Reference no: EM132274724

Essay Prompts

Ancient

1. What is the divided line analogy and what is the allegory of the cave? How do they relate and/or differ from each other?

2. Aristotle gives an account of what (primary and secondary) substance is by distinguishing between that which is "said of" (or "predicated of" as it is translated in the Reality text) a subject and that which is "present in" a subject. Explain what a substance is for Aristotle using and explaining this said of/present in distinction. Pay special attention to the implication that certain predicates' existence is dependent upon substance.

3. Compare and contrast Plato and Aristotle's views on substance.

Ancient & Medieval

4. What is Plato's account of the forms and what biblical content does Augustine add to Plato's theory in the reading that we did?

5. What is Aquinas's criticism of Aristotle with respect to existence? What explains existence, according to Aquinas?

Rationalists

6. Descartes: "I think, therefore I am" is the first piece of genuine knowledge that Descartes hits upon. How does Descartes arrive here? In order to have knowledge beyond this, Descartes thinks that we need God. What is his argument for the existence of God? Is it a good argument? Why or why not?

7. Spinoza: At the beginning of the excerpt from the Short Treatise, Spinoza states that ". . . in order to express our views more clearly, we shall premise the four following propositions." He then lists those four propositions and in the pages that follow gives arguments for each one. Choose one proposition and explain in your own words how Spinoza argues for it.

8. In Monadology 2, Leibniz writes, "...there must be simple substances, since there are composites; for the composite is nothing more than a collection, or aggregate, of simples." What, according to Spinoza, is a substance? Explain why must this substance must be simple (don't
forgot to to explain what it means for something to be simple).

9. In Monadology 17, Leibniz argues that "perception . . . is inexplicable in terms of mechanical reasons . . ." Discuss Leibniz argument here, putting it into your own words.

Empiricists

10. Locke: What does Locke think substance is? How does he come to this conclusion?

11. Berkeley: What is the only kind of substance, according to Berkeley? Why does he think this? What does he think primary qualities such as extension, rest, figure, motion, solidity, and number are?

12. Hume: Give Hume's skeptical argument. Explain how this relates to natural laws like Newton's law of gravity and/or one of his laws of motion (for example: force = mass * acceleration)

Kant

13. What, according to Kant, is substance?

14. What are phenomena and what are noumena? Why might the existence of phenomena force one to posit the existence of noumena?

15. What is Hume's skeptical challenge and how does Kant respond to that challenge?

Attachment:- Topics.rar