The Philosophy Club

The Philosophy Club is on. The president of the club is Margo Gignac from T,R 11:15am class. Other positions are being filled right now. If you're interested in participating let me or Margo know. Act now!

Right to die

An Australian quadriplegic who won a landmark legal battle to starve himself to death by refusing food died on Monday, his family said, ending an existence he described as a "living hell".

Domestic violence around the world

How do you fight domestic violence? How to convince an abuser that what he does is wrong?

Religion and engineering

An interesting conference about the origin of religions by philosopher Dan Dennet for TED. 
Dennet sees religion as a powerful and highly adaptable social institution. His idea is to teach an unbiased, factual History of World Religions in schools all over America. His goal? Watch and learn.

Link for "Doing Philosophy"

Check out the link for our textbook, Doing Philosophy. I'd like you to start fiddling with the quizzes for Chapter 1 and 7 (with different sections). They have flashcards and all sort of interactive tools.

The test is multiple choice and a truth-and-false section. Remember to bring your own scantrons 48TMS (rectangular, with 5 questions per row) to our exam. They have it in two colors, red and teel. 

How to study for my test? You should make flash cards. Write down each concept in a card. Separating concepts is better for memorization. When you are done with all our definitions, then suffle the cards and try to memorize the definitions.

The comment box is open in case you have questions. 

Important stuff

Assignment #1 (All PHI classes)

 

Suppose you believe "X" (which happens to be important for you). (a) Do you care if you have a justification for it? (b) Do you care if "X" is true? In your answer, try to think of a real-life example.


How about (more important) topics, such as euthanasia, death penalty, marijuana legalization, prostitution, torture, stem cell research, global warming, gay marriage, etc?

Phi 2010 T, 5:40-8:10pm

Phi 2010 TR, 11:15am

Phi 2010 TR, 9:50am

Phi 2010 MWF, 11am

Phi 2010 MWF, 9am

How light enters the brain via eyes (very detailed video)

We discussed secondary qualities. The red apple. Redness is not in the apple's surface. Red happens in the brain as a result of a very complicated process. 

Here is an approximate conversion of anstrom (wavelegnth) to color:

Ultraviolet - Shorter than 3,770 K. units.
Violet - From 3,770 to 4,300 K. units.
Blue - From 4,300 to 4,550 K. units.
Blue Green - From 4,550 to 4,850 K. units.
Green - From 4,850 to 5,400 K units.
Yellow - From 5,400 to 5,900 K. units.
Orange - From 5,900 to 6,300 K. units.
Red - From 6,300 to 7,550 K. units.
Infrared - More than 7,700 K. units.

What's a true belief?

A belief is (a mental state), something one takes to be the case. If someone believes "X" he/she generally believes that "X" is true. But it turns that my believing "X" doesn't make "X" true. The link between belief and truth is knowledge: B-------------K----------- Truth

Beliefs are sometimes divided into core beliefs (those which you may be actively thinking about) and dispositional beliefs (those which you may ascribe to but have never previously thought about). For example, if asked "do you believe tigers eat grass?" a person might answer that they do not, despite the fact they may never have thought about this situation before.

The main problem in epistemology is to understand exactly what is needed in order for us to have knowledge. In a notion derived from Plato's dialogue Theaetetus, philosophy has traditionally defined knowledge as justified true belief. (the justification is necessary. It shows that our belief is more than a lucky guess. A sort of "warrant."

The relationship between belief and knowledge is that a belief is knowledge if the belief is true, and if the believer has a justification (reasonable and necessarily plausible assertions/evidence/guidance) for believing it is true.


A false belief is not considered to be knowledge, even if it is sincere. A sincere believer in the flat earth theory does not know that the Earth is flat.  Now, Let's define truth.

Correspondence Theory of Truth: Truth is a fact. “Snow is white.” Facts are obvious. But what happens when you don't have the facts?

Pragmatic Theory of Truth: Truth is what best does the job at hand.

According to pragmatism, truth is a process of inquiry. A crime investigation requires a good inference process, we get to the truth by a process of trial & error. The best our explanations and inferences become, the closer we get to the truth. We get more truth as we go along. as I said in class, 20% of truth is better than nothing. Coherence theory of truth: Truth is what best coheres with the rest of our knowledge.

Global warming

Via Wilson Tique, a very interesting documentary about global warming.

Where is the juice?

 

We had an interesting discussion about wine on Friday. Some of you seem to indicate that one has all the right in the world not to like Clos de los Siete (above), a wine you can buy for about $15. I agree.

Now, while our preference for wine is somewhat subjective, there must be something in the Clos de los Siete, 2007, that is beyond a -mere- subjective opinion on my part. Namely, the quality of the juice itself. This is –ultimately- what decides the difference between a good and a mediocre wine.

What makes "good wine" good? A good combination of terroir, viticulture and vinification.

1- Terroir addresses the the influence of the place where the grapes are grown. Variations in factors, such as micro-climate (topography), soil properties (drainage and water availability, but possibly also chemical differences). The right viticulture: Yield is very important, this is how many grapes are grown per hectare of land; it is quoted in hectoliters per hectare e.g. 50 hl/ha. For example, fewer grape bunches per vine the more intense their flavor will be. At the very best vineyards yields can be as low as 30hl/ha, e.g. top quality Burgundy, as opposed to around 100hl/ha for non-quality wines, e.g. Liebfraumilch. The right vinification: Grapes must be made into wine as soon after they have been picked as possible, because contact with air causes oxidization, which spoils their flavor. Understanding the effects of air, as well as temperature control during fermentation have been breakthroughs in modern wine-making techniques. It can work in art as well. 

So whereas one is entitled to say "Triff, I hate Clos de los Siete", saying  "Clos de los Siete is a bad wine" is simply not true. 

Thrown, dropped, mutilated, and ground-up alive

Is the food we eat that cheap?

Check out this interesting article in TIME MAGAZINE about the kind of food we eat. It boils down to a thought experiment: Is it worth spending so many resources to raise animals for food, when doing so is more detrimental in the long run?

Somewhere in Iowa, a pig is being raised in a confined pen, packed in so tightly with other swine that their curly tails have been chopped off so they won't bite one another. To prevent him from getting sick in such close quarters, he is dosed with antibiotics. The waste produced by the pig and his thousands of pen mates on the factory farm where they live goes into manure lagoons that blanket neighboring communities with air pollution and a stomach-churning stench. He's fed on American corn that was grown with the help of government subsidies and millions of tons of chemical fertilizer. When the pig is slaughtered, at about 5 months of age, he'll become sausage or bacon that will sell cheap, feeding an American addiction to meat that has contributed to an obesity epidemic currently afflicting more than two-thirds of the population. And when the rains come, the excess fertilizer that coaxed so much corn from the ground will be washed into the Mississippi River and down into the Gulf of Mexico, where it will help kill fish for miles and miles around. That's the state of your bacon — circa 2009.

Black holes

Possible destruction of the universe?

From Techfreep: By accelerating protons toward each other at 99.999999% the speed of light the LHC can recreate conditions similar to those that resulted from the Big Bang, ultimately alighting a great deal about the particles and forces that comprise our Universe. A press release from CERN better illuminates their intent for the project. Another interesting article in Radiant Reality.

Dark Rosted Blend has very good photographs. It quotes some additional material worth speculating.

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CERN's main function is to provide the particle accelerators and other infrastructure needed for high-energy physics research.

Are you interested in possibilities?

I wanted to tell you that logical possibility is a subset of a wider kind known as subjunctive possibilities. Basically, subjunctive possibilities express wishes, commands, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity, or statements that are contrary to fact at present.

So, we have:

*Logical possibility is usually considered the broadest sort of possibility; a proposition is said to be logically possible if there is no logical contradiction involved in its being true. "Dick Cheney is a bachelor" is logically possible, though in fact false.

* Metaphysical possibility is either equivalent to logical possibility or narrower than it. For instance, "Water is H2O" is metaphysically necessary but not logically necessary.

* Nomological possibility is a possibility under the actual laws of nature. Most philosophers since David Hume have held that the laws of nature are metaphysically contingent -i.e., that there could have been different natural laws than the ones that actually obtain. If so, then it would not be logically or metaphysically impossible, for example, for you to travel to Alpha Centauri in one day; it would just have to be the case that you could travel faster than the speed of light. But of course there is an important sense in which this is not possible; given that the laws of nature are what they are, there is no way that you could do it.

* Temporal possibility is a possibility given the actual history of the world. Barack Obama could have chosen a degree in Accounting rather than Law, but there is an important sense in which he cannot do it now. So, the "could have" expresses the fact that there is no logical, metaphysical impossibility involved in Obama's having a degree in Accounting instead of Law; the "cannot now" expresses the fact that that possibility is no longer open, given that the past is as it actually is.

Laws of nature and origins of the universe

As per our discussion last week about laws of nature, read here. I think the most important laws are conservation laws, mass energy equivalence, and chemical laws, such as chemical equilibrium, First Law and Second Law of thermodynamics, and what is known as Classical Electromagnetism.

As per how these laws can change (a point one of you suggested in class), read this Wikipedia article:

Experiments and observations suggest that the Universe has been governed by the same physical laws and constants throughout its extent and history. The dominant force at cosmological distances is gravity and general relativity is currently the most accurate theory of gravitation.

I think for the sake of our future discussions it would be a good idea to check out the origins of the universe. Here is a PBS presentation entitled NOVA. Click "launch interactive."

What's the age of the universe? Click here for a brief discussion of the time-line of cosmology.

Important note for Summer A&B and Summer B classes

Below you find reviews for Final Exam for two different classes: Summer B and Summer A&B.
Summer A&B have chapters 5 & 6. Summer B have chapters 4 & 5. If you have any questions, I'll leave the comment-box open.

Summer B Topics for Final Exam (2009)

Review for Chapter 4

1. Numerical identity: two people are identical if they are one and the same. The idea of "individuality" = indivisibility. Qualitative Identity: Two people are identical if they share same qualities.
Animalism: Sort of "I'm my body." We are embodied, bodies being crucial for our physical interactions. C/E Locke's Tale of the Prince and the Cobbler, Siamese Twins. Also with the phenomenon of "transgender" (the transgender rejects his/her body for a different one, i.e. "I was born in the wrong body" is the claim).
2. Memory Theory. "I'm my memories." a- Direct memory, indirect memory. C/E Circularity in Locke's theory.
3. Psychological Continuity Theory: Real memory, apparent memory, quasi-memory. Psychological connectedness. C/E: Parfit's Teletransportation Machine: If Parfit dies, Parfit (the copy) is psych. continuous with the original and has a similar body (remember that it is not really the same body, i.e., Parfit is only numerically identical to himself). One implication at the end of 4.2 is this: Is identity a necessary condition for survival? The answer is no.
5. Brain Theory: "I'm my psyche caused and realized in my brain." C/A: Split Brains, Parfit’s Division (in this case Parfit's surviving brothers are psych with Parfit and have similar bodies being that they are twins). The experiment shows that one can be psyhc identical to someone else in the same brain (each brother share Parfit's half-brain hemisphere).
6. Identity and what matters in survival and responsibility.
7. Self as "process." Character. What's character? The consistency of behavior through time. An interesting summary on Personal Identity here.

Chapter 5
1. Subjective Absolutism: The view that what makes an action right is that one approves of it; Counterarguments: (a) By "Logical contradiction" we mean that two opposing arguments cannot be right at the same time, and (b)impossibility of moral disagreements (one can only agree with the absolutist and the reason is that he believes he's the ONLY ONE THAT'S RIGHT). 2. Subjective Relativism: What makes an action right is that it is approved by that person. Counterarguments (same as above). You must be able to tell the difference between the (the absolutist thinks she's the only one that's right, whereas the subjective relativist believes that many people can disagree and still be right at the same time) absolutist and the subjective relativist.
3. Cultural relativism: The doctrine that what makes an action right is that it's approved by that culture. Counterarguments: (a) Logical contradiction (see above), impossibility for moral disagreements and (b) differences between deep values (moral values, i.e., human behavior of fundamental consequence for human welfare) and superficial values (domestic habits, etiquette, fashion, etc) other cultural values to the effect that most cultures seem to share the same deep moral values.
4. Logical Structure of Moral Arguments: Moral standards + factual beliefs = Moral judgments (this is not a formula, just an approximation). What is a factual belief? A belief held by factual evidence (i.e., child abuse is wrong because of the facts we know about psychology, human rights, child development, etc,).
5. Are there universal moral principles? YES! 1- Principle of mercy (Unnecessary suffering is wrong) and 2- Principle of justice (Treat equals equally).

Section 5.2.
Difference between consequentialist theories and formalist theories. Consequentialism is the theory that judges the rightness or wrongness of an action in terms of its consequences. Formalism is the theory that judges the rightness or wrongness of an action in terms of the action's form (i.e., "killing is wrong": the formalist believes that moral actions are objective).
2. Ethical egoism: What makes an action right is that it promotes one's best interest in the long run = PRUDENCE. Counterarguments: (a) Egoist's motivations (if known, the egoist's intentions seem to betray reversibility principle). (b) Egoism is not a socially or politically cogent theory (i.e., you would not vote for an egoist in office).
3. Act Utilitarianism: What makes an action right is that it maximizes happiness everyone considered (which means, "bringing happiness for the greatest majority of people"). Counterarguments: (a) Mc Closkey’s informant (b) Brandt’s Heir, (c) Ross' unhappy promise, (d) Goodwin's Fire Rescue. In each one of these cases one has violated principles of justice, duty and equality.
4. Rule Utilitarianism: What makes an action right is that it falls under a rule that if generally followed would maximize happiness everyone considered. RU is a better theory than AU. Why? Because if applied, it can solve the problems posed by the previous counterarguments.Section
5.3.1. Kant’s Categorical Imperative: What makes an action right is that everyone can act on it (which yields universalizability), and you'd have everyone acting on it (which yields reversibility: Golden Rule)
2. Kant's Second Formulation: TREAT PEOPLE AS ENDS AND NEVER AS MEANS TO AN END. Problems with the second formulation: Problem of exceptions: Some times we have to treat people as means to ends: Broad's Typhoid Man.
Pluralistic Formalism: What makes an action right is that it falls under the highest ranked duty in a given situation.
3. Ross’ Prima Facie Duties. Actual duties: One that must be performed in a particular situation. Prima Facie Duty: A duty that must be performed unless it conflict with a more important duty. You must know hierarchy and each one of these duties as I explained in class: 1- Justice, 2- fidelity and 3- reparation being the first three, because they explain out the remaining ones: beneficence, non-maleficence, gratitude, self-improvement.
4. Why is Pluralistic Formalism better than Kantian theory? Because it allows for exceptions.

Thanks

We had a nice party last night. Thanks for the empanadas, tiramisu, cakes, brownies, risotto, chicken wings, cheeses, bread, quiche and coffee. Keep in touch and have a nice summer.

Your turn #4: Update, Update2 Update 3 (last post, closes next Tuesday) keep it going-growing

Today: Zen techniques, "talking silence" (John Cage's 4:33), "the fool," (think of Arlecchino, Lazarillo, from Simplicius, Scapin, Melville's deaf-mute, to Felix Krull and Erasmus' The Praise of Folly), "doing poetry" (from the poet as "possessed" [manikos] in the same sense as the Pythia at Delphi), "doing nothing" (read: doing the laundry), etc. Anyone can be a master, Zen is nothing special. See you this Thursday for the final exam and later, dinner, chez moi. By the way, here is a review of Just Another Love Story (the Danish movie we talked about in class).
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Today: poesis as antidote for unproductive lives, The Art of War: Sun Tsu's meaning of "force," winning without fighting, contrarian philosophy, Tao's cycles, strategy, suntsuian "complete victory," Chuang-Tzu's dream thought experiment (or "how to connect verbal subjunctive with travel in parallel realities"), levels of insult, "the impossible is possible" as chuang-tzuian poetry, Tzu's "leveling of all things into ONE," Who is crippled?
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Since we only have a week left, let's make this post more ambitious and include Taoism (up to the post below on wu-wei), even if it means making your comments a little more comprehensive. Feel free to comment on Confucianism or Taoism or -better- both.
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I enjoyed our last discussion because of its socio-political dimension. Confucianism's social project strikes me as a sort of communitarianism. The jūnzǐ suggest a middle-point between individuality and community. Each one of us -as individuals- is embedded. “Li” is the social bond, a proto-ethical set of habits that translate as civility, the cohesion needed to foster individual happiness. Aristotle would agree with Confucius that personal fulfillment (eudaimonia) cannot exist without a community. Can “li” become petrified? Certainly, but this is no fault of its original purpose, not at least if “shu” is properly applied. Go ahead.

D.T. Suzuki's Zen

From Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki's Essays on Zen Buddhism


Zen is the art of seeing into the nature of one's own being. It points the way from bondage to freedom. By making us drink right from the fountain of life, it liberates us from all the yokes under which we finite beings are usually suffering in this world. We can say that Zen liberates all the energies properly and naturally stored in each of us, which are in ordinary circumstances cramped and distorted so that they find no adequate channel for activity. 2- This body of ours is something like an electric battery in which a mysterious power latently lies. When this power is not properly brought into operation, it either grows moldy and withers away or is warped and expresses itself abnormally. It is the object of Zen, therefore, to save us from going crazy or being crippled. This is what I mean by “freedom,” giving free play to all the creative and benevolent impulses inherently lying in our hearts.

(Read more)

War within

Je suis en guerre contre moi-même. Cette guerre... terrifiante et pénible, mais en même temps je sais que c’est la vie... donc je ne peux pas dire que j’assume cette contradiction, mais je sais aussi que c’est ce qui me laisse en vie, et me fait poser la question, justement: “Comment apprendre à vivre?”

(I am at war with myself... a terrible, pitiful war... that’s life. But I cannot say that I can solve that contradiction; although it is this riddle that keeps me alive and moves me to bring forth the question: How can one learn to live?).-- Jacques Derrida
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With a little help from Derrida's quote above, let's take Sun-Tzu's Taoist strategy of battle inside of ourselves. It's the endless struggle of becoming...

Please, tomorrow, bring the Tao Te Ching

Confucianism

Confucius molded Chinese civilization in general and judging by the Analects, one can see that he exerted great influence on Chinese philosophical development. There is a humanistic tendency in Confucius’ thought; he did not care to talk about spiritual beings or even about life after death. Instead, he believed that we can make the Way (Tao) great. Confucius concentrated on man. 

His primary concern is a good society based on good government and harmonious human relations. Confucius believed in the perfectibility of all men and in this connection he radically modified a traditional concept, that of the “superior man” or chün-tzu. One can broadly sum up Confucius system in a handful of principles: 

1- T’ien (or heaven) is purposive, the master of all things. Tian is immanent: “Heaven sees through the eyes of the people, Heavens listens through the ears of the people.” Not necessarily anthropomorphic but anthropogenic, T'ien is embodied in the people and exemplified by the people. Heaven is a principle and that relates to human as that of part/whole relationship. 2- The Mandate of Heaven or T’ien-Ming consists of a Supreme Being who institutes a moral principle which then operates all by itself. That’s the principle of Heaven, T’ien Tao (later on called T’ien-li).

2- Jen (also pronounced as “ren” means indistinctly, altruism, humanity and fairness and appears more than 100 times in the Analects. Jen requires compassion. 

3- “Do not impose to others what you don’t want.” This is a negative form of the Golden Rule, which is essential in Confucianism. “If you want to establish yourself, establish others. If you want to promote yourself, promote others.” To be able to apply the golden rule one has to follow a method, 

4- “Shu,” which means to be empathetic, i.e., to be able to understand the circumstances. Shu necessitates 

5- “Xue” or learning. Not an achievement verb, but rather a stronger sense of affecting oneself whether by improving one’s sensitivity, understanding or ability. With “xue’ one appropriates what’s learned, a process of becoming transforming. Xue is accompanied by 

6- “Si,” that is, reflecting. “Learning without thinking, one will be perplexed, thinking without learning, one will be in peril.” (A, 2:15). 

7- The Doctrine of the Mean or “Zhong-Yong.” It means centrality, not to be “one-sided.” It doesn’t mean staying in the middle regardless or no matter what. The idea is to stay between two vices, not between excellence and vice. “Excess is as bad as deficiency.” (A, 20:1). One very important element in Confucianism is the idea of 

8- Li which is the idea of ritual propriety. Li can be seen as the embodiment of refinement that rules one’s life. If jen is the internal quality that makes a person an authentic person, then li is the body of external behavior that allows jen to be manifested and applied publicly. When li is properly performed, it becomes "yi,” a word that can be translated as righteousness. Li provides the fabric of social order. It’s the proper social behavior of a person embedded in a community of equals. Li is also a vital constituent of education: Humans are like raw materials, they need to be carved, chiseled, grounded and polished to become authentic individuals. By doing li one learns and instills oneself in the practice of li. 

Finally, there’s an aesthetic dimension to the cultivation of li. Elegance and aptness has a beauty to it, i.e., the cultivation of oneself that is expressed through the individual’s actions.