...Name: Instructor: Course: Date: Does God exist? If so, why is there evil? Like St. Augustine, I do acknowledge that ``God exists”. In order to explain his ideology, Augustine refers to the life of a tree, rock, dog and human beings. He argues that among the things aforementioned, only human being posses the ability to think and act thus meaning that among the creations on earth, the human being is the intelligent creature. Further, he expounds his argument by stating that if another being is intelligently superior to human beings, then it has to be God. However, St. Augustine acknowledges the presence of evil. St. Augustine’s opinion of sin is linked to the freedom to exercise ``freewill” by individuals an aspect that results to ``moral evil”. Free will forms the basis by Augustine that God should not be blamed for ``the existence” of sin. To expound on his argument, Augustine informs his readers that he like many other people has been subject to sin due to his desire to realize what sin entails and urges the people not to dwell so much on sin rather than the existence of God(pg,164). In conclusion, I support Augustine’s argument that no one can understand the thinking of God thus we should focus on his goodness rather than sin existence. Are Human Beings Selfish? I believe that every ``human being” is selfish. The selfish nature of human beings is evident from the daily activities that we engage in during our lifetime and routines. In the current society, it is common...
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...“From love is born life, and yet, from life is learned the art of how to love.” When my eyes first gazed over this sentence, my mind lit up with interest. I just sat beside myself in thought. I imagined life being born, waking up to a world of unknown. Using all senses to explore, learn and adjust. Amir Sabzevary had an interesting view on how we could picture the world. The world can be owned but shared and most of all, the world is to be looked at as a place of experiments. Everything is a learning experience but without experimenting we wouldn’t learn. Amir also explains how you must listen but before you can learn, one must be silent. Which I believe is true. I once heard the expression, “the older the wiser”. Growing up I was always around older family and friends. I have one sibling of which I’m the oldest. I’ve always wanted an older brother too look up to and listen too. I assume that’s why I was always fascinated by an older being, with the ability to pass down to me. I would listen, ask questions if a question arose, but for the most part I would listen, shake my head and nod to assure my attention was there. I agree that self-knowledge is important, although I think one must engage with others or other things to have different experiences to gain different knowledge of one’s self; such as the person in Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave”. The one person who decided to go out beyond the cave, seen things for himself and that the others in the cave only seen as...
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...Next, living the good life is simply pursuing happiness, but it cannot be defined as a definition or criteria because everyone has their own interpretation which is similar to the Hedonistic ideology of pursuing self-interest to maximize pleasure and minimize pain. Conversely, the issue is that people do not understand what truly makes them happy. Living the life of contemplation as Aristotle would agree supports this ideology of seeking contentment. For instance, from the movie, “Into the wild”, Christopher McCandless is the son of a wealthy family and satisfies the desires of his parents to go to university. On the other hand, he believes that “Fulfilling the absurd and tedious duty of graduating college” is useless, so he follows his own passion to explore Alaska. This attests to the fact that one cannot pursue anyone else’s source of...
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...| Definition | Historical Developments | Schools Of Thought | Key Contributors | Principal Issues | Epistemology | The theory of knowledge concerned with nature and scope of knowledge | From Ancient Greece forward, Plato, Socrates and developmental thought | Externalism, Internalism, Empiricism, Rationalism, Constructivism, Infinitism, Foundationalism, Coherentism, Skepticism | Aristotle, Plato, Spinoza, Locke, George Berkeley, Immanuel Kant. (with all the questions I think we can attribute some Socrates also) | Focused on the analysis of the nature of knowledge; how do we know what we know, why? How is knowledge acquired? What makes justified beliefs justified? | Metaphysics | Metaphysics is the study of the nature of reality, including the relationship between mind and body, substance, and accident, events, and causation (Johnson, 2008). | Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity is considered by many to be based in metaphysics but was adopted into physics because of its significance (Howie, 1997). | Cosmology, Ontology, Natural Philosophy, Philosophy of Religion, Mind, Perception | Aristotle, Plato, George Berkeley, Anne Conway, Oliva Sabuco de Nantes, Benedictus de Spinoza, Émilie du Châtelet, John Locke, Thomas Hobbes | The study of existence; Natural Theology – study of Gods, nature of religion, what is the divine? Universal Science - what are the first principals and how do they interact with being? | Moral | The philosophical study of moral judgments—value judgments...
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...Classical Leisure Classical leisure in ancient Greece was a health and knowledge based ideal that promoted virtuous choices and conduct, and in turn led to true happiness and fulfilment. This state of being, known to many as Aristotle’s ‘classical leisure ideal’, was not restricted by work or time and had no ulterior motives. The parallels in contemporary leisure pursuits that can be seen today include studying, poetry, music, games, travel and sport; and are crucial for the preservation of arts, culture and the history of leisure in the 21st century. The classical leisure ideal emerged in Greece in 400-500 BC, where Greek life was based on the city-state, and philosophers such as Socrates, Plato, Epicurus and especially Aristotle expressed leisure (schole) as the main goal in life (telos) (Lynch and Veal, 2006). ‘This state of being was contemplative and felicitous, with activity both giving intrinsic pleasure and being undertaken for self-development’, and was completely separate from ‘free time’ - ‘...anybody can have free time. Not everybody can have leisure’ (de Grazia, 1962 as cited in Lynch and Veal 2006 p. 8). Conditions that need to be met for classical leisure to exist include an awareness of the concept, ‘a breakdown in the universal ‘work ethic’’ and an ‘absence of the clock’ (p. 8). Consumerism and narcissism hinder these features and thus prevent some modern societies from adopting a system based on classical leisure. The ideas of freedom and conscious...
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...4 March: City of God – Utopian Reader – include a little bit on it – 22 volumes in all. Christianity – Augustine – classicly trained greek scholar. City in north Africa. Story like apostle Paul – orginially a person who persecuted Christians – north African wealth family from – found enlightenment in Christianity. Once he joined became one of the early scholars trained in greek – regulized Christian theology. Influence on western world – top four or five who influenced. Confessions and City of God his writings…look up! What’s the purpose of improving human society – complex – why do it? Can human society be made better? Why bother, what is the point, justification? Takes effort, misery involved, change, unknowns, takes energy, takes risks. HAPPINESS – justification for improving society. What do you have to have to be happy? What is happiness – PHI 101 – happiness according to whom? Lack of misery; literally the elimination of misery. Secondly, food – gives pleasure – Happiness is lack of human misery and maximizing /pleasure and happiness. Bliss 24/7 – hedonism Epicureanism – eliminating misery and maximizing happiness. The justification of utopianism = why did plato want the republic? Justisifcation for improving human society among the Greeks? Poor always poor, always unhappy, death claims everyone - it is rational to maximize pleasure and eliminate misery. Do eternally accouding to plato. Opinions – 1. Relativism is a retreat in the 20th century. Can’t...
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...Death and the Soul—Epicureanism and Stoicism Introduction What happens at death and the idea of the afterlife put human logic and science to a test. However, ancient philosophers, such as Plato, Aristotle, Zeno, and Epicurus, use the science of thought in order to understand complex ideas of the nonexistent. As David Lund, put it philosophy can suspend the facts of death in order to help search for life after death (Lund, 6). The ambiguity that science sees can be approach and open-minded thinkers. Life’s mysteries are evaluated by philosophers as results and the phenomenon of death on the physical plain is clear where science is not. The question as to whether or not life is simply a finite experience that disappears and fades to dust, or something more than this, falls into the disciplines of both philosophy and religion. In addition to death itself, the aspect of the soul is likewise a topic of considerable dispute and discussion within these two areas of study. The debate over whether or not human beings are purely physical in nature or something more is inherent within this ongoing discussion. Epicureanism and Stoicism will be explored to this end to better illustrate the varying theoretical and philosophical perspectives that are in place regarding both death and the element of the soul. In doing so, the acts of creativity that are relevant to this, for example, art, architecture, history, literature, music, and religion, will also be explored to better illustrate the...
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...Happiness By Huang Lu Xin Happiness is a mental or emotional state of well-being characterized by positive or pleasant emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy. A variety of biological, psychological and religious and philosophical approaches have striven to define happiness and identify its sources. Various research groups, including positive psychology, endeavor to apply the scientific method to answer questions about what "happiness" is, and how it might be attained. It's of such fundamental importance to the human condition that Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness were deemed unalienable rights on the United States Declaration of Independence. Philosophers and religious thinkers often define happiness in terms of living a good life, or flourishing rather than simply as an emotion. Happiness in this sense was used to translate the Greek Eudaimonia, and is still used in virtue ethics. Happiness is a fuzzy concept and can mean many things to many people. Part of the challenge of a science of happiness is to identify different concepts of happiness, and where applicable, split them into their components. There is a book named ‘Handbook of Emotion’. The editors and contributors are foremost authorities who describe major theories, findings, methods, and applications. In the 2nd Edition of the Handbook of Emotion, evolutionary psychologists Leda Cosmides and John Tooby say that happiness comes from "encountering unexpected positive events". In the...
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...from Socrates in that he didn't consider ideals to comprise in intelligence alone, yet in equity, moderation, and mettle too, these constituting the best possible agreement of man's exercises. It could be said, the State is man writ vast, and its capacity its capacity is to prepare its natives in goodness. For his optimal State he proposed the group of products and of wives and the government funded training of kids. Though Socrates and Plato had been to the fore in this mighty work and had contributed much valuable material to the up building of ethics; nevertheless, Plato's illustrious disciple, Aristotle (384-322 B.C.), must be considered the real founder of systematic ethics. With characteristic keenness he solved, in his ethical and political writings, most of the problems with which ethics concerns itself. Unlike Plato, who began with ideas as the basis of his observation, Aristotle chose rather...
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...The Divine Comedy Author name University The contrast between Inferno and Purgatory First circle was Limbo. There were unbaptized and virtuous non-Christians, many wise and well-known people such as Homer, Horace, Avicenna, Cicero, Hippocrates, Socrates, Aristotle and others. In the second circle (Lust) were people, who took possession of lust. Here Dante saw Cleopatra, Semiramis, Dido, Helen of Troy. A strong wind threw their souls back and forth without a pause. The third circle (Gluttony) was for gluttons, guarded by a huge Cerberus. They laid here in mud, under the cold rain, unable to see anything around and not paying attention to each other. Here, Dante met Florentine Chacko, who died recently. In the fourth circle (Greed) were wasteful and mean people. They moved heave objects from place to place. In the fifth one (Anger) were angry and lazy people. They fought each other in Styx marsh. Dante met Filippo Argenti there. The sixth circle (Heresy) was a haven of heretics who believed that the soul dies with a body. They were burned alive in the fiery tombs. Here he met Epicurus, Emperor Frederick II, and Pope Anastasius II. The 7th circle (Violence) was the circle of violence. Here were three rings. In the outer ring, sinners were boiled in a bloody Phlegethon river. Here lived Alexander the Great, Dionysius I of Syracuse, Guy de Montfort Obizzo d'Este, Rinier Pazzo, Rinier da Corneto, and Azzolino da Romano. In the middle ring were suicides and profligates. Suicides were...
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...BUS 309 WK 4 Quiz 3 Chapter 3 - All Possible Questions To Purchase Click Link Below: http://strtutorials.com/BUS-309-WK-4-Quiz-3-Chapter-3-All-Possible-Questions-BUS3094.htm BUS 309 WK 4 Quiz 3 Chapter 3 - All Possible Questions 1. Who is known for first holding that we should treat like cases alike? 1. Plato 2. Epicurus 3. Cicero 4. Aristotle 1. The topic of the proper distribution of burdens and benefits is known as 1. Distributive justice 2. Retributive justice 3. Economic welfare 4. Laissez-faire economics 1. Who made the violation of one’s moral rights the defining characteristic of injustice? 1. John Stuart Mill 2. Adam Smith 3. Karl Marx 4. Robert Nozick 1. Rawls’s theory of justice is 1. A libertarian theory 2. An egalitarian theory 3. A utilitarian theory 4. A retributivist theory 1. Justice for Mill was ultimately a matter of 1. Luck 2. Promoting social well-being 3. Property rights 4. Enforced equality 1. Brandt defends the equality of after-tax income on 1. Libertarian grounds 2. Deontological grounds 3. Utilitarian grounds 4. Egalitarian grounds 1. Libertarians assume that liberty means 1. Freedom 2. Noninterference 3. Equality 4. Liberation 1. Nozick begins with the premise that people have 1. Certain basic moral rights 2. Equality of income 3. Equality of opportunity 4. Certain basic positive rights 1. Nozick refers to the firm restrictions that rights impose as 1. Side constraints 2....
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...WHAP Cultural Heavyweights Dar Al-Islam and The Byzantine Empire. The Muslim World and The Byzantine Empire were two of the most powerful and most-linked-together civilizations during the Middle Ages due mostly to their cultural achievements, religious values, and economic activities. The Byzantine Empire and Muslim World had very similar and different cultural achievements due to their very unique styles but also sharing each other’s ideas as well. The Muslim world’s cultural achievements focused more on the development and interaction of cultures while the Byzantine Empire’s cultural achievements revolved more around the ideology of state building and the arts, but although there are some obvious differences between the two civilizations, their cultural achievements were very similar in many ways. Although the two civilizations practiced religions that shared some similarities, they did have religious oppositions as well and differed in many of their beliefs. Contrary to their very different religious values, they had very similar economic structures by trading on the silk roads and having very strong banking systems. The Muslim World and Byzantine Empire do share some similarities when it comes to economic activities and cultural achievements, they vary and contrast greatly when it comes to each of the civilization’s religious values. The Dar Al-Islam and the Byzantine Empire had quite different religious values, although some similarities are...
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...BUS 309 WK 4 Quiz 3 Chapter 3 - All Possible Questions To Purchase Click Link Below: http://strtutorials.com/BUS-309-WK-4-Quiz-3-Chapter-3-All-Possible-Questions-BUS3094.htm BUS 309 WK 4 Quiz 3 Chapter 3 - All Possible Questions 1. Who is known for first holding that we should treat like cases alike? 1. Plato 2. Epicurus 3. Cicero 4. Aristotle 1. The topic of the proper distribution of burdens and benefits is known as 1. Distributive justice 2. Retributive justice 3. Economic welfare 4. Laissez-faire economics 1. Who made the violation of one’s moral rights the defining characteristic of injustice? 1. John Stuart Mill 2. Adam Smith 3. Karl Marx 4. Robert Nozick 1. Rawls’s theory of justice is 1. A libertarian theory 2. An egalitarian theory 3. A utilitarian theory 4. A retributivist theory 1. Justice for Mill was ultimately a matter of 1. Luck 2. Promoting social well-being 3. Property rights 4. Enforced equality 1. Brandt defends the equality of after-tax income on 1. Libertarian grounds 2. Deontological grounds 3. Utilitarian grounds 4. Egalitarian grounds 1. Libertarians assume that liberty means 1. Freedom 2. Noninterference 3. Equality 4. Liberation 1. Nozick begins with the premise that people have 1. Certain basic moral rights 2. Equality of income 3. Equality of opportunity 4. Certain basic positive rights 1. Nozick refers to the firm restrictions that rights impose as 1. Side constraints 2....
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...Unit 1 IP Introduction to Humanities HUMA215-1101B-08 Topics in Cultural Studies Terry Meeks American Intercontinental University Instructor: J. Anderson March 27, 2011 Abstract Many ancient cultures existed throughout time but none as popular as ancient Greece and ancient Rome. Although Rome eventually became powerful and ruled over Greece, much of Roman art, architecture, and religion were adopted from the cultures they conquered and were adapted to meet the needs of the Roman Empire. Much of the Roman society mocked that of ancient Greece. | ANCIENT GREEK CULTURE | ANCIENT ROMAN CULTURE | GEOGRAPHY AND GOVERNMENT | Athens was the center of the Greek world in the fifth and fourth centuries BCE. Athens was the capital of Greece and its name was taken from the Greek goddess Athena. Athens was symbolic of art, freedom, and democracy (the prevailing government of ancient Greece introduced around 500 BCE by an aristocrat). Athens was just one of over 800 city states that made up ancient Greece. Several city states (comparable to a modern county) were isolated from each other and the mainland as they were located on islands that made up the fractured geography of ancient Greece. These islands were located in the Aegean Sea and reached around the Mediterranean to peninsula of Italy and to the shores of Asia Minor. Each city state considered itself a cultural center. City states of ancient Greece were very independent however they remained loyal to Greece...
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...1-29-2015 Prospectus I will study the workings of Classical Greece’s political economy. It is important for me to understand this because I am minoring in Philosophy. Greece is important to Philosophy because many great thinkers such as Pythagoras and Socrates were “Greek” thinkers. So more or less, I chose Greece for a personal educational gain rather than just some random society to write a research paper on. World historians and readers alike should be interested in this research because from Greece came the father of Western Philosophy, which is the backbone of what is taught in Western academia and really had a huge impact to the world, as we know it. With Philosophy comes questions, with questions come many great answers that impact societies and even the earth. I want to study how Greece’s political economy impacted philosophic thinkers and people alike. In order to help readers understand whether or not outside forces like society’s political economy impacts deeper thinking like philosophy I will dive deep into Athenian Democracy, documents certain philosophers wrote in the day and time in which they lived, and even look into some other people of the time who had strong opinions on what exactly was going on them. Philosophy impacted more than most people think and I am sure in my research I will be able to back that up with primary sources to prove my argument. In writing this research paper I will be exploring the political economy of Classical Greece between 510...
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