Philosophy 101

Question 1

What is the one truly serious philosophical question?

Answer 1

Suicide and deciding whether or not life is worth living.

Question 2

What is absurd/absurdity?

Answer 2

The futility of a search for meaning in an incomprehensible universe, devoid of God, or meaning.

Question 3

What does Camus mean by “consciousness”?

Answer 3

Consciousness does not form the object of its understanding. It merely focuses. It is the act of attention.

Question 4

What is the myth of Sisyphus and how does Camus use it to illustrate his view?

Answer 4

Camus sees Sisyphus as the absurd hero who loves life to the fullest, who hates death and is condemned to a meaningless task.

Question 5

What does Taylor mean by meaningless experience?

Answer 5

A meaningless existence involves endless pointless activity- an existence full of activity that never culminates in anything

Question 6

How does meaningless existence contrast with labors that have a point?

Answer 6

The activity becomes significant and no longer meaningless

Question 7

How does Taylor use Sisyphus to illustrate his view? What modifications does he make to the myth and how does that affect its meaning?

Answer 7

Taylor points out if Sisyphus hoisted stones to the top of a hill to build something beautiful and long lasting his activities would no longer be pointless.

Question 8

What’s Taylor’s example of the New Zealand glow worms? What is their relevance for understanding the meaning of life?

Answer 8

It suggests that the point of living is life itself

Question 9

Are our lives really like that of Sisyphus

Answer 9

Each human life resembles the myth about Sisyphus

Question 10

What is the philosophers despair that Taylor mentions and why does he think this is misguided?

Answer 10

If you’re looking for external meaning, you will never find it. You’ll be constantly searching because it comes from within.

Question 11

Does Pojman think religion actually threatens autonomy?

Answer 11

Living in autonomy along with religion helps achieve personal goals and growth

Question 12

Explanation for origin and sustenance of universe

Answer 12

We have a satisfying explanation of the origin and sustenance of the universe. We are the product not of chance and necessity or an impersonal big bang, but of a heavenly being who cares about us.

Question 13

Good will win out over evil—we are not fighting alone, but God is on our side in the battle. So, you and I are not fighting in vain, we will win eventually.

Answer 13

This thought of the ultimate victory of Goodness gives us confidence to go on in the fight against injustice and cruelty when others calculate that the odds against righteousness are too great to dig he against

Question 14

We have a motive to be deeply moral

Answer 14

God lives and cares for us—His love compels us, so that we have a deeper motive for morally good actions, including high altruism. We live deeply moral lives because of deep gratitude to one who loves us and whom we live. Secularism lacks this sense of cosmic love

Question 15

Cosmic Justice

Answer 15

Cosmic Justice reigns in the universe. The scales are perfectly balanced so everyone will get what they deserves according to their moral merit.

Question 16

All persons are of equal worth

Answer 16

All persons of equal with since we all have been created in the image of God and are his children. We are all brothers and sisters we ought to treat each other as family

Question 17

Grace and forgiveness

Answer 17

A happy ending for all. Alls well that ends well (the divine comedy) the moral guilt which we experience, even the most heinous acts can be removed and we can be redeemed and given a new start. True moral liberation.

Question 18

Life after death

Answer 18

There is life after death. Death is not the end of the matter but we shall live on. Recognizing each other in a better world. We have eternity in our souls and are destined for a higher existence.

Question 19

Explain moral objectivism

Answer 19

The view that moral truths exist, and they do so independently despite what individuals and societies think.

Question 20

Explain cultural relativism

Answer 20

Morality does exist. Determined by the culture in question

Question 21

Explain subjectivism

Answer 21

Morality does exist and is 100% determined by the individual in question.

Question 22

Emotivism

Answer 22

There is no such thing as morality. All moral claims are simply deceptive of one’s attitude towards the topic in question.

Question 23

Explain the argument of relativism that entails moral infallibility

Answer 23

Those who determine morality are infallible arbiters of right and wrong. Individual relativism makes each person an infallible judge of moral matters and cultural relativism makes each society infallible determiners of ethical realities.

Question 24

Explain the argument of relativism and no moral progress.

Answer 24

A society’s present beliefs and practices must already be morally right and any change from that standard would be morally wrong.

Question 25

Explain the argument of cultural relativism entail that moral reformers are always evil

Answer 25

There is no objective truth in morality. Right and wrong are only matters of opinion and opinions vary from culture to culture.

Question 26

Which meta ethical view best supports the value of tolerance?

Answer 26

Moral objectivism if tolerance is a moral value, the objectivism must forbid acts of intolerance. Objectivism merely claims that there is a single objective moral standard

Question 27

What is consequentialism?

Answer 27

An ethical theory that judges whether or not something is right by what it’s consequences are.

Question 28

Is a persons intention relevant to an act being deemed good/bad?

Answer 28

Intentions behind actions are insignificant. The only thing that is the good deed.

Question 29

Are there actions that are intrinsically good/bad?

Answer 29

No

Question 30

What is the principle of utility?

Answer 30

The principle that actions are to be judged by their usefulness I. The sense of tendency to produce benefit, advantage, pleasure, good or happiness.

Question 31

What are the only intrinsic good/bad according to utilitarianism?

Answer 31

The one intrinsic good is pleasure, the bad is pain. We are to promote pleasure and act to reduce pain.

Question 32

What is the pig objection to utilitarianism?

Answer 32

Pleasure is not a noble per suit, it degrades people down to the level of pigs.

Question 33

Does mill think there are objectively higher/lower pleasures.

Answer 33

There can be no evaluative basis for the distinction between higher and lower pleasures. Mills suggests that it is better to have a small quantity of a high quality pleasure than a large quantity of a low quality pleasure.

Question 34

What makes one a competent judge of higher/lower pleasures?

Answer 34

Anyone who has experienced both the lower pleasures and the higher.

Question 35

Explain the quote: It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied;better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.

Answer 35

He argues that no reasonable person would ever want to be a dog or a pig just for the sake of being more comfortable. Being human can sometimes cause stress that animals or fools don’t have to deal with.

Question 36

What makes one a competent judge of higher/lower pleasures?

Answer 36

Anyone who has experienced both the lower pleasures and the higher

Question 37

How for all practical purposes does mill think we ought to act? What law should we follow?

Answer 37

Liberalism: that individuals ought to be free to do as they wished unless they caused harm to others. Individuals are rational enough to make decisions about their well being. Government should interfere when it is for the protection of society.

Question 38

Is Kant a consequentialist?

Answer 38

No, he is a non consequentialist

Question 39

Are the effects of an action relevant for Kantian ethics? What about intention?

Answer 39

That a person good or bad depending on the motivation of their actions and not on the goodness of the consequences of those actions.

Question 40

Why does Kant think so called “natural goods” are not actually intrinsically good?

Answer 40

The only thing that is good without qualification is the good will, Kant says. All other candidates for an intrinsic good have problems. Courage, health, intelligence can be used for bad purposes and therefore can not be intrinsically good.

Question 41

What makes an action right/morally good?

Answer 41

Morality is defined by duties and one’s action is moral if it is an act motivated by duty.

Question 42

What does Kant mean when he says that the Moral Law must be universal?

Answer 42

Act only in accordance with the maxim through which you can at the same time will that it become universal law. If you do an action, then everyone should also be able to do it.

Question 43

How does moral law apply to different species?

Answer 43

The moral law is a truth of reason and hence that all rational creatures are bound by the same moral law.

Question 44

What is the difference between hypothetical imperative and categorical imperative?

Answer 44

Categorical imperatives specify actions we ought to take regardless of whether doing so would enable us to get anything we want. Hypothetical imperatives identify actions we ought to take but only if we have some particular goal.

Question 45

How do we discover the moral law.

Answer 45

Sense of obligation to which our will offer responds. We are pulled in a certain direction not because we desire to act in that way but in spite of our desire to act in the opposite way.

Question 46

What is the first formulation of the categorical imperative?

Answer 46

The principle of the law of nature. The law of universalizability because it argues that if an action is morally right then it must apply consistently to everyone

Question 47

What is the difference between perfect duty and imperfect duty?

Answer 47

Perfect duties are prescriptions of specific kinds of actions and violating them is morally blameworthy. Imperfect duties are prescriptions of general ends and fulfilling them is praise worthy.

Question 48

The 4 examples of Kant Categorical Imperative

Answer 48

Commuting suicide Making false promises Failing to develop one’s abilities And refusing to be charitable

Question 49

What is the second formulation of the categorical imperative?

Answer 49

The principle of ends. Treat humanity whether yourself or others in every case as an end and never merely a means.

Question 50

Explain what Kant means when he says Rational Natire exists as an end in itself?

Answer 50

Rational beings should be treated as an end in themselves and not as a means to something else. The fact that we are human has value in itself.

Question 51

Explain the difference between a permissible case of using someone versus merely using someone?

Answer 51

Slavery vs employment. Difference between using others merely as a means and using others as means but not merely as means. You use others merely as means if and only if you use them to get what you want without making their permission a requirement.

Question 52

Why is the end more significant than the means?

Answer 52

A positive outcome isn’t a good thing if the methods used were dishonest or harmful to others.

Question 53

Explain happiness as the final end of human action

Answer 53

Aristotle believed that happiness is the single ultimate end to which all of humanity strives. It is an ultimate end because we desire happiness only for the sake of happiness and nothing else.

Question 54

Archer/target example.

Answer 54

Like an archer who have a mark at which to aim, The better you know your target the better chances to attain what you want.

Question 55

What is the significance of translating eudamonia as human flourishing instead of just happiness?

Answer 55

Eudaemonia is the highest human good whereas the real happiness is a state of feeling in oneself. Happiness is usually understood in the enlightenment sense as a series of repeated pleasures. It is an activity across a lifetime.

Question 56

3 accounts of eudaemonia?

Answer 56

Pleasure Honor Contemplation

Question 57

Rejection and favor of Pleasure.

Answer 57

The pleasure of the masses, pleasure is good but not thee good. We can take pleasure in the wrong things.

Question 58

Reject/Favor of Honor

Answer 58

We want to be honored for the right things by competent people. Our happiness would be 100% dependent on others.

Question 59

Reject/favor of Contemplation

Answer 59

Contemplation is valuable for its own sake but ultimately useless.

Question 60

What is function argument what is it and what’s the point?

Answer 60

The purpose of a function argument is to understand what humans are what their function is and how cultivating virtues accomplishes a flourishing life for humans.

Question 61

What is the human function?

Answer 61

Happiness is connected to function. Everything in the universe has a function and a happy human life is one in which we fulfill that function. Humans purpose is to exercise their virtues in accordance with their reason