Philosophy Exam Review

The Big Three Ancient Greek philosophers

• Socrates → taught Plato

• Plato → taught Aristotle

• Aristotle → focused more on science and observation

Philosophy

Love of wisdom; study of big questions about life, knowledge, and reality.

Epistemology

Study of knowledge (how we know what we know).

Ethics

Study of right and wrong.

Metaphysics

Study of reality and existence (What is real?).

Logic

Study of correct reasoning and arguments

Where/how does philosophy begin?

• Begins with wonder and questioning.

• Ancient Greeks started asking deep questions about the world, knowledge, and values rather than relying on myths.

Plato’s Allegory of the Cave

• Prisoners see only shadows on a wall, think it's reality.

• One escapes, sees the real world, understands truth.

• Symbolizes moving from ignorance to knowledge.

• Suggests education = freeing the mind.

Intersection of Catholicism & philosophy

• Catholic thinkers (like St. Thomas Aquinas) used logic and reason to explain and support faith.

• Philosophy helps explore religious truths through reason, not just belief.

Three laws of thought

• Law of Identity: A = A (A thing is what it is).

• Law of Non-Contradiction: A cannot be both true and false at the same time.

• Law of the Excluded Middle: Something is either true or false—no “in-between”.

Ockham’s razor

• The simplest explanation is usually the best.

• Don’t multiply causes or explanations unnecessarily.

Principle of sufficient reason

• Everything must have a reason, cause, or explanation.

• Nothing happens “just because.”

Deductive arguments

• General → Specific

• If premises are true, conclusion must be true.

• Validity = proper structure, not truth.

• Example: All humans are mortal. Socrates is human. Therefore, Socrates is mortal.

Inductive arguments

• Specific → General

• Conclusion is probably true.

• Judged by strength, not validity.

• Example: 95% of students believe in ghosts. Gottfried is a student → he probably believes in ghosts

Abductive arguments

• Best guess based on evidence.

• Tries to find the most likely explanation.

• Example: Street is wet → It probably rained last night.

Bacon’s four idols

• Idols of the Tribe: Human nature flaws (e.g. illusions, jumping to conclusions).

• Idols of the Cave: Personal experiences/biases shape how we see the world.

• Idols of the Marketplace: Misuse of words causes confusion (e.g. vague terms).

• Idols of the Theatre: Blind acceptance of traditions, systems, or ideologies.

Hasty Generalization

Drawing conclusion from too little evidence

Example: One bad experience = whole thing is bad

Ad Hominem (Attack on person)

Attacking the person, not their argument

Example: “She’s wrong because she’s a Leafs fan”

Appeal to Tradition

Justifying something because it’s tradition

Example: “We’ve always worn uniforms”

Attack on Motive

Saying someone’s argument is just based on self-interest

Example: “They only care about the environment for sales”

Bandwagon

Something is right because it’s popular

Example: “Everyone wears it, so you should too”

Straw Man

Misrepresenting someone's argument to weaken it

Example: “He wants to ban seat belts completely”

Plato’s Forms

• Plato believed the physical world is a shadow of a perfect, invisible world of Forms (ideas).

• Example: All physical circles are imperfect copies of the perfect Form of a Circle.

• Only the mind (not senses) can access these perfect Forms.

• True reality = world of Forms.

Berkeley’s Idealism

• Famous quote: “To be is to be perceived.”

• There is no physical matter, only ideas in minds.

• Objects only exist because God always perceives them.

• Reality = collection of ideas, not physical stuff.

Materialism

• Only physical matter is real.

• No soul, no spirit—just bodies, motion, and matter.

• Example: Thomas Hobbes believed even thoughts and feelings are just motions in the brain.

Monism

• Reality is made of one single substance.
  Example: Spinoza said everything (mind + matter) is one thing: God or Nature.

• We see this one substance in different ways (as thoughts or as things).

Dualism

• Reality is made of two different kinds of things:

  • Mind/soul (non-physical)

  • Body (physical)

• Believes that mind and body are separate but connected.

Descartes’ dualism

• “I think, therefore I am” = proof that mind exists.

• Mind and body are two different substances.

• Body = physical, Mind = thinking thing.

• Both interact but are separate.

Spinoza’s and substance

• There is only one substance: God or Nature.

• This one thing has two aspects:
  Extension (physical things)
  Thought (mental things)
  Everything is part of this one reality.

Essential properties

what something must have to be what it is (e.g., "appleness").

Accidental properties

extra traits like color, size, shape, which can change.

Taoism (Lao Tzu)

• Reality can't be fully understood with reason or language.

• The Tao is the source of everything, but it is not a thing itself.

• Let go of control and flow with the natural way of the universe.

Heidegger’s being and being

• Being (with capital B) = the mystery of existence itself.

• being (small b) = anything that exists (e.g., a chair, a person).

• Western philosophy has forgotten to ask what Being itself really means.

Hobbes & Social contract theory

• Humans are selfish and violent by nature.

• To live in peace, people must give up freedom and follow strong leaders.

• Society is a machine that keeps order through laws and rulers

St. Anselm & the ontological argument for God’s existence

• God is the greatest being we can think of.

• If God exists only in our mind, then a greater being must exist in reality.

• Therefore, God must exist in reality (because that is greater than just in the mind).

St. Thomas Aquinas

• Blended Aristotle’s ideas with Christian theology.

• Believed we know reality through senses and reason, but God is the ultimate truth.

• Soul = eternal, body = temporary.

• Human purpose = union with God.

The cosmological argument for God’s existence 

• Everything that exists was caused by something else.

• There can’t be an infinite chain of causes.

• So, there must be a first cause—that is God.

The Great Chain of Being

• A medieval idea of a hierarchy of creation:

  • God (pure being)

  • Angels (pure spirit)

  • Humans (body + soul)

  • Animals

  • Plants

  • Rocks (lowest level of being)

Leibniz & the contingency argument

• Everything in the universe is contingent (could have not existed).

• There must be something that exists necessarily (must exist).

• That necessary being is God—the explanation for why anything exists at all.

The Teleological argument for God’s existence (design)

• The universe shows order and purpose.

• Like a machine, it must have a designer.

• That designer is God.

Paley & the watchmaker analogy 

• If you find a watch, you know it has a designer.

• The universe is more complex than a watch.

• So, the universe must have a designer too: God.

Atheism

• Atheism: belief that God does not exist.

• Problem of Evil: If God is all-good and all-powerful, why does evil and suffering exist?

• Some atheists argue this shows that God cannot exist.

Agnosticism

• Not sure if God exists or not.

• Reasons:

Lack of proof for or against God.

Human minds are limited—we may never know the full truth.

Belief in mystery or uncertainty over certainty.

Metaethics

• Looks at what morality means and where it comes from.

• Asks questions like: “What is ‘good’?” or “Is morality objective or subjective?”

Normative ethics

• Decides how we should act.

• Looks at ethical theories like deontology, utilitarianism, and virtue ethics.

Applied ethics

• Uses moral theories to deal with real-world issues (e.g., abortion, war, animal rights).

• Asks: “What is the right thing to do in this specific case?”

Moral relativism

Belief that morality is not absolute—it depends on the person or culture.

Egoistic relativism

Right and wrong depend on the individual.

Cultural/social relativism

Right and wrong depend on society or culture.

Value-laden language

• Language that expresses values or opinions (not neutral).

• Example: Saying “murder” instead of “killing” shows a moral judgment.

Ethical grounding

• How we justify what is right or wrong.

• Metaphysical: Morals come from a higher power or God.

• Naturalistic: Morals come from nature or human instincts.

• Rationalistic: Morals come from reason and logical thinking.

Moral responsibility (praise and blame of actions)

• If we are free to choose, we are responsible for our actions.

• We can be praised or blamed for what we do—only if we have free will.

Determinism

• Belief that all actions are caused by outside forces (e.g., fate, nature, God).

• No free will = no moral responsibility.

• Can’t truly be blamed or praised for what you do.

Libertarianism

• Belief that humans have complete free will.

• We are morally responsible for our choices.

• We can be praised or blamed for our actions.

Existentialism

• Belief that we create our own purpose in life.

• “Existence comes before essence” — we are free to choose who we become.

• We have total freedom and total responsibility for our actions.

• Key thinkers: Kierkegaard, Sartre, Nietzsche, de Beauvoir.

Immanuel Kant

• Ethics based on duty and moral rules.

• Actions are right or wrong regardless of consequences.

• Categorical imperative = universal moral law:

  • Act only in a way you want everyone to act.

  • Treat people as ends, not as means to an end.

Consequentialism

• Actions are judged by their outcomes.

• If the result is good, the action is good—even if the act itself seems wrong.

• Allows more flexibility (e.g., lying to save someone is okay).

Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill on utilitarianism

Jeremy Bentham

• Focused on pleasure vs. pain.

• An action is right if it brings the most pleasure.

• Used 6 criteria:

  • Intensity – stronger pleasure is better

  • Duration – longer pleasure is better

  • Certainty – more likely pleasures are better

  • Propinquity – sooner pleasure is better

  • Fecundity – if it leads to more pleasure, it’s better

  • Purity – less pain mixed in = better

John Stuart Mill: Utilitarianism

• Agreed with Bentham but added a 7th rule:

• Extent – the more people benefit, the better the action.

• “The greatest good for the greatest number.”

Aristotle on virtue ethics

• Ethics is about building good character, not just following rules or consequences.

• A virtuous person knows how to act in any situation.

• We must find the Golden Mean (balance between extremes).

• Example: Courage is the balance between cowardice and recklessness.

St. Thomas Aquinas on virtue ethics

• Brought Aristotle’s ideas into Christianity.

• Said that being virtuous helps us become more like God.

• Believed that faith and reason work together in ethics.

John Locke & personhood

• Believed people are born with natural rights (life, liberty, property).

• These rights cannot be taken away morally, even if violated.

• His ideas influenced human rights laws and the U.S. Declaration of Independence.

Rationalism: Plato and Rene Descartes

• Plato believed true knowledge comes from reason, not the senses.

  • Knowledge = Justified True Belief (belief + truth + reason).

  • We are born with innate ideas (a priori knowledge), like math or justice.

  • True knowledge is about unchanging Forms, like beauty or goodness.

• Descartes doubted everything, even his senses.

  • Famous for: “I think, therefore I am.”

  • He believed in using reason to find truth because the senses can deceive us.

  • Goal: find knowledge that can’t be doubted.

Empiricism: Aristotle, John Locke, and David Hume

Aristotle: Knowledge starts with sense experience.

• Believed we learn by observing and using logic.

• Rejected Plato’s theory of Forms.

• Knowledge is a posteriori (after experience).

John Locke: We are born as a blank slate (“tabula rasa”).

• Knowledge comes from experience and reflection.

• Two kinds of qualities in things:

• Primary (real, like size or shape) and

• Secondary (depend on perception, like color or taste).

David Hume: Knowledge is from experience, but reason helps us sort it.

• Hume’s Fork:

• Relations of ideas: Always true (math, logic).

• Matters of fact: Come from experience (can be doubted).

• Was skeptical about how much we can truly know.

Kant’s views on epistemology

• Tried to combine rationalism and empiricism.

• Believed we use sense data + a priori concepts (like space, time, cause) to understand the world.

• We can never fully know things as they are, only how we experience them.

• Said we use intuition and mental structures to shape knowledge.

• Helped inspire pragmatism and the idea that truth is partly constructed by the mind.

Plato’s Justified true belief

• To know something:

  • You must believe it.

  • It must be true.

  • You must have reasons or evidence to support it.

• This is the classic definition of knowledge.

Berkeley’s idealism

• Believed things only exist when they are perceived: “To be is to be perceived.”

• We can’t be sure of the real world because we only know our perceptions.

• God keeps everything constant by always perceiving it.

• Reality exists in the mind.

Hume’s Fork

• Hume divided knowledge into two kinds:

1. Relations of ideas – Always true, based on logic (e.g., math).

2. Matters of fact – Based on experience (e.g., the sun will rise).

   • Only relations of ideas are certain; matters of fact can always be doubted.