Phil' 305 Ancient Greek Philosophy

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Phil. 305Ancient Greek Philosophy

• Prof. Tony Roark
• Fall 2009

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On your 3x5 card

• Official BSU name
• What youd like to be called
• Previous Phil. courses taken
• Why are you here?
• Interesting fact about yourself
• Special concerns or needs

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Contact Information

• Email troark_at_boisestate.edu
• Web www.boisestate.edu/people/troark
• (NOT a Blackboard site)
• Phone [phone]
• Hoof Education 601 (tell the admin. that youre
  a student in my class)

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Our Text

• Readings in Ancient Greek Philosophy (3rd ed.)
• Editors Cohen, Curd, Reeve
• We shall call it CCR.

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Course Requirements

• Prep Questions
• Quizzes
• Exams
• Participation

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Prep Questions

• Done before class, turned in as you enter the
  class room.
• Posted on the web with the reading assignment.
• Bring two copies.
• Credit for evidence of good-faith effort.
• 25 of course grade.

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Prep Question Grades

• 25 A 19 C
• 24 A 18 C gt14
• 23 A- 17 C-
• 22 B 16 D
• 21 B 15 D
• 20 B- 14 D-

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Quizzes

• Five of them lowest score dropped.
• Very short 5-10 minutes.
• Over recent material.
• One-class forewarning.
• 10 of course grade.

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Exams

• Three of them.
• Short longer essay format.
• Pre-Socratics in-class (9/10 10)
• Plato take-home (10/29 25)
• Aristotle in-class (12/15 25)

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Exam Grading Criteria

• The Five Cs
• Correctness
• Completeness
• Clarity
• Cleverness
• Conciseness

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Class Participation

• 5 of final course grade reserved for things
  like
• Regular attendance
• Attentiveness in the classroom
• Responsiveness to questions asked of you in class
• Constructive participation in class discussion

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Policies

• Except in the case of prior arrangement or
  documented emergency, late work will not be
  accepted.
• Must be present in class for prep question
  credit.
• Im reasonable -- communicate!
• Dont plagiarize.

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When? Where?

• Ca. 585-322 BCE
• (ca. abbreviates circa about
  BCE means before the common era)
• All points around the Mediterranean and Aegean
  Seas.

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How do we know?

• Versions of the texts themselves.
• Direction quotation from other sources (known as
  fragments).
• Summaries and periphrastic remarks (known as
  testimonia).

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Authoritative Collections

• Pre-Socratics compiled by H. Diels and W. Kranz
  in 1903
• Plato compiled by Henri Estienne (Stephanus)
  in 1578.
• Aristotle compiled by Immanuel Bekker in 1831.

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Ancient Books

• Papyrus rolls, up to 15 long.
• Rolls contained up to 20 pages, pasted
  side-to-side.
• Papyrus reeds used by Egyptians as far back as
  3100 BCE by Greeks, 600 BCE.

• Language Attic Greek.
• Text written in all caps.
• No spaces between words.
• No punctuation.
• (Sometimes L-to-R and R-to-L!)

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For Thursday Milesians

• Thales everything is water.
• Anaximander everything is apeiron
• Anaximenes everything is air.
• ?!