Aristotle/Nicomachean Ethics
Virtue/Happiness, Best good, Self Sufficiency, Virtue not contingent on chance or fortune, bad fortune not bad life
Plato/Apology Republic
Socratic Wisdom, Episteme vs Doxa, Allegory of the cave
Machiavelli/The Prince
Goal of politics is to maintain power+control, autonomous field, don’t need morals
Descartes/Mediations on First Philosophy
Skepticism: cant know anything for certain, “I think”, I exist bc I think
Pascal/The Wager
Defends belief in god
Rousseau/Social Contract
General Will, Common good (general welfare), Real freedom (Will of all+gen will), Will of all (sum of private wishes)
Hobbes/The Leviathan
All powerful government, State of nature is bad without government, Social Contract (lose some freedom for happiness)
Hume/Treatise on Human Nature
Empiricism (get knowledge from experience), Skepticism (cant know anything for certain but its ok), Descartes different
Kant/Enlightenment
Maturity, public vs private use of reason (constrained to specific role), autonomy (guide self with moral law)
Mill/Utilitarianism
Greatest Happiness for all, Utility (right or wrong)
Fuerbach/Essence of Christianity
God is reflection of our essence, selfcociosuness, Alienation
Marx/Communist Manifesto
Proletariat (selling labor for wage), Bourgeoisie (owning means of production), capitalism=exploitation, communism=stateless classless, workers come together
Frued/Ego and Id
Ego (Consciousness), Id (unconscious), Superego (source of moral agency), repress instinctual drives
Nietzche/Genealogy of Morals
Morality=internalize the instinct to be cruel to others, only justified if hurting after being hurt
Adorno + Horkheimer/Dialectic of Enlightenment
Instrumental Reason (only reason to confirm what you wanna do), Means end reasoning, Nazism
Ardent/Origins of Totalitarianism
Fascism, Totalitarianism happens when nation state falls apart, Jews targeted bc no political representation
Jean Paul Sarte/Existentialism
Existence precedes essence (born–>define who we are later), Full responsibility for actions, Freedom (take that responsibility), Bad faith (lie to self to avoid it), Authenticity (live free with choice)
Simone De Beauvior/Ethics of Ambiguity
Ambiguity (free/limited), true freedom is shared freedom, not born with fixed essence, Ethics (support others freedom)
Audre Lorde/Transformation of Silence
Silence vs Fear (don’t allow fear to silence you), speech and action=autonomy, silence doesn’t stop finite fate
