12365 - History of Ancient Philosophy (2)

Learning outcomes

Three main objectives: (1) philological: to provide the essential tools for the study of ancient Greek and Roman philosophy; (2) dialectical: train to the discussion of a philosophical problem by examining ancient solutions compared to other solutions, particularly in modern and contemporary philosophy; (3) rhetorical: to provide a philosophical writing method aimed at preparing a written exercise on ancient philosophy.

Course contents

The four courses of History of Ancient Philosophy this year are devoted to a reflection on what makes us human: death (BA) and time (MA).

"[P]rendere atto della nostra condizione mortale significa anche prendere atto che siamo esposti alle contingenze del tempo, al potere del tempo che passa indifferente e inarrestabile. È una condizione rischiosa, certo, ma questo siamo: noi siamo i nostri progetti, quello per cui lottiamo e quello che decidiamo di fare. Rinunciando a questo rinunceremmo a noi stessi. Rivendicare l’importanza dei progetti, della nostra condizione di esseri temporalmente determinati, significa naturalmente riconoscere che siamo sempre esposti anche al rischio della sconfitta e del fallimento, al dominio della contingenza. Ma anche questo fa parte di quello che siamo: proprio perché mortali, siamo esseri fragili, esposti. Non ha senso rifiutare la paura della morte: non perché la morte sia un bene, ma perché la morte è costitutiva di ciò che siamo." (Mauro Bonazzi, Creature di un sol giorno: I Greci e il mistero dell’esistenza, Torino: Einaudi, 2020, p. 149)

 

The course of History of Ancient Philosophy (2) will take place in the Second Semester, Forth Period: March 21-May 7 2022.

Hours: Tuesday, 3-5pm, Classroom C (Via Zamboni, 34); Thursday, 11am-1pm, Classroom C; Friday, 11am-1pm, Classroom C.

Start: Tuesday, March 22, 3pm, 2022, Classroom C.

NOTICE: Tuesday 29th March there will be no class.

 

SFA (2) – The Immortal Death of the Philosopher: Socrates at Trial

 

“Death does not always mark the boundary of a person’s life as an end that stands outside it; sometimes it is a part of that life, continuing its narrative story in some significant way. Socrates, Abraham Lincoln, Joan o f Arc, Jesus, and Julius Caesar all had deaths that were further episodes of their lives, not simply endings, and we are able to see their lives as beading toward those immortal deaths.”

Robert Nozick, The examined life: Philosophical meditations, New York: Simon & Shuster, 1989, p. 23

 

In the spring of 399 BC, the 500 or 501 jurors of the Athens court tried and sentenced Socrates to death, considered by many to be the first philosopher in Western history, judging him guilty of “corrupting young people and not believing in the very gods in which the city believes, but in different and new divine things” (Pl. Ap. 24b-c). The death sentence of the first philosopher is both the inauspicious outcome of the first trial against a thought crime, and what makes the death of Socrates “beautiful” by transforming him into a cultural hero. The aim of the course is to question the ancient sources of the event, starting from Plato’s Apology of Socrates, and some contemporary interpretations, to reconstruct the stages of the process and investigate its deep reasons. At the end of the lessons, will be scheduled a mise en scène of the process.

 

Main topics:

1. The trial of Socrates: the problem of the sources
2. The trial of Socrates: the historical-political and legislative-institutional context
3. The trial of Socrates: the charges (ancient charges and formal charges)
4. The trial of Socrates: the defense speech
5. The trial of Socrates: the prosecution’s reasons
6. The goal and the end: eudaimonia and “the beautiful death”

 

Readings/Bibliography

• Diagramma cronologico [Chronological diagram] to know by heart (see Teaching material on Virtuale)
• Dispensa di Storia della Filosofia Antica dai Presocratici ad Agostino 2017/18 (see Teaching material on Virtuale)
• Platone, Apologia di Socrate, transl. Simonetta Nannini, Siena: Barbera, 2007 (repr. Santarcangelo di Romagna: Rusconi, 2016).

* The bibliography can be supplemented during the course.

Teaching methods

LECTURES COURSE (13 lectures)

Adopted methods:

• Slow reading of the sources in the original language and through a comparison of translations.
• Linguistic analysis and semantic fields.
• Argumentative analysis and short essays (pensum).
• The research community method.
• Dramatization.

PHILOSOPHICAL WRITING SEMINAR (2 lectures)

• Editing guidelines.
• Reading essay of an ancient work: form and contents.

Assessment methods

EXAM PROGRAMME FOR ATTENDING STUDENTS

The exam (6 cfu) consists in an oral test that requires (1) the study of the Diagramma cronologico [Chronological diagram] (by heart) and the Dispensa di Storia della Filosofia Antica dai Presocratici ad Agostino (for students who have already taken a first exam [SFA (1)], only chapters 16 to 23 of the index), available on the teacher’s web page (see Virtuale) or, in hard copy, at the copy center Centotrecento (via Centotrecento 19, Bologna) (among the online teaching materials, a .pdf entitled Linee guida [Guidelines] will also be available: it must be read carefully); and (2) the study of the topics discussed in class: a list of 10 questions will be distributed at the end of the course.

                                            Alternatively:

*** Motivated students (who have already included in their study plan the SFA [1] exam) may substitute the entire oral exam with a paper of 5-7,5 standard pages, following the indications of the writing seminar to be held in the last week of the course. The seminar handbooks will be available online (see Virtuale).

 

PROGRAMME FOR NON-ATTENDING STUDENTS

The students who cannot attend for legitimate reasons must substitute the 10 questions entailed by the exam programme with the study of one work of ancient philosophy selected from (1) Platone, La Repubblica, transl. Mario Vegetti, Milano: BUR, 2006; and (2) Aristotele, Etica Nicomachea, transl. Carlo Natali, Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1999. The rest of the exam programme will remain the same.

*** Students who cannot attend are strongly advised to read the guidelines and, if necessary, to email me in order to make an appointment to discuss the details.

 

EXAM EVALUATION

The oral exam will be considered overall sufficient only if the historical and the philosophical part will be both sufficient.

The paper will be considered overall sufficient only if its form and content will be both sufficient.

Teaching tools

• Handout with excerpts from ancient works.
• Partition diagrams and concept maps.
• Handbooks: (1) Norme di redazione per un saggio breve [Editing guidelines for a short essay]; (2) Seminario di scrittura filosofica [Philosophical writing seminar].

* All materials will be shared in class and made available to students in pdf files.

• Web pages.
• Databases and bibliographical repertoires.

Office hours

See the website of Carlotta Capuccino