Below is one of many 3 Minutes Guides to philosophers, this one sets Descartes out in a way that helps engage more seriously with him once you've seen it.
Sunday, 29 January 2012
Saturday, 28 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : Week 18
28 January •
Book 4: KNOWLEDGE Chapter 1, Certainty and doubt: Descartes
Well, this is the start of the second half of the course - 3 books and TMAs down, 3 to go (plus the exam). It'll be finished before we know :-)
Book 4, Chapter 1: Certainty and doubt: Descartes PDF document (386.1KB) - Book 4, Reading 1 PDF document (94KB)
Introducing the theory of knowledge sound file (7.1MB) - Descartes, doubt and knowledge sound file (12.3MB)
Online Activity for Book 4 Resource 
Book 4: Quiz for Chapter 1 iCMA 
Optional further material Structured content
-
Book 4 discussion ForumNG
Friday, 27 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : End of Week 17
It was a bit 'turn the handle, churn out a TMA' this week. Now the wait is on to find out the mark. as I wrote somewhere before, the DD101 TMAs were a bit easier to judge and the scores seemed to be proportional to effort expended, this Philosophy lark seems a lot harder to judge.
I think I stuck rigidly to answering the question and added in my own examples, which seems to be the way forward, even referenced Red Dwarf's 'Better than Life' - not too sure how helpful that will be in the final analysis.
So now on to Book 4, Knowledge, and from the little I have read so far this looks proper interesting, Rene Descartes and scepticism, right up my street !!!
I think I stuck rigidly to answering the question and added in my own examples, which seems to be the way forward, even referenced Red Dwarf's 'Better than Life' - not too sure how helpful that will be in the final analysis.
So now on to Book 4, Knowledge, and from the little I have read so far this looks proper interesting, Rene Descartes and scepticism, right up my street !!!
Tuesday, 24 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : TMA03 Submitted
Well that is a first, submission a whole 2 days before the deadline, never done that before, and finally trimmed it to 1998 words, so decided to stop messing about with it and submit.
Now to try and motivate myself to crack on with book 4.... or wait until the weekend.
Now to try and motivate myself to crack on with book 4.... or wait until the weekend.
1 Year of Open University Study
The DD101 course website opened exactly one year ago, so I guess this is effectively the end of year one of my PPE Degree (if I ever get there).
The most surprising thing is that this blog has received over 15000 page views in this first year, and that was never expected as this was basically a motivational device to keep me on track.
Still, now DD101 in the bag, and half way through the TMAs for A222, just 4 more courses to go !!!
The most surprising thing is that this blog has received over 15000 page views in this first year, and that was never expected as this was basically a motivational device to keep me on track.
Still, now DD101 in the bag, and half way through the TMAs for A222, just 4 more courses to go !!!
Monday, 23 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : TMA03 word count growing
Not sure how this is possible.
Sat down to do a final read through of the essay before submission, started at 1850 words, tweaked it here, re-arranged a sentence there, added a reference, checked the word count - 2046.
So I seem to have taken a step back from a final read to now needing to edit about 50 words out - I should just have submitted it. It is always the same, it is the last 5% of tweaking and tarting about that takes up far more than 5% of the time.
Argh !!
Sat down to do a final read through of the essay before submission, started at 1850 words, tweaked it here, re-arranged a sentence there, added a reference, checked the word count - 2046.
So I seem to have taken a step back from a final read to now needing to edit about 50 words out - I should just have submitted it. It is always the same, it is the last 5% of tweaking and tarting about that takes up far more than 5% of the time.
Argh !!
Sunday, 22 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : TMA03 nearly done....
Despite 2 cracking football matches on TV this afternoon, I now have the TMA pretty much complete. I am waiting for it to be proof read and then I'll read it through a couple more times, but it is about ready to go.
This is the first assignment that I have not struggled to get under the word count, but as the word count is a pretty wide 1500 to 2000 words, I'm hoping that at 1850 I've answered the question as fully as I need to.
I was marked down in the first TMA of this course for including the ideas of Hume and Parfit when the question asked specifically about Locke, and that was really because in the last course (DD101), the essay answers needed to know about all you'd read in that section of the course, so that is what I did in this course's (A222) first TMA.
So in this TMA I have stuck rigidly to the question of views on hedonism and avoided the temptation to wander into the discussion on 'act' or 'rule' utilitarianism - we'll see when the mark comes back if this was the correct way to answer the question.
This is the first assignment that I have not struggled to get under the word count, but as the word count is a pretty wide 1500 to 2000 words, I'm hoping that at 1850 I've answered the question as fully as I need to.
I was marked down in the first TMA of this course for including the ideas of Hume and Parfit when the question asked specifically about Locke, and that was really because in the last course (DD101), the essay answers needed to know about all you'd read in that section of the course, so that is what I did in this course's (A222) first TMA.
So in this TMA I have stuck rigidly to the question of views on hedonism and avoided the temptation to wander into the discussion on 'act' or 'rule' utilitarianism - we'll see when the mark comes back if this was the correct way to answer the question.
Saturday, 21 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : Week 17
21 January •
Assignment week
Assessment resources Events
- Assignment: TMA 03 (cut-off date 26 January
Working on first draft. Have about 750 words with the introduction, definition of terms, description of Bentham and Mill's hedonism, going in to the criticisms of both views. Then need to explain why these are not adequate and write a conclusion.
I think I will carry on with this until its sort of finished. Re-read Chapter 2, and the Tutorial Forum regarding hedonism - make sure I haven't missed anything, then edit and re-write as necessary. Hope to finish draft by end of Sunday, then a couple of days for the re-write.
Friday, 20 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : End of Week 16
This looked like it was going to be an interesting and challenging week, with regard to discussing the legal and moral implications on abortion. However, the one aspect that I was most interested in - when does a fetus become a person - was not discussed. Just the fact that a fetus had potential to become a person, but not the point when we should argue that it has.
The thought experiment on the violinist was not that gripping, and all in all, the chapter felt a bit thin.
Now I have 6 days to write the TMA about Bentham and Mill's hedonism, then it is on to book 4 - this course is flying by......
The thought experiment on the violinist was not that gripping, and all in all, the chapter felt a bit thin.
Now I have 6 days to write the TMA about Bentham and Mill's hedonism, then it is on to book 4 - this course is flying by......
Saturday, 14 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : Week 16
14 January •
Book 3: ETHICS Chapter 4, The morality of abortion
- Book 3, Chapter 4: The morality of abortion PDF document (374.3KB)
- Book 3, Reading 4 PDF document (134.7KB)
- Book 3, Reading 5 PDF document (110.7KB)
- Abortion discussed on television sound file (6MB)
Video extract to accompany 'Abortion discussed on television' file (30.5MB)- Philosophers on abortion sound file (19.9MB)
- Book 3 Quiz for Chapter 4 iCMA
- Optional further material Structured content
- Book 3 discussion
Thursday, 12 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : The Only Way is Ethics, Bentham & Mills
I had a really good stab at this part of the book, started really well in fact, felt I was getting somewhere and then the rest of my life got in the way.......
I have a presentation to give on Tuesday which is taking up too much of my time, but on the upside it looks like I will be traveling for about 9 hrs this weekend so maybe some reading time there.
The other problem with this course is that each section seems to have a book of 4 chapters, one a general introduction, the second is the TMA, which makes me think 3 & 4 will be the exam questions. However, all this does at this point is allow you to slide on reading knowing that in the short term for the TMA all you need is to read one chapter thoroughly - but course of action this will come home to roost in June if other chapters have not been covered :-(
I have a presentation to give on Tuesday which is taking up too much of my time, but on the upside it looks like I will be traveling for about 9 hrs this weekend so maybe some reading time there.
The other problem with this course is that each section seems to have a book of 4 chapters, one a general introduction, the second is the TMA, which makes me think 3 & 4 will be the exam questions. However, all this does at this point is allow you to slide on reading knowing that in the short term for the TMA all you need is to read one chapter thoroughly - but course of action this will come home to roost in June if other chapters have not been covered :-(
Sunday, 8 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : Study will recommence today..... after the Man City v Man Unt Match
Yesterday was spent carrying out overdue household chores and jobs that had been put off for some time. I think I must have had 6 trips to the trip with car loads of stuff we should have gotten rid of ages ago.
The plan was then to catch up with the study today, but with the football live on terrestrial TV its gonna be pretty difficult to get any reading done with that going on in the background. So with any luck, study will start from about 3PM.
The plan was then to catch up with the study today, but with the football live on terrestrial TV its gonna be pretty difficult to get any reading done with that going on in the background. So with any luck, study will start from about 3PM.
Saturday, 7 January 2012
Friday, 6 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : End of Week 14 & TMA02 Marked and Returned
I have received my marked TMA02, and it was an encouraging jump, although just to the other end of a Pass 2, so still below the marks for DD101.
I don't think I could have put any more effort in to writing this TMA, possibly it was not an easy subject to approach with an open mind which may have hampered my critical thinking slightly :-)
However, on the up side, my conclusion that the theory of evolution destroyed the argument for a Christian god was accepted and positively commemted on.
So, I'd better get on with Chapter 3, as I am now the best part of two weeks behind where I should be, although Ethics is an interesting subject.
Also, the author of Book 3 is available to discuss his book with students which should be interesting and worthwhile.Shame that the author of Book 2, Timothy Chappell, didn't offer students the same opportunity to discuss his very partisan and biased view of the Philosophy of Religion......
I don't think I could have put any more effort in to writing this TMA, possibly it was not an easy subject to approach with an open mind which may have hampered my critical thinking slightly :-)
However, on the up side, my conclusion that the theory of evolution destroyed the argument for a Christian god was accepted and positively commemted on.
So, I'd better get on with Chapter 3, as I am now the best part of two weeks behind where I should be, although Ethics is an interesting subject.
Also, the author of Book 3 is available to discuss his book with students which should be interesting and worthwhile.Shame that the author of Book 2, Timothy Chappell, didn't offer students the same opportunity to discuss his very partisan and biased view of the Philosophy of Religion......
Thursday, 5 January 2012
A222 - Exploring Philosophy : Elluminate Tutorial, but TMA02 still not returned.
I experienced the 'Elluminate' on-line tutorial for the first time and it was a bit of a mixed bag. About 6 students logged in and there were the expected connection, audio and punctuality problems, but once it got going it was useful, although we probably got about 20 minutes good discussion from the hour, but better than nothing and some useful pointers for the next TMA.
Although, not having the last TMA marked and returned is severely hampering my motivation to move on and engage with this Chapter. I know the Festive period has gotten in the way, but the submission date was 15th December, and its now the 5th January.
Having written this, it will probably arrive this afternoon :-)
Although, not having the last TMA marked and returned is severely hampering my motivation to move on and engage with this Chapter. I know the Festive period has gotten in the way, but the submission date was 15th December, and its now the 5th January.
Having written this, it will probably arrive this afternoon :-)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)