St. Mary’s Catholic High School
HZT4U Philosophy
Final Exam Review – June 2012
PART A:
PART B:
PART C:
Knowledge & Understanding; Thinking & Inquiry
A1. Multiple Choice
/ 25 marks
A2. Matching
/ 10 marks
A3. Fill in the Blanks
/ 10 marks
A4. Logic Problems
/ 5 marks
Communication; Application
B1. Short Answer
/ 15 marks (complete on lined paper)
Communication; Application
C1. Essay
/ 25 marks (complete on lined paper)
TOTAL:
/ 90 marks
Knowledge Based Topics (N.B.: refer also to review sheets from earlier in the semester)
philosopher/philosophy
pragmatism
faulty analogy
post hoc
non-sequitur
Alan Turing
Chinese Room T.E.
empiricism
existentialism
atheism
evil
teleological
metaphysics
deism
pantheism
determinism
autonomy
branches of philosophy
argument structures
straw man
tu quoque
syllogism
soft determinists
ontological argument
utilitarianism
Descartes
Socrates
cynicism
deontological
epistemology
monotheism
axiology
deism
nihilism
Plato
red herring
ad hominen
post hoc ergo propter hoc
subjectivism
categorical imperative
rationalism
Sartre
anti-foundationalism
foundationalism
ethics
St. Thomas Aquinas
cosmological
Aristotle
remembering
forgetting
Thinking/Communication/Application-Based Themes
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Identifying fallacies
Natural law, Church teaching on sexuality
Arguments for the existence/non-existence of God
Films we’ve watched/reviewed from a particular philosopher’s viewpoint
How cynics, hedonists, pragmatists and existentialists might respond to a “disaster” or moral
dilemma
Plato and Aristotle’s ethics: the “good life”
Strict determinism’s perception of chaos theory, Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, and William
James’ arguments in “The Dilemma of Determinism”
Knowledge to be claimed as truth: conditions needed; Gettier’s challenge and theory
Note: bring your half-page “roster” of logical fallacies
MDTYGKFTE*
(* More Dumb Things Ya Gotta Know For The Exam)
Intro: What is Philosophy?
* branches of philosophy
* nature of philosophical questions
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Logic:
* what is an argument?
* informal fallacies: straw man, red herring, etc.
Epistemology:
Descartes & rationalism
* the cogito – how he got from radical doubt to knowledge of and belief in God
Locke & empiricism
* impressions … sensations … ideas
Kant & “categories” of perception – bridging the rationalist-empiricist gap
Skepticism and chaos theory (Note: this latter does NOT mean everything is random!)
Distinction between rationalism & empiricism, & the reasons people opt for one or the other
Knowledge, Belief, and Opinion
 “justified true belief” & Gettier’s objections to it; etc.
 Direct & indirect knowledge, & other distinctions
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Metaphysics:
Varieties of Theism/Atheism
Arguments for the existence of God: strengths and weaknesses
The nature of the person:
* free will and determinism (& its major weaknesses: James)
* criteria for defining “personhood”: Church teaching (catechism)
The mind-body problem: what it is, and various solutions
Permanence & change: various views
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Ethics:
Various approaches to ethics: Plato, Aristotle, Natural Law (C.S. Lewis & natural law theory: the impact of natural
law philosophy on the Church’s understanding of sexuality and reproductive technologies, etc.),
Hedonism/Cynicism/Stoicism, Pragmatism, Utilitarianism, Existentialism, Kant (C.I.) – be ready to illustrate with
applications to specific issues
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Some key philosophers and their ideas:
Socrates
* the nature of virtue & evil – the “unexamined life”
* human learning = remembering; evil = forgetting (what you knew in pre-existence)
Plato
* the ideal world of “forms” – the allegory of the cave
* his ethics – philosopher kings – & the nature of happiness
Aristotle
* ethics – the golden mean – & the nature of happiness
Aquinas
* connection to Aristotle/empiricism
* the Five Ways + others’ “proofs” for the existence of God (Anselm, Pascal)
Mr. Phillips’ Web Page: http://www.start.ca/users/chesswiz/philosophy.html
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