Term Essay Prompts, Fall 2023
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3520
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Philosophy
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Dec 6, 2023
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Dr. Nicholas Barber Introduction to Philosophy Fall 2023 PHI 205 Final Essay Prompts 1.
In Plato’s “Apology,” Socrates disavows knowledge but claims to be wise. Explain how Socrates disavows knowledge while maintaining confidence in certain moral truths. 2.
In Plato's "Meno" (80c-e), Meno prompts a paradox of rational inquiry: either we already know for what we're searching (rendering rational inquiry useless), or we don't know for what we're searching at all (rendering rational inquiry impossible). Discuss the paradox of rational inquiry and how to dissolve it, if possible. 3.
Toward the conclusion of Plato's "Meno," Socrates asks Meno whether there is any difference in value between true belief/opinion and knowledge. Socrates uses the example of someone giving directions to Larissa: in both cases, there appears to be no difference in value because the person has true directions. However, what is the difference between the two in terms of virtue, the main topic of the dialogue? In other words, what is the difference between someone with a true belief about what is virtuous and someone with knowledge of what is virtuous? Reference the text, specifically the discussion between Socrates and Meno about true belief/opinion and knowledge, and posit an answer. 4.
Edmund Gettier's "Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?" specifies two examples aimed to undermine the traditional model of knowledge, whereby a subject (S) knows (P) if and only if (S) 1) believes (P); 2) has evidence or justification for believing (P); 3) (P) is true. Gettier's examples show that these three conditions are jointly insufficient for (S) knows (P), where (P) is any proposition about the external world. Analyze the results of one of Gettier's examples and assess its implications for the traditional model of knowledge. 5.
In Meditations Book One, Rene Descartes employs the method of hyperbolic doubt presumably to secure an indubitable foundation for knowledge. Discuss the motivations involved and how Descartes applies this using Book One. 6.
Descartes ends Book One of Meditations
by positing a skeptical scenario: What if it were the case that an evil genius has possessed my mind and led me to believe that all my knowledge of the external world is flawed? Explain why Descartes posits this scenario and the implications of doing so. 7.
In Meditations
Book Two, Descartes discusses a burning wax that simultaneously causes the alteration of the wax's sensible qualities even though the wax is still knowable. Analyze the wax passage and provide the example's upshot or implications.
Dr. Nicholas Barber Introduction to Philosophy Fall 2023 8.
John Stuart Mill’s Qualitative Hedonism or Utilitarian Ethic is based on utility or the greatest happiness principle, which holds that "actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong in proportion as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness" where “
happiness" is pleasure and the absence of pain; "unhappiness" pain and lack of pleasure. Discuss a specific example to illustrate a defect or virtue of Utilitarianism or Qualitative Hedonism. 9.
In "Experience Machine," an excerpt from The Examined Life
(1989), Robert Nozick presents a thought experiment that attacks hedonic theories of well-being, according to which people's well-being consists only of the balance of pleasure over pain. Nozick captures the essay's crux: "Notice this is a thought experiment, designed to isolate one question: Do only our internal feelings matter to us?" Discuss Nozick's thought experiment and its implications for hedonic notions of happiness/well-being (or the value of our inner subjectivity). 10.
Immanuel Kant holds that the form
of morality can be found in what he calls the "Categorical Imperative" (CI), which requires autonomy and universality. State one formulation of the CI, delineate what the formulation means, and state your position as to whether to act for the sake of the CI. Use counterexamples and independent reasoning to buttress your argumentative stance. 11.
Kant's deontological (duty-based) ethic conflicts with Mill's utilitarian (consequential) ethic. Explain the salient differences between the two ethical theories these two thinkers put forth and argue for the ethic you find most compelling, and this can be choosing one side over and against the other, offering a position that combines the intuitive thrust behind both ethical theories in some way, or rejecting both in favor of a third alternative. 12.
One of Kant’s main projects in the Critique of Pure Reason
is to synthesize rationalism and empiricism. Kant states, “All knowledge begins with experience
, but not all knowledge is derived from experience. Explain how Kant synthesizes these two schools of thought. 13.
(Toughest prompt) Kant’s notion of a transcendental unity/identity of apperception is his view of self-consciousness. Provide an interpretation of what Kant means by “T.U.A.” and explain what self
-consciousness (his conception of self) amounts to for Kant. 14.
Friedrich Nietzsche's thought of the eternal recurrence of the same “Heaviest Burden” is considered by many, including Nietzsche himself, to be
his greatest contribution to philosophy. Analyze the passage from the Gay Science
and provide
Dr. Nicholas Barber Introduction to Philosophy Fall 2023 an interpretation of its meaning or significance. Couple this analysis with “On Redemption” from Thus Spoke Zarathustra
. 15.
Friedrich Nietzsche gives a possible derivation of how morality came to be in his work Genealogy of Morals
. Provide an account of how "good and bad" (a pre-moral distinction) became "good vs. evil" (a moral distinction) according to Nietzsche and whether Nietzsche believes the moral revolution was beneficial for anyone involved. You may use Nietzsche's concept of a will to power (reevaluation of all values) to explain aspects of this narrative. 16.
Jean-Paul Sartre's "Existentialism is a Humanism" details the dominant recurring motifs of atheistic existentialism, e.g
., that existence precedes essence. Sartre concludes that understanding existential as humanism is the only authentic way to live. Both explain what atheistic existentialism amounts to for Sartre and whether it is the only genuine way to live, especially considering that moods like anxiety, anguish, abandonment, despair, and forlornness emerge from not taking on the radical responsibility we have been endowed with and constructing our own values that ultimately will be meaningful in our lives
.
17.
Soren Kierkegaard's proclamation that "Truth is subjectivity and subjectivity is truth," seen from the lens of Kierkegaard's Christian existentialism, is a commitment to a conception of truth that is objectively uncertain. First, discuss what differentiates Christian from Atheistic existentialism, clarify what kind of truths Kierkegaard is referring to, and assess whether his proclamation is viable and/or fruitful. You should mention why Kierkegaard emphasizes having a passionate inwardness to truth and why truth is not paradoxical but that our relation to truth is. 18.
Sartre’s “Existential
ism is a Humanism" is an essay devoted to a clear delineation of atheistic existentialism, beginning from the premise that existence precedes essence. Give a thorough explication of this central premise, the existential moods it engenders or can give expression, and what is really at stake by adopting an existentialist viewpoint. 19.
In Susan Wolf’s “Moral Saints,” she remarks that a troubling feature of morality involves “the
disturbing way morality is apt to dominate non-moral goods.
”
Analyze either the Loving Saint or Rational Saint and provide insight into the cogency of her line of thinking.
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Dr. Nicholas Barber Introduction to Philosophy Fall 2023