Calendar – Philosophy at CSUN with Prof. Jiménez

9/25

This coming week we have a pair of heavy-hitting readings to ingest:

We’ll work on these, respectively, on Tuesday and Thursday. For each reading I have provided:

an outline of the reading as a whole,
a selection of passages to focus on, and
for each of the passages to focus on, a question to guide your reading.

Do the reading before class. Open the text, open the notes, see the question, look for the the answer in the text.

Hume and Kant are the first two figures you can write on for the unit 2 commentary. You might think about whether you want to write on either of them or not, and then use prep and class time to start drafting that.

9/18

This coming week I want to try a bit of a different approach. We’re discussing Telfer and then Thursday I want to do an in-class writing exercise.

9/11

I have made week 5 a catch-up week with just one reading (on food!), so the relative glut of material for this coming week shouldn’t be overwhelming in the long run.

Here’s what we’re reading and talking about next week:

We’re more or less circling the same issue we discussed this past week, that is, about the aesthetic and its relation to our everyday lives. Saito’s book is great, and I made the introduction to it an optional read.

I want these readings to serve partially as an introduction to the sort of work philosophers do, but admittedly the aesthetics of the everyday is a bit of a ‘boutique’ concern. However, the aesthetics of the ordinary is, I think, an excellent lens on the particular sort of perspective philosophers bring to bear on things we take for granted. Probably none or very few of you have wondered about the meaning of ‘dirtiness’ or ‘cleanliness’; learning to look at these everyday categories and phenomena in a different and potentially more meaningful way is precisely what it means to learn to ‘do’ philosophy.

I would recommend you start thinking about a commentary on this unit, in case you want to start getting some work done. I didn’t like the way I worded the first unit commentary assignment, so I revised it. See the unit 1 commentary assignment here.

9/4

For next week, two readings:

Dewey on aesthetic experience, and
Irvin on Dewey.

I would also recommend you take a look at the first commentary assignment.

8/26

For next week, I would recommend you do a few things.

Make sure you have no questions about the syllabus: about the assignments of the course, about the reading material, about when and how to find out what’s going on week to week, about how to reach me. All of that is on the syllabus.
For Monday: Work on your Meno draft commentaries. We’re trying to produce a commentary that, in so many words, explores the Meno paradox. On Tuesday we’re going to talk about Socrates’ theory of recollection, and specifically:

how the theory is intended to respond to Meno’s paradox, as well as
how the slave’s short lesson in geometry is intended to serve as evidence of the theory of recollection.

In its current state, your commentary should:

state the question of the dialogue, and
describe how Meno’s paradox emerges in connection with that question, and what the stakes of that paradox are.

We did these together in class. I proposed two things to think about in the interim:

Why is the question of the dialogue difficult to answer? and
How does the slave’s learning serve as a response to Meno’s paradox?

Hopefully by the end of class Monday, you’ll have a commentary completed.

Also for Monday: Read (or reread) §§5 and 6 from my notes on Plato’s Meno, together with the relevant text,
For Wednesday: Read the excerpt from book X of Plato’s Republic (note the specific page range, so you don’t read more than you have to), together with my notes.

8/24

Welcome to the fall semester! Some things you might consider before class tomorrow:

Check out the syllabus. It summarizes all of the assignments and policies for the course. We’ll look at highlights together tomorrow.
Find out how to reach me outside of class. I’m available over email, Zoom, Discord, and during office hours.
Figure out how to keep up to date on course material and assignments. In addition to mentions in class, I’m going to keep you updated through a few means this semester, including these two:
- I’ll update this page about once a week with a description of what’s happening
- I’ll send more regular updates through the Discord channel (see contact info for details)
In case you were wondering, don’t worry about books. All texts are here. See the course outline.

Tomorrow we’re going to go over particulars of the course and then we’re going to get right into the material and begin discussing Plato’s Meno.