| Introduction to Course: continued.
Last class: explored possible meanings of "free
will." Saw two major alternatives:
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Influences on choices do not determine the choices because
there is also the outcome of all those determining influences intersecting.
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Influences on choices do determine the choices. Any
given choice is the outcome of all those determining influences intersecting.
This class: discuss the three readings, using the questions
handed out in class #1.
A. Introduction.
Discussion: is the problem just learning
to recognize what is
truly good so that we will seek it?
Education is the answer?
B. "Always Time to Kill." by Jason Epstein
Discussion: We humans show a terrifying
eagerness under
some circumstances to become truly murderous.
List the
main possible causes: bad education?
testosterone?
resentment? kin favoritism?
other...
C. "Prisoner's Dilemman" by Michael Berryhill
[Cf. film, American History X]
Discussion: Does the social pattern
in the prison--"checking,"
gangs, etc.---reflect life on the outside
as you have
encountered it? How could such patterns
arise. Who
decided? No one? It is not the
result of choices? Why is the
prison social pattern so similar from place
to place then?
Summary question: how much inner freedom is manifest
in this human behavior?
For next class: Dr. Monasterio's readings from
Frankl and Sartre.
For next week: select time for viewing movie
For later next week: Readings on Ramayana and Bhagavad
Gita.
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