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=Welcome to the PHIL 520 Wiki!=

We will use this throughout the term to post questions about the texts we are reading, which in turn will guide our discussions in class. Each week, each of you must post one question. Each post must quote a specific passage from the week's reading and then raise a question in response. Put your name in bold in front of the post so it is easy for me to identify you. Your question should engage critically with the text--it will not suffice merely to say "I don't understand what X is saying here." Here's an example of a good post:


 * Week 1 - Rousseau.**


 * Graham:** At the end of I.8 of The Social Contract, Rousseau says the following: "We might also add that man acquires with civil society, moral freedom, which alone makes man the master of himself: for to be governed by appetite alone is slavery, while obedience to a law one prescribes to oneself is freedom." Isn't it contradictory to say that obedience is freedom? We might agree that obeying one's appetites is to be enslaved by them, and that freedom requires at least the capacity to free oneself from them. Nevertheless, wouldn't genuine freedom involve the ability to go against a law, even if it is a law that one has prescribed to oneself? Doesn't freedom reside in the capacity to choose, on a given occasion, whether or not to follow a law?

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When you have completed your post, hit "Save" in the upper right-hand corner. You may always go back and edit your post. Feel free to engage with previous posts in asking your questions.

If you have any questions about this assignment, post them here.

QUESTIONS: