🗓 10 Meetings from January 14-March 17
🕰️ Sundays 6-9pm
🗺 Bay Ridge, Brooklyn
💰 Sliding scale: $0-$50 ($50 amounts to $5 per meeting, which will go toward tea and snacks.)
📋 To apply, fill out this form before January 3.
👥 Class size will be ideally 7-10.
About
“Philosophy concerns those necessities we cannot, being human, fail to know. Except that nothing is more human than to deny them.” - Stanley Cavell
This course will be an introduction to philosophy as one might hope to get as an undergraduate, but without the institutional sludge and collegiate ego. We will meet every week to discuss a philosophical text, including texts by Plato, María Lugones, Charles Mills, Nagarajuna, Descartes, Al-Ghazali, J. L. Austin and Paul Grice. Topics include: the nature of the self; of knowledge; of language and conversation; of morality; and of oppression—among others to be determined by the interests of the group. Meetings will be casual but focused: the majority of the time will be spent coming to an understanding of the text, with occasional forays into our own philosophical speculations. The meetings take place at the facilitator’s home: tea and light snacks will be provided.
Syllabus
Subject to revision based on group interest. PDF’s of all texts will be made available and a list of specific editions will be circulated for those interested in purchasing hard copies.
Jan 14 | María Lugones, “Playfulness, ‘World’-Travelling, and Loving Perception” |
Jan 21 | Plato, Phaedrus |
Jan 28 | Plato, Phaedrus cont. |
Feb 4 | Charles W. Mills, “But What Are You Really?” |
Feb 11 | Nāgārjuna, Mūlamadhyamakakārikā (ch. 24) |
Feb 18 | Descartes, Meditations and/or Al-Ghazali, al-Munqidh min al-dalal |
Feb 25 | J. L. Austin, “A Plea for Excuses” |
Mar 3 | H. P. Grice, “Logic and Conversation” |
Mar 10 | Stanley Cavell, “Must We Mean What We Say?” |
Mar 17 | TBD |
The facilitator
Eric Bayless-Hall is a student, teacher, and lover of philosophy and conversation. He is currently a philosophy student at the CUNY Graduate Center and teacher at City College. He also teaches high school English and in the summers teaches ancient Greek at CUNY. In addition to philosophy and language, he has a long-standing interest in pop music.