Personhood and Paul Snowden

I know it was tough, but your continued attention with the Snowden lecture will certainly help you with the upcoming assignment.

The Snowden lecture will be listened to in class again tomorrow, and we will stop it several times in order to listen to what he has to say, and discuss his ideas of persons and animals.

If you want to listen to the lecture tonight, type "Philosophy Bites" into google, and when you get to the homepage, scroll down until you see the link to the Snowden lecture.

Enjoy your evening!

What is a Person?

Two days of great discussions has now passed, and your first assignment will be handed out on Monday. Your ideas have been WONDERFUL to listen to.

The class started with the question "At what point (exactly, with specifics) does a human become a person entitled to all protections under the law?" You had excellent ideas and your criteria of personhood included:
1. A living, intelligent being, that is aware of it's existence in relation to other living things/beings.
2. The ability to know you are alive/conscious.
3. The ability to communicate because of reactions (hunger, need for medications etc).
4. The ability to have emotions.
5. The instinctual or intelligent need for companionship.
6. A heartbeat.
7. The ability to problem solve.
8. The ability to think and use senses.
9. Self-awareness, emotion and instinct.

I have truly enjoyed these days of discussion, and I look forward to seeing you apply these ideas with the upcoming project.
Enjoy the weekend ... Good luck, Amy, with Miss Acton!!!

Chapter 6: Vocab and First class travel

While the vocab was a necessary evil, you were able to use the ideas within the discussion of the Teletransporter machine. I loved your questions!

Look over the thought experiment again tonight, and be prepared to discuss it further tomorrow.

Enjoy!

Spiderman, Survivor and the Cell Phone Game

Thanks again to youtube for a visual representation of Plato's Allegory of the Cave. Spiderman was never more confused than when he saw the spider in the book! I appreciate your discussion about the pros and cons of the video, and your interpretation of it's significance.

Watching Survivor was a great way to look at perception and reality. Your ideas about how each was represented in the video were well explained. Please don't be afraid to speak up in class if you disagree! :)

Lastly, the Cell Phone game. Great work finding all the answers (as they were in the textbook!) Eric and Taylor ... you ran well, and Kelly it was great to see you getting so excited! REMEMBER ... winner take all tomorrow (or at least the chocolate bars!) with one final question.

Have a great night!

Perception and Reality: A Difference?

Your definitions of perception and reality were great today! You adapted and changed depending on what the group before you had written, and it was so lovely to see your opinions become so animated.

We read Plato's "Allegory of the Cave", and I can't help but wonder what it would be like to be one of those prisoners. Keep thinking about what you perceive and what is real ... and let me know if you come up with any different thoughts.

Introducing the three main ideas of Metaphysics (Supreme Being, Person(hood), and Self) let me see just how much you already know. You articulated your ideas about theses words so well, and when you had the opportunity to scratch off others people's ideas ... well, that's when I think you all shone. Continuing to share our ideas, and still listen to the ideas of others, will help us all get so much out of this class.

Have a great weekend! No homework!

Welcome!

Hello and welcome to our blog. I hope this tool will help us all this semester!

Today we "cubed" and discussed what questions we want answered, what we know, and what it means to be "myself". I am so very proud of your abilities to share with each other and your desire to learn from each other.

Please be sure to have your cell phones charged for class tomorrow. And remind me to hand out your textbooks, please!