Welcome to the discussion board accompanying the Introduction to Philosophy course at HSMSE. From time to time I will post questions (prompts) on this blog for you to think about. It will be your responsibility to respond to ONE POST PER WEEK. (Additional posts will be worth extra credit!) Feel free to comment on the responses of your classmates, but only after posting an original response. (In other words, respond directly to the prompt and then comment on other responses.)
Here are some suggestions for how to respond to prompts:
- Clarify a question
- Ask your own question about the prompt (make sure to explain WHY your question is important)
- Outline the argument in a way that makes it easier to understand
- Point out a problem in the argument
- Provide a solution to a posed problem
- Expound on a point made in the prompt
When commenting on your classmates' responses, please remember to make your comments in the spirit of academic discussion. The purpose of academic discussion is to help EVERYONE better understand an issue. As such, it is absolutely unacceptable to make ad
hominem attacks (attacks on a person) in your comments. Of course, it is perfectly acceptable to disagree with someone, but make sure that your comments relate to specific ideas or thoughts in the post. It is a good idea to ask yourself why you are making a comment before you do so. If your answer is, "to help the class better understand the issue," than it is likely that your comments are in the spirit of academic discussion. If your answer is, "to belittle my classmate," or "to show everyone what an idiot my classmate really is," than your thoughts should be kept to yourself.
FINALLY, as a way of demonstrating that you have read this post and in order to assure that there are no technical difficulties responding to posts, please write a short response (3-5 sentences) to ONE of the three questions below.
- What was the most interesting part of the first three days of Philosophy class?
- What surprised you about philosophy class (good or bad)?
- What do you hope to learn by the end of philosophy class? (I am NOT looking for a mere list of philosophers!)
Happy posting!
17 comments:
3. What do you hope to learn by the end of philosophy class?
What I hope to learn at the end of this course is how to observe and question the world around us. As well as obtaining a better understading about how philosphers think, and the method they used to question certain aspects of life. This also includes how they attained unique thoughts about situations exsiting to day. I would also prefer to be educated on the history behind philiosphy, and its origion. Finally, I hoped further my knowledge on some of the major topics being discussed amoungst philosophers currently.
What surprised you about philosophy class (good or bad?
I only have good things to say about my favorite class, of course. I think what surprised me the most was how good I felt on the first day of school just exploring the thought of philosophy. I already knew that Philosophy was going to be an exciting subject, I just didn't think the ideas would flow from me as easily as it did. It was really interesting that we had an open discussion and that anyone who wanted to share an idea would be able to if they were to speak up. I wish more people did speak up, though - it would've made the discussion livelier. I suppose they were just shy, and hopefully that changes! I thought Mr. Wille was excited about math when I had him last year, but it seems that he likes philosophy more than that, and that's pretty cool. I found it a bit surprising that he was bouncing up and down on the first day like an excited kid. I didn't think he was THAT much into it.
I'm pretty excited about this semester.
What was the most interesting part of the first three days of Philosophy class?
Well, the most interesting part of the first three days was actually asking myself what philosophy was, because i never did before. And when I actually did, i found myself actually exploring my mind a lot more than usual. I guess I never really had a formal philosophy lesson, and it was actually pretty cool to think so hard about something and come up with an answer. Its really cool to have a teacher that lets you think for yourself, not just tell you things, and have you challenge your own opinions so you can actually think about the subject, not just sit there and take notes. I guess this is pretty exciting to me because I've never really had an exposure to that kind of environment before. Not to mention its fun to say "wille."
I'm looking forward to a great semester.
What surprised you about philosophy class (good or bad)?
What suprised me about philosophy class was the way we "tackled" or took on the concept of philosophy. In my old middle school, i had a few classmates who discussed their own philosophies with and what they accepted in the world. One classmate, who's an agnostic, says that isn't sufficient evidence to prove, verify, or whatever other word, the existence of God, and that the only way to find out was to wait and see. My other classmate, who's and athiest, believes that just because there isn't sufficient evidence that it means that God doesn't exist at all. At the different times they had they had there discussions, they would always be giving good arguements, even though most of the arguments i don't even remember, i began to take in the different information and experience and tried to mold all of it together into my own, unique, which seems kind of impossible. The way i saw us "tackling" the concept of philosophy was with a class, and what also suprised me was the size of the class. Looking at how most, not all, of my classmates last year didn't seem to be interested in philosophy, the size of the class suprised me, even for a small class like ours.
Well, i guess that's it.
What surprised me about Philosophy class was there were so many different takes on the subject's concept. I think we already began the process of Philosophy just by trying to define it. Philosophy is a great subject because there is no right or wrong answer, no limits to how deeply one can reflect on an idea or topic. Philosophy is just our basic thought process in it's raw stage. I can't wait to continue to learn about Philosophy.
The most interesting thing about Philosophy class was learning about fallacies. I found it interesting learning about the different kinds of arguments people use that are fallacious, and realizing how some are used in real life. The most interesting type of argument to me was the "Strawman" argument, exaggerating a point made by your opponent and then stating how it's wrong. I found this interesting because of how it's being used right now in the health care debate, with the side who wants health care reform arguing their point, and the other side finding things in their propositions and blowing them way out of proportion, creating a strawman.
(Fahmida)
2. What surprised you the most about philosophy class (good or bad)?
- What surprised me the most about philosophy class is to understand to know what it is to DO philosophy. Before, I only thought philosophy was to think from a different perspective on different aspects of life, and to share wisdom. To make a long story short, the thing that surprised me most was the many things i did after finding out what philosophy was.
What was the most interesting part of the first three days of Philosophy class?
I'd say the most interesting part was making posters with other classmates. It gave us a chance to learn a little something about our other classmates and how to work together with them. I probably should've written more or something a little more philosophical, but I believe this works fairly well.
-Louis
What was the most interesting part of the first three days of Philosophy class?
i really like the drawing part. i think that it was really fun, and it sparked a lot of creativity in the class, and also made everyone feel more energetic and stuff. i also like the group work and stuff and i like when u talk about the history stuff
Patrick Jedrysek
•What do you hope to learn by the end of philosophy class?
By the end of philosophy class I hope to complete one of the 2 aims we had which was: How do we study philosophy. The first time I heard this question, I was amazed by its simplicity and yet couldn't find myself to being able to answer. Another thing that has peaked my curiousity is the argument we had with fallacies and that opened my mind to a lot of the fallacies we experience everyday.
The first three days of philosophy have been fun. The most interesting part of these first three day would be the sharing of the fallacies in class. It was funny to see how other teams described each fallacy. What surprised me about philosophy is how much philosophy has to do with history, which is a good thing. By the end of philosophy class, I hope to learn how philosophy changes interacts with our dialy life and how much of an impact it has on our lives
What do you hope to learn by the end of philosophy class?
I find this philosophy class very interesting and I hope to learn a lot by the end of the class. There are several things in wish to learn. One thing that I wish to learn by the end of the class is the origin of philosophy. I find it important that in order to know and to do philosophy, one needs to know where and when it came from. Another thing I wish to learn is to be able to do philosophy and be able to see the real truth of things and to not make fallacies.
What do you hope to learn by the end of philosophy class? (I am NOT looking for a mere list of philosophers!)
Man all Im trying to learn is what is acually the truth of the world and all things in it.
I want to know how it affects our lives.
I just dont want to leave this class feeling like i learned nothing at all or at least finding nothing out about the truth...and maybe also some falaceis and truth arguments to mess with some teachers :]
What was the most interesting part of the first three days of Philosophy class?
The interesting part of the class is how we are actually learning how to "do" philosophy. Learning how to think and see things differently. Not just reading some papers and answer questions, but think about the meanings under the words. Also I love the class discussions. People talk about their ideas and others agree or disagree on it. It makes me feel like we are all philosophers.
-Candy Lin.
What was the most interesting part of the first three days of Philosophy class?
Easily the most interesting part of the three days of philosophy was the discussion on truth. For the first time I realized that there is very little truth in my life. What I thought were truths were simply mere beliefs. However thankfully, it is philosophy that makes an attempt to find and expose truths.
-Santi
What was the most interesting part of the first three days of Philosophy class?
The most interesting part of philosophy in the last three days was definitely the exploration of fallacies. Even though i had a general idea what a fallacy was, i never saw how much of a threat it was to the " love of knowledge". This has led me to be more reluctant in accepting an argument as true because it seems more reasonable.
What surprised you about philosophy class (good or bad)?
What surprised me in philosophy class was how quickly we got into discussing about philosophy and started having passages about philosophy. The liitle booklet "The Trial and Death of Socrates" by Plato was a big surpise to me. It is authentic to the concept of philosophy and, its incredible that we get to keep the booklets.
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