PHIL 210.001 – Wonder, Myth, and Reason: Introduction to Ancient Greek Science and Philosophy

Instructor: Ava Geenen. This course meets MTWRF 11:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. via remote synchronous (RS) instruction.

This course is intended to bring us into conversation with Ancient Greek philosophy. The goals of this course include 1). Familiarizing ourselves with the works of influential early philosophers and 2). Exploring the enduring philosophical questions in those texts. The readings will primarily focus on epistemological, ethical and political questions like “what is knowledge and how can we get it?” “what is a good life?” and “how should we navigate conflicts between the law and what we think is right?”

A particular aim of this course is to reflect on how we conduct philosophical inquiry. In service of that objective, the course will be split into three units, organized around different forms of doing philosophy: Dialogue (focusing on Socratic dialogues), Discourse (focusing on Aristotle and other Hellenistic philosophy) and Drama (focusing on how philosophical questions are staged in plays).