Chicago Odyssey Project in the Humanities, Southside Course (2011)
Moral Philosophy: “Living Philosophically”
Instructor: Charles Thomas Elder (Phone: 550-9406 [cell]; e-mail: celder@uchicago.edu)
Intern: Lindsay Atnip (Phone: (717) 319-8967 [cell]; e-mail: lmatnip@gmail.com)
Philosophy is both inviting and forbidding. Reflection on the world and on oneself in the world
is part of common-sense existence, yet radical, root reflection, which is the mark of true
philosophizing, is on the far side of daily life. There is nothing more commonplace than
“philosophy” and nothing rarer than philosophy. (Natanson, Maurice, The Journeying Self, p. 1)
Intellectual life and moral life are one. (Simone Weil, Lectures on Philosophy, p. 221)
Description:
Our word “philosophy” comes from the Greek, philia (“love”) + sophia (“wisdom”). Asked whether he was
wise, Socrates is said to have responded that, no, he was not a “professor of wisdom” (or “sophist”) but
simply a “lover of wisdom,” that is, a philosopher. In fact, Socrates went still further and claimed not to truly
know anything at all—except perhaps that he did not know. At the same time, he lived his life—and
ultimately embraced a martyr’s death—in testimony to the importance of the pursuit of wisdom and the
realization of the philosophical ideal, insisting to the end that “the unexamined life is not worth living.”
In this course, we will explore the meaning and implications of the philosophical life, focusing
particularly on the idea that there is a radical disjunction between “reality,” properly conceived, and what
most people understand by the word, and framing our inquiry in light of Plato’s famous allegory of the cave.
We begin with Plato, looking first at his representation of the life, teachings, and death of Socrates, and then
at the allegory, as he sets it forth in Book VII of The Republic—pausing briefly to consider one of the more
popular contemporary refigurations of the allegory—the Wachowski brothers’ film, The Matrix. Then, in the
second half of the course, we move on to the modern theme of social constructivism as it is found in three
very different twentieth century thinkers—a contemporary sociologist (Peter Berger), a French feminist
philosopher (Simon de Beauvoir), and a seminal colonial and racial theorist (Frantz Fanon)—and finally
concluding with a return to the allegory as interpreted by a notable French religious philosopher and mystic
(Simone Weil).
Each of these thinkers in different ways poses fundamental questions about the nature of reality,
about what is real and what is unreal in our experience, about how it is possible to distinguish the one from
the other, and in the case of de Beauvoir and Fanon, about how reality is defined predominantly by power
and in the interests of those who have it. The point of the course is not to insist that reality is other than what
it seems to be, but rather to propose that the question of what is real and unreal in the world needs to be taken
with utmost seriousness, because how we decide this question, whether we do so deliberately or not,
ultimately determines who we are, what we will become, and what we will live for—which is, of course,
precisely what wisdom is about. In other words, framed in the context of The Matrix, our choice, once we
engage this question seriously, is between taking the red pill or the blue one. By the logic of the story, at
least, there is no third option.
There are five broad goals of the course:
1. to expose you to some classic figures in the history of philosophy;
2. to enhance your ability to read and comprehend philosophical texts;
3. to promote the development of certain language skills, both oral and written;
4. to develop your capacity to think critically, creatively, and evaluatively about fundamental
philosophical questions and problems; and
5. to encourage reflection on how these questions and problems bear upon your personal life and
way of living in the world.
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Expectations of the students:
1. consistent and timely completion of assigned reading;
2. regular attendance and active participation in class discussion;
3. a number of short writing assignments (brief statements and abstracts); and
4. one four to five (4-5) page final paper.
Books:
Plato, Five Dialogues (Hackett)
Berger, Peter, and Luckmann, Thomas, The Social Construction of Reality (Anchor Books)
Fanon, Frantz, Black Skin, White Masks (Grove Press)
PART ONE:
THE LIFE AND DEATH OF SOCRATES; PLATO’S ALLEGORY OF THE CAVE
Session 1: Introductions; course overview; Plato: the meaning of piety (or “holiness”) (January 31)
Reading: Plato, Euthyphro, in Five Dialogues, pp. 2-20.
Questions: Why is Euthyphro bringing a court case against his own father? What is Socrates'
reaction upon learning of this? What does Euthyphro initially think about his own knowledge of
what is pious and impious? What is Euthyphro’s first definition of piety—and Socrates’ objection
to it? What is Euthyphro’s second definition of piety—and Socrates’ objection to that? How does
Socrates amend Euthyphro's second definition of piety to avoid the problem he found? What
question does Socrates ask about the relationship between piety and the gods?
Socrates then asks, “is the pious being loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it
pious because it being loved by the gods?” (10a) How does he answer this question? Consider
this same question in a more contemporary variant: “Is what God condemns evil because he
condemns it, or does he condemn it because he judges it to be evil? How would you answer this?
(Is God bound by something other than God?)
Socrates asks, "What part of justice is piety or holiness?" (10d) What is Euthyphro's
answer? Instead of answering Socrates question about what the principal good thing done by the
gods is, Euthyphro offers another definition of piety. What is it? What problem does Socrates
have with this definition? Is Euthyphro ever able to offer Socrates a satisfactory definition of
piety? What, finally, is at stake in this question?
Session 2: The allegory of the cave: the unreality of the world and the reality of the forms; education as
conversion (February 7)
Reading: Plato, The Republic, Book VII [514a-521d] [in packet].
Questions: What is the allegory as a whole meant to illustrate? Is it convincing?
What are the various elements of the allegory—e.g., the cave itself, the fetters which hold the
prisoners, the puppets and “puppet masters,” the images on the wall of the cave, etc.—meant to
represent? Why should the released prisoner have to be “compelled” to stand up and turn around? Why
does he believe that what he saw previously was more real than what he sees now? Why should he have
to be “dragged” from the cave by force? (Consider: what is this intended to suggest about the process?)
What does it mean to exit the cave, and why it is painful and difficult? What does the prisoner see once
outside of the cave? Why does the allegory as a whole suggest about what we customarily call
“knowledge”? What does it say about education? (Consider: what does it mean to “turn the whole
body”? [518c])
Special meeting: showing of the film, The Matrix (Friday, February 11)
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Critical Thinking and Writing: The meaning and critical appraisal of The Matrix: criticism,
argumentation, and judgment (February 14)
Session 3: The allegory of the cave (continued): reading the allegory in light of The Matrix (February
21)
Reading: Plato, The Republic, Book VII (re-read); Irwin, William, “Computers, Caves, and
Oracles: Neo and Socrates” [in packet].
Questions: If our own situation is like that of those in the cave, how do we get out?
Why do you suppose Plato has to resort to allegory to make his point? What does this
suggest about the nature of philosophical truth—or, perhaps, the nature of philosophical
education? (See 521c.) How might this bear on our understanding of the relation between
philosophy and art—or more specifically, on the relevance of a film like The Matrix?
According to Irwin, how and in what specific respects is The Matrix a retelling of the
story of Socrates? What are some of the significant differences between Socrates and Neo? How
does The Matrix effectively recast the allegory of the cave? What do the film and the allegory
have in common in their treatment of the themes of knowledge and reality, and of the
relationship between what is real and unreal? How are they different—apart from the Kung Fu
fighting? How does Irwin interpret the taking of the red pill? Do you find his interpretation
convincing?
Critical Thinking and Writing: Socrates and MLK in prison: the conflicting allegiances of justice
and duty (February 28)
Session 4: The execution of Socrates: philosophy as learning how to die (March 7)
Reading: Plato, Phaedo [57a-69e; 115a-118a], in Five Dialogues, pp. 93-107, 151-54.
Questions: What does Socrates mean when he says that “those who practice philosophy in the
right way are in training for dying” (67e)? What is meant by “dying” in this context? Why does
Socrates believe that only the philosopher—or the person who lives philosophically—is truly
virtuous? (See 68a-69b.) In particular, what should we make of Socrates’ claim that wisdom is
the only valid “currency” which can be exchanged for virtue (69a)? Do you agree?
What impresses you most about Socrates’ final moments before death? Do you find his
death noble? Heroic? Do you believe that he is, as Plato suggests, among “the best, and also
the wisest and most upright” of men (118a)? Why or why not?
PART TWO:
RETHINKING THE ALLEGORY: SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIVISM IN MODERN THOUGHT
Session 5: Berger and Luckmann: the social construction of reality—the reality of everyday life (March
14)
Reading: Berger, Peter, and Luckmann, Thomas, The Social Construction of Reality, Part One,
“The Foundations of Knowledge in Everyday Life,” Chapter 1, pp. 19-46. [Skim part 3,
“Language and Knowledge in Everyday Life,” pp. 34-46.] (Note: try not to allow yourself to get
bogged down in the technical terminology that the authors use in this work. The points they
want to make are, for the most part, relatively simple. The technical terms are a kind of
shorthand nomenclature for—or naming of—complex but readily comprehensible social
processes. It’s a useful exercise to try to master them. We’ll talk about why.)
Questions: What are the authors trying to do in this chapter? Why is it important? (How,
initially, do you see it linked to Plato’s allegory of cave, if in fact you see any connection?)
“Phenomenological analysis” in this context (20) means simply a description of things as they
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appear to consciousness: why do suppose the authors want to say that this enterprise is
“empirical” but not “scientific”? What’s the difference?
Why should the “reality of everyday life” present itself as “the reality par excellence”
(21) What other realities, or different spheres of reality, are there? What is the significance of
the fact that the reality of everyday life is “taken for granted as reality”? (23) How is our
conviction about the reality of everyday life sustained and reinforced? Under what conditions,
or by what means, might that conviction be challenged?—Or, put differently, what kinds of false
ideas or illusions are enshrined in what we call everyday reality? (Consider, for example, what
the authors call the role of typifications, or “typificatory schemes” [impossible term!] (30 ff.),
in the construction of everyday reality, and further, the role of language in typifying our
experience. (38-9)]
Office hours: no class; individual meetings with instructors (March 17)
Critical Thinking and Writing: reading social theory; looking for a thesis, following an argument
(March 21)
Session 6: Berger and Luckmann: the social construction of reality—society as objective reality; the
origins and function of symbolic universes (March 28)
Reading: Berger and Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality, Part Two, “Society as
Objective Reality,” Chapter 1, “Institutionalization,” sections “a” and “b”—and the discussion of
“reification” in section “e” (p. 89, first paragraph); and Chapter 2, “Legitimation,” section “a”
(pp. 47-67; 89 [part]; and 92-104).
Questions: What does it mean to say that man “has no species-specific environment”? (47)
What are some of the implications of this fact? How is this related to the idea—which may seem
at once illuminating and absurd—that “man produces himself”? (49) From what, according to
the authors, does “the empirically existing stability of the human order” derive? (51) What is
the relation between what the authors call “habitualization” and “institutionalization”? (53-4)
What are some of the benefits of institutionalization? What are some of its negative effects?
Why should institutions have a “coercive power” over individuals? (Consider: who derives the
most benefit from this fact?) What does it mean to speak of a “canopy of legitimations”
stretching over institutions? (62) What are some examples of such legitimations? (Again,
consider to what extent these so-called legitimations are true and valid, and to what extent they
might be considered false and corrupting.)
What is the meaning of “reification”? (89) Why is the reified world “by definition, a
dehumanized world”? (89) (Consider this question in light of The Matrix: why is the depiction
of the human world in the film necessarily and also a dehumanized world?)
What are the “horizontal” and “vertical” levels of integration, and why are both of them
important? (92-3) What are the four different levels of legitimation? (94-5) What is the
“symbolic universe,” and why does it represent the highest and most fundamental form of
legitimation? (95 ff.) What is the nature of our own symbolic universe? To what extent is it
shared and to what extent is it private and individual? Why do the author’s seem to believe that
“All social reality is precarious”? (103) Do you agree?
Session 7: de Beauvoir: the social construction of the woman: the dialectic of consciousness and
otherness (April 4)
Reading: De Beauvoir, Simone, The Second Sex, Introduction and Chapter IX (part) (pp. xixxxxv; 139-52, 163, 197-8) [in packet]
Questions: What does de Beauvoir mean when she asks the question, “what is a woman”? (xxi)
How is this different from asking the question, “what is man”? What does it mean to say that
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“Otherness is a fundamental category of human thought”? (xxiii) (Think of other examples where
the concept of “otherness” is essential to the definition of the thing.) What has this to do with the
idea, attributed to Hegel, that any given consciousness is hostile to every other consciousness?
(xxiiii) Is this true? What does de Beauvoir mean when she says that “along with the ethical urge of
each individual to affirm his subjective existence, there is also the temptation to forgo liberty and
become a thing”? (xxvii) What does it mean “to become a thing”? Why is this a matter to be
defined not in terms of “happiness” but in terms of “liberty”? (xxxv)
What does it mean to say that the existence of other men “tears each man out of his
immanence and enables him to fulfill the truth of his being, to complete himself through
transcendence, through escape toward some objective, some enterprise”? (140) (Think here about
how we define ourselves through what we do.) How it that woman becomes, for man, the “incarnate
dream” of quiet and plenitude? (140) What are some of the implications of this, both for women and
for men?
Critical Thinking and Writing: Things Fall Apart
Session 8: de Beauvoir: the social construction of the woman (continued) (April 11)
Reading: De Beauvoir, Simone, The Second Sex, Conclusion (pp. 716-32) [in packet]
Questions: What does it mean to say that “woman is not our brother”? (716) What would it mean
for woman “to emerge into the light of transcendence”? (717) How is it that “the two sexes are
each the victim at once of the other and of itself”? (719) What do you suppose de Beauvoir means by
“bad faith”? (719) What is entailed by the emancipation of woman, as de Beauvoir conceives it?
(731) Is such emancipation possible? Is it necessarily a good thing?
Session 9: Fanon: the social construction of the black man: the dialectics of recognition (April 18)
Reading: Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, Introduction and Chapter 7, “The Black Man and
Recognition” (part) (pp. xi-xviii, 191-97)
Writing assignment due: Write a brief statement of what you take to be Fanon’s project, as he
outlines it in the Introduction and in Chapter 7. What is he trying to do in the book and how does he
propose to go about it?
Questions: The book opens, in the Introduction, with a series of startling, provocative propositions.
What do you make of the style of the book—especially in the opening few pages? What is the author
attempting to do through his writing? What do you make of Fanon’s claim that “there is but one
destiny for the black man. And it is white.” (xiv) Or, further, that “what is called the black soul is a
construction by white folk”? (xviii) Do you agree? How is this related to the idea, in Nietzsche, that
“Man’s misfortune . . . is that he was once a child”? (xiv) (If you’re interested and motivated to do
it, look at Berger and Luckmann’s treatment of what they call “primary socialization” in Chapter III
of The Social Construction of Reality, pp. 129-37.)
What does Fanon mean, in Chapter 7, when he writes, “Man is human only to the extent to
which he tries to impose himself on another man in order to be recognized by him”? (191)
Session 10: Fanon: The Rights and Duties of Man: The Creation of a Human World (April 25)
Reading: Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, Chapter 8, “By Way of a Conclusion” (pp. 198-206)
Writing assignment due: Partial abstract of Chapter 8: statement of problem and thesis.
Questions: What is Fanon attempting to do in his conclusion? On the basis of what you have read,
do you think he is successful?
What does Fanon believe is his one right and his one duty? What does he mean when he
claims that: “The black man is not. No more than the white man.” (206) Do you see any
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connection between this claim and what we have learned from Plato—and especially, perhaps,
through the allegory of the cave?
Assignment: Final essay, 4 to 5 pages, typed, on topics to be discussed.
Critical Thinking and Writing: writing essays: introduction; formulating a thesis; framing a problem
(May 2)
Session 11: Simone Weil: Returning to the allegory of the cave; review and summation (May 9)
Reading: Plato, The Republic, Book VII (re-read); Simone Weil, “The Allegory of the Cave” [in
packet]
Writing assignment due: bring a statement of your essay thesis—in a single sentence.
Questions: What does Weil mean when she says that the fetters are “the imagination”? Why does
understanding “the unchanging pattern of things” demand moral stamina rather than intelligence?
What is “moral stamina”? What are some of the implications of Weil’s claim that “education means
turning the soul in the direction in which it should look”? What does it mean to say “True morality
is purely internal”?—and “Intellectual and moral life are one”?
* * * Final essays are due Monday, May 16, and should be turned in to Amy, before final class
meeting***
Rev. 3/1/2011
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