Lectures

• Why Study Philosophy?
• What Does Philosophy Mean?
• How To Do Philosophy
• How Is Philosophy Different from Science?
• How Is Philosophy Different from Religion?

Readings

• Kyla Wazana Tompkins, “Some Notes on How To Ask a Good Question about Theory….” L.A. Review of Books’ Avidly, (2016): 1–3.
• Danielle S. Allen, Talking to Strangers: Anxieties of Citizenship since Brown v. Board of Education: 3–36.

Lectures

• What Are the Main Branches of Philosophy?
• What Is Philosophy’s Main Method?
• Identifying and Evaluating Arguments
• Two Categories of Arguments
• Four Common Syllogisms

Readings

• Read and discuss Plato, The Apology, 22–44.
• Read and discuss Plato, Crito, 45–57.
• Read and discuss Plato, Phaedo, 96–154.

• Common Informal Fallacies
• Defining Reason
• Discussing “Auschwitz on Trial”

• Read and discuss Hannah Arendt, Responsibility and Judgement, 227–256.

• Two kinds of harmony
• Kongzi’s “Golden Rule”
• Ruist and Mohist interpretations of tianming 天命
• Consequentialist ethics and fatalist ethics
• Defining dao 道
• Discussing paronomasia in Ruist and Daoist philosophies
• Defining xin 心
• Philosophical realism

• Read and discuss Ivanhoe & Van Norden, (Kongzi), The Analects.
• Read and discuss Ivanhoe & Van Norden (Mozi), “Impartial Caring,” and “A Condemnation of Aggressive War,” 63–73.
• Read and discuss Ivanhoe & Van Norden (Mengzi), Books 1 & 2, 113–126.
• Read and discuss Ivanhoe & Van Norden (Laozi), Daodejing.
• Read and discuss Ivanhoe & Van Norden (Zhuangzi), “On Equalizing Things,” 209–219.

• Defining ziran 自然
• The role of dao 道 for translating Buddhism for Chinese culture
• Defining atman
• The four goals in Upanishadic life
• The Four Noble Truths
• Defining karma
• The Three Marks of Existence

• Read and discuss Thich Nhat Hanh, “Heart of Understanding,” 1–30.
• Read and discuss James Baldwin, “Freaks and the American Ideal of Manhood,” 814–829.
• Read and discuss Danielle S. Allen Talking to Strangers: Anxieties of Citizenship since Brown v. Board of Education: 140–159.

• Defining ontology
• Extensional vs. intensional objects
• Tabula rasa
• Kant’s ethics

• Read and discuss Descartes, Meditations 1 & 2.
• Read and discuss Locke, “An Essay Concerning Human Understanding.”
• Read and discuss Kant, “Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics.”