Philosophies of the Humanities 1 – feb to march 2024
Week 2:
First reading: Nietzsche – Beyond Good and Evil
- Questions why philosophy exists and why we seek the truth, what makes the truth so
important, and the fact it is a great risk we take searching for the truth
- The idea of opposites and how their definitions are tied to each other, one defines the
other
- “most of a philosopher’s conscious thought is secretly directed and forced into
determinate channels by the instincts”
- “Even behind all logic and its autocratic posturings stand valuations or, stated more
clearly, physiological requirements for the preservation of a particular type of life. For
example, that the determinate is worth more than the indeterminate, appearance worth
less than the “truth”
- Says that what Philosipher’s actually do is “they take a conjecture, a whim, an
“inspiration” or, more typically, they take some fervent wish that they have sifted through
and made properly abstract – and they defend it with rationalizations after
the fact.”
- “sly spokesmen for prejudices that they christen as “truths””
- Says that if they were truly good, they would express and warn people that what they're
saying isn’t fact but a prejudice
- Says that philosophers’ philosiphies are ideas from the seed of the plant they’ve always
grown, prejudices
- Talks about how physiologists ideas are considered more truthful as there is tangible
physical evidence
-
Reading 2: Plato – The Republic:
,Seminar 1 notes: 14th february 2024
Plato -
Western philosophical thought
-rationalistic tradition prioritizing reason above everything else
Utopian or dystopian?
-Theory of knowledge
(epistemology) how we know the truth and what the truth is
-Theory of the good
(ethics)
-Theory of society
(society) how should social order be structured
Plato – knowledge is the cure to ignorance
Freedom / chains
Knowledge / ignorance
Health / illness
Gaining knowledge is painful / so it's more pleasurable to
remain in ignorance
He talks about reason and emotion between men and women
Moral judgement
What is - more important as its right there, present
What is becoming - less important
The sun inside the cave is the real sun, the sun outside exists outside our world,
and is in a different realm of thought, which is where the truth is.
Realm of forms – outside the cave (understanding reason_
SUN = IDEAL FORM OF THE GOOD (TRUTH, BEATUTY)
Eternal, unchanging, perfect (what is)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
,Realm of appearances – in the cave (The senses)
Fire = actual sun
Shadows = material world, things
Temporary, changing/ becoming, imperfect
Rationalism, idealism, dualism, hierarchy, Education and social order
Maybe the outside of the cave is the upper class
Maybe the cave is the media class with people confusing the masses with images
(the shadows)
Useful words for the exam:
. RATIONALISM
. IDEALISM – idea that there is a real world separate from the material world.
Pursuing something unreachable.
. DUALISM – two realms
. HIERARCHY – one is superior, one is inferior
, It's him trying to think what the ideal social order would be.
Once you acquire knowledge from outside the cave, you need to come back to
society, the cave and give back.
Book X:
Banishment of the Poets
If youre a craftsman and you make 20,000,000 couches you start
to understand what unites them, but in the world of couches,
they are all different, meaning none of them are The Couch.
A imitative painting of a couch is an imitation of the appearance,
twice removed from the truth and essential form of the couch
Reason (philosopher dickheads). (Head) The thought of the couch
Spirit / courage (the coldest guys). (Heart) the craftsman building the couch
Appetites/ base desires / lowly pleasures (consuming). (Stomach) the painter
painting a couch
Reading 2: Nietzsche – Beyond good and evil:
Criticizing Pato (first reading):
Nietzsche is a naturalist – the natural world and what's around us (real world)
Pato is an idealist – prime shitchatter
. Dogmatism -} “eternal demands” --} “Good in itself”
. Philosophical edifices ---} “all-too humans”
. Superstition of the subject/soul (“I”)
. Plato – Christianity - (democracy)
. Perspectivism (as a condition of life)
. European struggle against this dogmatism
