Book Office Hours Appointments HERE

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Tentative Course Schedule:

(Please Note: I am providing this tentative course schedule merely as a courtesy. It should not be construed as a commitment to keep strictly to the plan outlined below.

 

 

Week 1:  Introduction, Early Greek Philosophy

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Day 1    Introduction to course -  What is Philosophy? What are the origins of Philosophy?   In class exercise and discussion.  (Identify a philosophical question, Choose favorite section of Voices of Ancient Philosophy)

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Day 2    Parmenides Poem on your own. How will you find the poem?  In class exercise and discussion.  (Where do the ideas of Greek/Roman Philosophy come from?)

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Supplementary reading:  Bernard Williams "Why Philosophy Needs History"

 

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Week 2  Sources, Doxography and the Presocratics I:  The Milesians, Xenophanes

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Day 1:  Parmenides Poem on your own. How will you find the poem?  In class exercise and discussion.  (Where do the ideas of Greek/Roman Philosophy come from?)

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Readings for Day 2:

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a. Shields preface ix-xii & Chpt 1 pp. 1-9  

b. Curd Introduction, pp. 1-22 and pp. 31-38;

c. SEP links on Pre-Socratics and Doxography

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Day 2: Are we studying the ideas of the actual people? What counts as the text? How to have fun.     Begin The Milesians & Xenophanes

 

 

 

 

 

 

Week 3:  Eleatics Change and Multiplicity; Being and Unity

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Readings for Week 3:  

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a. Curd pp. 39-72

b. Shields pp.  9-20

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Day 1  Continue the Milesians & Xenophanes   Begin: The Presocratics II:  Heraclitus, 

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Day 2  The Presocratics II:  Parmenides

 

 

 

 

 

Week 4 -- Parmenides' Assault on a posteriori Knowledge and Zeno's Paradoxes

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Readings:  

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a. Curd pp. 39-72

b. Shields pp.  9-20

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Day 1    Parmenides Continued

 

Day 2   Parmenides, Zeno if there is time  (How to read Plato)

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Week 5 --  Sophists & the Challenges for Philosophy; Socrates

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2/18 Day 1 

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Parmenides, Zeno if there is time  (How to read Plato)

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Readings for Day 2: 

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a. Curd fragments on Protagoras pp.145-148,

b. Plato's Protagoras 309a-328d (Cooper's Collected works see syllabus or google drive week 4)

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2/20 Day 2    Protagoras and Plato's Protagoras

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Week 6  Exam and Plato’s Project

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PAPER #1 DUE MONDAY OVER EMAIL

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ASSIGN Exam 1  Covering the Presocratics and Socrates

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Readings for Day 1:

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a. Euthyphro, Meno 70-80d, and re-visit Protagoras reading (Elenctic method vs. Sophistic Method, Protagoras’ Conventional Morality vs. Socrates’ Revisionism, Hedonism and Ethics, Knowledge and Techne (the Skill Analogy))

b. Shields 35 -59

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2/25  Day 1   What are Socrates' main philosophical contributions?

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Reading for Day 2:  Read Plato's Gorgias as a class

2/27   Day 2  Socrates in the Gorgias

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Week 7: Plato on Knowledge and Explanation

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3/4  Day 1  Continue Reading Plato's Gorgias

 

3/6   Day 2 Meno 80d-100 & Phaedo 57-90  Two Accounts of Recollection

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Week 8:  Plato on Knowledge and Explanation

 

Day 1   Meno 80d-100 & Phaedo 57-90  Two Accounts of Recollection  Phaedo  91-118  Forms in the Phaedo & The Hypothetical Method

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Short paper #2 assigned

 

 

Day 2     Phaedo  91-118  Forms in the Phaedo & The Hypothetical Method; Shields Pp 68-82

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Exam 1 Due

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Week 9:  Plato’s Republic

 

Day 1 Transitioning to the Republic; The Forms and Western Culture. Helmut Heit, Jude Dougherty and Susan Bordo.  In class reflections and discussions. Republic 1-2 The Challenge of the Republic

 

 

Day 2 Transitioning to the Republic; The Forms and Western Culture. Helmut Heit, Jude Dougherty and Susan Bordo.  In class reflections and discussions.

 

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Week 10:    SPRING BREAK    

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Week 11:   The Move to Virtue

 

Day 1    Republic 1-2 The Challenge of the Republic & Begin Bk 3 Education and Virtue

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Day 2   Republic4, 6-7 Education and Higher Education

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Short Paper #2 Assigned

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Week 12 Transitioning to Aristotle

 

Day 1 Plato’s   Parmenides  Finishing Plato, moving to Aristotle

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Day 2   Parmenides & Begin Aristotle's Categories (cont)

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Week 13:   Aristotle on Being and Nature        

 

Day 1   Intro to Aristotle, Categories  Short Paper #3 assigned

 

Day 2   Physics  2.1-3  Nature and the Four Causes

 

 

 

 

Week 14:  Aristotle on Luck and the Automatic; Begin Happiness and Virtue

 

Day 1  Physics 2.4-9 Luck and the Automatic, Hypothetical Necessity

 

Day 2   EN Bk. 1 & 2 & 6

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Week 15:  Hellenistic Philosophy

 

Day 1  Student Presentations

 

Day 2  Student Presentations   

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