Bruce Michael Barbone Steven - Just the arguments 100 of the most important arguments in Western philosophy

Introduction: Show Me the Arguments

Michael Bruce and Steven Barbone

We are going to ruin undergraduate philosophy. That was what we told our friends and teachers when we pitched the idea of this book to them. It was our experience that for almost any given philosophy class that we took as undergraduates, there were only a handful of arguments, totaling no more than a few pages of carefully crafted notes, that we needed to know. We imagined a rolodex of arguments in front of us, which we could spin through with ease to find the argument and move on. Midterm or final examinations in one of these classes would be reduced to presenting a philosophers argument, followed by a critique usually another philosophers argument. The ability to state an argument clearly and concisely, in a term paper, for example, demonstrates that one succinctly understands the material. The following arguments can be viewed as answers to such test questions and also to some of lifes questions as well.

Show me the argument is the battle cry for philosophers. Everyone has subjective personal experiences, sentiments, and opinions, so philosophy appeals to the common ground of reason to evaluate claims objectively. Logical reasoning is independent of political and religious commitments. Put simply, an argument is valid or it is not. (Whether or not it is convincing is another issue.) When one analyzes a position in terms of its argument, one responds with a certain level of rigor and attention. Uncompelling arguments can be dismissed out of hand as absurd and forgotten; however, arguments that evoke strong reactions, often due to the potential consequences of the argument, are countered by a restatement of the initial argument, explicitly displaying the inferences, assumptions, and justifications and why the conclusions do not follow. When things become serious, one wants just the arguments .

The time has long passed when it was possible for one to read the entire Western philosophical canon. Philosophy needs new didactic tools to address the fact that the quantity of influential arguments will increase while the number of hours that a student at any level has will remain relatively the same. Philosophy as a formal discipline will increasingly need to get smart about how it selects which arguments deserve more attention than others in the classroom and then how to teach them. Outside of the classroom, there are little-to-no resources that function as study guides. Detailed study guides are made for everything the Bible, calculus, grammar, biology except for philosophy. There are laminated sheets in bookstores that list all the standard mathematical equations, sheets that have common Spanish verbs, and even one on Golf for Women, but not one has arguments on the existence of God, free will, or moral responsibility. Many books present important philosophical arguments, but it is often the case that these books outline only a single argument or a string of related arguments. Encyclopedias of philosophy are great for limited descriptions of philosophers and concepts, but there is a need for reference tools that offer specific arguments. In the end, these secondary sources often bury the argument in commentary and analysis and do not lend themselves to concise and efficient referencing. It can take just as long to find an argument in the analysis as it would to go to the original text. This volume acts as a compact and accessible companion to both sources.