Chapter 1:

Introduction to the Field of Philosophy

Overview: Philosophy (which literally translates from Greek as “love of
wisdom”) is a field that focuses on rational analysis of fundamental
issues dealing with knowledge, reality, and values. This class is
organized around philosophical archetypes, or people who have
represented an original perspective that has been very influential to
contemporary life.

Major Ideas: After reading the material in this chapter and hearing the
lecture, you should understand the following major ideas in depth, but
other parts of the reading may appear on the assessment (besides names
and dates).

Introductory Reading
Wisdom, Knowledge, and Belief
Archetypes vs. Stereotypes
The Branches of Philosophy
Reason and Arguments
Fallacies and Biases
Common Misunderstandings of Philosophy
 Introductory Reading
What is Philosophy?

When many people hear the term philosophy it calls to mind deep
thinkers, pondering the nature of the world or the meaning of life.
Pondering these deep questions is part of it, though philosophy is a very
general, wide-ranging discipline. So while it’s true that philosophers
think about the meaning of existence, they think about many other things
as well—the existence of God, the soul, the nature of the mind, the best
way to live your life, morality, and more.

Philosophy can get abstract, but the best philosophers apply the ideas
they come up with. The best philosophers see a strong relationship
between the things they believe, and their resulting actions. In some
cases, this application may be at the individual level (as we will see with
Confucius), but in other cases, this application may be at the societal
level (as we will see with Karl Marx). I hope the relationship between
ideas and actions will be apparent as we go along in the class, though
certainly some philosophers are better at applying their ideas than
others.

Philosophy translates from Greek as “love of wisdom.” Clearly

knowledge and wisdom are different things, but using reason to acquire
knowledge and apply it can lead to the growth of wisdom itself, which is
what philosophy is all about. But more on knowledge, wisdom, and
belief later.

The Branches of Philosophy

There are a few general branches to (or categorizations of) philosophy.

Epistemology is the theory of knowledge, where stuff like language,
logic, and critical thinking are discussed. Epistemology deals with not
just spoken and written languages, but with logical languages as well.
Early work in logical languages played a major role in the computer
revolution (for example, logical languages like F# and HTML underlie
the operations of computers and internet webpages). If you have ever
taken a critical thinking class, you were learning epistemology.

Another branch of philosophy is metaphysics, which asks questions

about what is, what exists in the universe and how, what is real, purpose,
causality, and more. Does God exist? Asking whether God exists is
metaphysical, as are questions about God’s nature—questions like
whether he is outside of time and space, whether he/she/they is male or
female (or neither), or whether they are force, energy, or being. Because
these questions ask about the nature of God’s existence, they are
metaphysical. As opposed to questions that may, say, ask about how we
can communicate with or know with God, which would be
epistemological. A category of metaphysics that we will study later is
theology, or the study of God. But metaphysics is not just studied in
relation to religion; it can be studied in science as well. When scientists
discuss the possibility of parallel dimensions or vibrating strings, they
are discussing metaphysics in that they are speculating about the nature
of reality.1

And the other major branch is value theory (or axiology) which, surprise
surprise, asks questions about value, often relating to ethics, politics, and
society. Questions about value are generally harder to settle with
evidence and logic. In value theory you will often see evaluative words
like best, right, wrong, good, etc. What is the best video game ever
made? Are you a bad person if you don’t vote? Is it wrong to lie? Notice
that these questions are based on deep values whose answers will differ
greatly from one person to another. For this reason, discussions of value
generally search not for certainty but for compromise. Although this
branch may seem hopelessly subjective, compromise on disagreements
over value has led historically to what might be called moral progress,
from labor laws to voting rights for the disenfranchised.

1
Although there are many sources today, including shows, that discuss these ideas, one of the
first books to successfully popularize them is: Gribbin, J. (1984). In Search of Schrodinger’s Cat.
New York, NY: Bantam.
Sometimes these last three subdivisions of value theory mentioned
above (ethics, politics, and society) are separated. Sometimes ethics is
listed as a branch in itself since ethics is the most widely studied subfield
of values. Whichever way the branches are divided, what’s important is
that you know philosophers generally discuss foundational issues
relating to reality (metaphysics), knowledge (epistemology), and values
of some kind.

So Why Does Any of This Matter to Me?

This might sound counterintuitive at first, but you should care about
philosophy because you already do. That’s right, you already have a
philosophy. Philosophy is inescapable. You already believe things. Your
head, like mine, is filled with prior knowledge and experiences leading
you to these various, often completely unconscious, beliefs. Sometimes
our collections of beliefs are seen as a worldview. Some assignments in
this class are an attempt to make your worldviews more clear and
explicit.

And why should we make our worldviews more clear? Because,

generally speaking, our worldviews act upon us, we do not act upon
them. That is, it’s likely that much of what you believe is a matter of
sheer accident: you believe based on tradition, emotion, personal
experiences, and so forth (see the discussion of fallacies and biases
below, which are clear examples of the lack of rationality in our belief-
formation processes).

The question is, do you want to believe something because you’ve really
thought it through? Or do you want to believe something because you
grew up believing it without question? Naturally, some of you might not
really care whether your belief is true. You might be thinking, so what?
If my belief works for me, why does it matter? This view, that beliefs
are good to the extent that they are practical (pragmatism), is a view we
will discuss when we get to the PreSocratics, a group of philosophers in
ancient Greece who preceded Socrates.
But even if you are not a pragmatist, you might be thinking that truth
itself is relative to individuals and cultures. There is no absolute,
objective truth, you might argue. This view, that truth is relative, will
also be a part of our discussion of the PreSocratics.

All of this discussion, of course, illustrates the power of beliefs.

Thinking through the implications of beliefs is one of the great values to
philosophical inquiry. Sometimes it’s very valuable to know why,
exactly, we believe the things we believe. And in some cases, it can be
life changing to investigate the source of one’s belief. Just consider
someone who goes from not believing in a higher power to believing in a
higher power, or vice versa. Even less drastic observations about one’s
upbringing can be incredibly freeing, like the realization that something
your parents taught you is not true, or mistaken in some way. Sadly,
there are myriad ways that society as a whole can instill beliefs in us
unconsciously. The value of philosophy is in critically analyzing those
beliefs to decide whether they are worth believing.

Knowledge, Wisdom, and Belief

These words get thrown around in philosophy classes quite a bit, so it’s
good to have some basic definitions. I implied above that wisdom is a
state that goes beyond mere knowledge. If philosophers love wisdom,
then at the least a wise person is one who knows how to apply the
knowledge that she has. Wise people are often people who appear to
have a deep sense of peace and understanding of their place and purpose
within society and more generally the universe.

But what is knowledge, then? Knowledge is often defined as “justified,

true, belief.”2 And a belief can be simply defined as a subjective
acceptance that something is true or right. If you believe something, that
belief is part of you. That's why when the belief gets challenged, we

2
A famous challenge to defining knowledge this way came from this publication: Gettier, E. L.
(1963). Is justified true belief knowledge? Analysis, 22, 121-123.
often get uncomfortable. The personal nature of belief makes it difficult
to discuss beliefs, but not impossible.

So, I have knowledge that the earth is round. Why is this knowledge?
Because the belief is justified—there is evidence supporting it, for
example, in the form of pictures from space. It is true—the earth is, in
fact, round. And I believe it—I accept personally that the earth is round.

Assessing knowledge can get quite complicated with other topics, but
this discussion of knowledge, wisdom, and belief at least gives us a
foundation.

What Philosophers Do: Archetypes vs. Stereotypes

Another way of understanding philosophy is to look at what

philosophers actually do, and what they have done over the years. Like
most academics, what philosophers literally do is teach, write, research
and/or speak about the topics that interest them. Today, there are a good
number of public philosophers, some of who have started successful
YouTube channels or podcasts.

But let’s take a look at the general topic of religion and consider the
following questions. How does a psychologist study religion? How does
a sociologist study religion? How does a philosopher study religion? By
distinguishing these we will be closer to understanding the concerns of
philosophy.

First, the psychologist is concerned with the role religion plays in our
minds/psyche. For instance, the psychologist might wonder whether a
particular religious fanatic is masking some childhood trauma through
his die-hard religious devotion. Second, the sociologist is concerned
with the role religion plays in society. So the sociologist might
investigate the social structure of religion, and how certain religions
have developed over time in different cultures.
But neither psychology nor sociology is concerned with whether or not
religious claims are true. This is the concern of philosophers.
Philosophers go to the base of a problem and ask if the original
justifications are worthwhile. But philosophers study many topics,
religion is just one example.

All of the philosophers we’ll study in this class are considered

philosophical archetypes, or people who have expressed influential
perspectives over the course of human history. Archetypes are original
models that others often try to emulate. Have you ever heard the phrase
the hero’s journey? The hero is an example of an archetype, someone
who goes through a set path of overcoming obstacles, dealing with
hardship, and usually defeating some sort of foe or enemy. The famous
psychologist Karl Jung discussed archetypes in depth, but in this class
we will be studying philosophical archetypes.3

Just to be clear, an archetype is not a stereotype. A stereotype is a

simplistic distortion, often intended to be insulting. Saying that all Irish
people drink is a stereotype. An archetype is a much deeper, complex,
and original model.

Reason and Arguments

A lot of what philosophers do on a day to day basis, however, comes

down to reasoning through arguments. Even philosophers who have
influenced the world profoundly began with arguments. Arguments are
produced when we give a reason for thinking that a claim/statement is
true or right. The reason given is called the premise and the claim being
supported or proven is called the conclusion.

Arguments in the academic sense are not feuds or verbal fights between
people. Arguments don’t even require two people. We make arguments
to ourselves all the time. For example, when we decide not to go
Christmas shopping on a certain day because there will be too many
3
Jung, C. (1981). The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious. Princeton, NY: Princeton
University Press.
people we are making an argument. Here the premise is: There are too
many people out in the stores today. And the conclusion is: Therefore, I
will not go Christmas shopping today. You might not say it this way to
yourself, but at the base of your thinking is an argument that we can
assess. When we think about thinking, as we’re doing in this class, we
try to get at the base of our thinking, to expose our reasoning process to
the light of day, so to speak.

Arguments can also be very sophisticated, and we will look at many

complex arguments throughout the class. But despite their
sophistication—perhaps because of their sophistication—arguments
don’t necessarily settle complex issues. Indeed, one of the most
interesting yet confounding aspects of life is that on particular topics
there can be reasonable arguments on both sides, making it difficult to
know what to believe. Because arguments are attempts to persuade
others, some will be persuaded and some won’t.

For example, each justice of the Supreme Court of the United States
writes sophisticated rational justifications for their decisions. In the
landmark supreme court decision that legalized abortion nationwide, Roe
vs. Wade, a person was defined by viability (that is, the ability of the
fetus to survive outside the mother’s womb). Drawing from the idea that
the fetus is not a person, and the 14th amendment right of privacy to do
what one wants with their own body, abortion was argued by the
majority of justices to not be morally wrong and, therefore, was
legalized. And yet, in Dobbs vs. Jackson, the supreme court overturned
Roe vs. Wade. In this case the majority of justices largely sidestepped
the issue of whether the fetus is a person, arguing that the right to
abortion is not rooted in the nation’s history. As abstract as some of this
is, and whatever your belief about abortion, these court rulings are
examples of the effects of philosophical argument on society as a whole.

To learn what something is, it often helps to compare it to what that

thing is not. Arguments are not explanations, descriptions, or value
judgments. If you say “I hate vanilla ice cream” you are not making an
argument; it’s a value judgment. There is no conclusion being supported
by a premise/claim. Notice, however, that a value judgment can be part
of an argument if it is supported by relevant reasons. For example, you
could say: “It is wrong to treat people as expendable. Slavery treats
people as expendable. Thus, slavery is wrong.” This is an argument
since the value judgment within it is not alone, and there is a conclusion
supported by a premise. Notice that the following is also an argument:
“Anything that does not have rights can be harmed for the greater good.
Animals do not have rights. So animals can be harmed for the greater
good.”

We might disagree with the value judgment in an argument, but that is

irrelevant to whether it is an argument. To be an argument, there only
needs to be a relevant and coherent reason given (a premise) to support
the conclusion. First determine if it’s an argument, evaluating the
content comes later.

There are two kinds of arguments: deductive and inductive. Deductive

arguments provide certain conclusions while inductive arguments
provide the best possible support for a conclusion. If I know that all the
clothes in my closet were made by my grandmother, then if I am
wearing a shirt from my closet, I know with certainty that the shirt was
made by my grandmother—this is deduction. If know I did well on the
first two exams in my algebra class, this is at least some evidence to
believe I will do well on the next exam in the class—this is induction.
Notice that arguments can be written as part of an ordinary passage, or
they can be written in premise/conclusion format like the following
examples. See if you can tell which are inductive and which are
deductive. Ask yourself, if you assumed the premises to be true, would
the conclusion follow with certainty? If the conclusion would follow
with certainty, then it’s a deductive argument. If the conclusion is only
likely or probable, then it’s an inductive argument.
Argument Examples

1. Most people who work construction are pretty strong.

2. Jane works construction.
So Jane is pretty strong.

1. I like to exercise.
2. I want to go biking with my girlfriend.
Thus, I should buy a bike.

1. We are either eating fish or vegetables for dinner tonight.

2. We are not eating fish.
Therefore, we are eating vegetables.

1. All women are mortal.

2. Hypatia was a woman.
So Hypatia was mortal.

Fallacies and Cognitive Biases

Sometimes we try to make a good argument, and we fail. When we fail

in this way, we have committed a fallacy, or a mistake in reasoning.
Also, sometimes our minds employ unconscious tricks that derail our
reasoning—when this happens, it is a cognitive bias. Generally, I will
ask you to be aware of potential fallacies and biases in your reasoning in
this class on assignments and class discussions (and hopefully beyond).
But let’s begin with biases.

The dual processing model of mind is a theory that says humans engage
in fast and slow thinking.4 This model suggests that the human mind has
two basic modes. Sometimes we think quickly, leading to unconscious,
routine behaviors, like when we tie our shoes in the morning, or brush
4
The originators of this theory are Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky. Here is their original
paper: Kahneman, D., & Tversky, A. (1979). Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under
Risk, 47(2), 263-291. Kahneman also wrote a book about the theory later: Kahneman, D. (2011).
Thinking Fast and Slow. New York, NY: Farrar. Strauss, and Giroux.
our teeth at night. And other times we think slowly, like when we
carefully consider which class we will take, or when we attempt to
understand what an author’s intentions are while reading. But
interestingly, what was once slow thinking can become fast: when we
first learned how to tie our shoes, we had to think slowly, but once we
learned how, the behavior became automatic, fast thinking. In this class,
the focus will be slow, careful thinking.

But fast thinking can get in the way of slow thinking, as happens with
cognitive biases. These biases are a type of fast thinking, the mind’s
attempt to simplify the vast amount of raw data (sounds, feelings,
thoughts, sights, etc.) we are faced with from second to second. As you
can tell by the name, cognitive biases happen when there are errors in
this simplification. Below are common types of cognitive biases.

Types of Cognitive Biases

Confirmation bias: The tendency to seek or interpret evidence in

ways that “prove” your existing beliefs. Here’s an example:
• Imagine a person tells you that God does not exist. You ask
him why, and he just shows you a bunch of atheist websites
to prove his point, when you know that there are plenty of
websites that contradict his view as well. Because this person
is only seeking evidence that supports his view, he’s engaged
in the confirmation bias.

Availability Heuristic: unconsciously assigning a probability to a

type of event on the basis of how often one thinks of that event.
• Imagine that you read about natural disasters in the paper
three days in a row. You start thinking about natural
disasters. You might then say that “natural disasters are
happening way more often than they used to” but real
probabilities are not calculated based on just one person’s
recent memories/experiences.
False consensus effect: assuming our attitudes are shared by
society at large.
• “I believe in evolution by natural selection, so everyone else
believes it too.”
• “I think this class sucks, so everyone else does.”

Negativity Bias/ Loss aversion: the tendency people have to weigh

negative information more heavily than positive information when
evaluating things, or to be more strongly motivated to avoid loss
than to accrue gain.
• Some advertisers will point out that another product doesn’t
work, rather than that their product does work.
• We are more worried that we will lose money we already
have, than that we might not gain money we could have
gained.

In-group Bias: we find it easier to form negative opinions of those

who aren’t in our group (tribalism).
• Republicans may see Democrats as being less informed, and
vice versa.

Fundamental Attribution Error: failure to appreciate that others’

behavior is as much constrained by events and circumstances as
our own would be if we were in their situation.
• If John trips over a rock, we assume he’s being careless. But
if we trip over the same rock, we assume the rock was placed
in an awkward spot.

Better-than-average Illusion: when most of a group rate themselves

as better than most of the group relative to some characteristic
• People tend to think they are smarter, think more clearly,
have better memories, etc., than most other people.
• “Most Americans are stupid… except me.”
The fact of our biases as human beings must be fully felt and
understood. These biases are not individual prejudices, but a collective
human ailment. During my first year of graduate school, I studied the
confirmation bias, which again is the tendency to confirm what one
already believes (by, for example, reinterpreting conflicting evidence)
rather than objectively seeking out the truth. When people asked about
my research and I told them I was studying bias, I often got similar
responses. “Ah bias! Just like those folks at Fox news” or “Just like
those folks at MSNBC” or “Just like those religious folks” or whatever.
The problem is that, in recognizing bias, as these quotes illustrate, our
own bias comes through. The problem is that everyone is biased, not just
republicans or democrats or atheists or whoever, as can clearly be seen
from the research.5 When I was writing up my thesis on the confirmation
bias for my doctoral program, I at one point realized I was looking at the
data in such a way to confirm my own hypothesis—that is, I was using
the confirmation bias while studying the confirmation bias!

What are the implications to human bias? Well for one, it should humble
us. We shouldn’t be so quick to think we're right or that we’ve fully
understood something. This doesn't mean we can’t still be right or that
we have to constantly doubt ourselves; it just means we should be more
careful in forming opinions and beliefs.

But back to fallacies. Again, unlike biases, fallacies are mistakes in

reasoning that almost look like an argument, but don’t quite get there
due to bad evidence/reasons in the premises. Although the examples of
common fallacies below are in premise/conclusion format, they are not
arguments; but I keep them in that format to show you how fallacies can
masquerade as arguments, appear to be arguments. Please note that not
every fallacy can ultimately be defined, and the whole point of studying
them is to become better at making arguments. The point is not to
memorize them, but to understand them.

5
Nickerson, R. S. (1998). Confirmation bias: A ubiquitous phenomenon in many guises. Review
of General Psychology, 2(2), 174-220.
Types of Fallacies

Ad hominem: attacking a person instead of her argument.

• 1. Bill cheated on his last wife.
• Therefore, we can’t listen to Bill when he says that women
deserve equal pay to men.

Straw man: misrepresenting someone’s argument then attacking

that false representation.
• 1. It’s ridiculous to believe that we evolved from monkeys.
• Therefore, evolution is false.

Appeal to emotion: substituting reason for emotions like wishful

thinking, pity, guilt, fear, anger, and so forth.
 1. I like to believe that someday there will be world peace.
 Therefore, someday there will be world peace.

False dilemma: assuming that there are only two choices, when
there are more, often ridiculing one choice in favor of the other.
 1. Either you’re with us or against us.
 So you better be with us!
 A variation is the perfectionist fallacy: assuming that an
option should be rejected because it’s not perfect.
 1. The police are never going to stop all crime.
 Therefore, we should not have police.

False cause (correlation is not causation): assuming that because

two things happened around the same time, that one necessarily
caused the other.
• 1. The killer was playing video games before he committed
the murder.
• Therefore, video games caused him to commit the murder.
 Appeal to authority: claiming that something is true simply
because an authority figure says it is.
 1. My dad says that God doesn’t exist.
 So God doesn’t exist.

Appeal to popularity: claiming that something is true since many

people believe it.
 1. Many people believe the earth is round.
 Thus, the earth is round.

Hasty generalization: this happens when we reach a general

conclusion without enough evidence (or with biased evidence).
 1. The swans in this park are white.
 Thus, all swans are white.
 A variation is anecdotal evidence: using only one or
two people’s experiences to falsely reach a general
conclusion.
 1. When I eat lots of salt, I am unhealthy.
 Thus, salt is unhealthy for everyone.

Now you know that philosophy is a rational method for addressing deep
problems in the realm of knowledge (epistemology), reality
(metaphysics), and values (value theory). You know that philosophy is
about loving wisdom. You know that philosophical archetypes typically
express their ideas through arguments, a series of premises/reasons that
support or prove a conclusion. You know that cognitive biases and
fallacies make us less rational, and inhibit rational inquiry. Now, let’s
look at some common misunderstandings of philosophy.

Common Misunderstandings of Philosophy

Philosophy is a matter of opinion, isn’t it?

Part of the problem with this characterization of philosophy is that it’s

partly true—indeed, what you will learn in many philosophy classes are
influential, rational opinions. But we can’t underestimate the words
influential and rational. There is a great difference between the
sophisticated, developed opinion of Aristotle versus the ignorant, boring
opinion of a white supremacist like Richard Spencer.

But more importantly, aside from the very hard sciences, every
academic discipline expresses opinions. Psychologists express their
opinions about how the mind works, political scientists express their
opinions about government. While it’s true that disciplines like
psychology use a lot of experimental evidence to support their opinions,
so do many philosophers.6

Also, crucially, I will not be grading you on your opinion in this class,
but on your ability to understand the ideas/opinions of the philosophers
we’re studying and on your ability to express an opinion free from
fallacies and biases.

Anything goes in philosophy, you can argue that the moon is made of
cheese if you want

Actually, arguing that the moon is made of cheese would be seen either
as a bad argument, or as no argument at all, so no philosopher would
take it seriously. The point is that, contrary to what some outside of
philosophy say, not anything goes in philosophy. Philosophers are still
guided by common knowledge, scientific facts, and general common
sense when they present their ideas. Do some of their ideas get pretty
complicated? Of course, but that is due to the nature of the topics
themselves being complicated, not due to an “anything goes”
motivation.

Philosophy is impractical, right?

This misunderstanding of philosophy does not take into account the

actual data on those who major in and/or have careers in philosophy.

6
In fact, there is an entire movement called experimental philosophy that tries to put the focus of
philosophy on scientific data. Knobe, J., & Nichols, S. (2008). Experimental Philosophy. New
York, NY: Oxford University Press.
The false narrative is that philosophy majors make less money and are
more likely to be unemployed while smoking weed in their parents’
basement. But the data actually shows that philosophy majors excel
academically, especially on important tests like the GRE, LSAT, and
MCAT. The data also shows that philosophy majors tend to make a lot
more money than you might expect, relative to other majors. Finally,
philosophy majors are also highly valued by some employers.7

The White Cisgender Male Problem

Racism, sexism, and other forms of discrimination are serious issues in

all cultures, and it is no different within philosophy. It is unfortunate that
academic philosophy and other academic disciplines, historically, have
ignored women, LGBTQ folks, and non-Western cultures. I take this
critique to heart and have been adding more diverse sources to the
curriculum for many years now. This includes ancient Indian, Chinese,
feminist, LGBTQ voices, and more. In addition to the chapters in this
reader, we will study current articles from people in diverse
communities.

But one last point about this topic. Although diversity of culture and
sexual orientation are important, diversity of thought is important too
(sometimes called viewpoint diversity). While we will study some
cisgender white males in this class, many of them had very, very
different viewpoints. This is yet another way that philosophy can help
you learn from diverse perspectives.

If no one will ever agree on topics in philosophy, what’s the point of

discussing them?

This is the oldest misunderstanding in the book. First of all, there is an

unstated premise in this misunderstanding that looks something like this:
“There is no point in discussing something if the topic is difficult for
people to agree upon.” Why this last claim is false should be apparent in
7
See the following website for the data to back up these claims about the usefulness of studying
philosophy: [Link]
the Roe vs. Wade example above: should the supreme court not have
discussed abortion and come to a conclusion about it just because it is a
difficult topic to agree upon?

Throughout history, debates over difficult topics have helped us to

progress as a society: abortion, LGBTQ and women’s rights, slavery,
etc.

But more importantly, the point of discussing philosophy is for the sake
of the ideas themselves—because discussing deep ideas generally
enriches our lives, making us wiser and more open-minded. Philosophy
does not teach you what to think, but how to think. Philosophy gives you
a method for tackling difficult, enduring problems. We need food for the
mind as well as food for the body to be flourishing human beings, which
is why we need philosophy.