Embedded Files
June 12 - Sellars on Philosophy as a Way of Life
“Thus, [in antiquity,] philosophy was a way of life, both in its exercise and effort to achieve wisdom, and in its goal, wisdom itself. For real wisdom docs not merely cause us to know: it makes us "be" in a different way” (Hadot 1995: 265).
But what does it mean for philosophy to be a way of life? In this month’s paper, we will discuss philosopher John Sellars’s consideration of this question. After introducing us to Hadot’s conception of philosophy as a way of life, Sellars discusses a few other possible answers to the question “What is Philosophy as a Way of Life?” Join us in examining Sellars’s answers to this question and discussing fundamental questions about the nature and purpose of philosophy.
Get the reading
Click here to download the essay from the journal's website
Details: John Sellars, "What is Philosophy As a Way Of Life?" PARRHESIA 28, 2017, pp 40-56.
PARRHESIA is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Get the reading guide
Your facilitators have put together a fantastic (and extensive!) reading guide for you. Use it to work through Sellars' essay and to start thinking about questions you want to discuss
May 8 - Mencius and Xunzi on virtue and human nature
Are human beings disposed to be good, evil, or neither by nature?
To become a virtuous person, do you have to become something you’re not, or do you really just become who you really are in the first place?
Mencius and Xunzi represent two classical but divergent ways of developing Confucian thought on virtue, with deep implications for the way we think about education, selfhood, and human nature. Join us for a discussion of their ideas! This session will be facilitated by two CU Boulder philosophy faculty members.
Get the reading
We will read the excerpts collected in this PDF: https://bit.ly/May-8-Reading
Get the reading guide
Your facilitators created a reading guide with section-by-section summaries and questions to think about.
April 10 - David Velleman on "Family History" (Rescheduled from March 13)
How important is it to know your biological parents?
In this month's essay, philosopher David Velleman argues that knowing your biological family is a uniquely important way that we come to understand ourselves, and provides crucial self-knowledge that can’t be learned any other way. As a consequence, he argues (perhaps shockingly!) that we have a reason to prohibit people having children using an anonymous person’s sperm and egg donations. Those children would never know their biological parents, and so, according to Velleman, creating them would be selfish of the parents.
Get the reading
Download Velleman's essay "Family History" here: https://bit.ly/Mar13-Family-History
---
This essay is published in an open access book (Creative Commons license) by Velleman titled Beyond Price. The essay we are reading, "Family History," is chapter 5. You can view and download the entire book here: https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/30338
(No reading guide this month)
Feb 13 - Regina A. Rini “Of course the baby should live: Against after-birth abortion'”
This month we follow philosophy into some unusual and uncomfortable – even shocking– territory. Philosophers Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva, in a 2013 article for the Journal of Medical Ethics, argued that infanticide can be morally permissible since newborns lack a right to life because they lack moral personhood. We are reading philosopher Regina Rini’s criticism of Giubilini and Minerva.
What does it take to count as a moral person who has a right to life?
You might wonder, “Why did Rini bother to write this? Obviously an argument in favor of infanticide must be flawed!” Even so, Giubilini and Minerva’s argument raises deeper questions about what is required for living being to have a right to life. Join us in exploring these issues with Rini’s essay as our guide.
Get the reading - Rini makes this short article available on her website as a PDF. Download it here: https://reginarini.files.wordpress.com/2013/10/rini2013againstinfanticidejme.pdf
Regina A. Rini (2013). “Of course the baby should live: Against ‘after-birth abortion’”. Journal of Medical Ethics 39(5): 353-356.
Get the reading guide: Your facilitators have put together a reading guide with helpful summaries and questions for thought.
View the Google Doc Download the PDF
January 9 - Plato on the art of rhetoric - excerpt from his Gorgias
Since 1924 Toastmasters International has helped people learn to write and deliver effective speeches. But this is an activity with a loooong history. In ancient Greece (5th-4th century BCE) skill in public speaking was especially prized and in fact necessary for anyone wanting to engage in politics or participate in a court case. Consequently, an entire industry arose around effective public speaking, including teachers who traveled around and sold lessons.
In our reading this month, Socrates confronts one of the most famous of these teachers, Gorgias, and asks Gorgias to explain his ‘craft,’ oratory (or rhetoric), and its relation to knowledge.
Get the text
A note on translations: All versions of the Gorgias are translations from ancient Greek. You may find some more accessible and pleasant than others, so feel free to look around. Some translations use the words “oratory” and “orator.” But others use “rhetoric” and “rhetorician.” This is a case of English having two equally good words for the same Greek word.
A note on our excerpt: We are reading the first 25% of the dialogue.
If you use a version with Stephanus numbers in the margins, we are reading from 447a-466a. If you are using some other version, we are reading up through Socrates’ explanation that he thinks oratory/rhetoric is one of the four parts of flattery. We are stopping when Polus changes the discussion to who has power in cities.
Text versions:
Read online with Perseus Digital Library
Read online with the Internet Classics Archive
Prefer a PDF that you can mark up? Email your request to popco@colorado.edu
The first four audio “chapters” comprise an introduction. You’ll want to start at “05 – Gorgias part 1” and listen through the first 24 minutes of “06 – Gorgias Part 2.”
Access a print, digital, or audio version through Boulder Public Library
Reading guide
Your facilitators can recommend the SparkNotes guide to the Gorgias for general guidance while reading.
Some questions for thought:
BEFORE YOU READ -- Who would you identify in today's culture as having oratorical or rhetorical ability (i.e. talent at making speeches)? What criteria do you think about when assessing oratorical ability?
Multiple times in the dialogue, Socrates emphasizes that he is interested in a discussion rather than a presentation or a speech. What sort of difference does Socrates have in mind? In what cases is a discussion preferable? In what cases is a speech preferable?
Socrates and Gorgias agree that persuasion can produce (a) conviction-without-knowledge or (b) knowledge, and they agree that there is a distinction between the two. How would you describe the difference? Do you think one is preferable to the other? If so, what makes it better? From the inside, can a person tell when she has (a) conviction-without-knowledge versus (b) knowledge, or can a person be uncertain which she has?
Socrates makes the following analogy:
pastry baking is to medicine __AS__ oratory is to justice
pastry baking : medicine : : oratory : justice
How would you explain what he has in mind? What is the relation he sees between pastry baking and medicine? What does it mean for this same relation to exist between oratory and justice? What evidence would count in favor of Socrates' view about oratory?
December 12: Amy Olberding's "What's the Difference Between Being Righteous and Being Rude?"
Can incivility be righteous and morally appropriate?
If so, how can know when our incivility is righteous?
Philosopher Amy Olberding (University of Oklahoma) confronts these questions in this short essay for the online magazine Aeon. She worries that the "as public discourse grows crueller, nastier and more aggressive," we might be more tempted to think we're being righteously rude when we're actually falling short of moral uprightness. She reflects on what true righteous incivility would require.
Get the text
Read or listen (audio version available!) online at
https://aeon.co/essays/whats-the-difference-between-being-righteous-and-being-rude
Prefer a PDF? Here you go
**Note: This essay contains a couple "F-bombs" in its examples of uncivil discourse.**
No reading guide this month
November 14: "Five Face of Oppression" by Iris Marion Young
Social movements are often aimed at rectifying oppression, and many groups have been identified as victims of oppression: (in Young's words) "among others women, Blacks, Chicanos, Puerto Ricans and other Spanish-speaking Americans, American Indians, Jews, lesbians, gay men, Arabs, Asians, old people, working-class people, and the physically and mentally disabled."
Given that oppression ranges so broadly, it is worth pausing to ask whether we have a clear sense of what oppression actually is.
Join us to discuss this month's reading, "Five Faces of Oppression," in which political theorist Iris Marion Young argues for an account of oppression that she thinks will help us better understand it and identify what about oppression is unjust.
Get the text
This essay originally appeared as chapter 2 of Young's book Justice and the Politics of Difference. It has been reprinted in many collections, so pagination differs between versions.
Boulder Public library has a digital copy of the book mentioned above
eBook catalog entry for Justice and the Politics of Difference
You can also request a hard copy through BPL's interlibrary loan service
Interlibrary loan page for Justice and the Politics of Difference
Several sites host PDF versions of this essay. Here's a good one:
Hosted by University of Waterloo
You are welcome to contact Dawn at popco@colorado.edu to request a PDF by email.
(To our knowledge, there is no audio version of this essay available.)
Get the reading guide
The facilitators have prepared a helpful reading guide for you.
October 10: Robots and Moral Standing
We seem prone to empathize with some robots. This month's author, Mark Coeckelbergh, reminds us that in 2015 the creators of robot dog "Spot" were criticized for kicking Spot to show that the robot could regain stability. “Kicking a dog, even a robot dog, just seems wrong”
Is it wrong to "abuse" a robot?
After all, even though we empathize, we are also prone to tell ourselves that robots are just machines, incapable of actually being abused.
In the essay we are reading this month, philosopher Mark Coeckelbergh investigates the question of whether robots have moral standing that would require us to avoid treating them in certain ways. Turns out, the question isn't so easy.....
Get the reading:
There is no audio version of this essay available.
Reading guide:
The facilitators have a prepared a reading guide for you, including some questions to spark your thinking!
September 12: John Stuart Mill - Utilitarianism (only chapter 2 - "What Utilitarianism Is")
How do we determine what it is right or wrong to do? Mill suggests a simple-sounding principle: "Actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness; wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness." In other words, only the consequences matter.
Mill's view - utilitarianism - (which is also the title of his book) is considered one of the major ethical theories in western philosophy. Many college students today still encounter this view by reading Mill's book, first published in 1861.
Join us to discuss Mill's classic statement of utilitarianism and what, if anything, it has to tell us about how to act rightly in the world.
Get the reading:
📚Two versions of the printed text
Project Gutenberg - https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/11224 (available as HTML, EPub, Kindle)
EarlyModernTexts.com - https://www.earlymoderntexts.com/authors/mill (available as PDF, EPub, Mobi) -- This version of the text has been modified to make it a bit more accessible to modern readers. Sentences and syntax are somewhat simplified.
🎧Librivox audiobook version
From Librivox website - https://librivox.org/utilitarianism-by-john-stuart-mill/
On YouTube - https://www.youtube.co/watch?v=ExwXDcvH4go
Reading guide:
For reading guidance, we recommend this interactive version of the text produced by the University of Notre Dame:
https://godandgoodlife.nd.edu/digital-essays/utilitarianism-john-stuart-mill/
And here are two videos that provide helpful overviews of Mill's thinking:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfiEa6MfoTw
And some Questions For Thought from the facilitators:
(August - summer break)
July 11 - Engaging with a polluted media feed
Assume (hopefully not too hypothetically!) that you are someone who cares about truth and knowledge.
What should you do when your social media feed is filled with conspiracy claims, racism, and other ideas you know are false?
Should you interact with these posts?
If you do so, should you interact with an open mind?
In this month's reading, philosopher Heather Battaly argues that in these cases it is best to interact in a closed-minded way -- we should engage dismissively or not at all with "polluted" posts while working to counteract them in other ways.
Join us to discuss Battaly's reasons in favor of a closed-minded response and to think through our own reasons for how we should interact with a polluted social media feed.
Find links to the reading, a reading guide, and more information in the expanding tabs, below.
Questions? Check below or email us.
This month we have a PDF and an audio version for you!
Listen to Battaly read her paper on YouTube
Reading guide
June 13 - Plato's Meno
"Can you tell me, Socrates, can virtue be taught?"
Meno accosts Socrates with the above question in the first line of the dialogue bearing his name. What follows is a discussion that explores the nature of virtue, the structure of proper definitions, the possibility of knowledge, and a theory of learning.
We'll read and discuss the first 2/3 of the dialogue since this work is jam-packed with ideas to keep us thinking!
Get the text
We'll be reading the first 2/3. If you have a version with Stephanus numbers in the margins, we are reading up to 86d. If you are using another version, we are reading through the end of the geometry "lesson" with Meno's slave boy.
📃 Download from Project Gutenberg
🎧 Listen on YouTube (up to timestamp 36:48)
🎧 Another YouTube version (with elaborate character voices) (up to timestamp 55:17)
Get the reading guide
May 9 - The People Who Prioritize Friendship Over Romance
This month we will base our discussion on an essay in The Atlantic by Rhaina Cohen titled "What If Friendship, Not Marriage, Was at the Center of Life?"
We will be joined by CU Boulder philosopher Iskra Fileva, who specializes in philosophy of psychology and moral psychology.
In the essay, Cohen introduces several sets of friends who find in each other -emotional intimacy, shared goals, deep care - what many seek in a romantic partner. One of the friends describes it as “having a life partner, and you just don’t want to kiss them.”
Some of the questions raised in the essay include:
Why don't we have clear terminology for these sorts of friendships?
Why do these sorts of friendships make many people uncomfortable?
What do we miss out on if we prioritize romance over friendships of this sort?
This essay is available online at The Atlantic's website:
PDF version (without visible ads)
Reading guide
View the reading guide in your browser
April 11 - Feelings of sympathy vs. moral principles
Join us to discuss Jonathan Bennett's essay "The Conscience of Huckleberry Finn"
Huckleberry Finn sincerely believes that the right thing to do is to turn in the runaway slave Jim, but Huck's feelings for Jim prevent him from doing so. In a case like this, it seems morally better that Huck doesn't live up to his moral principles but instead follows his feelings. In this essay, Bennett asks us to consider how sympathy and moral principles interact in the consciences of Huck Finn, Heinrich Himmler, and Jonathan Edwards. What can we learn about how to navigate these sometimes conflicting pulls within ourselves?
Get the text
Jonathan Bennett has made this 10-page essay available at the site earlymoderntexts.com - https://www.earlymoderntexts.com/faqs/bennett/oarticles
📚 PDF - https://www.earlymoderntexts.com/assets/jfb/huckfinn.pdf
March 14 - What's the value of (potentially) unanswerable questions?
Join us to discuss chapters 1, 2, & 15 of Bertrand Russell's The Problems of Philosophy
Russell opens this classic short book with a puzzle: what can we know about a table in front of us when our experience is always limited by our own perceptions and perspectives? With these considerations he shows us how philosophical thinking can turn every day experiences into puzzling investigations. But given that philosophy can seem to open up more questions than it answers, what worth is there in practicing it?
Join us for a discussion of chapters 1, 2, and 15. (No need to read the other chapters to make sense of these 3!)
🎧 Audiobook options
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yu1xfhUHNrs (Open description for chapter time markers)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNsTB7WrUF8 (Open description for chapter time markers)
📗 Text options
on Project Gutenberg: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/5827/5827-h/5827-h.htm
Hard copies and ebook from Boulder Public Library
Feb 14 - In Praise of Love: Plato's Symposium
This month we'll turn to the Platonic dialogue most suited to Valentine's Day. In the Symposium, we find Socrates and friends, after a feast, deciding to take turns giving speeches in praise of the god Love. (In fact, they choose this rather than drinking!) Cue up the flutes, and grab a glass of wine - it's time to recline around the couch for our symposium.
Get the reading
🎧 Audiobook (LibriVox) on Youtube: https://youtu.be/hRS6b6dwbHw
📗 Read Jowett translation from Internet Classics Archive: http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/symposium.html
📗 Read Fowler translation from Perseus
For section-by-section summaries, you may find Sparknotes helpful: https://www.sparknotes.com/philosophy/symposium/summary/
About same-sex love in the dialogue: The Greeks had a very different perspective on same-sex love than contemporary Americans. Unfortunately, it is challenging to find good resources on this issue since for many years scholarly study of the subject was frowned upon. Below are two reasonably accurate pieces you may find helpful. The one inaccuracy I would address is this: sources suggest that in Athens pederasty was mainly practiced by the social elite; it wasn't widespread among all classes.
https://stmuscholars.org/ancient-greek-pederasty-education-or-exploitation/
http://www.inquiriesjournal.com/articles/175/examining-greek-pederastic-relationships
Some possible discussion questions from your facilitators:
Pausanias distinguishes a vulgar/common type of love from a divine/heavenly type. The divine type of love primarily values the mind of the beloved rather than the body and is aimed at virtue. That is to say, it is a relationship that strives to improve people. In what way, if any, are these features incorporated into contemporary understandings of love?
Eryximachus’s description of love doesn’t sound like a description of a sort of human emotion or relationship. What is he talking about?
At 198d-199a (the beginning of Socrates’s speech) Socrates accuses the other speakers of being dishonest and making love seem much better than it is. Is this a fair criticism? What have the other speakers left out?
Diotima (as reported by Socrates) says that love is always love of the good (200a). This appears to have obvious counterexamples: people sometimes love vile people and abusers; people can love activities and habits that seem clearly bad for them. Is there a charitable way to understand Diotima’s claim so that it is more plausible?
Diotima (as reported by Socrates) says that the goal of love and of reproduction is a kind of immortality. To what extent, if any, is this a fair characterization of the desire to produce offspring?
Some of the speeches before Socrates’s have misogynistic passages. But Socrates’s speech is a repeating of what he heard from the wise woman Diotima and relies on concepts of (literal and metaphorical) reproduction and pregnancy. What should we make of this juxtaposition?
The end of the dialogue takes a strange turn: the very drunk Alcibiades shows up among the rather sober party. Instead of praising Love he offers (mocking?) praise of Socrates. What does Plato, as author, want us, as readers, to make of this shift? What are we to make of Alicibades’ speech in particular?
Most speakers in the dialogue describes love in a way that reflects their particular background and interests: Pausanias focuses on pederastic love, and he was the older love of Agathon. Eryximachus is a doctor, and his account is about love as a feature in the entire natural world. The comic poet Aristophanes tells a humorous and impossible tale about the nature of love. The tragic poet Agathon gives a highly rhetorical and flowery discourse on love, representing Love (the god) as a poet and the source of all beauty and talent. Socrates links love to philosophy and knowledge. What, if anything, is Plato (as the author of the dialogue) communicating to us by thi
Dec 13 - The grounds of religious and supernatural belief
Why do people believe in supernatural beings, including those of religion?
Do these explanations provide good reasons for our beliefs?
Join us this month for a discussion based in philosopher Stephen Law's provocative essay "Belief in Supernatural Beings is Totally Natural - and False." The essay is published through the online magazine Aeon.
The discussion is open to all interested thinkers, and the facilitators will maintain a discussion space that is welcoming of all and philosophically driven. All participants are hereby reminded that fellow discussants come from a variety of backgrounds and hold a variety of beliefs. Inquisitive, honest, and brave discussion is encouraged. Disrespect will not be tolerated.
Reading:
We are discussing philosopher Stephen Law's provocative essay "Belief in Supernatural Beings is Totally Natural - and False."
No reading guide this month.
Nov 8 - Ignorance may be bliss, but is bliss enough?
We often hear the phrase "ignorance is bliss," but do we stop to reflect on whether this sort of bliss contributes to a well-lived life? Perhaps we think that a good life depends entirely on our internal mental states: what we we believe and think. If so, then whether our bliss comes from ignorance or from truth might make no difference, and what activities we pursue in life will depend on which personally bring about good internal mental states. But maybe a good life depends on things external to us, regardless of what we believe or feel. If so, then maybe the bliss you feel from ignorance is not a bliss that makes your life better.
This week we will read and discuss 3 short pieces: 2 excerpts from Robert Nozick's writings where he discusses his famous "Experience Machine" thought experiment, and a recent piece from Aeon (online magazine) discussing the value of truth.
Robert Nozick - excerpts on the "Experience Machine" (6 pages)
Aeon essay "When the truth hurts"
Reading guide
Oct 11, 2021: Chapters 3 & 4 of On Liberty, by John Stuart Mill
Is it (ever) acceptable to pressure or coerce people to act in certain ways?
Why value individual choice and expression of choice?
In Mill’s nineteenth century work On Liberty, he examines to what extent it may be acceptable to coerce others. Mill is interested in ways that governments curtail our actions, but he is even more interested in ways that popular opinion can be coercive in preventing behavior that deviates from the acceptable norm. Although Mill doesn’t discuss cancel culture, virtue signaling, or public shaming, we can explore what resources he offers us for thinking through these very contemporary concerns about expression of choice.
We are discussing chapters 3 & 4.
Get the reading:
via EarlyModernTexts.com
PDF download of chapters 3-5
Audio chapter 3
Audio chapter 4
via Boulder Public Library
No reading guide this month
Sep 2021: Excerpts from Popper's Conjectures and Refutations
How can we tell science from scientific pretenders?
Philosophy of science has had a long debate about where to draw the line between science and pseudo-science. Our common-sense answers about what science is (e.g., “Science is the empirical study of the world”) run into a surprising amount of trouble. Karl Popper, the philosopher we are reading from, recognized this problem and invented a solution that made him a sort of hero among scientists. We are going to be discussing Popper’s solution and testing it to see if it holds water.
We are reading sections 1-2 (about 5 pages) of the first chapter of Popper’s book, Conjectures and Refutations.
Getting the reading
NOTE: We are only reading about 5 pages of this book - sections 1-2 of the first chapter.
Download PDF of chapter 1 here - we are only reading sections 1-2 (about 5 pages)
Sorry - not available from Boulder Public Library or
Reading guide for Popper's Conjectures and Refutations
Aug 2021: Seneca's On the Shortness of Life
How should we live so we make the most of our available time?
(No pressure...)
First century Romans, like modern folk, apparently complained about human life being too short. In this book Seneca responds to that complaint by arguing that life is long enough if you don't waste your time in worthless pursuits. This would all be empty platitudes but that he goes on to describe how we should spend our time so that we enjoy our lives and don't dread our deaths. Let's see what we can learn!
Getting the reading:
Boulder library: Hoopla audiobook available 🎧
Text available online: 📗
Internet Archive (Williams translation, can download in various forms)
Audiobook versions: 🎧
Reading guide for On the Shortness of Life
July 2021: selections from Plato's Republic
What reason do we have to act morally and justly?
Would we still have a reason to act appropriately if we could get away with acting badly?
How would we design a just city?
If you ever only read one work by Plato, make it this one! The Republic recounts a fictional conversation between Socrates and a group of friends about the nature and rewards of justice. (“Justice” as Plato uses the words, is almost equivalent to our more general term “goodness.”) Specifically, they want to understand if we have any reason to be good since it seems so much more profitable to be bad if we can get away with it. Along the way they decide that we can understand justice better if we look at a just city, so they make a detour into political theorizing.
The Republic consists of ten chapters, called "books." We will read the first two-thirds of Book 2 and the last third of Book 3.
We are skipping Book 1
We will read Book 2 ONLY UP TO 376d, where they begin discussing the educational and upbringing of the guardians.
We will read Book 3 STARTING AT 410b, where they stop discussing education by observing that physical education and poetry are both needed for the soul to turn out well.
Quick note: There are lots of books about Plato's book that are titled Republic: ... Make sure you actually get Plato's book and not a modern author's book about Plato's book. (Did that just make things more confusing?)
Boulder library: show multiple options, print and audio 📗🎧
Text available online: 📗
Internet Classics Archive (Jowett translation, can download)
Perseus - Book 2 read up to 376d (Shorey translation)
Perseus - Book 3 starting at 410b (Shorey translation)
Audiobook versions on YouTube: 🎧
Book 2, pt 1 (entire)
Book 2, pt 2 (our selection ends at 12:30)
Book 3, pt 2 (our selection starts at 33:25)
Another YouTube option: 🎧
A different translation than above, the narrator discusses while reading
Reading guide for Plato's Republic (selections from Books 2 and 3)
June 2021: Sophie de Grouchy's Letters on Sympathy (Letters 1-4)
What is sympathy and how do we develop it?
Why do doctors seem less affected by witnessing suffering than others?
Why do we sympathize more with some people rather than others?
Why do we enjoy seeing people suffer when it is onscreen, onstage, or in a book?
Sophie de Grouchy (1764-1822) responds to these questions and more in her work Letters on Sympathy. We will discuss the first half of this work (Letters 1-4) together.
De Grouchy was a French philosopher who was active in the republican movements of the day, even helping start a political journal in 1791. Letters on Sympathy is the only work she published under her own name, though we know she published more works anonymously. Although the work is formatted as a series of letters, it was was always intended to be published as a single work of philosophy.
Text and audio versions available from earlymoderntexts.com
https://www.earlymoderntexts.com/authors/degrouchy
These texts are edited for a modern reader. You’ll find the text in multiple formats (PDF, Epub, Mobi) as well as very nicely produced audio versions.
We will discuss letters 1-4 (103 minutes listening time, 22 pages in the PDF version)
(This text may be rather hard to find in print aside from the recommended source, above. Until the 21st century, many philosophical works by women of this period languished in obscurity. That is changing, but availability of published editions are still in short supply.)
Reading guide for Sophie De Grouchy's Letters on Sympathy (Letters 1-4 )
May 2021: Epictetus' The Handbook (Enchiridion)
It’s not only the 20th century that gave rise to “A Short Introduction to….” or “A Brief Handbook of…” For our May session we will read Epictetus’ 1st/2nd century CE manual of Stoic ethical guidelines. This work goes sometimes by its Greek title Enchiridion, and other times by the English title The Handbook. Although short, this book provides a lot of ideas to chew over and consider – and much that will likely surprise those new to ancient Stoic thought.
How to say it:
Epictetus – “eh-pick-TEE-tus”
Enchiridion – “on-kai-RID-ee-un”
Available from the Boulder library
Multiple editions/versions available as eBook and eAudiobook. Click https://tinyurl.com/9kabuhmv to see search results for “Epictetus Enchiridion”
Available online
Carter translation, from the Internet Classics Archive (Read online or download plain text): http://classics.mit.edu/Epictetus/epicench.html
Wentworth Higginson translation, from Project Gutenberg (Read online or download as EPUB or Kindle format): http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/45109
Wentworth Higginson translation, from Perseus Project (Read online. Useful for anyone who wants the Greek handy.): https://tinyurl.com/tmme7uut
“A modern rendering” – not a translation per se, but rather a paraphrase of the Carter translation in more modern, colloquial English. You may want to try it if you find Carter unwieldy:: http://www.ideonautics.net/manual2.htm
Available as audiobook on YouTube
Carter translation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaFe3nGhdGI
Oldfather translation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVN-DqUqyS8
Reading guide
Reading guide for Epictetus' The Handbook (Enchiridion) view online PDF
If you have 45 minutes, you may want to watch a talk POPCO facilitator Dawn Jacob gave on Stoic philosophy for the Longmont Public Library: https://youtu.be/iIFvLI4BNJw
April 2021: selections from Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics
We can probably agree with Aristotle that having virtues of character – like honesty, bravery, generosity, and so forth – are important for a good, thriving life. But what is a character virtue, generally speaking? How do we acquire them? Aristotle answers these questions in Book Two of the Nicomachean Ethics, which we will read. We’ll also read his detailed account of two character virtues in particular: bravery (Book Three, chapters 6-9) and generosity (Book Four, chapter 1).
A note on length: “Chapters” in the Nicomachean Ethics tend to be about 1-3 pages long. The total reading for this month is about 26 pages, though it is fairly dense in parts.
Don't start at the beginning. Here are the sections we are reading in Nicomachean Ethics:
Book Two - all of it (chapters 1-9)
Book Three - chapters 6-9
Book Four - chapter 1
Available through the Boulder Public Library
On the shelf: collected works
Available online
Internet Classics Archive - view online or download to read later - translated by Ross
Project Gutenberg - translated by Chase
Perseus digital library - use the navigation bar at the top to choose books/chapters - translated by Rackham
AUDIOBOOK - LibriVox - (chapter navigation is limited) translated by Taylor, read by Geoffrey Edwards
Reading guide
March 2021: Plato's Apology and Crito
We will combine two short readings for this session. In the Apology we read the speech Socrates made in his defense when charged with corrupting the youth of Athens. In the Crito, one of Socrates's close friends attempts to persuade him to escape prison. His friends have made all the arrangements; all he has to do is go along with it. Yet Socrates argues that the right thing to do is stay in prison and accept his execution.
Available through the library
These two works -- Apology and Crito -- are often "bundled" together with a couple other Platonic dialogues. Searching "Plato apology" on the library website will return multiple ebook options and a couple audiobook options.
Available online - other sources
Apology and Crito from The Perseus Project (searchable, with navigation links)
Apology and Crito from Internet Classics Archive (can download text files)
Reading of Apology on YouTube (1hr 6min)
Reading of Crito on YouTube (31min)
Reading Guides
Apology reading guide: view online PDF download
Crito reading guide: view online PDF download
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