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OCR AS Philosophy & Ethics: Official Thread for May/June 2016

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Original post by nihil_nimis
How do you guys give your opinion in part b without using "I think that/In my opinion..."


Very breifly you can at the end if you back it up with a criticism you agree with and havent already mentioned. It's best to use as many different philosophers as possible to support/oppose and coming to a conclusion based on them.
Reply 261
Topics that are LEAST LIKELY to come up are

Teleological argument
Aristotle (both prime mover & 4 causes)
Creatio ex nihilo
Goodness of God / God as lawgiver/judge


MOST LIKELY

Plato's forms
Ontological with Kant's challenges
Problem of evil
God as creator


Posted from TSR Mobile
I've been told by my teacher that the following four areas will come up:

Problem of evil
Cosmological argument
Ontological argument
Plato

He believes these 4 are coming up due to a source which predicts them and is generally on point, therefore I am going to be revising these subjects...

...I wish everyone good luck!!
Hello guys, could someone please attach an Essay they may have done on Plato's theory of forms because I'm finding it hard to structure the essay, thank you :smile: x
any predictions for the 10 markers for philosophy?
How peak would it be if everyone walks in like "Imma bang out Plato and onto" then we get 2 questions on science, Singer's criticisms of the teleo and Explain Aquinas' 3rd way.
Original post by @Damzbobs
do you think kants moral arguement will come up?

Came up last year
Original post by Phoebesmith1999
any predictions for the 10 markers for philosophy?


Go back to like page 13, I posted some long ass paragraph about all the possible questions ever.
Original post by amalick1029
How peak would it be if everyone walks in like "Imma bang out Plato and onto" then we get 2 questions on science, Singer's criticisms of the teleo and Explain Aquinas' 3rd way.


LOOOOl I would legit walk out and not do the exam
Original post by MajorDot
Hello guys, could someone please attach an Essay they may have done on Plato's theory of forms because I'm finding it hard to structure the essay, thank you :smile: x


I've never actually done a Part B but in this part A i got 22/25 and looking back at it i don't know how because it was my first essay and reading back it was absolute shite:

The analogy of the cave is what Plato used to portray his idea of the World of Forms more clearly.

In it, he tells us to imagine that there are a group of prisoners who have been held in a cave all their lives, and have never left it or had any experience of the outside world. They are all chained facing a wall, so that they can never see the cave’s entrance. At the entrance of the cave, there is a fire, and whenever someone or something passes that fire, it casts a shadow onto the wall the prisoners are facing. The prisoners think that the shadows are reality.

But one day, a prisoner breaks free and rushes outside the cave. He sees the fire,and people, animals and other things. Here, he has discovered the real world and for the first time realizes that it is so much more than the cave, the shadows and everything else seen previously.

This man is so overwhelmed by this new reality that he has found that he goes back into the cave, to tell the other prisoners what they are missing out on.However, the rest of the prisoners do not believe him, and in fact become angry at the man, because they believe that the shadows are reality.

The outside world is a depiction of Plato’s world of forms. He believed that the World of Forms was the true reality that we will never accept until we see it for ourselves. The cave represents the physical world in which we live. Thisβ€œcave” that we live in makes us somewhat ignorant to change, and until we become more accepting of the world of forms, we are not fully able to reason.

The shadows represent objects in the physical world we live in. These objects are a mere illusion of reality, because they are ever-changing, unlike the constant world of forms. Society, i.e.- the prisoners, try to understand these objects,the shadows, as the true reality, because we have not even tried to find the truth, and refuse to reason and even think that there is a reality past the physical world we are in.

The freed man illustrates a philosopher, who is the only one willing to look past this so-called reality and realize that there is a world of forms, which is the only real truth there is. Plato is basically trying to say that the ones with true knowledge are the only ones who see past the mundane β€œshadows”.

Plato believed that our world was only based on a world of forms, and most people were reluctant to believe that because they refused to reason and consider that there was something higher than what they saw every day. Those who were exposed to the World of Forms, i.e. - the prisoners after they were told by the free man what was out there, would become very angry and rather than accept it, they would conform to the physical world. The shadows in the cave are the things that disillusion us, and so we would much rather stay imprisoned than to have something change our lifelong beliefs.
(edited 7 years ago)
Reply 270
How would you structure a question on Plato and his Forms?
Original post by Vexated
Assess the claim that Plato does not value experience enough.

I really don't know how to answer this?

Perhaps you could use Aristotle but still...


Neither, anyone got any ideas??
Original post by law123abc
Neither, anyone got any ideas??


I guess you could refer to how Aristotle said that Plato focuses too much on the metaphysical world and not the real world. He is ignorant that progress and logic and intelligence are things that are very present in the real world and is almost elitist in discrediting everything in reality and instead saying that this ideal world is far better. just a thought, not sure how I could write 10 marks on it
Original post by amalick1029
I've never actually done a Part B but in this part A i got 22/25 and looking back at it i don't know how because it was my first essay and reading back it was absolute shite:

The analogy of the cave is what Plato used to portray his idea of the World of Forms more clearly.

In it, he tells us to imagine that there are a group of prisoners who have been held in a cave all their lives, and have never left it or had any experience of the outside world. They are all chained facing a wall, so that they can never see the cave’s entrance. At the entrance of the cave, there is a fire, and whenever someone or something passes that fire, it casts a shadow onto the wall the prisoners are facing. The prisoners think that the shadows are reality.

But one day, a prisoner breaks free and rushes outside the cave. He sees the fire,and people, animals and other things. Here, he has discovered the real world and for the first time realizes that it is so much more than the cave, the shadows and everything else seen previously.

This man is so overwhelmed by this new reality that he has found that he goes back into the cave, to tell the other prisoners what they are missing out on.However, the rest of the prisoners do not believe him, and in fact become angry at the man, because they believe that the shadows are reality.

The outside world is a depiction of Plato’s world of forms. He believed that the World of Forms was the true reality that we will never accept until we see it for ourselves. The cave represents the physical world in which we live. Thisβ€œcave” that we live in makes us somewhat ignorant to change, and until we become more accepting of the world of forms, we are not fully able to reason.

The shadows represent objects in the physical world we live in. These objects are a mere illusion of reality, because they are ever-changing, unlike the constant world of forms. Society, i.e.- the prisoners, try to understand these objects,the shadows, as the true reality, because we have not even tried to find the truth, and refuse to reason and even think that there is a reality past the physical world we are in.

The freed man illustrates a philosopher, who is the only one willing to look past this so-called reality and realize that there is a world of forms, which is the only real truth there is. Plato is basically trying to say that the ones with true knowledge are the only ones who see past the mundane β€œshadows”.

Plato believed that our world was only based on a world of forms, and most people were reluctant to believe that because they refused to reason and consider that there was something higher than what they saw every day. Those who were exposed to the World of Forms, i.e. - the prisoners after they were told by the free man what was out there, would become very angry and rather than accept it, they would conform to the physical world. The shadows in the cave are the things that disillusion us, and so we would much rather stay imprisoned than to have something change our lifelong beliefs.


You're an angel thank you so much
Original post by MajorDot
LOOOOl I would legit walk out and not do the exam


i will actually cry if they don't come up
Original post by charrose4x
i will actually cry if they don't come up


does anyone have and extra quoted for plato, my teacher always says we need quotes but i don't actually know many from plato that are easy to remember:s-smilie:
Original post by charrose4x
i will actually cry if they don't come up


Yeah, I am riskily basing all my revision off of predictions.

Assess Gaunilo's response to Anselm [10]

Successful:

Unsuccessful:

Would this be how you'd answer this sort of question, literally just splitting up your points and arguing that it was to an extent successful and unsuccessful?I can really see Gaunilo coming up tbh.
Original post by charrose4x
does anyone have and extra quoted for plato, my teacher always says we need quotes but i don't actually know many from plato that are easy to remember:s-smilie:


Sorry we need quotes? I've never used a quote like that apart from "evil is the absence of good", "in genesis, 'God saw that it was good'", or "In chapter 2 of proslogion, Anselm says....."

I think as long as you have a general idea instead you'd be good.
Original post by Vexated
Yeah, I am riskily basing all my revision off of predictions.

Assess Gaunilo's response to Anselm [10]

Successful:

Unsuccessful:

Would this be how you'd answer this sort of question, literally just splitting up your points and arguing that it was to an extent successful and unsuccessful?I can really see Gaunilo coming up tbh.


Yeah cos its asking to assess you could bring up kants arguments and say how its better than ganilos also
Original post by law123abc
Neither, anyone got any ideas??


http://philosophicalthoughts4all.blogspot.co.uk/2011/01/b-plato-does-not-value-experience.html

This person basically wrote the essay.

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