PHILOSOPHY 203/203W

Lecture Notes

These notes are intended as supplements to the course materials. They are designed to serve as a handy reference for technical jargon and defined terms, and also as a starting point for further discussion. I cannot stress enough that these notes are not to be used as substitutes for the assigned reading. In many cases I provide a potentially controversial interpretation of the text. When you write about one of these texts in one of your papers or on the exam, you may want to take my interpretation into account. But you can’t take it for granted that my interpretation is correct. In particular, when you explain a philosopher’s view in the course of your writing, you cannot quote (or paraphrase) my interpretation without also quoting (or paraphrasing) the author’s own words and then submitting my interpretation to critical scrutiny.

One of the most important lessons you should learn from this course is that in philosophy there are no experts. Of course the professionals have read more than you have, and of course they’ve spent more time thinking about the issues. Nonetheless, when you are discussing a philosophical question, you can’t say – As Descartes says, blah …. – as if that were some sort of argument for blah! And the same goes for me: If I say "Blah" in the course of my lectures or in these notes, the mere fact that I said it is no reason to believe that it is true. So don’t mistake my glosses on the texts for the texts themselves. Treat these notes as you would treat any text. Your job is to argue with what's on the page in order to figure out whether it’s right. Don’t be a credulous sheep. Don’t believe what you read.