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APA Newsletters APA Newsletters Volume 02, Number 1 Fall 2002 NEWSLETTER ON TEACHING PHILOSOPHY FROM THE EDITORS, TZIPORAH KASACHKOFF & EUGENE KELLY ARTICLES MARGARET A. CUONZO “The Value of Paradox in Teaching Philosophy” KEITH ALLEN KORCZ “A Comparison of Classroom Editions of Hume’s First Enquiry” LISA KEELE AND RONDO KEELE “Let Them Eat (Barley) Cake: An Epicurean Recipe to Share with Your Students” REVIEWS John F. Kavanaugh and Donna J. Werner, Eds.: What’s Ethics Got to Do with It? The Role of Ethics in Undergraduate, Graduate, and Professional Education at St. Louis University REVIEWED BY JAMES FLYNN Robert C. Solomon: The Big Questions: A Short Introduction to Philosophy REVIEWED BY CARRIE FIGDOR Anthony Kenny: Frege: An Introduction to the Founder of Analytic Philosophy REVIEWED BY SAMIR CHOPRA Paul Herrick: The Many Worlds of Logic REVIEWED BY CARRIE FIGDOR Patrick J. Hurley: A Concise Introduction to Logic REVIEWED BY CARRIE FIGDOR Robert M. Johnson: Fundamentals of Reasoning REVIEWED BY CARRIE FIGDOR Merrilee Salmon: Introduction to Logic and Critical Thinking REVIEWED BY CARRIE FIGDOR Maurice F. Stanley: Logic and Controversy REVIEWED BY CARRIE FIGDOR BOOKS RECEIVED ADDRESSES OF THE AUTHORS © 2002 by The American Philosophical Association ISSN: 1067-9464 APA NEWSLETTER ON Teaching Philosophy Tziporah Kasachkoff & Eugene Kelly, Co-Editors Fall 2002 Volume 02, Number 1 that students who encounter hedonism in J.S. Mill or Epicurus ROM THE DITORS dismiss it as recommending a life that is merely crude and F E sensual. Yet Epicurus’s hedonism does not focus on strong physical pleasures; it suggests we give the body simple nourishments, which, to a person in want, offer the highest Tziporah Kasachkoff pleasures. One source of this idea in Epicurus is his Letter to The Graduate Center, CUNY Menoeceus, where he recommends eating barley cakes and ([email protected]) drinking water. To make the point in class, the Keeles borrow an ancient recipe for barley cakes from Marcus Porcius Cato’s Eugene Kelly On Farming, which they prepare at home and serve to their New York Institute of Technology students in class. The paper contains a step-by-step procedure ([email protected]) for producing the cake. Our authors conclude with an examination of the source of the recipe, and attempt to support Welcome to the Fall 2002 edition of the APA Newsletter on its authenticity. The blandness of the cake, and its ability to Teaching Philosophy. We are pleased to present three papers satisfy hunger in a way that frees the mind from the body for of interest to teachers of philosophy, and several reviews of the pursuit of intellectual and spiritual pleasures, should books that can be used in the philosophy classroom. convince students that Epicureanism does not deserve its association with hedonistic theories that recommend strong Our first paper, “The Value of Paradox in Teaching physical pleasure as the best way of life. Philosophy,” by Margaret A. Cuonzo, discusses the use of paradoxes in a course in logic, for which she supplies a We always encourage our readers to suggest themselves syllabus. Paradoxes, if treated correctly, bring students into the as reviewers of books and other material that they think may process of philosophy in a compelling manner. Beginning with be especially good for classroom use. The names of the other a brief analysis of the nature of paradox, Dr. Cuonzo argues books and materials we have for review are listed in section that in contemplating a paradox our intuitions come in conflict, IV of the Newsletter. Please remember again that our and this mental conflict has pedagogical value. Students are publication is devoted to pedagogy and not to theoretical forced to reconsider the intuitions that are in conflict, and either discussions of philosophical issues, and that should also be resolve the paradox or abandon at least one of the intuitions borne in mind when reviewing material for our publication. in conflict. But such an effort is central to the philosophical As always, we encourage our readers to write for our process itself. It rests upon the Socratic realization that some publication. We welcome papers that respond, comment on of our deeply held beliefs may be false, and some concepts or take issue with any of the material that appears within our we thought quite clear may turn out to be unclear. Using as pages. her starting point the mental state into which her students have The following guidelines for submissions should be followed: been brought by a paradox, Dr. Cuonzo shows how teachers ♦ The author’s name, the title of the paper and full of logic can develop in their students habits of reflection and mailing address should appear on a separate sheet sophistication in conceptual analysis. She concludes the body of paper. Nothing that identifies the author or his or of her paper with a discussion of how paradoxes can be her institution should appear within the body or within resolved, what conceptual structures a student must possess the footnotes/endnotes of the paper. The title of the to achieve these resolutions effectively, and what classroom paper should appear on the top of the paper itself. techniques foster this process. ♦ Four complete copies of the paper should be sent. Keith Allen Korcz’s paper, “A Comparison of Classroom ♦ Editions of Hume’s First Enquiry,” offers a useful portrait of Authors should adhere to the production guidelines five currently available editions of Hume’s Enquiry Concerning that are available from the APA and that are published Human Understanding. Korcz makes recommendations in the present edition of the APA Newsletters. among them on the basis of such factors as cost, the quality of ♦ All material submitted to the Newsletter should be introductory essays, and other editorial paraphernalia such as available on windows-readable computer disk, but additional materials by Hume or his contemporaries. Special don’t send the disk with the submitted paper. The consideration is given to the most recent edition, one by Tom editors will request the disk when the paper is ready Beauchamp at Oxford University Press. The article contains a to be published. In writing your paper to disk, please table that sets forth and compares the key features of the five do not use your word processor’s footnote or endnote editions. function; all notes should be added manually at the The third paper, “Let Them Eat (Barley) Cake,” by Lisa end of the paper. Keele and Rondo Keele, has as its premise the observation — APA Newsletter, Fall 2002, Volume 02, Number 1 — ♦ All articles submitted to the Newsletter are blind- propositions is not a paradox unless each proposition, taken reviewed by the members of the editorial committee. individually, has strong intuitive force. In both definitions, it is They are: a necessary condition for being a paradox that we have strong Tziporah Kasachkoff, The Graduate Center, CUNY intuitions about the truth-values of the parts of the paradox. In ([email protected]), co-editor fact, it would not be too far off the mark to define “paradox” as “a set of mutually inconsistent intuitions in which each Eugene Kelly, New York Institute of Technology intuition is individually very strong.” On this definition, it is ([email protected]), co-editor neither the argument nor the set of mutually inconsistent David B. Martens ([email protected]) propositions that is emphasized, but rather the intuitions. This Andrew Wengraf (andrew@welch- third definition is more faithful to the etymological roots of the wengraf.fsnet.uk) term paradox, which comes from the Greek terms for “against” or “beyond” (para) and “expectation” or “opinion” (doxa). The Dr. Neil Rossman has stepped down from the review Greek terms emphasize the counterintuitive nature of committee. The editors wish to thank him for the many years paradoxes, and not their unacceptable conclusions or sets of he contributed to the reviews and the discussions that shape propositions. the content of the APA Newsletter on Teaching Philosophy. I prefer Sainsbury’s definition for pedagogical reasons. Contributions should be sent to: Students who are beginning to study paradoxes are usually at Tziporah Kasachkoff, Philosophy Department, CUNY– a point in their philosophical education where they have been Graduate Center, 365 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10016 introduced to the idea of soundness, and have learned that an or to argument with true premises and valid reasoning must have a Eugene Kelly, Department of Social Science, New York true conclusion. By putting the paradox in the form of an Institute of Technology, Old Westbury, NY 11568 argument with seemingly true premises, seemingly valid reasoning, and a seemingly false conclusion, students encounter something that seemingly conflicts with what they have learned about soundness. This invites them to think more deeply about the premises, conclusion and reasoning in the ARTICLES paradox, and also to think about the nature of soundness and perhaps, the limits of logic. For an example of a paradox, consider an instance of the sorites paradox: The Value of Paradox in Teaching Philosophy 1. A person with 0 hairs is bald. Margaret A. Cuonzo 2. For any number n, if a person with n hairs is bald, then a person with (n + 1) hairs is bald. Long Island University – Brooklyn Campus 3. Therefore, a person with 1,000,000 hairs is bald. Introduction On the first definition, we have an unacceptable conclusion, with intuitively plausible premises, derived using Many of the reasons that lead professional philosophers to apparently correct reasoning. On the second definition, the study philosophical paradoxes also motivate the use of set of mutually inconsistent propositions includes the two philosophical paradoxes in the classroom. Paradoxes force premises, the proposition that the reasoning used is valid, and those who study and attempt to solve them to confront strong, the denial of the conclusion of the argument (in this case that conflicting intuitions, discover ways in which intuitions can a person with a million hairs is bald).
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