Fall 2010 Wisdom Course Study Questions

Return to Wisdom

I'll post study questions and study advice to this page. Any exam I give you will draw from these questions. While the clicker questions are more preliminary than these study questions, you should also study those questions.

September 8, 2010 (2)

1. Explain the "Axial Age" hypothesis from Hall's introductory chapter. What implications does it have for a theory of wisdom?

It was a historical moment when civilizations in the East and West gravitated around figures that represented new modes of thought and uniquely human paths to wisdom: Socrates, Confucius, Buddha, Jesus Maybe, these cultures have left behind some virtues as well as other factors. We have to question if we are more or less wise today, than during those times.

2. How is Pericles wisdom different from Socrates'? What terms from Greek philosophy describe each?

3. What is the difference between implicit and explicit theories of wisdom?

• Implicit (ask what wisdom is?)
• Explicit (expert definitions study famous people and most educated people)

4. Distinguish sophia, phronesis, and episteme.

Sophia is "moral sagehood" and is purely contemplative. It is complete knowledge. Phronesis is practical wisdom, while episteme is everyday knowledge.

5. Describe the "perspective shift" in the Aquinas quote in the Robinson article. Does this seem like a basic trait of wise thinking?

September 13, 2010 (3)

1. What is Socrates' view of wisdom? How did he come to this view? What insights and limitations does it hold for you?

2. How does Plato connect a belief in the soul to the idea of wisdom as a transcendent state of knowledge? How does the myth of reincarnation fill in his view of the task of pursuing wisdom?

This relates back to the idea of Platonic Dualism, which says that someone can only achieve wisdom if his or her soul is disconnected from the body (the body creates barriers to achieving wisdom because of all its needs). He believes that knowledge is abstract and ideal, and therefore the knower of the knowledge also needs to be abstract and ideal. Plato believed that each time the body is reincarnated the person becomes more pure because it is detaching itself from physical objects and needs. → The more you are reincarnated, the more wisdom you acquire.

3. According to Osbeck, how is wisdom a kind of "making" for Aristotle?

September 20, 2010 (4)

1. What is Labouvie-Vief's interpretation of ancient thought on wisdom? What is her criticism of Plato in particular?

• Homer's idea of wisdom is embedded in action and experience
• Wisdom is moral and spiritual integrity, humility and compassion, insight into the pragmatic
• Plato- has no ideal consciousness; no separation of self/environment (or gods); it is "profoundly irrational"

2. What are the main elements of the Berlin Paradigm's definition of wisdom? Give a preliminary assessment of this definition, considering criticisms of researchers such as Carstensen and Ardelt.

“Lifespan psychology”. Attempt to test wisdom in an empirical fashion. It involved participants conducting  “read-alouds” and giving honest answers. Answers that spanned the five factors of wisdom were considered wise.

Five Factors of Wisdom:
1.	Factual knowledge: conditions of life
2.	Procedural knowledge: strategies of judgment
3.	Life Span Contextualism: understand human developmental contexts
4.	Relativism: difference of goals, values and priorities
5.	Uncertainty: Socratic ignorance

Cognitive Mechanics: an aptitude for reasoning and thinking
  -Declines with age
Cognitive Pragmatics: ways of thinking
  -Heightens with age

3. What is Carstensen's "time horizon" theory? Critically evaluate.

  Older people are generally better at regulating emotions because of their sense of (limited) time left to live. "When your time perspective shortens...you tend to focus on emotionally meaningful goals. When the time horizon is long, you focus on knowledge acquisition" (Hall 63). "Older people experience negative emotions less frequently than younger people, exercise better control over their emotions and...rebound quickly from adverse moments" (Hall 63).
  The fact that older people have a shorter "time horizon" makes them more concerned with social connections and emotional richness - while young people have an "open-ended sense of the future" and pursue the acquisition of knowledge instead.
  "Carpe diem" attitude is not necessarily tied to age, it occurs whenever a persons "time horizon" shifts. "It has already been detected, for example, in young people exposed to life-altering public events, like the September 11 attacks in the United States" (Hall 71-72).

4. Give a general summary of the life-span perspective on wisdom as discussed in Clayton and Birren's, "The Development of Wisdom Across the Life Span"

  History has claimed that wisdom is a positive quality associated with the onset of old age. Compared attributes associated with the young and old with attributes of the wise. Although the older subjects did not judge themselves as any wiser than the younger subjects, the younger subjects attributed wisdom to the older subjects.
  All subjects perceived wisdom as a "multidimensional attribute involving the integration of general cognitive, affective, and reflective components" (130).

September 22, 2010 (5)

1. Summarize Aristotle's view of the "hierarchy of knowledge and wisdom." Should we theorize wisdom as complete and universal knowledge? \

2. Is there such a thing as philosophical wisdom in contrast to practical wisdom? (A's answer at Bk 6, sec. 7)

3. Is the human good (happiness) objective enough to support Aristotle's view of wisdom?

4. Why does Aristotle think about wisdom as a a virtue?

September 27, 2010 (7)

1. Describe the Berlin Wisdom Paradigm in terms of its motivations, assumptions, model of wisdom, and research. Then be prepared to evaluate in at least in terms of perliminary criticisms in Hall, class discussion, and your own reflection.

2. Identify specific research on "age of onset" of wisdom. Present your preliminary assessment. (Add later evidence to your notes as it comes in.)

- In a study by Baltes and Smith it was found that most people expect wisdom to begin to evolve after 55 years of age and continue to develop until the age of 85 (pg 106-108). They also conducted a think aloud study with participants from three age groups; young adults, middle-aged adults and older adults. It was found that participants performed better when the questions they were asked dealt with their own age group (pg 108-111).

- Kunzman and Baltes (pg 121-123) found that late adolescence and early adulthood is the primary age window for a first foundation of wisdom-related knowledge. Beyond this age, factors other than age became critical for the development of wisdom-related. However older adults are among the top performers in wisdom related tasks.

3. Develop arguments and considerations for and against the claim that wisdom (on the Berlin paradigm or in general) provides a model of living that is fundamentally boring.

     - When looking at the idea of wisdom in general and more specifically at the SOC theory, the claim that this lifestyle approach is boring could easily be made. When all chance, uncertainty, and any element of the unknown is removed or pre-accounted for, life excitement is removed as well. From there, personal growth and experience is heavily limited, and therefore one could say that truly living life is no longer fully accessible. To add, if all emotion is removed from assessing wisdom, and instead all responses become automatic, many argue that does not fully make available the full scope of what it is to be human and truly feel and react.
         On the other hand, one could argue that wisdom is not boring, but rather freeing for someone who is wise. If someone is wise, their availability to be spontaneous and easily react with wisdom allows them to live an exciting and fulfilling life without having to worry all the time.

September 30, 2010 (8)

1. What is a meta-heuristic? How might wisdom be thought of as a collection of meta-heuristics?

2. What is SOC theory? How might think of wisdom as a collection of meta-heuristics fit or not fit with SOC theory?

SOC stands for selection, optimization, compensation. Selection refers to goals which are implemented as a motivatioin for a good life. Elective Selection means matching needs to resources and Loss selection means being able to restructuring your goals or selecting new ones due to loss. Optimization of SOC theory is getting the most of the means to an end. Compensation means responding to the loss of means, adjusting to failures and set-backs while fixing problems in order ot get the best outcomes.

For meta-heuristics see notes from 9/29. SOC theory would fit as meta-heuristic since it can be applied as a rule of thumb.

October 11, 2010 (10)

1. What, if any, implications does the evidence on emotion in moral decision making (Hall Ch. 6 and Haidt, "Emo Dog" - including his research on disgust) have for a theory of wisdom?

Emotion in moral decision making means that the emotion or intuition comes first, then rationalization. Haidt describes this at the “emotional dog with the rational tail.” One example of where we use emotion to make a moral decision is in Marc Hauser’s Trolley Problem. fMRIs were taken of people doing the trolley problem, and evidence of emotional and automatic cognition was found in the brain scans. This “social intuitionism” is not just about consulting our emotions, but the ability to actually change our emotional structure. What causes us to act is our relatively intuitive automatic part of our brain. Implications that the evidence on emotion in moral decision making are concentrated around several key questions: can we change our responsibilities? What guidelines do we use? and can we train our emotional responses? In what ways? It might sound good to say that wise people train their emotions, but in relation to what?

2. How did Ancient and Hellenistic philosophers think about the relationship between philosophy and life? How did Judaic sects such as Christianity, incorporate Platonic and Hellenistic philosophy into belief and practice?

3. Does wisdom have to involve an orientation to the good?

October 13, 2010 (11)

1. Drawing on details from your reading, construct a general overview of the cultural context and history of yoga.

2. What's is Patanjali's analysis of the human condition and what remedy does he propose?

3. What are the Brahmavihara?

4. How does Yoga challenge a more cognitive model for determining the right actions to follow to develop wisdom?

October 20, 2010 (12)

1. Drawing on your understanding of Buddhism from both the readings for today and the Feuerstein chapter, reconstruct the Buddhist analysis of wisdom as a successful response to suffering. Then offer your evaluation of the Buddhist's point of view.

Suffering is a part of life. And so, there is also an origin of suffering, which can be causally analyzed. Find the cause of suffering, allows one to put an end to it, but in order to put an end to suffering, one must follow a specific path. This path is most commonly the 8 Fold Path that Feuerstein presents. This however is no enough to overcome suffering. One must also understand that permanence is not found on earth and so one must sever all feelings of permanence in order to eliminate suffering. This means that one must relinquish the self, the ego, all material objects, attachments, cravings, etc. And so, what a person has to do is to see reality “as it is” and adjust one’s response to that understanding (the 4 Noble Truths). Which would actually be very helpful because it would allow one to realize that all things come to an end and so it is unreasonable to hold on to material objects and attachments when all will be lost in the end anyway. For many people however, this theory would be difficult, maybe even near impossible to put into action because materialism tends to have a strong hold upon people who relate their status and character to material things.

2. Is there reason to think that the direct training of emotional responses such as compassion and humility will increase wisdom? If so, how? If not, why not?

3. Drawing on the Ricard reading, reconstruct his view that ego attachment is an obstacle to wisdom and to overcoming suffering? Is egolessness a good ideal to pursue in cultivating wisdom? Make careful distinctions to capture both Ricard's view and criticisms of it.

October 25, 2010 (13)

1. What does evidence from Glimcher and Gilbert on decision making and "discounting" suggest about the challenge of wisdom?

On page 85 in Glimcher, he notes that success breeds habit and pleasures habituate. Gilbert was the video on assessing the probability of and value of gain.

The challenge would be discounting present value of wisdom versus future wisdom. We get too caught up in what we can gain immediately that we lose sight of what we can gain if we have patience.

2. How does Sternberg think that creativity comes into play in wise decision making? Briefly evaluate.

3. How does Stanovich provide a framework for thinking about the value of teaching wisdom?

October 27, 2010 (14)

1. Give a general reconstruction of Stoic philosophical committments and the Stoic's advice for cultivating wisdom.

Philosophical Commitments: Four unifying concepts are freedom, judgment, volition, integrity

Cultivating Wisdom: make sure your responses to the world reflect what you say you know about the world.

Epictetus “Enchiridion”

Main idea: some things are in our control and some things are not

Stoics believe that everything is physical (meaning God is in all things)

Long “Epictetus in his Time and Place”

“Stoicism, then, views the world as a system that is both deterministic and providential. God, the omnipresent active principle, establishes and implements everything in a causal sequence that leave no room for events to occur otherwise than the way they do, though it does leave room (here things get complicated) for us to be the agents of our own decisions and hence answerable, praiseworthy, or blamable for what we think and do.” Pg. 22

2. Identify the rationales for "negative visualization" and evaluate the objections to this wisdom training practice.

3. Do stoics have a "control" problem? Does Irvine's treatment of the dichotomy of control develop stoic thought in a practical and consistent manner?

• It is a mixed case: we have some, but not all control of our emotions or situations in life
• We should therefore base our goals on where we can have control (for example, not a goal to win the game, but to play our best during the game)
• Irvine's treatment of the dichotomy of control in consistent with Stoic thought. In a practical manner, it instructs how specifically to respond to the world, and to realize human limitations

November 1, 2010 (15)

1. How does theory and data about resilience (especially Parker, Vaillant, Vaillant & Ardelt, and Meany) affect a theory of wisdom? Do you have to have stress or challenge to develop wisdom? If so what kinds?

2. What strengths might older people have in developing wisdom, in spite of their declining mental acuity?

3. How did Monika Ardelt study the relationship between wisdom and life satisfaction? Summarize her conclusions.

November 8, 2010 (17)

1. How does Estes define proverbs? What themes does he find? Collect examples of some of these themes.

2. How do proverbs work?

November 10, 2010 (18)

1. For both Job and Ecclesiastes, be prepared to give a summary and indicate major turning points in the text. Reflect on the view of wisdom in each book and it's relationship to other theories we have studied.

2. How would the views of wisdom in these books be practically valuable to a tribe of humans?

November 15, 2010 (19)

1. What are the two main approaches to reading the Song of Solomon? What insight about wisdom does this book represent?

   The Song of Solomon is a text, written like love poems. The two main interpretations are:
   1.	Allegory for our relationship with God. “Married to God”. Combines physical and psychological love.
   2.	Modern interpretations believe that the poems are simply about love.

2. Be prepared to identify some of the distinctive features of Islamic religion and faith.

-The five concrete pillars of Islam- Recognition of God, prayer, fasting during Ramadan, alms giving and pilgrimage.

-Mohammed (570-632 A.D.) is the last prophet, and the Koran contains God's final revelation to him. -There is a dualist psychology between the mind and the soul, the soul being connected with the heart.

3. Identify similarities and differences between Islamic wisdom (both proverbs and spiritual practice) and other cultural/religious models of wisdom.

November 17, 2010 (20)

1. Does Wisdom involves social cognition?

2. How do we development wisdom intuitions? (drawing also on Haidt, "EmoDog," p. 827.)

3. What does the Ultimatum Game or the Public Goods game tell us about how some values become part of our cognitive dispositions. Does the public good game teach a wisdom lesson about punishment?

4. How well does "collaborative filtering" work as a metaphor for social cognition of wisdom.

One example of “collaborative filtering” is Pandora, which elects songs based on what the people listening to a song that you like are also listening to. One theory of wisdom is that it is the product of social collaborative filtering, because little judgments that we make create a filtering process that can actually produce wisdom (much like music filtering produces actions). Wisdom is a product of social interaction. However, collaborative filtering does not mean that humans actually find true wisdom. For example, Pandora might select music that you prefer, but this doesn’t necessarily mean that it is good music.

November 29, 2010 (22)

1. What does research in moral psychology and behavioral economics suggest about the way individuals develop values?

2. Can we make direct inferences about the content (or dynamics) of wisdom from research in moral psychology and behavioral economics?

3. Can we find examples of the "efficacy of Wisdom" in religious culture? Does this evidence also imply limits?

December 1, 2010 (23)

1. How does introspection work? What reasons do we have for doubting the accuracy of our introspective self-appraisals?

2. What advice does Wilson offer to increase self-knowledge?

3. How does narrative opacity relate to wisdom?