimately mathematical, orderly, harmonic (including the soul).
• Parmenides and his student Zeno argued that only that which is unchanging is really real, so the changing sensible world is unreal.