PHL105Y Introduction to Philosophy Monday, September 25, 2006

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PHL105Y Introduction to Philosophy Monday,
September 25, 2006

• Announcements
• If you are new in the class today, welcome.
  Please take a syllabus from the desk at the
  front.
• For Wednesdays class, read the first 10 pages of
  the Plato book (the beginning of Euthyphro)
• Tutorials continue this Friday. Your second
  tutorial assignment is due, in hard copy, at the
  beginning of your tutorial. Your tutorial
  assignment is available on the web, and will be
  sent on the weekly email update around 5pm today.
• Remember that you need to register for your
  tutorial on CCNet (not ROSI). 16 people have yet
  to register.

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Your tutorials

• David Dedourek TUT201, TUT204, TUT207
• Catherine Manoukian TUT206, TUT205
• Suzan Poyraz TUT202, TUT203
• Contact information on your TAs (including
  emails) is available by clicking the office
  hours link on the main CCNet menu for the
  course. http//ccnet.utoronto.ca/20069/phl105y5y02
  01/
• Do ensure that you are signed up for a tutorial
  on CCNET (ROSI tutorial registration doesnt
  matter). As of today, about 90 of students had
  signed up. Students who sign up on CCNet also
  receive weekly update emails.
•  
• TUT201 FR1100-1200NE 297    
• TUT202 FR1200-1300NE 259     
• TUT203 FR1000-1100NE 257     
• TUT204 FR1400-1500NE 269     
• TUT205 FR1500-1600NE 295     
• TUT206 FR1200-1300NE 295     
• TUT207 FR1300-1400NE 297

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Evaluating Arguments

• Deductive arguments
• Valid/invalid
• Sound/unsound
• Inductive arguments
• Strong/weak
• Cogent/not cogent

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Validity and soundness

• Deductive arguments
• Valid/invalid
• Validity is a conditional notion IF the premises
  are true, then the conclusion must be true. When
  testing for validity, you can assume anything you
  like THAT IS CONSISTENT WITH THE PREMISES and see
  if the conclusion follows. (If you say, What if
  one of those premises were false? and then
  discover that the conclusion doesnt follow, you
  havent shown the argument invalid).
• If there is any scenario which makes ALL THE
  PREMISES TRUE and the CONCLUSION FALSE at the
  same time, the argument is invalid

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Validity and soundness

• Deductive arguments
• - Sound/unsound
• A sound argument must be VALID and have ALL TRUE
  PREMISES
• If some of the premises are false, then the
  argument is unsound even if it is valid.
• Sometimes you might know that an argument is
  valid, but not know whether it is sound (when?)

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Inductive arguments

• Inductive arguments
• Strong/weak In a strong inductive argument, the
  premises make the conclusion probable. This is a
  CONDITIONAL notion again IF those premises were
  true, the conclusion would probably be true.
• Cogent/not cogent An inductive argument is
  cogent if it is strong AND all the premises are
  actually true.

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Fallacies
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Fun with fallacies

• Straw man
• Appeal to the person (aka ad hominem)
• Appeal to popularity
• Appeal to tradition

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Fun with fallacies

• Genetic fallacy
• Equivocation
• Appeal to ignorance
• False Dilemma

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Fun with fallacies

• Begging the question
• Hasty generalization
• Slippery slope
• Composition
• Division

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Spot the fallacy

• Friedrich Nietzsche argued that morality was a
  human invention. But he was a singularly
  badly-behaved person, so we have no reason to
  take his arguments seriously.
• There is no proof that string theory is correct.
  Therefore, string theory is incorrect.

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Spot the fallacy

• If Wanda is in Sudbury, then she is in Ontario.
  Wanda is not in Sudbury. Therefore, Wanda is not
  in Ontario.
• The guilty should be punished in a court of law.
  We are all guilty of something. We should all be
  punished in a court of law.

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Working with sources
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Quoting an author

• When you are using the authors precise words,
  you need to enclose these words in quotation
  marks. When you are quoting the assigned text in
  a paper for this course, it is sufficient to
  indicate the page number (use the Stephanus or
  marginal page number for the Plato text).
• EXAMPLE According to Descartes, although one
  idea can perhaps issue from another, nevertheless
  no infinite regress is permitted here. (28)

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Quoting an author

• Make sure what you have quoted is grammatically
  integrated with your text. You may need to
  change a first-person pronoun to a third-person,
  for example. Indicate any changes with square
  brackets.
• Example Descartes says that the reality that
  he is considering in his ideas is merely
  objective reality. (28)
• This can get awkward. When in doubt, just
  paraphrase the text.

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Quoting an author

• Where you omit any words, indicate the omission
  with an ellipsis (three dots, like this ).
• Dont omit anything unfairly its fine to omit
  phrases like as I have said before

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Quoting an author

• You always need to explain what youve quoted.
  If the meaning is at all obscure or open to
  various interpretations, explain it always
  explain the value of the quotation to
  establishing your thesis.

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Using secondary sources

• You can use secondary sources for your papers in
  this course, but I dont recommend it. You will
  have enough to work with focusing on our main
  texts.
• If you do use secondary sources, any standard
  citation format is fine (MLA, humanities). Use
  it carefully. Make sure any reader could find
  your source.

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Using secondary sources

• Always ensure that there are crystal-clear lines
  between your own thought and the thought of
  others. If you get some ideas from a website,
  say, it is not OK to just have a footnote at the
  end of that paragraph indicating that you looked
  at the website the text of the paragraph itself
  should make it very clear which ideas, phrases or
  concepts came from the site and which came from
  your own creativity.

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Using secondary sources

• The fact that you can see some claim on a
  website, or in a book, even a great book, is not
  on its own an argument for the truth of that
  claim. You need to give reasons for any claim
  you make, whether its something you thought up
  or something you found in a book.

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Real Philosophy at LastPLATO
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Platos Euthyphro

• Plato (427-347 BCE) wrote about 25 dialogues,
  almost all starring his mentor Socrates (469-399
  BCE)
• Plato largely appears to be sympathetic to what
  Socrates is saying Socrates is the hero.

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Platos Euthyphro

• For the purposes of this course, we wont draw a
  distinction between what Plato thinks and what
  Socrates thinks, and well be pretending that
  Plato just wrote down exactly what Socrates said.
• So you dont have to say, According to Plato,
  Socrates said that .

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Materials on reserve at the UTM library in the
South Building

• All the texts for this course (and all UTM
  courses)
• Entirely optional background reading on Plato
• Kenneth J. Dover Greek Popular Morality in the
  Time of Plato and Aristotle
• Richard Kraut The Cambridge Companion to Plato

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A quick note on your text

• The works of Plato are standardly cited by the
  Stephanus numbers and letters running down the
  margin of your page (e.g. 43a 11bc 12b-e
  17c-18d)
• Citing by Stephanus number is more accurate and
  enables readers of other translations and
  editions to check your work