All
[these pages] I've uploaded this evening (Feb. 1) are sections of a set of lectures I wrote out one quarter (and read to my poor students). This will require radical reworking and general wikification to become appropriate for
WikiPedia. On this page, we can discuss how to do this (if you're into it, that is!).
- 1 Introduction to Philosophy
- WhyPhilosophize -- PhilosophicalMethod -- DefinitionOfPhilosophy -- PhilosophicalSubdisciplines
II. Philosophical method. 5
III. A definition of "philosophy." 18
IV. The purpose and plan of this course. 22
2 Some Rudiments of Logic 24
I. What is logic? 24
II. The fundamental concepts of deduction and induction. 28
III. Valid and cogent argument forms and fallacies. 35
IV. Meaning and definitions. 38
3 Metaphysics 49
I. Some metaphysical questions. 49
II. Metaphysics and ontology. 51
III. The existence of physical objects. 56
IV. The problem of substance. 60
V. The problem of universals. 68
VI. The problem of change. 82
4 Philosophy of Religion 91
I. Introduction. 91
II. What is God? 95
III. Faith and rationality. 106
IV. Two bad arguments for the existence of God. 110
V. Three traditional arguments for the existence of God 113
A. The ontological argument. 114
B. The cosmological argument. 118
C. The teleological argument. 124
VI. The argument from evil. 127
VII. Conclusion. 133
5 Philosophy of Mind 135
I. Introduction. 135
II. The mind-body problem. 141
A. Dualism. 144
B. Physicalism. 151
C. Other theories of mind. 157
III. Theory of perception. 163
IV. The will and its freedom. 178
A. Determinism. 181
B. Libertarianism. 184
C. Compatibilism and the definition of "free will." 188
6 Philosophy of Language 193
I. Introduction. 193
II. The meaning of "meaning." 195
III. Proper names. 197
IV. Meaningfulness. 204
V. Against relativism about truth. 206
VI. Theories of truth. 211
7 Epistemology 219
I. Introduction 219
II. Justification in general. 222
III. The regress argument and theories of justification. 225
IV. The sources of justification. 235
V. Knowledge. 239
VI. Skepticism. 248
VII. Common sense. 257
8 Ethics 262
I. Introduction. 262
II. Meta-Ethics 264
A. Naturalism 264
B. Non-naturalism. 269
C. Non-cognitivism. 275
III. The theory of value. 279
A. Values subjectivism. 282
B. Hedonism. 285
C. Eudaimonism and other theories of value. 289
IV. The theory of conduct. 296
A. Varieties of consequentialism. 298
B. How to decide on a theory of conduct. 302
C. The problem of justice. 305
D. Deontological theories of conduct. 310
E. Rule consequentialism. 317
9 Political Philosophy 323
I. Introduction. 323
II. The justification of the state. 325
III. Anarchism and the natural law theory. 329
IV. Social contract theories. 334
V. Consequentialist justifications of the state. 340
VI. The purpose of government. 344
OK, here's the deal:
- I know a lot of this sucks. It is written to get the general concepts across to Ohio State undergrads. Yes, some of what I've written might be outright wrong, and most of it can be tightened up considerably. So, help me do that. Don't bother replying to something I've written here. Just make the change you think is necessary, please.
- I have taken actual stands on certain issues. You should de-opinionate these, if you can. (This, like much other but not all improvement, will have to be done by philosophers who know the issues.)
- Please render my prose a little more formal, less lecture-like.
- I have saved the text in section-sized chunks, but I think it could have been saved in much smaller chunks. If you want to do that, that would be Very Cool.
- Since these are lectures, I refer to myself, the students, Ohio State, readings, other lectures I've given (hence, other parts of the wiki) and other stuff that shouldn't belong on the wiki. If you want to help totally wikify this text, you would remove all that stuff. Please?
- I have saved the sections on pages with titles describing their content. Ultimately, perhaps, the titles should be changed, or the entirety of a certain page should be split up and put on other pages. I leave that to you.
- Finally, you might not like my style, and you might think that I don't present the issues reliably enough, and otherwise feel that this contribution is not exactly a boon to WikiPedia. If that's the case, you can feel free to replace what I've written with your own golden prose; I'd just appreciate that you convey roughly the same information that I do (i.e., you cover the same topics and say the same (true) things I have to say about them). If these textbook entries are placeholders before better stuff comes along, that's perfectly fine by me. The lectures are long since over and it took me all of an hour to upload them to the wiki! So I won't mind, really!
I think that's it for now. Any comments or questions?
I added a note to the top of most of the pages. I would hope the notes don't last longer than the first couple of edits, which should suffice to make them read suffeciently less like lectures. And haveing them link here means interested parties can find which ones have not yet been reviewed (that gives me an idea:
ReviewRequests). That having been said... Thanks for the material, Larry. I skimmed sections here and there, and it all looks quite good. Quite a boon for the
PhiloSophy section. I might just look you up and request a copy when I have to teach some undergrad intro class (or will the wikipedia be enough by then...). --
PhillipHankins
Thanks very much, Phillip! -- Larry
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