Spring 2009 Wisdom Course Supplemental Notes

Return to Wisdom

I'll use this page for supplemental notes from the class. -Alfino

Jan 13: Introduction

Early Questions

1. What are the characteristics of wise people?

empathetic, knowledge, virtuous, innovative, realistic, cautious, accepting experience

age/experience, "street smart" (as opposed to book smart), personality and charisma, serenity

abstract thinking, simple lifestyle, moral transc., discipline

insightful, open-minded, humble, developed capacity for self-reflection

sacrifice, experience, age, character, education (formal/informal), well-spoken, just, awareness of world / others.

unconventional

application of knowledge, rational, open minded, looking at the bigger picture, reflective.

2. Give examples of wise people in your life. Describe them.

3. Wisdom illusory or real?

maybe real, but the subjectivity of wisdom literature is a problem.

can't identify it with specific emotion like happiness.

recognizable in others.

4. Give a preliminary definition of wisdom.

1. Practicing one's knowledge.
2. Wisdom is like other things that look simple, but are really complex.
3. Good judgement and advice about important but uncertain matters.
4. Expert knowledge system in the domain, fundamental life pragmatics.

Note to Class

Class,

Thanks for a good first class. I think we've got a really interesting group.

I'll be asking for volunteers to present a brief overview of key ideas or "highlights" from specific readings. This is not a substitute for my presentation of the material, but it really helps me gauge what you took from the reading and where I should come in. The presentation itself is very informal. Just identify, in 3-5 minutes the key ideas you took from the reading and some questions you have after doing the reading.

For next week, I need volunteers for the five readings assigned. Once you volunteer, you don't need to do this again until the whole class has gone.

So please email me with a particular reading (1-5) from next week's class that you could give a "Highlights" presentation on.

Thanks.

Jan 20: Greek/Hellenistic Wisdom 1

excerpt from Apology

The excerpt from the Apology which we read for this week gives the classic statement of Socratic Wisdom, also refered to as socratic ignorance. For Socrates, wisdom is a property of the divine. Paradoxically, humans are wise primarily to the extent that they realize that they do not possess wisdom. Socrates (and Plato) are pretty clear in other dialogues (cf. Meno) that knowing that you do not know something is better than thinking that you do. The Sophists, whom Socrates refers to as the paid teachers of the youth, help people acquire a pretense of knowledge. Poets don't even understand their own poems, so how could they have wisdom? Craftsmen, interestingly, do have some wisdom according to Socrates, but they overgeneralize from the domain in which they do have wisdom to areas in which they do not.

excerpt from Symposium

The Symposium is presented by Plato as the record of a drinking party in which each participant was obligated to give a speech on the nature of love. You can check the wikipedia for an overview of the specific speeches. Our excerpt is taken from Socrates famous speech on love, in which he quotes Diotima, a real female (rare then) ancient Greek philosopher. Love turns out to be a semi-divine force that motivates us to pursue the highest forms, including Wisdom. Wise people do not get stuck chasing pretty lovers (especially boys for these guys); they realize that beyond the specific beautiful people, there is the form of beauty. Climbing the "ladder of love" reorients our lives in a practical way toward less transitory things. That is supposed to be a wise thing to do. Start at 201D for the main part of the reading.

excerpt from Phaedo

The Phaedo is the dialogue recording a lengthy conversation about the immortality of the soul. The setting for the dialogue is the jail in which Socrates' will soon be executed by lethal ingestion of hemlock. The incredibly dramatic ending is the death scene itself. Our two passages are from the end of the dialogue and include that scene. In the first passage, roughly 78B to 86E, Socrates is giving some arguments for associating the soul with the sort of reality that might not perish. Specifically, he imagines that souls that practiced philosophy have less matter clinging to their souls upon death. Simmias and Cebes have an objection to his view, but they are afraid to put it forward since, in the present circumstances (Socrates' immanent death), it might be disturbing if they are right and the soul isn't immortal. After assurances from Socrates, Simmias makes the objection that the soul may be like the attunement of an instrument, but then, when the instrument perishes, the attunement does as well. This "Pythagorean" view is imcompatible with Socrates, yet trades on the same analogy.

In our second passage, 107D to the end of the dialogue, you get to full scale Platonic myth of the afterlife and reincarnation. Drink it in and analyze it as myth. What vision of the wise life is implied by this vision of the afterlife?

• Note connection of purification practices in life (philosophy as a contemplative practice?) to the state of the soul in the afterlife at 82c-d and 114C.