Microfiction: Teaching through showing

Last week's PY111 class was perhaps not much loved by some of my students. It consisted in going through a mathematical proof, which was to exemplify a few things:

Firstly, I aimed to get my students through the proof the way Socrates gets the slave to understand the mathematical demonstrations in the Meno: not by saying what the next step or answer is, but by asking questions which lead to the right answer. I would, of course, never claim to have succeeded in this the way Socrates does, but what is important is Socrates's insisting that he is not teaching the slave, but merely getting him to express the opinions that are already in him. Meno agrees with him.
Secondly, the mathematical proof showed how there are some things which you cannot say or tell, but which you can only show.
Thirdly, this showing of something is done through its relation with other things. We derive the square root of 2 by it being the length of the diagonal of a square which sides equal 1. Similarly, in the Meno, Socrates defines shape by its relation to colour and as the side of a solid. Shape is not defined as standing alone, but what it is is shown by relating it to something else. Does Socrates ultimately want Meno to do the same with the idea of virtue?


My microfiction assignment of this week was:

In 10 words or fewer, express how Socrates is not teaching, or how he is.

OR

In 10 words or fewer, express how something can be shown but not told.

When my students put their minds to these two ideas, they came up with the following microfiction. I have not split them up, as it seems to me it is not always clear which of the two options has been chosen:

"Enticing knowledge that is already in the mind."

"Something shown not told, Socrates' idea of recollection vs teaching."

"Showing relies on the physical world; telling requires the mind."

"The shape can be shown but can't be described in detail."

"Uncertainty of questions brings clarity."

"You can question and that encourages the boy to learn."

"Leads the boy to his own opinion, he doesn't teach."

"Socrates teaches by enlightening us to a new way of thinking." (11 words)

"Guiding through the pit of perplexity is teaching." (including a graph which shows the move from being assured, through confusion, to understanding)

The following two are somewhat special. The first one was scratched out without another one provided:

"He makes you understand what you do not know/understand."

This one goes far over the word limit of 10, while having a clear stance on whether or not Socrates is teaching:

"For an answer, there's a method. I don't know either. To get to the answer, I can either be taught the answer or the method."

Not bad, huh?

Microfiction: Perplexed about Pyrrhonism

Two weeks ago, the first-year philosophy students at the University of Essex discussed the possibility of enquiry and Pyrrhonian scepticism. It resulted in some interesting microfiction.

While scepticism tends to be defined as the idea that knowledge is impossible, Pyrrhonian scepticism would not even make that statement, as one cannot even know that. Instead, the Pyrrhonian sceptic way of life is one of suspending judgment: accepting the appearances of life as they appear to us without making any judgment about their being real or unreal. This, Sextus Empiricus tells us, will ultimately lead to tranquillity.

Socrates shares with this scepticism the idea that we should not just take things to be true or real. The way things appear to us will perplex us. But for Socrates, this is the path to knowledge. We have to be perplexed before we can really think about things, because thinking that we already know things when we actually do not will definitely not help us any further.

This week's microfiction assignment was as follows:

In 10 words or fewer, write down what Socrates thinks of perplexity.

OR

In 10 words or fewer, write down the sceptic way of life.

And this is what my students came up with:

"Perplexity is good as it gives us the desire to seek." (11 words)

"Perplexity is the tool that drives us to seek knowledge."

"Socrates believes perplexity is good, it encourages us to seek."

"Perplexity motivates us to seek for the truth by doubting."

"Deny everything, attain tranquility."

"A skeptic lives to question how we see the world."

"Sceptic way of life equation: suspended jugdement, continued inquiry = tranquility."

"I'm suspending my judgement on whether this microfiction is real."

"Real or unreal? Both; neither; let's go get an ice cream!"

Do you think these are good descriptions of Socrates's view on perplexity and of the Pyrrhonian sceptic way of life?

Microfiction: Harming Euthyphro's dilemma

With some delay, I would like to present the microfiction that my students wrote for their third week of reading Plato's Meno. That week actually saw a pause on the Meno and instead involved a discussion of Plato's Euthyphro.

Euthyphro is a short and interesting dialogue exemplary for Socrates's typical 'what is'-questions. In this case, the question is on the definition of piety. Though different in content, there is therefore a formal likeness with what was discussed the week before.

The dialogue is also famous for what is know as 'Euthyphro's dilemma'. A short version of it goes like this: 'Are things good because God loves them or does God love them because they are good?' We discussed how this is the question of the independence of the value of goodness. Are certain acts good because God as an authority has decided that they are good, or are certain acts good because they are good, a value to which God is also answerable?

A third issue with this dialogue we discussed is the ending: Euthyphro leaves, but seems almost to flee. He suddenly says that he has somewhere else to be and cannot continue discussing the topic of piety with Socrates. We wondered why he does this. Socrates has, up until that point, shot down any attempt of Euthyphro at a definition of piety. He is now in a complete state of uncertainty and this is not a good place to be in for a self-proclaimed expert on the matter. Was Euthyphro harmed by his encounter with Socrates? Opinions on this question varied: while some thought that he was harmed, because he lost confidence in himself and his knowledge, others said that it is not a bad thing to bruise one's ego once in a while.


My assignment for this week's microfiction was:

In 10 words or fewer, write down Euthyphro's dilemma.

OR

In 10 words or fewer, write down how Euthyprho is harmed, or how he is not.

The result:

"God wills because good, good because God wills; Euthyphro's Dilemma."

"Something is right because it is right or agreed on."

"Is goodness intrinsically valuable or goodness is from an authority."

"Intrinsic values, normative values. I don't think it matters."

"Is everything good because God wills it, is good independent?"

"Is something good because God wills it or vice versa?"

"Something's right because people say it's right. No dilemma here."

"Do the gods decide what's pious? Or favour what's pious?"

"Goodness from God, or goodness from good."

"Are actions good because God wills it good or good independently?"

"Euthyphro's sense of moral correctness is shown to be problematic."

"Questioning about himself on his views."

"Socrates exposes the inconsistency in Euthyphro's belief."

"Questions his loyalty to Gods, bringing his father to justice?"

"Self-destruction means self-reconstruction."

"Egocentric, self-proclaimed God expert. Fails to give true definition."



I must say that there are some gems there.

Microfiction: On swarms of family likenesses

This week, more microfiction was created by the brilliant minds of my students, and I would not in a million years wish to deprive you of reading them.

As last time, I gave them two options:

In 10 words or fewer, write down what Wittgenstein means by 'family resemblance'.

OR

In 10 words or fewer, write down Socrates's criticism of Meno's attempt at defining virtue.

In order to orient those readers unfamiliar with Wittgenstein's work or with Plato's Meno, perhaps the following will help:

With regard to Wittgenstein, the following passage from The Blue and Brown Books (published by Blackwell) was central to our discussion on 'family resemblance' or 'family likenesses':

'This craving for generality is the resultant of a number of tendencies connected with particular philosophical confusions. There is :

(a) The tendency to look for something in common to all the entities which we commonly subsume under a general term.--We are inclined to think that there must be something in common to all games, say, and that this common property is the justification for applying the general term "game" to the various games; whereas games form a family the members of which have family likenesses. Some of them have the same nose, others the same eyebrows and others again the same way of walking; and these likenesses overlap.' (p.17)

In complete opposition to this, Socrates insist in the Meno that Meno provide him with a definition of virtue, tell him what virtue is rather than give him a list of particular virtues, which he compares to 'a swarm' (72a). He then goes on:

'But, Meno, following up this image about swarms, if after you had been asked by me about the very being of a bee, just what it is, and you were saying that there are many and of all sorts, what would you answer me if I asked you: "Then are you saying that they are many and of all sorts and different from one another in this by which they are bees? Or that it is not this in which they differ, but in something else, such as beauty or size or something else of this sort?"' (72a-b)

Meno can of course only agree that bees do not differ from each other in that by which they are bees. And this is when Socrates once again makes his request clear:

'And so too, surely about the virtues: even if they are many and of all sorts, still they all have some one and the same form through which they are virtues'. (72c)

What Socrates wants we defined as intension: the meaning of the concept. What Meno keeps providing is the extension of 'virtue': those examples of virtue that the concept covers, a list of particular virtues.

With this background, I hope everyone can make sense of the following phrases, which I have sorted by subject matter:

On family resemblance:

"'Overlapping' similarities: features between family members is family resemblance."

"How the common characteristics of each family member overlap."

"Characteristics can be shared by a few, and by many."

"Family members with family likeness, Wittgenstein's equation; family resemblance."

"Overlapping with every member in the family."

"A bucket of noses and ears shared by kin."

On Socrates's criticism of Meno:

"Extensive. Undefined list."

"Meno is using extension, rather than intension for virtue."

"Requires universal form of virtue that makes examples successful."

"A hollow definition masted(?) by example."

"Meno's definition explains the extent of virtue, not the intension."

"Swarms of nonsense, get to the intension of virtue."

While all these phrases show imagination and effort, I need to make a comment about those on Wittgenstein's notion of 'family resemblance'. While we did discuss how family members share features with each other while not all having one and the same feature which could be considered a common characteristic, the value of Wittgenstein's thought there does nog lie in his insight into the intricacies of human biology and genetics. Thinking through how family members relate to each other was merely a step in getting to an understanding of the philosophical idea. It was this philosophical idea, rather then the preparatory thought, that I was inviting my students to explore through microfiction. I suppose this means that, in the future, I should be more clear about what I want from them.

Microfiction on Socrates

In order to shortly revise the topic discussed in class, I have invited my students to start writing microfiction, following an assignment that I give them each week.


Sometimes called flash fiction, microfiction is the practice of writing a story or an idea in as few words as possible. At the University of Essex, it is used by Learning and Development to help students develop the skill to write concisely. In their workshops, they challenge students to write down a story or big idea in 10 words or fewer.

For students, putting down their thoughts and ideas concisely is an important skill when it comes to writing essays and dissertations. When writing an essay, it is important that they articulate their idea(s) clearly. Practising microfiction will help them do that.

The class under discussion is PY111 Introduction to Philosophy at the University of Essex. I teach two separate classes, on Fridays, a total of 22 students. This term, we will be reading Plato's Meno very closely, tackling not just the question of human virtue, but also of Socrates's methods of enquiry and the age-old philosophical question: what is philosophy?

Last week, we started reading the first few pages of the Meno, which involved a study of the character of Meno, the character of Socrates, and some preliminary thoughts on virtue, or human excellence.



At the end of the class, I proposed the following assignment for my students:

In 10 words or fewer, write down what sort of character Socrates is.

OR

In 10 words or fewer, express how there is the universal in ethical relativism.

Here are the results of my students putting their brain at work for 5 very short minutes:

"Socrates is wise because he admits he doesn't know everything."

"Socrates is wise as he accepts what he doesn't know."

"Socrates is an ironic guy that recognises his own flaws."

"The internet troll of Athens. Without the internet."

"Good teacher and philosopher as well as a classic instigator."

"Socrates is arrogant and cunning but yet awfully clever."

"Old, bearded, wise. But doesn't even know it."

"A wise man that knows himself to be a fool."

"Socrates. Wisest man in Athens. Knows nothing."

"Possessor of wisdom, through possession of ignorance."

"Described as wisest man, yet recognition not aware of everything."

I must say I am extremely happy with what they came up with. Some of these are very original, putting in their own words what we discussed in class and playing with grammar and meaning.

As no one endeavoured to tackle the second assignment, I wish to proof that - while perhaps not the best written sentence in history - it is possible:

"Many ways of being virtuous - still, all of them, virtuous."

And I will leave it there.



On non-native writing

It is laborious, as it happens, to write in the language most familiar to you - so that to write in a language which seems to be at a considerate distance from you, which you experience as external to you, becomes an even deeper challenge. Exactly for this reason it requires more practice, and so a new blog was born.

“By writing much, one learns to write well,” Robert Southey said once, according to Internet rumours. Since I decided to take this saying by heart, the idea of yet another blog has been wandering in and out of my head. I also considered keeping a diary, and therefore not display my thoughts where the whole world could access them, but figured that putting them online would result in a greater pressure to think carefully about which words to use and how to express myself. The problem is not that I cannot write in English – the aim is for me to learn to write well as well as to not take hours to get a good sentence out. From this it should be clear that, despite its presence on the World Wide Web, this blog is for me. Its genesis is my desire to improve my writing skills. Any reader, however, will be considered a most generous bonus.

The meaning of the chosen title of my blog will be the content of a future post, but it may be appropriate to address its inspiration . As part of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in the Humanities, the University of Essex puts on a module entitled 'Dangerous Ideas: Essays and Manifestos as Social Criticism'. I have had the luck to end up in this module as a notetaker for Student Support and have thus far enjoyed it immensely. The idea of manifestos fascinated me. To present or defend succinctly a way of life, an idea, a proposal for change – this seemed to me to be the perfect topic for my writing exercise.

And that is how we ended up here.