Live Like a Philosopher: Ethics and Civics in the Ancient World
For students in Live Like a Philosopher (Fall 2024), in partnership with the National Education Equity Lab.
This site contains all the video lecture content for the course, organized by unit. For the course syllabus, click here.
To review the material we’ve covered since the beginning of the semester, click on any unit or lecture below. Subtitles can be accessed through the “CC” button in each video player. Special thanks to Natalie Horberg for all the illustrations!
INTRODUCTORY UNIT Socrates and the Life of Philosophy
Welcome to the Introductory Unit of “Live Like a Philosopher”! This first part of Lecture 1 discusses the question “what is philosophy?” and the idea of philosophy as a way of life. The video also includes an overview of the syllabus and the arc of the semester, along with some tips on how to succeed in the course.
This second part of Lecture 1 introduces you to the study of Plato’s dialogues and the figure of Socrates, focusing on Plato’s Apology. We discuss what it was that Socrates did in Athens, and why he was put on trial and eventually sentenced to death. The lecture ends by discussing Socrates’ influence and legacy.
This first part of Lecture 2 continues our Introductory Unit and includes a discussion of the kind of heroism that Plato saw in Socrates, followed by a deeper dive into the Socratic method found in the Apology.
This second part of Lecture 2 concludes the Introductory Unit of our course. In this video we focus on Plato’s Symposium, beginning with another exercise in analyzing Socrates’ method of elenchus. Other topics include the notion of love as “giving birth in beauty” that Plato develops in the Symposium and the way he wants us to see the beauty in Socrates.
UNIT 1 Plato: The Life of Reason
Welcome to Unit 1! This is the first part of Lecture 3 in our course, which focuses on Plato’s understanding of the good life. Our study begins with Callicles’ challenge to the philosophical life in Plato’s Gorgias. Topics include Callicles’ view of “natural justice” and his critique of philosophy, Callicles’ endorsement of a hedonistic conception of the good life, and the difference that Plato draws implicitly between the disharmoniousness of the rhetorical life and the harmoniousness of the philosophical life.
In this second part of Lecture 3, we discuss Plato’s Republic. After an overview of the main topic and general argument of the dialogue, we begin in Book 2 of the text with Glaucon’s challenge to Socrates’ view of justice as an intrinsic good. We move next to a discussion of the tripartite understanding of human psychology that Plato develops in Book 4, and his conception of the just life as a life of internal balance and psychological harmony.
This first part of Lecture 4 picks up from where we left off in the last lecture by examining more closely Plato’s identification of the good life as the just life. We consider here in particular the role of reason in the good life and the difference that Plato draws in the Republic between knowledge and mere belief or opinion.
This second part of Lecture 4 concludes Unit 1 and our study of Plato’s approach to the good life in the Republic, focusing on Book 7 of the dialogue. In this video we’re introduced to Plato’s theory of forms. We also consider his views on the transformative power of education in his famous allegory of the cave.
UNIT 2 Aristotle: The Life of Virtue
Welcome to Unit 2! This is the first part of Lecture 5, where we begin our study of Aristotle’s theory of the good life. This video discusses the historical context for Aristotle’s life and views, along with some background information on Greco-Roman approaches to ethical theory. We then move on to Aristotle’s disagreement with Plato on the nature of the good life and explore how Aristotle’s approach to metaphysical questions influences his approach to ethics.
This is the second part of Lecture 5, where we examine Aristotle’s theory of the good life in further detail, beginning where we left off in the last video with the question of a final end or ultimate goal for all human beings. This video discusses the way Aristotle identifies our final end with happiness or eudaimonia, and how he expands on this view with his “function argument” in Book 1 of the Nicomachean Ethics.
We continue exploring Aristotle’s account of the good life in this first part of Lecture 6. After a recap of key points from the last lecture, we then move on to Aristotle’s views on the fragility of the good life, the need for politics and external goods in living well, the importance of habituation in developing virtue, and Aristotle’s particularist approach to ethical theory.
This second part of Lecture 6 concludes Unit 2 and our study of Aristotle. In this video we examine the finer details of Aristotle’s ethical thought by considering his views on the various elements of virtue and how we develop a virtuous character. We’ll focus here on the role of pleasure in virtuous action, Aristotle’s doctrine of the mean, the importance of volition in acting virtuously, and the centrality of phronēsis or practical wisdom as a master virtue. We end this video with a discussion of Aristotle’s views on the significance of friendships in a good life and blindspots/challenges for Aristotle’s ethical theory.
UNIT 3 Epicureanism: The Life of Pleasure
Welcome to Unit 3, where we begin our study of the Hellenistic period of Greco-Roman philosophy! In this first part of Lecture 7, we consider what was distinctive about Hellenistic philosophy in comparison with the philosophy of the Classical period. We then discuss the Greek philosopher Epicurus and the school he founded, which lasted almost 500 years. Our focus in this video will be on the fundamental principles of Epicureanism, particularly in metaphysics and epistemology, found in Epicurus’ Letter to Herodotus, where he argues for a materialist understanding of reality.
This video, the second part of Lecture 7, continues our study of Epicureanism in Unit 3. Following up on the last video and our discussion of Epicurus’ views in metaphysics and epistemology, we turn in this lecture to Epicurean psychology. After examining Epicurus’ views on the nature of the human soul, we discuss two of the cornerstone principles of the tetrapharmakon or “fourfold remedy” that Epicureanism prescribes for living well: that we have nothing to fear with respect to the gods and nothing to fear with respect to death.
We continue our study of Epicureanism in this video, focusing in this first part of Lecture 8 on Epicurean ethics. After recapping Epicurus’ views on the gods and death, we investigate the details of his hedonistic conception of eudaimonia in his Letter to Menoeceus and the Principal Doctrines, where pleasure (viewed as the absence of pain) is the goal of the good life. Instead of a license for self-indulgence, this is best seen as an enlightened form of hedonism: an ethics of frugality and tranquility that focuses on “static” rather than “kinetic” pleasures. This video concludes by discussing the Epicureans’ views on the role of friendship in human well-being.
This video, the second part of Lecture 8, concludes our study of Epicureanism. We consider here the influence of a later Epicurean thinker in the Hellenistic period, the Roman philosopher and poet Lucretius, who puts Epicurean philosophy into verse in his monumental poem De Rerum Natura. After that, we address the relationship between virtue and pleasure in Epicureanism, and explore some possible problems for the school’s approach to the good life.
UNIT 4 Stoicism: The Life of Freedom
Welcome to Unit 4! This is the first part of Lecture 9 in our course, which focuses on the Stoics’ approach to the good life. We begin by situating Stoicism in the Hellenistic period of Greco-Roman philosophy, tracing the evolution of the school from its origins in Greece through to its development in the Roman world. Before getting into the core ideas of the Stoic system, we first address a common misconception that Stoicism promotes an attitude of passive resignation. We’ll do this by analyzing just what it is the Stoics do and don’t claim — all with a bit of logic!
In this second part of Lecture 9, we discuss the tight integration of physics, logic, and ethics in the Stoic slogan to “live in agreement with nature.” We also investigate the Stoics’ approach to “wishing with reservation” and how they develop a cosmopolitan moral outlook that reaches beyond personal and local concerns to encompass all of humanity.
We continue our study of Stoicism in this first part of Lecture 10. After recapping some of the key features of the Stoic system, we turn to Epictetus’ ideas on what’s “up to us” and the idea of Stoic freedom. We also discuss the differences between Epicureanism and Stoicism, the Stoics’ “cognitivist” view of the emotions, and their promotion of healthy emotions. This video ends with a summary of the Stoic Sage.
This video, the second part of Lecture 10, concludes Unit 4 and our study of Stoicism. We begin by distinguishing between the Sage and the Progressor before moving on to the Stoics’ idea of cultivating indifference and their distinction between “preferred” and “dispreferred” indifferents. This leads us to a reconsideration of the Stoic Sage and the ways in which there are Sage-like figures all around us. The lecture ends by considering some problems for Stoicism and the continuing impact of Stoic theory today.
