Week 1 – Discussions –
Part I: Q&A Discussion Part II: Peer Critique
In this four-week class, each week features a discussion forum with two discussion topic areas in each forum (plus the introductory form in Week 1.) Each weekly discussion assignment asks for two Q&A discussions and two peer critiques. Please follow the guidelines (including word-count minimums) carefully.
Part I: Q&A Discussions: You will be asked to come up with an original question based on the work of the philosophers you are studying in each week’s required readings. Think about what stood out to you in the works in question—what ideas, theories, or approaches did you find to be interesting, engaging, or perhaps intriguing or challenging? (See the list of discussion topics for the specific authors or works you may select from in framing your questions.)
Your task is then to do your best to answer your own question as incisively and thoroughly as possible in a brief essay of around 250 words (posts with fewer than 150 words will not receive any credit). The word count includes your question but not any citations. You must cite at least one source, which will be the particular essay or article from the required readings you are addressing. You are welcome to include as many other sources in your Q&A thread as you may need, but this is optional. Just be sure to cite any source from which you take ideas, arguments, or passages of language within the body of your response, including AI writing aids such as ChatGPT and Gemini. Include the citation next to the quoted or paraphrased passages of text and include the full source citation information at the end of your response (you need not do separate works cited or list of references for this assignment). Your score for this part of the assignment will be based on the relevance, sophistication, and originality of your questions, as well as the insight, understanding, and incisiveness expressed in your answers.
—————————————————————————————————————————–
Plato, Euthyphro (entire): [Introductory Notes on the Euthyphro from The Online Library of Liberty, Plato, Dialogues, vol. 2 : See pp. 88-115 for Jowett’s translation of the Euthyphro]. Study Guide [supplemental reading]: Euthyphro: Introductory Notes.
Plato, Republic, Book IV, §437b-441e; Books VI-VII, §509d-521a [Excerpts can be found here: Plato, Dialogues, vol. 3 : Bk. IV, pp. 272-278; Bk. VII, pp. 351-360; and also here: Plato: Complete Works, Ed. John M. Cooper, Bk.IV, pp. 1099/1068-1104/1073; Bk. VII, pp. 1161/1130-1169/1138. [Please note that the three items below are for further study; this is supplemental reading.]
For further study and comparison, read this concise and annotated contemporary translation of the Allegory of the Cave from Book VII of the Republic.
For further study, read this brief analysis of the Allegory of the Cave retrieved from http://personal.tcu.edu/jrharris/sample.pdf.
For a further analysis of Socrates’s explanation of the divided line at the very end of Book VI, read this article by John Malcolm “The Line and the Cave,” 1962.
Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy: Preface; Meditations I-II, pp. 1-12 [ [You can find an in-depth analysis of Descartes’s philosophy and more of his work here: The Online Library of Liberty ].
Russell, The Problems of Philosophy: Chapters I-IV [ Russell, Bertrand.The Problems of Philosophy, pp. 5-24]. The entire work can be found online here: Bertrand Russell, The Problems of Philosophy.
Study Guide [supplemental reading]: SparkNotes on Russell’s Problems of Philosophy: Chapter I; Chapter II; Chapter III; Chapter IV.
For general research on any philosophical topic, theme, or major philosopher, here are two excellent online sources:
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Topic 1: Ancient Greece: The Philosophy of Plato and Socrates
I) Q&A: The first topic for the Week 1 discussion is the philosophy of Plato and Socrates. The word-count requirement for each Q&A is loosely set at a minimum of 250 words; however, a Q&A post of fewer than 150 words will receive no credit.
To complete this discussion topic, please start a new thread to post your Topic 1 Q&A in the following format:
My Week 1 Topic 1 discussion question is:
My answer to this question is:
Topic 2: Rationalism & the Philosophy of Descartes
I) Q&A: The second topic for the Week 1 discussion is the philosophy of Descartes [Meditations I & II]. The word-count requirement for each Q&A is loosely set at a minimum of 250 words; however, a Q&A post of fewer than 150 words will receive no credit.
To complete this discussion topic, please remain in the same thread your started for Week 1 Q&A and post your Topic 2 Q&A in the same format:
My Week 1 Topic 2 discussion question is:
My answer to this question is:
**** I’ve added the required files which include readings & power points ***
