I Day 1 What is philosophy A The love of wisdom or knowledge Intro to Philosophy Notebook i One of the earliest schools of philosophy was Plato s Academy founded circa 370 B C E And is the oldest school of thought known to man a Math Theology Physical Sciences History Linguistics Social Sciences Fine Arts b Theses disciplines eventually branched off into more specific studies of philosophy a the study of the good and of value in general B Philosophy poses questions with competing theories as to what the correct answers to these Debate Rhetoric ii Metaphysics a The study of the nature of reality iii Epistemology a The study of knowledge iv Ethics questions are II Day 2 Knowledge A Propositional knowledge factual knowledge i e g Knowing that today is Wednesday ii e g Knowing that 2x3 6 B Skill knowledge i e g How to ride a bike ii e g How to multiply C Criteria for Propositional Knowledge i A subject S knows that some proposition p is true if and only if a Subject S believes that the proposition p is true b Proposition p really is true c There is some reason that serves as adequate justification or warrant for S s beilef that p is true ii The second criterion is one of the crucial differences between knowledge and mere belief More beliefs can be and often are false A piece of propositional knowledge is never false iii The third criterion is needed to prevent a lucky guess from counting as knowledge It is not enough that one s belief be true one must have been justified in holding the belief in the first place D Propositions beliefs and truth i Whatever else a belief is belief involves accepting a proposition as true ii A proposition is the content of a declarative sentence Two different sentences can express one and the same proposition Consider a My name is Kramer Lindsley b Je m appelle Kramer Lindsley iii Sentence A and B are clearly distinct sentences They aren t even sentences of the same language But they express the some proposition iv Propositions assert that something is the case about the world that some fact or state of affairs obtains in the world v A proposition will be true if and only if what it asserts to be the case about the world is in fact the case That is it will be true if and only if the state of affairs it asserts to obtain actually does obtain Otherwise it will be false vi At any given time a proposition is either true or it is false No proposition can be both true AND false E Two Kinds of Justification i A belief that a proposition P is true may be justified in virtue of the fact that P s truth is self evident a P s truth is self evident if merely in virtue of grasping the content of P a subject S cannot doubt that P is true b An example of of self evidently true propositions First person reports of sense data I seem to see a dagger before me It is important to note that there is a dagger before me is not a self evident proposition even if there seems to be a dagger before me I might after all be hallucinating ii A belief that proposition P is true may be justified in virtue of the fact that P s truth III follows logically from other justified beliefs Day 3 Argumentation A Inductive Arguments POSSIBLY true i James is a man Premise ii Most men like sports iii JAMES likes sports B Deductive Arguments ABSOLUTELY true i All men are mortal Premise ii Socrates is a man iii Socrates is mortal IV Some Random Grad Student Notes A Existing i Actually exists Possible ii Could not have failed to exist necessary Anselm B Non Existing i Could have existed but doesn t Possible ii Could not have existed and doesn t impossible C A Priori Knowledge i Self evident ii i e 2 2 4 bachelors are unmarried men iii Basis for deductive arguments D A Posetriori Knowledge i Knowledge from sensory experience ii i e bachelors are happy to be single kind of a poor example so let s change it hm how about if you touch a hot stove you gonna burn yoself i God is the being than which nothing greater can be conceived Ontological Onsome iii Basis for inductive arguments E The Reconstructed Ontological Argument Awesome It s awesome when they exist ii Deductively valid and wholly a priori iii Reductio Ad Absurdum a Reduced to absurdity iv When having something that makes it better than POSSIBLY having it a Right Not right It s all relative b Things that are good are BETTER when they exist c Things that are bad are WORSE when they exist v Question Begging circular Argument vi Normal Concept a Possible beings ACTUAL beings God has to be possible Nothing can be merely possible merely possible b magicians Houdini Penn Teller Merlin vii Existential Concept a involves essentially the notion of existence Magicans EXISTING magicians F The Cosmological Argument i Relative definition of God uncaused causer first mover independent being ii Premise There must be an explanation for the existence of any being and an explanation for the obtaining of any fact iii Principal of Sufficient Reasoning iv Four versions see Wordsmiths packet v Only establish that there is at least one of these god like beings a Created the possibility that there might be more than this one God vi Deductive deductively valid a a posteriori b If all premises are true the conclusions must be true Premise 1 version 1 There are things which are in motion Premise 1 version 2 There are beings which did not exist previously but which come into existence at a certain point in time Premise 1 version 3 There are entities whose existence in contingent that come into existence at a particular time and go out of existence at a particular time Premise 1 version 4 There are dependent beings beings which would not have existed and had the properties that they in fact have if something else had not existed Premise 2 version 1 Everything which is in motion must be set in motion by something distinct from itself or must be a self mover Premise 2 version 2 Everything which comes into existence at some point in time must be caused to exist by something distinct from itself nothing can be its own cause since it would have to exist prior to its own existence in order to be able to cause itself to come into existence Premise 2 version 3 If every being were contingent in this sense there would be a time at which nothing exists Premise 2 version 4 Every being which exists is either a dependent vii The Principle of Sufficient Reason PSR a Premise 3 version 3 If there were a time at which nothing existed nothing would ever come to exist since everything that
View Full Document
Unlocking...