Category:PHI 2323 Exam 3
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| Location | HSC 201 |
|---|---|
| Date | Tuesday, December 17, 2019 |
| Time | 14:00–16:00 |
General Questions
How would St. Augustine, Descartes, Nietzsche, or Pope St. John Paul II answer the following questions:
- What is man's origin or cause (if any)?
- What kind of thing is man?
- What is man made up of?
- What is man's goal in life (if any)?
- How does man know things?
Consider how the later thinkers respond to the earlier ones, and how earlier thinkers might respond to later ones. Compare them with Aristotle and Plato.
St. Augustine
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René Descartes
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- a thinking thing (res cogitans)
- Mind and body
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- through intellect, not senses.
Friedrich Nietzsche
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Pope St. John Paul II
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Particular Questions
St. Augustine. Confessions
Book VIII
- How does Augustine view Christianity at the beginning of this book (i.1)?
- What prevents Augustine from converting (i.2, vii.18)?
- Why does Augustine say he has two wills (v.10, ix.21)?
- Why does he describe his will as having different parts (vii.19)?
- Why does Augustine say a man may have many wills (x.24)?
- How do we determine the answer to this question? How do we know that Augustine must hold we have one will (cf. x.23, x.24)? Why does Augustine describe the one will in these ways?
Book X
- Augustine says that "to hear you speaking about oneself is to know oneself" (iii.3). What does he mean by this? How does this claim differentiate Augustine from Plato and Aristotle?
- Describe the "fields and vast palaces of memory" (viii.12–xxv.36); specifically, be able to list and describe the sorts of things that are in our memory, according to Augustine.
- Does Augustine hold we have innate ideas (x.17–xi.18)? How precisely do we recollect them (ibid.)?
- In xxxvi.37, Augustine asks "where in my consciousness, Lord, do you dwell?" but doesn't answer this question until xl.65. Why does Augustine have a lengthy discourse on the state of his virtues and vices before returning to the search for God in his memory?
- In xl.65, what function does God perform in the mind? What reason or reasons might Augustine have for thinking that God plays this role?
Descartes. Meditations on First Philosophy
Letter of Dedication
At the beginning of page 5 (on page 49 of our edition), Descartes distinguishes geometry and philosophy. What can we gather from this distinction about Descartes' aim? Consider Descartes' comparison of his arguments with those of geometry (pg. 4 / pg. 49).
Meditation 1
- Why does Descartes aim to demolish his opinions (pp. 17–18, our edition pg. 59)? What will his procedure be (18/59)?
- Descartes presents a few hypothetical situations that should cause us to doubt that we are sensing anything real at all. Explain them. How does each hypothetical cause more doubt than the one before it?
Meditation 2
- Explain Descartes' claim that the pronouncement "I exist" cannot be doubted, that this opinion alone is "certain and unshaken" after the demolition in the previous meditation (25/63–64)
- Explain Descartes' argument that he is not a rational animal (25–28/64–66). What does Descartes conclude that he is (28/66)? How does he come to these conclusions?
- At the end of Meditation Two, Descartes concludes that "nothing can be perceived more easily and more evidently than my own mind" (34/69). How can Descartes conclude this if sensations seem to present the world in a very clear and distinct way? What is the import of the example of the wax in answering this question (30–33/67–69)?
Meditation 3
- According to Descartes, by what standard can we discern that something is true (35/70)?
- What is Descartes' argument for God's existence (45–47/76–77)?
- origin of the idea of God: only God could implant the idea of God
Meditation 4
- How does Descartes explain the fact that error occurs (55/82; 58–60/84–86);
- Why is Descartes sure that so long as his will "extends only to those matters that the intellect clearly and distinctly discloses to it, it plainly cannot happen that [he] err[s]" (62/87)?
Meditation 5
- What is Descartes' second argument for God's existence (65–67/88–89)?
- The meaning of the idea of God (similar to Anselm's ontological argument)
Meditation 6
- What does the example of the chiliagon show (72–73/92–93)?
- How is it that Descartes can now conclude that "corporeal things exist" (78–80/96–97)?
- How does Descartes describe the body (85/100)? How does he explain the relationship between the mind and the body (85–88/100–102)?
Nietzsche. Beyond Good and Evil
Preface
What would it mean to suppose, as Nietzsche commands us, that "truth is a woman"?
Chapter 1
- What does Nietzsche mean when he asks "WHY NOT RATHER untruth?" What is "the problem of the value of truth" (¶1); and why does Nietzsche state that "[t]he falseness of an opinion is not for us any objection to it" (¶4)? If truth should not be our primary aim, what should it be?
- Is the "will to truth" the primary motivation of philosophers (cf. ¶5–9)? If not, what is their primary motivation? What is the fundamental cause of their philosophies? Consider especially the example of the Stoics (¶9).
- Why are the psychologists wrong to say that "the instinct of self-preservation is cardinal instinct of an organic being" (¶13)? What is the cardinal instinct, and what reasons might Nietzsche have to think it is the cardinal instinct?
- What reason does Nietzsche give us to doubt that "I think" (¶17,19)? What does Nietzsche mean when he says that "our body is a social structure composed of many souls" (ibid.)? Why does he think this?
- What is Nietzsche's critique of the physicists (¶22)? Why is the claim that nature conforms to law "bad philology" (ibid.)?
Chapter 2
- Explain Nietzsche's "semblance theory" of knowledge (¶34).
- How does Nietzsche use this semblance theory to reach the conclusion that "ALL active force … [is] Will to Power" (¶36)?
Chapter 5
Why does Nietzsche think that "systems of morals are only a SIGN-LANGUAGE OF THE EMOTIONS" (¶187,198).
Nietzsche. Thus Spake Zarathustra
Zarathustra's Prologue
- Why is Zarathustra so chummy with the saint ("laughing like schoolboys") if he thinks the saint should know that "God is dead" (2,10)? What do Zarathustra and the saint have in common?
- What is the meaning of the earth (3)? What does Zarathustra mean when he says "remain true to the earth" (ibid.)? What does this tell us about Nietzsche's worldview?
- Describe "the last man" (5).
- Why will Zarathustra "bury [the dead rope dancer] with [his] own hands" (6)?
Part 1
Chapter 1: "The Three Metamorphoses"
Describe and explain the significance of the three metamorphoses in the life of the superman.
Pope St. John Paul II. The Jeweler's Shop
- Consider the Adam's recounting of the Jeweler's monologue in Act 1. What does the Jeweler say about man? What is its philosophical import?
- How does marriage help us understand the nature of man? How does love?
Pope St. John Paul II. Subjectivity and the Irreducible in the Human Being
What is subjectivity? What does it mean to say that man is irreducible? What needs to be added to Aristotle's account of man as "rational animal" and why?
| AUGUSTINE | DESCARTES | NIETZCHE | WOJTYŁA | ----------------------+---------------------+---------------------------+--------------------------------------------------------+---------------------------------------------| origin | God | God | accident/unknowable, but whatever it is, it's material | God | goal | God | God | bring about the superman | God | composition | Body/Soul | Mind/Matter, mostly mind | matter | Objectivity: rational animal | what is man? | image of God | thinking (doubting) thing | conglomeration of desires | Irreducible Subjectivity: independent being | how do we know stuff? | divine illumination | intellect alone | semblance theory | (N/A) |
AUGUSTINE
How does augustine view Christianity at start of Book 1?
Convinced intellectually of its correctness, but unable to bring himself to conversion.
What prevents Augustine from converting?
Corrupted will (explained as "multiple wills") desiring after lust He doesn't want to let go of his former self. "Make me chaste, but not yet"
Why does Augustine say he has two wills?
There is some part of him that desires to do what is good and right, another part of him that wants to do what is wrong. Ultimately argues that he has only one will since he has ownership of both
Why does he describe his will as having different parts?
He opposes the Manichees who believe in multiple wills: they think that when we do wrong, it is not really us, but another will inside us
How do we know that Augustine must hold we have one will?
We praise or blame the person for their actions. If there were multiple wills, then we would not be able to attribute blame. Therefore, a singular person has a singular will. The "multiple wills" argument is meant to describe our disordered desires/inclinations that attract us to sin.
What does Augustine mean by saying, "to hear you speaking about oneself is to know oneself"?
Knowledge of God can lead us to deeper knowledge of the human person since man is the image of God.
How does this claim differentiate Augustine from Plato and Aristotle?
Plato and Aristotle believe we can come to knowledge about man apart from God. In fact, they believe the reverse: that by coming to know ourselves and reality, we may come to know "The Good" (i.e., God)
What sorts of things are in our memory?
* images (phantasms) of past sensation * memories that can be recalled * experiences * learned skills * abstractions (mathematics) * emotion * forgetfulness
According to Augustine, do we have innate ideas?
Yes: already present, but fractured among different parts of mind
How precisely do we recollect them?
sensation starts the process of putting pieces together
Where is God in consciousness? Why the discourse on virtue and vice?
Austine wonders whether he's "good enough" to perceive God in his own mind. i.e., vice prevents us from being able to hear God. He realizes he has God's grace, which means he is "good enough"
What function does God perform in the mind?
Divine illuminator: enables us to know for certain whether something is true Since we aren't unchanging, how can we come to know things that _are_ unchanging? We need God to have clarity of unchanging truths
DESCARTES
What is Descartes' aim?
To rebuild philosophy from the ground up with absolute certainty like the demonstrations that we have about mathematical and geometric truths
MEDITATION I
Why and how does Descartes aim to demolish his opinions?
He wants to find what we know for absolute certain. Opinions can be wrong Goes to root of everything: sensation Senses can deceive us, so get rid of everything we know based on sensation
How does each hypothetical case cause more doubt than the one before it?
What if we are dreaming? - can't trust our senses, but we can trust our mind What if what we know is a deception? - can't trust what we believe to be true What if God is an evil genius? - can't trust our own thought
MEDITATION II
How does Descartes know "I exist"?
He is able to think it the act of thinking this requires the existence of a consciousness that is aware of its own existence
What is man? Why not "rational animal"?
Descartes is unable to determine the meaning of "rational" and "animal" Concludes that man is a "thinking thing" by thinking, he means (DUADWRIS):
* doubting * understanding * affirming * denying * willing * refusing * imagining * sensing
What we know first is what we are; and we first come to know that we exist.
How can Descartes say "nothing can be perceived more easily and more evidently than my own mind" if sensations seem to present the world clearly?
Sensations do not present world clearly: e.g., wax everything we sense about wax changes when heated, yet we still call it wax because our mind can see through the deception Prejudice in senses: e.g., robots on the street wearing clothes we jump to conclusions about what we're sensing and could be wrong Thus knowing something must come from the mind
MEDITATION III
How do we know something is true?
Truth = clarity and distinction
Argument for existence of God (part 1)
Idea of God must originate with God and be placed in us by him. God, a perfect and infinite substance, cannot arise from our imperfect and finite existence
MEDITATION IV
How does Descartes explain the fact that error occurs?
God is infinitely perfect and does not make errors. Errors are our limited understanding because we are finite and cannot understand as God does
Why is Descartes sure that so long as his will "extends only to those matters that the intellect clearly and distinctly discloses to it, it plainly cannot happen that [he] err[s]"?
truth = clarity and distinction intellect arrives at clearly and distinctly ---- intellect arrives at truth truth = not error ---- intellect cannot arrive at error
MEDITATION V
Argument for existence of God (part 2)
Meaning of the idea of God things that exist are more perfect than things that do not exist God is infinitely perfect. ---- God exists
MEDITATION VI
How does Descartes conclude that corporeal things exist?
Something in the mind that perceives sensible things Something outside of self must be producing these sensations If God is perfect and good, then he is not a deceiver Therefore, corporeal things exist
How does Descartes describe the body?
Body is mechanical and material in nature
How does he explain relationship between mind and body?
There must be a connection because the mind seems to pay a lot of attention to the body: e.g., pain We don't idly stand by while arm is chopped off and say "that's nice" Nerves communicate information to the brain mysterious connection between brain and mind
NIETZSCHE
Why is truth a woman?
Difficult to understand and figure out; not clear
CHAPTER 1
"WHY NOT RATHER untruth?"
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