Philosophy of Human Nature

Midterm Exam Review Tips
(Updated October 13, 2001. Now complete.)

Plato

-- What set of changes in worldview was underway in Greek culture between the time of Homer and Socrates?

-- What are the first definitions of justice in the Republic, and what does Socrates think is wrong with them?

-- What does Thrasymachus mean in saying that "justice is the advantage of the stronger?" What element of the Homeric or archaic worldview is he defending here?

-- How does Socrates understand the notion of an art or practice? Is ruling a state or managing government an art-form in his sense?

-- What dilemma does Socrates pose for Thrasymachus? In the last pages of Book I, how does he answer Thrasymachus's argument the tyrant is sensible and wise, since he knows better how to attain happiness than does the just man?

-- Glaucon and Adeimantos are not satisfied with Socrates's first answer to Thrasymachus's claims for the tyrant. How does Socrates answer them more fully in Book IX of the Republic?

-- In Book IV, how does Socrates define justice in the city? Does justice in his sense also imply a temperate society?

-- How does Socrates distinguish reason and "high spirited" passion, or the highest and middle parts of the soul? Why does he think spirit, with its desire for honor, will serve reason if rightly trained?

-- Why does Plato think that if the desiring part of the soul controls us, we experience internal strife and disharmony, and never feel at peace?

-- Like Augustine, Plato defines evil not in terms of particular acts, but in terms of the wrong motives or inner psychological condition. Explain their interpretation of evil as "inordinate desire."

-- How does Plato define timocracy, oligarchy, democracy and tyranny as forms of society in Book VIII? (Remember that his use of these terms don't line up perfectly with our current usage). Where would you put the United States in Plato's categories?

-- Unlike timocracy, in which persons ruled by the middle part of their soul lead the state, in oligarchy, democracy, and tyranny, the lowest part of the soul is in control. Why then is oligarchy more controlled and orderly than democracy, and why does democracy decay into tyranny?

-- Just as the city ruled by a tyrant has no freedom, why does Plato think that the tyrannical person is the least free of all??

Augustine

-- Plato gives a certain important role to the desire for honor, and for courage as a virtue (although he demotes them from their first-place rank in the Homeric worldview). Why does Augustine instead emphasize the need for humility, and fear pride?

-- How does Augustine argue in Book I that only the will itself can make us act on inordinate desires as our motives?

-- In Book II, how does Augustine argue that our reason discovers something superior to our own minds? Is he right that in our evaluations, at some point we must employ standards that we do not justify in terms of any prior standards? How do we know these first standards or highest principles, in his view?

-- Compare Augustine's descriptions of a soul enslaved to inordinate desire to Plato's description of the tyrannical man.

-- In Book I, how does Augustine distinguish the will to be happy from the will to live rightly?

-- In Book I, how does Augustine argue that an evil will is only a perversion of a good will, not a will to do or attain something intrinsically evil for its own sake? Is his argument convincing to you?

-- Augustine believes that truth can be shared by many without competition (p.57). Connect this with Socrates's argument in the end of Republic I that wisdom involves expert knowledge that is shared among the wise, rather than being an object of competition and exclusive ownership.

-- How does Augustine use the neo-Platonic conception of a cosmic hierarchy to argue that every kind of created being is intrinsically good, or adds something to the value of the whole? How does this show that beings with free will are worth creating, even if they can sin?

-- In Book III, how does Augustine argue that the will cannot be determined or controlled by external forces? Why does he think we identify our selves with our will?

-- In the last third of Book III, how does Augustine finally answer Evodius's question as to why we sin or act on inordinate desire? In other words, what is our ultimate motive for violating the standards or just action of which we are innately aware in conscience?

-- In Book III, how does Augustine think we can use our free will to seek a way out of sin, even if we are presently controlled by "carnal habits" and have great difficulty resisting our inordinate desires for temporal good?