Upcoming plans:
- This week
- Tu/Th are in-class conferences with student/teacher (to go over the progress report)
- Friday October 2 progress reports are distributed to students
- Next week – Tuesday October 6: Parent/Guardian Conferences (scheduled by the office using the online form)
What you should be reading now (homework):
Be sure to use the glossary: Units I, II, III, IV, V Glossary
- Supplemental (optional) readings:
What you should be assessing (in terms of your own learning; what you should know/be able to do at this point):
- What is philosophy? (Focus on “dealing with uncertainty” and “knowing” – the pursuit of knowledge as true belief in what is actually real and/or knowable.)
- philosophy: A word that literally means “love of wisdom.” It is the study of the most basic, deepest questions about life, knowledge, right and wrong, and the universe.
- metaphysics: The branch of philosophy that studies the ultimate nature of reality. It asks questions like: What is real? What is the world made of? Do minds and souls exist?
- rigorous: Extremely careful, thorough, and precise that involves deep reflection, careful research, and asking questions to gain an understanding.
- scholarly: Having to do with serious academic study for the purpose of “producing knowledge” and based on deep research, inquiry, asking questions, seeking answers, dialogue, systems thinking, reading and writing (speaking and listening), critical thinking, and rigour.
- model: A structural guide, plan, or framework used to show how different parts connect and interact to explain reality.
- conceptual: Looking at a problem by focusing strictly on the ideas and the meanings of the words, rather than looking at physical facts.
- theoretical: A deep, systematic explanation of how things really are, focusing on the “why” and “how” rather than just basic facts.Kertes 15
- theory: An organized set of ideas meant to explain how something works or why something happens, backed up by logic or evidence, and using rigorous and systematic analysis.
- thesis: The main theoretical argument or claim that a writer presents in a paper and defends with facts.
- tools of philosophy (reading, writing, reasoning, dialogue): The four core practices philosophers use to look closely at reality, understand complex issues, clear up their thoughts, and share knowledge with others.
- synthesis: Combining different ideas, facts, or pieces of information together to create a brand-new, complete understanding of something.
- system: A group of connected parts or ideas that work together to form a complete whole (like a bicycle, a computer program, or a set of laws) and that do more together than on their own.
- systematic: Breaking something down into parts and seeing how the parts work together in a holistic way, using an organized and rigorous process of research.
- origin: The source, starting point, or cause of how something came into being. The word “origin” is tricky because it can mean different things depending on the context. It can mean an evolutionary origin (how something slowly grew out of older forms, like the Earth forming from space dust) or an absolute origin (how space and time themselves popped into existence out of nothing).
- knowledge: Believing something that matches objective reality, with facts or logic to prove it. For an idea to count as “knowledge,” it cannot just be a personal opinion, a feeling, or a guess, as it must be a fact about reality (as it is) that remains true whether people believe it or not.
- learning: The process of gaining new knowledge, skills, or behaviors through studying, practicing, or being taught.
- inquiry: The act of asking questions, exploring a topic deeply, or searching hard for the truth about something.
- How do scholars read? What is reading?
- Purpose of high school: To teach how to read at the high school and/or pre-university level (everyone who graduates demonstrated that they read at the high school or higher level); to prepare students for future studies/careers (high school level reading prepares for trades, business, other jobs; pre-university level reading prepares for further studies in college or university; both levels prepare for being a citizen of a democratic society such as Canada)
- Three levels of reading:
- High school level reading = Read to learn (read to remember)
- Pre-university level reading = Read to understand (and explain) (a synthesis of text, context, subtext, meta-text) (reading between the lines) (inference and meaning)
- University level reading = Read to produce knowledge (and disseminate it)
- How do you learn from difficult texts (even out-of-reach ones)?
- Preview
- Take notes
- Use systems (break into parts, think about connections)
- Use models
- Focus on key ideas
- Focus on key terms
- Ask questions
- Re-read
- Use levels of analysis
- Describe
- Explain (theory)
- Connect
- Reflect (value)
- Metacognition
- Synthesis
- How is scholarship and systems thinking connected?
- Scholarship is producing knowledge (to understand)
- Systems thinking is breaking complex things into parts to help you understand how they work together (how to understand)
- What is metacognition and why is it a useful skill/thinking strategy in scholarship?
- metacognition: Metacognition is simply thinking about your own thinking. In a philosophy class, it means being aware of your own mental processes. Instead of just learning a piece of information, metacognition involves tracking your understanding (knowing what you truly understand versus what you are still confused about), managing your learning (catching yourself when you lose focus or realizing you need to change your approach to solve a tough problem), and examining your thoughts (spotting your own biases or questioning why you believe a certain conclusion). Basically, metacognitive thinking is like stepping outside of your own mind to judge how well your brain is learning, reasoning, and processing information.
- What are the levels of analysis in philosophy? How is philosophy “done”?
- We will discuss this in lead up to the midterm
- What is the Socratic method?
- Socratic method: A way of finding truth through a cooperative question-and-answer conversation. Instead of giving a lecture, a teacher asks continuous questions to help the student discover the flaws in their own logic.
- The point: to learn about, understand, and be able to explain reality (to discover and understand truth, true reality) (to know)
- contrast this to the Sophists: A group of traveling teachers in ancient Greece who were paid to teach young men public speaking and how to win arguments. They cared more about persuasion and winning debates than finding actual, objective truth.
- Socrates: The famous philosopher who walked around Athens asking deep, difficult questions to get people to realize what they didn’t actually know. He never wrote anything down (but Plato, his student, did write down what Socrates taught). Socrates’s dedication to questioning changed Western philosophy forever.
- Plato: A student of Socrates and the teacher of Aristotle. He wrote down Socrates’ conversations, founded one of the world’s first universities, and believed that our physical world is just an imperfect shadow of a perfect, ideal reality (called the “Forms”).
- material cause (of Aristotle’s “Four Causes”): The physical “stuff” or raw ingredients that an object is made out of. (Example: The material cause of a coin is metal; the material cause of a sweater is wool).
- Four Causes, Aristole: A system created by Aristotle to explain why things exist and change. He believed you can’t truly understand any object until you can explain its material, its shape, its creator, and its purpose.
- presocratic: The philosophers who lived before Socrates (or weren’t influenced by him). They were the world’s first scientists, mostly focused on figuring out what nature and the universe were made of.
- What is an argument (in philosophical scholarship)?
- premise: A statement offered as a reason for accepting a certain claim. Premises act as the evidence or foundation for the argument.
- numbered premise form: A clean way of writing out an argument so that each premise and the conclusion are given a number and placed on their own lines. This makes it easy to see the structure and point out where an argument might be weak.
- validity (valid or invalid): Validity is purely about the logical connection between statements. An argument is valid if there is absolutely no possible way for its premises to be true while its conclusion is false. An argument is invalid if it is possible for all the premises to be true, but the conclusion still turns out false.
- testing (for validity): to test for validity, ask yourself if you can imagine a coherent scenario where the premises are true but the conclusion is false. If you can imagine such a scenario without a contradiction, the argument is invalid.
- induction: A style of argument where you use specific observations or facts to make a general conclusion that is likely, but not 100% certain.
- inductive reasoning: A style of logic where the premises do not 100% guarantee the conclusion, but they provide strong enough evidence to make the conclusion reasonable to believe. For example, noting that the sun has risen every day up until now gives you strong evidence that it will rise tomorrow, but it isn’t an absolute logical guarantee.
- How do you participate in a seminar?
- Preview
- Notes
- Notecard with key points
- State arguments (premises in support of a conclusion)
- Ask “real” questions
- Listen
- Focus on the validity of the arguments and on understanding the point (charity)
- Define to clarify, not to “win”
- Listen, listen, listen…
- Summarize and reflect afterwards
