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The following topics are to be investigated at an introductory level. Each inquiry session is scheduled for 2 to 2½ hours. The actual length of each session and the order in which the topics are investigated may vary from one inquiry group to the next, except that the first six topics are scheduled in the sequence indicated below. A list of suggested reading will be available to each seminar participant.
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THE NATURE OF PHILOSOPHY
0. The identity
of philosophy. The role of philosophy in world history. Today's
science and culture in historical perspective. Who should study philosophy
and why. How to study philosophy. The structure of philosophy
– its branches and their interrelationships.
METAPHYSICS
– “What exists?”
1. Alternative
metaphysical positions. Axiomatic concepts. ‘Existence’ and
‘consciousness’. ‘Existent’ and ‘object’. ‘Entity’, ‘identity’,
‘unit’, and ‘relation’. Entification, identification, classification, and individuation.
‘Space’ and ‘time’. ‘Perceptual concrete’, ‘physical object’, ‘event’, and ‘cause’.
‘The Universe’ and universes of discourse. ‘Space-time’.
The reality and identity of space-time. Objectivism vs. subjectivism and naive
(atomistic-absolutist) objectivism. Ontology. Foundations of
mathematics, physics, etc. Cosmology. Determinism and free
will. ‘Volition’ and metaepistemology.
EPISTEMOLOGY
– “How do you know?”
2. Theories of
knowledge and the nature of reason. Action and interaction.
Differentiation and integration. Stimulus and response. Sensation,
perception, concept-formation, and the process of abstraction. Paradoxes
of self-awareness. Linear and holistic processing. Conscious
and subconscious processes. Observation, reason, emotion, and intuition.
3. The nature
of thought. Entification, identification, and classification.
Language and logic. Truth and validity. Semantics and syntax.
Semantic ascent and truth predication. Metatheory and conceptual
schemes. Set theories. Ontological commitment. Theory-laden
perception. The primacy of perception. The validity of the
senses. Experimentation/observation/reason vs. mysticism.
4. Contextual
absolutism vs. non-contextual absolutism and universal skepticism.
Empiricism, rationalism, subjectivism, pragmatism, etc. Contextual
relativity vs. subjectivity. Metric tolerance vs. uncertainty.
Incompleteness vs. uncertainty. The unprovability of consistency
vs. uncertainty. The analytic-synthetic dichotomy. The
objectivist-subjectivist-intrinsicist trichotomy.
5. Principles
of efficiency and clarity in thinking. Types of pseudo-thinking.
The nature and the role of definitions. Common thinking errors.
The integration of linear and holistic processing. Intuition, reason,
humor, and the creative process. ‘Volition’ and metaethics.
ETHICS
– “So what?”
6. ‘Value’ and
‘standard of value’. The significance of volition. ‘Moral agent’.
Normative and descriptive questions. ‘Value’ and the epistemological
trichotomy. Hierarchies of values, virtues, and goals. The
value of cognition, the virtue of rationality, and the goal of happiness.
Ends, means, and ‘unearned value’. Hedonism, utilitarianism, altruism, cultural relativism, etc.
7. The nature
of justice. ‘Justice’ and ‘mercy’. ‘Justice’ and ‘equity’.
‘Justness’ and ‘fairness’. The significance of making (and of not
making) moral judgments. The significance of pride. Trust.
8. Self-sacrifice
and the altruistic premise. The relationship between the concept,
‘conflict of interest’ and the concept ‘selfishness’. The relationship
between the concept, ‘altruism’, and the concepts ‘agent’ and ‘life qua
agent’.
9. Good and evil.
The potency or impotency of evil. What is the meaning of “the victory
of evil over good”? The concept ‘sanction of the victim’. Punishment
vs. restitution.
PSYCHOLOGY
10. Free will.
The nature and significance of volition. Analyses of theories of
psychological determinism. Free will as the choice to think or not
to think. Emotion and motivation. Conceptual reaffirmation
and perceptual reaffirmation of concepts. Cognitive control of motivation.
11. Self-esteem.
Reaffirmation and self-esteem. Psychological consequences of the
failure to achieve and maintain self-esteem. Pseudo-self-esteem and
its psychological consequences.
12. Dependency.
Revolt against the responsibility of volition. The independent vs.
the socialized mind. ‘Social metaphysics’. Interdependence
vs. co-dependence and pseudo-independence.
13. Human virtue
and mental health. Rationality and independence, productivity and
integrity, pride and self-confidence, etc. – their relations to survival
and to mental health. Psychological consequences of hierarchical
inversions of virtues (and of values).
14. Sex and romantic
love. The relationship between a person's sexual choice(s) and the
expression of his deepest values. Sex and self-esteem. The
psycho-epistemological significance of sex in the romantic love relationship.
15. Religion.
Well formed concepts of a god(s). Logically defensible existence
arguments for a god(s). The psycho-epistemological consequences of
belief in the supernatural.
POLITICS AND ECONOMICS
16. Political
science. Principles of political power. ‘Sovereignty’.
‘Political equality’. ‘Liberty’. ‘Rights’. Foundations
of alternative political theories. ‘Individual liberty’, ‘civil liberties’,
‘political rights’, ‘civil rights’, and the United States Constitution.
Freedom vs. constraint. Liberty vs. compulsion. Concepts of
‘property’. Concepts of ‘unearned value’. Faith and force.
17. Economics.
Foundations of economic theories. Intrinsic, subjective, and objective
theories of value. Resource allocation and the principle of comparative
advantage. The mechanism of a market. Maximization of marginal
utility. Investment and consumption. Profits and wealth.
18. Issues in
political-economics: Productivity and distribution (interpersonal
and temporal) of wealth. ‘Economic justice’ and political vs. economic
egalitarianism. Inherited wealth. Welfare. Money.
Inflation. Takings and givings. Taxation. Economic, political,
and social stability. Depressions. Monopolies. Cartels.
Trade unions. Protectionism. Etc.
AESTHETICS
19. The rage
for order and the rage for chaos. Artistic expression and the artist's
metaphysical value judgments. Romanticism, naturalism, fatalism,
romantic realism, etc. Romantic realism and free will. Form,
substance, evaluation, and aesthetic experience. Symmetry, harmony,
contrast, dynamics, etc. The abstract in art. Music.
20. Sense of
life and self-image. Aesthetics and the psychology of repression,
not of vices and depraved obsessions, but of virtues and heroic aspirations.
Art and psychotherapy. A benevolent vs. a malevolent sense of life.
Additional series of seminars and
laboratories are periodically available for philosophic inquiry and research
in Formal Logic and Set Theories, in Cognition Science, in
Early
Childhood Education, in Metatheoretical Considerations in Modern
Science, and in Music Appreciation, Analysis, and Therapy.
Topics are investigated at an intermediate level by students who have completed
An
Introduction to Philosophic Inquiry.
Katherine
E. Macedon