Meeting Cancelled

Meeting cancelled tomorrow – there will be no meeting this Wednesday. Once we get a full tab of how many people can come on what days, we will finally decide a concrete date for meetings. Monday is out, unless you guys are okay with it being bi-weekly. Tuesday is also out, and Wednesday, it seems, is a less than plausible option. If there are more than ten to fifteen members that would be comfortable with a Monday or Wednesday date, we can consider that. Thursday or Friday are other options, although strongly discouraged ones.

E-mail your preferences to locke.avicenna@gmail.com.

Also, please get the word out – there will be cookies next meeting! Not normal chocolate-chip ones, either, and there's plenty for everyone, so get the word out for Philosophy club! When recruiting, please get the person's name and email address.

Wednesday

Check back Tuesday afternoon for an update, but unless otherwise noted, there will be a meeting this Wednesday, room 1033, as usual. Bring something to contribute to the discussion! Also, in order to keep the discussion ordered, we might be nominating a moderator. This will not be me or Daniel (hopefully) and we will be deciding who at the meeting.

Meeting 2: Wednesday

Meeting two will be on Wednesday. Invite anyone who wants to come along. As an incentive, there may (or may not) be food (you never know). The topic this week will be Aristotle. Since we covered Plato last week, it's only fair to look at his main opponent next.

To Recap: Epistemology is the field of philosophy concerned with knowledge. How do we know what we know? How do we acquire knowledge? How can we tell truth from lies, reality from fiction?

Plato believes that our senses can fool us. He categorized the things we know into four categories. The most basic (impure) form of knowledge, he believed came from our imagination. (example: we can imagine seeing a unicorn, however, that does not mean that unicorns exist). The next form of knowledge is knowledge gained from the senses. This is also prone to deception (illusions, deception, subjectivity, etc). The first "true" form of knowledge is that gained from reason (all triangles have three sides, 3 + 3 = 6, etc). The final form of knowledge exists when one can interpret and know everything through pure reason, a state he called "The Good".

Plato believed that everything in the physical world had a counterpart in the "World of Forms". There may be many chairs, but there exists only one, true, 'pure' chair, and that is from the world of forms. This alternate world, Plato believed, was where one's soul came from, and would ultimately return to. Think of the "World of Forms" as Heaven.

Looking forward: Look up information on Aristotle's Epistemology. Here are two links:

• http://science.jrank.org/pages/9174/Epistemology-Ancient-Aristotle.html
• http://instruct.westvalley.edu/lafave/Arstotle.htm

Aristotle believed that one must rely on the senses in order to gain new information. Think of the scientific method, and how observations are made in science – that's Aristotle's method of gaining knowledge. He believed that reason alone could not provide one with true knowledge. This sparked off a divide, from Rationalism (Plato, reason) to Empiricism (Aristotle, senses).

While looking through information, think about the following questions for Wednesday.

1. How can we gain new knowledge?
2. How do we know what we know is true/real?
3. What are the limits of our knowledge?

First Meeting

The opening meeting of philosophy club will be held on Monday, November 23rd, in room 1033 after school. The topic for this week's discussion will be the epistemology and metaphysics of the greek philosopher Plato.