Political Science
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Exam #1
Study Guide
We are all liberals
Women and Children: regulation of sexual intercourse
Guardians: three groups, born with silver in their soul and they are like the police; to
protect the city of Kallipolis
Qualitative and Quantitative: more than one way of studying political science
Quantitative: statistics, numbers
Qualitative: Normative, subjective
Allegory of the cave: the good; what the philosopher kings see as good and true, in the
allegory the sun was seen as the good and true, The shadows and illusions are the key to
the story, we can add our own interpretation of the shadows, the cave represents our
world, the things that distract us but also keep us in line(shadows and illusions), social
constructions, speech to the cope of human capacity of knowledge, who we think we
are and what we know to be true, prisoners thought they were free, apply it to
something contemporary today
Human nature: social construction, “he hit me because he loves me”, skepticism of
human nature
The political: What is common to the whole, matters if common concern, justice, your
experience with the system, authority and legitimacy of the state; what is common to
the whole is antagonism and it is up to politics to alleviate those conflicts which would
expand the political. The political is more economics issues, you see the political in the
classroom; anywhere your voice is heard.
Understand the order of regimes matters, something about democracy, Socrates
thoughts, democracy is the best of the worst, chaotic, the poor killed the rich, the
danger to democracy is the freedom people have, the value most cherished in a
democracy, dangers: democracy is in your hands, you have to care or else it won’t work
Justice: justice is benefitting ones friends and harming ones enemies, Thrash; “ the
advantage of the stronger, an unjust man will always get more then the just man”, laws
about immigration and gay marriage, Justice is never concrete it is not static. Justice is
more or less up in the air, Socrates; “virtue and wisdom, injustice is vice and ignorance
The noble lie: what keeps order and structure, it resolves uncertainty, there is no
question of where you stand, no competition. Establishes order and removes
uncertainty in our society that occurred in Kallipolis.
Philosopher kings: born with gold in their souls (the myths of metals), rulers of Kallipolis,
the noble lie is passed in between philosopher kings, they see the good in the lie