Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Monday, September 28, 2009
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Friday, September 25, 2009
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Big Questions
What kind of life brings the most happiness to human beings? What kind of life prevents human beings from being happy?
In the Ethics, Aristotle talks about the kinds of habits that make it possible for people to act in ways that lead to happiness, and that avoid unhappiness.
In the Ethics, Aristotle talks about the kinds of habits that make it possible for people to act in ways that lead to happiness, and that avoid unhappiness.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Saturday, September 19, 2009
More
I could return to questions that first started interesting me in graduate school: why does the chorus decide to stay with Promoetheus and share his fate in Aeschylus's Prometheus Bound? Why does Lady Macbeth decide not to murder Duncan herself, without her husband's help, in Macbeth? What is the Thucydides' understanding of chance, and the understanding of Plutarch in the lives of Timoleon and AP. (These were all my most successful papers in graduate school.)
In my experience, one small observation can take you far. My observation that Young Socrates responds in a most manly way in the first section of the statesman became a dissertation.
And my dissertation ends with a question: if Young Socrates is an example of courage detached from temperance, then perhaps Theatesus is an example of temperance detached from courage. That is a question that I am eager to pursue. The demands of my teaching have not permitted it, and I need the leisure to do it. I need the leisure and opportunity that St. John's affords to pursue questions that are veyr important to me.
Also Livy.
Translated: part of Klein's math book from German for my modern language requirement. French, etc.
What is the account of origins in the Timaeus, the Physics (?), and the nature of things?
In my experience, one small observation can take you far. My observation that Young Socrates responds in a most manly way in the first section of the statesman became a dissertation.
And my dissertation ends with a question: if Young Socrates is an example of courage detached from temperance, then perhaps Theatesus is an example of temperance detached from courage. That is a question that I am eager to pursue. The demands of my teaching have not permitted it, and I need the leisure to do it. I need the leisure and opportunity that St. John's affords to pursue questions that are veyr important to me.
Also Livy.
Translated: part of Klein's math book from German for my modern language requirement. French, etc.
What is the account of origins in the Timaeus, the Physics (?), and the nature of things?
History
The questions arising out of 9/11 got my interested in the history of the clash between Islam and the west. I read Julian Norwich's series about Byzantium, and that got me interested in reading the primary sources (such as Procopius). It also got me interested in tracing things back even further--to the fall of the Roman Empire and the invasions of vandals etc. I'd like to read Gregory of Tours, the Franks and Lombards. etc. That got me interested in the history Greece and Rome. Some of these works are in the curriculum and I am excited to read or re-read them: Thucydides, Herodotus, Plutarch, Tacitus. (Not that Plutarch is primarily a historian. My most successful paper in graduate school was about Plutarch's understanding of chance in Timoleon and Amelius Paulus.)
Shakespeare got me interested in reading the Oxford history and Hume that got me interested in the original sources as well of English history--as well as the intersection with the hsitory of the Roman Empire.
I am interested in Enlgish history, partly because of Shakespeare, and also because it traces back the United States, it is the history of our legal traditions.
I like to trace things back to the beginning. (and use primary sources, and read in the original languages, etc.)
See also question of origins: taught myself Hebrew and read 1st chapter of Genesis in Hebrew to see what it teaches.
Being at SJ would also make it possible for me to return to my first love, the study of philosophy, especially the dialogues of Plato, but also Aristotle and the other philosophers of the western tradition. Finish the study of the trilogy that I began with the statesman. Also Laches and Charmides (dialectical virtues).
Also, the study of ideas in literature. My first successful paper in college was sacrificing the happiness of individuals to the requirements of society in Billy Budd and the Scarlet Letter.
Shakespeare got me interested in reading the Oxford history and Hume that got me interested in the original sources as well of English history--as well as the intersection with the hsitory of the Roman Empire.
I am interested in Enlgish history, partly because of Shakespeare, and also because it traces back the United States, it is the history of our legal traditions.
I like to trace things back to the beginning. (and use primary sources, and read in the original languages, etc.)
See also question of origins: taught myself Hebrew and read 1st chapter of Genesis in Hebrew to see what it teaches.
Being at SJ would also make it possible for me to return to my first love, the study of philosophy, especially the dialogues of Plato, but also Aristotle and the other philosophers of the western tradition. Finish the study of the trilogy that I began with the statesman. Also Laches and Charmides (dialectical virtues).
Also, the study of ideas in literature. My first successful paper in college was sacrificing the happiness of individuals to the requirements of society in Billy Budd and the Scarlet Letter.
Friday, September 18, 2009
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Monday, September 14, 2009
Friday, September 11, 2009
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Questions
Concerning liberty: This has become a practical question as a result of America's decision to establish something like liberal democracies in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Other questions that I have been thinking about are: Is it right for the U.S. to use humiliating, frightening, or otherwise disturbing interrogation techniques to prevent a terrorist attack? Is it right for the U.S. to conduct warrantless surveillance of international phone calls to prevent a terrorist attack? Does Israel have a right to exist in Palestine as a Jewish state? All of the above questions are, at bottom, the same question: if liberty, as Locke says, is to be free from violence and oppression, then what may a government justly do in order to protects its citizens from foreign attacks?
Other domestic questions: Should the U.S. government provide health care for everyone living in the United States? All of these questions are ultimately the same question: are the people capable of governing themselves, or would it be better for them to be governed by others who are by nature more able to rule?
In regard to Shakespeare: what may the governed rightly do to protect themselves from their own government?
Other questions that I have been thinking about are: Is it right for the U.S. to use humiliating, frightening, or otherwise disturbing interrogation techniques to prevent a terrorist attack? Is it right for the U.S. to conduct warrantless surveillance of international phone calls to prevent a terrorist attack? Does Israel have a right to exist in Palestine as a Jewish state? All of the above questions are, at bottom, the same question: if liberty, as Locke says, is to be free from violence and oppression, then what may a government justly do in order to protects its citizens from foreign attacks?
Other domestic questions: Should the U.S. government provide health care for everyone living in the United States? All of these questions are ultimately the same question: are the people capable of governing themselves, or would it be better for them to be governed by others who are by nature more able to rule?
In regard to Shakespeare: what may the governed rightly do to protect themselves from their own government?