I just got the open course Death removed from my iPod. It is a course provided by Professor Shelly Kegan in Yale University. I downloaded it to my iPod so I will not waste the time when I was jogging.
It is a good course, I have to say, and also it is introductory level, which is suitable for a non-philosophy student like me. Nevertheless I failed to finish it. First of all, I need something funnier than this for jogging. Secondly, also one reason for the funny thing, up to now Professor Kegan is mainly talking about physicialism which is not new for me. Another course I've watched talked about this in a more persuasive way.
It is not to say that I don't like this course, I got several ideas that I would appreciate for the few lectures I've listened to, mainly about physicialism and dualism, do we have a soul or can I survive my death.
Shelly started by examine the question, what does it mean by asking can I survive my death. Very impressive, typical philosopher. It is a good habit that before you are trying to answering something, find out what the question about first. And it is not always clear.
Then comes a long debate for dualism. Three ideas left an impression. First is Descartes' argument that if we can think of something separately, they must be two different things. We can think about a body without a soul and we can think about a soul without body, so body and soul must be two things. This argument, from my point of view, is obviously wrong. I know that there are some ideas about how powerful merely thinking or naming is, and I appreciate those idea. But not this one here. Human imagination has its own limitation, you can easily find it when studying physics, like quantum mechanics or high dimensional world. On the contrary, we can think about various things that are not there, like dragons. So human imagination, interesting as it may be, can not be used as a way of judgment.
Then is Platonic forms. It is an interesting idea which separate beauty, just, and in Plato's view, soul from our everyday object. Platonic forms, they are perfect, they are pure. It occurs to me that perfect and pure should also be platonic forms. So, don't worry about death, Plato says, it only makes you better because you will get rid of your body, and what remains, is the essence, is what is pure, namely your soul.
The third one is Shelly's view of how to prove the non-existence of something. We could only do it by proving the evidences for the existence of something do not stand. And as we can see, even if we did that, we can only reach the conclusion that something tend to be non-existing, I think to that extend, mathematics is unique.
What would also worth recording is my feeling towards philosophy. I like their way of thinking, and I admit that the best physics is about philosophy, about how we view our world. But, I don't see that other than brain storm, what would philosophers bring us. Shelly fights a long way for physicialism, but his best proof comes from psychology or computer science. So why don't we just appeal to these subjects for answers? After all, from my point of view, what can really move this seems eternal question ahead is the advance of neuroscience.
It is a good course, I have to say, and also it is introductory level, which is suitable for a non-philosophy student like me. Nevertheless I failed to finish it. First of all, I need something funnier than this for jogging. Secondly, also one reason for the funny thing, up to now Professor Kegan is mainly talking about physicialism which is not new for me. Another course I've watched talked about this in a more persuasive way.
It is not to say that I don't like this course, I got several ideas that I would appreciate for the few lectures I've listened to, mainly about physicialism and dualism, do we have a soul or can I survive my death.
Shelly started by examine the question, what does it mean by asking can I survive my death. Very impressive, typical philosopher. It is a good habit that before you are trying to answering something, find out what the question about first. And it is not always clear.
Then comes a long debate for dualism. Three ideas left an impression. First is Descartes' argument that if we can think of something separately, they must be two different things. We can think about a body without a soul and we can think about a soul without body, so body and soul must be two things. This argument, from my point of view, is obviously wrong. I know that there are some ideas about how powerful merely thinking or naming is, and I appreciate those idea. But not this one here. Human imagination has its own limitation, you can easily find it when studying physics, like quantum mechanics or high dimensional world. On the contrary, we can think about various things that are not there, like dragons. So human imagination, interesting as it may be, can not be used as a way of judgment.
Then is Platonic forms. It is an interesting idea which separate beauty, just, and in Plato's view, soul from our everyday object. Platonic forms, they are perfect, they are pure. It occurs to me that perfect and pure should also be platonic forms. So, don't worry about death, Plato says, it only makes you better because you will get rid of your body, and what remains, is the essence, is what is pure, namely your soul.
The third one is Shelly's view of how to prove the non-existence of something. We could only do it by proving the evidences for the existence of something do not stand. And as we can see, even if we did that, we can only reach the conclusion that something tend to be non-existing, I think to that extend, mathematics is unique.
What would also worth recording is my feeling towards philosophy. I like their way of thinking, and I admit that the best physics is about philosophy, about how we view our world. But, I don't see that other than brain storm, what would philosophers bring us. Shelly fights a long way for physicialism, but his best proof comes from psychology or computer science. So why don't we just appeal to these subjects for answers? After all, from my point of view, what can really move this seems eternal question ahead is the advance of neuroscience.
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