Technovana

In teaching ethics, and in paying too much attention to politics, I encounter the sentiment that "We've always had [insert great misfortune], so we'll never be without it" over and over again. The sentiment is offered as a reason not to work toward alleviating poverty, warfare, disease, and all manner of problems that simply affect the whole globe and likely look to big to overcome. Still, I think this is a problematic line of reasoning, and one that we should stamp out as if it were a logical fallacy (and might trade on one, more below). Ok, so why is it a problem? For one, it's simply conversation-stopping in any ethical debate. Should we devote resources to researching Sudden Infant Death Syndrome? Well, babies have always died for no reason, so we'll never prevent that... There is simply nothing to do but throw one's hands in the air and give up. Now, in ethics, there is some reason to take this argument seriously. There is a very general principle...

Today, I told my students that while Socrates was not the first philosopher, he is the one who really set what would come to be called Western Philosophy in motion. I don't know exactly how accurate that view is since there were a number of odd mystery cults circulated in the Mediterranean, Pythagoras and his crew for instance. Nevertheless, there is something about the drama of the trial and death of Socrates that seemed to energize the philosophical project, such as it was at the time. Even if created in retrospect, the narrative of a person dying for asking questions sends a powerful signal that there is something important about what he was doing. Remember that it's not quite right to say that Socrates died for his ideas. The early dialogues offer little in the way of a positive project, and what is there is usually attributed to Plato working out the early stages of his project. In the end, Socrates is executed because asking questions is dangerous. It undermines the str...

I put what might be too much thought into presentation when I teach. I say it's too much because I don't know how much of it comes across to my students, but insofar as a teacher must entertain, it seems appropriate to work on one's showmanship. Over time, I've developed some particular aesthetics of teaching that both keep me motivated and focused in the task, and hopefully contribute something unique to my students' experience. My basic model is jazz improvisation, for reasons perhaps best understood by fellow initiates of Robert Anton Wilson. The presentation slides give me an overall structure and contain the essential information. For the most part, the slides are supposed to be springboards for verbal improvisation. I like the idea of running discussion sessions, and when it happens I enjoy it, but I find it hard to get the students going. In introductory ethics courses, when I include assignments that require them to read before coming to class, it's ea...