This new text/reader is the first major introduction to philosophy that incorporates movies as a key pedagogical element. Throughout the text, summaries of and references to current and classic films engage students, revealing what they already know and addressing issues that they find relevant. The book highlights the major topics within philosophy and includes the core readings that represent them; instructors with various pedagogical approaches will find Classic Questions and Contemporary Film inviting and accessible.
Preface
CHAPTER 1: PHILOSOPHY, PHILOSOPHERS AND ARGUMENTS: What Is Philosophy?
1.1 Introduction
How Does One Do Philosophy
How Do We Proceed
1.2 Deductive Argumentation
What Are Some Common Deductive Arguments?
How Are Deductive Arguments Evaluated?
Doesn't the Content of the Argument Matter?
1.3 Logic Exercises I: Deductive Arguments
1.4 Nondeductive Argumentation
How Do Inductive Arguments Compare with Deductive Arguments?
What Are Some Common Inductive Argument Forms?
How Does Abduction Differ from Induction?
1.5 Logic Exercises II: Inductive Arguments
1.6 Philosophical Analysis and Objectivity
How Can We Determine Whether Philosophy Is Subjective?
But Isn't It Just Obvious That Philosophy Is Subjective?
Is the Law of Noncontradiction an Objective Philosophical Truth?
1.7 Readings and Movies (and Further Exercises)
Exercise A: Extracting and Recasting Arguments Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1974)
Plato: The Apology
Exercise B: Extracting and Assessing Socratic Arguments
Bertrand Russell: The Value of Philosophy
Exercise C: Extracting and Recasting a "Russellian" Argument
1.8 Synthesis and Self-Analysis
1.9 Additional Narratives
CHAPTER 2: EPISTEMOLOGY AND SKEPTICISM: What Can We Know?
The Matrix (1999)
2.1 A Definition of Knowledge
What Is Epistemology?
What Is Required for Propositional Knowledge?
2.2 Justification, Perception, and the Problem of Knowledge
What Is the Problem with Being "Completely Justified"?
Are Our Senses Adequate Sources for Knowledge?
2.3 The Importance of Studying Epistemology
Why Should Anyone Care About Any of This?
What Do Philosophers Think about Knowledge and Certainty?
2.4 Readings and Movies
Plato: A Study of Knowledge: The Theaetetus
Chuang Tzu: Butterflies,
Sextus Empiricus: The Criterion Problem,
Rene Descartes: Meditations I, II and VI
12 Angry Men (1957)
John Hospers: An Argument against Skepticism
Jack S. Crumley II: Responding to the Skeptic
Lorraine Code: Gender and Knowledge
2.5 Synthesis and Self-Analysis
2.6 Alternative Narratives
CHAPTER 3: GOD, CREATION, AND EVIL: Does God Exist?
Bruce Almighty (2003)
3.1 Philosophy and Religion
How Does One Do Philosophy about Religion?
Can We Know Anything about God?
3.2 Ineffability and the Divine Nature
What If the Ineffability Thesis Were True?
What Can We Know about God?
How Do We Know God?
What Is God Like?
Must We Refer to God as "He" or "Him"?
3.3 The Ontological Argument
Is it Impossible for God Not to Exist?
Are There Any Ontological Argument Detractors?
3.4 The Cosmological Argument
Is the Universe Evidence of God's Existence?
How Does Aquinas Argue for God's Existence?
Can Aquinas Appeal to PSR Versions?
Must the First Cause Be God?
3.5 The Design Argument
Does Nature Provide Evidence of a Designer?
Is the Design Argument Successful?
How Is Darwinian Evolution Relevant to the Design Argument?
Has the Design Argument Been Defeated?
3.6 The Problem of Evil
Is the Argument from Evil Sound?
How Do Theists Respond to the Problem of Evil?
What Kind of Theodicies Are There?
What Is the Inductive Problem of Evil?
3.7 Readings and Movies
Anselm and Gaunilo: The Greatest Possible Being
Thomas Aquinas: The First Three Ways
William Paley: The Argument from Design
Inherit the Wind (1960)
Charles Darwin: The Origin of Species
Schindler's List (1993)
John Hick: The Irenaean Theodicy
Soren Kierkegaard: The Unknowability of God and the Leap of Faith
3.8 Synthesis and Self-Analysis
3.9 Alternative Narratives
CHAPTER 4: MIND, BODY AND CONSCIOUSNESS: What Kind of Thinking Thing Are We?
Being John Malkovich (1999)
4.1 The Mind-Body Problem
What Does This Have to Do with the Mind-Body Problem?
Can Science Help Solve the Problem?
What Are the Options?
4.2 Leibniz's Law
4.3 Substance Dualism
What Are Descartes's Arguments for Dualism?
How Does the Argument from Doubt Fail?
What about Descartes's Divisibility Argument?
What Is Interactionism?
Is Interactionism Intelligible?
4.4 Eliminative Materialism
What Is the Case for Materialism?
What Is the Case for Eliminativism Materialism?
Is Eliminative Materialism a Plausible Theory?
4.5 Reductive Materialism
So Why Not Reduce the Mental Without Eliminating It?
What Is the Case Against Reductive Materialism?
What Are Mental Events, and Why Are They Important?
What Do the Data Tell Us About the "Insideness" of Our Experiences?
4.6 Functionalism
What Are Functional Concepts?
But Isn't This Behaviorism Again?
Can Machines Be Persons?
Where Does This Leave Us?
4.7 Readings and Movies
Jeffrey Olen: Reductive Materialism
Bicentennial Man (1999)
William Lycan: Robots and Minds
John Searle: The Myth of the Computer
Dean A. Kowalski: Some Cartesian Rejoinders
4.8 Synthesis and Self-Analysis
4.9 Additional Narratives
CHAPTER 5: FREEDOM, DETERMINISM, AND FOREKNOWLEDGE: Are We Free to Choose?
The Matrix Reloaded (2003)
5.1 Fate and Determinism
Are We Ever Free to Choose?
"Do You Believe in Fate, Neo?"
Does Everything Have a Cause?
How Should We Address the Problem?
5.2 Compatibilism
What Does It Mean to Act Freely?
Why Isn't Everyone a Compatibilist?
5.3 The Dilemma of Human Freedom
So Now What?
Must We Give Up Our Beliefs in Freedom and Responsibility?
What Are the Options Again?
5.4 Libertarianism
Is Agent Theory Defensible?
How Do We Explain the Uniqueness of Agents?
5.5 The Threat of Theological Determinism
What Are Divine Perfections?
Can the Freedom-and-Foreknowledge Problem Be Solved?
5.6 Readings and Movies
Baron d'Holbach: Determinism Is Incompatible with Freedom
Walter T. Stace: Freedom Is Compatible with Determinism
Run, Lola, Run (1998)
Roderick Chisholm: Human Freedom and the Self
Minority Report (2002)
Dean A. Kowalski: Reconciling Freedom and Foreknowledge
5.7 Synthesis and Self-Analysis
5.8 Additional Narratives
CHAPTER 6: FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS: Is Ethics Objective?
Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989)
6.1 Subjectivity and Objectivity in Ethics
What Are Ethical Foundations?
Is Ethics Objective?
How Is Ethics Subjectively True?
6.2 Three Conventionalist Theories about Ethics
What Is the Case for Simple Ethical Subjectivism?
What Is the Case against Simple Ethical Subjectivism?
What Is the Case for Moral Relativism?
What Is the Case against Moral Relativism?
What Is the Case for Divine Command Theory?
What Is the Case against Divine Command Theory?
6.3 Reconsidering Objectivity in Ethics
What Is the Relationship between Science, Objectivity, and Ethics
Are There Ethically Significant "Truths of Reason"?
Are There Other Ways to Justify Objectivity in Ethics?
6.4 Readings and Movies
David Hume: Ethics as Sentiment
The Joy Luck Club (1993)
William Graham Sumner: Folkways, Ethnocentrism, and Cultural Relativism
Plato: The Euthyphro
6.5 Synthesis and Self-Analysis
6.6 Alternative Narratives
CHAPTER 7: ETHICS AND MORAL THEORY: What Ought I Do?
Life Is Beautiful (1998)
7.1 Ethics and "Oughts"
What Are Mores?
Are All "Ought Statements" Ethical?
7.2 Moral Reasoning
Can Morality Be Equated with Legality?
Must We Study Philosophy to Think Ethically?
What Is So Important about Ethics?
Why Should We Do the Right Thing?
7.3 The Basics of Moral Theory
What Is a Moral Theory?
What Are Some Examples of a Moral Theory?
7.4 Readings and Movies
Plato: Gyges and the Ring
Groundhog Day (1993)
Aristotle: Virtue Ethics
Extreme Measures (1996)
John Stuart Mill: Utilitarianism
Immanuel Kant: Respect-for-Persons Ethic
Friedrich Nietzsche: Master and Slave Morality
Nel Noddings: The Ethics of Caring
7.5 Synthesis and Self-Analysis
7.6 Additional Narratives
CHAPTER 8: HUMAN NATURE, SOCIETY, AND JUSTICE: What Is the Nature of a Just State?
Lord of the Flies (1990)
8.1 Hobbes, Locke, and Social Contract Theory
Why Do We Need Government at All?
How Do We Avoid a Hobbesian State of Nature?
Aren't Hobbes's Views Rather Extreme?
Isn't Democracy More Plausible?
8.2 King, Socrates, and Civil Disobedience
What Morally Justified the Civil Rights Movement?
What Is the Relationship Between King and Locke?
Is it Ever Permissible to Break the Law?
Should We Follow King or Socrates?
Shouldn't We Practice Civil Disobedience Only as a Last Resort?
8.3 Marginalized Voices
Who Was Malcolm X?
What about the Plight of Women in Society? <...
