FS2469  PASCAL, "PENSEE" (IN INGLESE) (A.A. 2024/2025)

• Unità Accademica

  Facoltà di Filosofia

• Corso

  Licenza in Filosofia , Licenza in Filosofia con specializzazioen in Filosofia pratica , Licenza in Filosofia con specializzazione in Filosofia teoretica , Licenza in Filosofia con specializzazione in Filosofia della religione

Obiettivi: In this seminar the student will become acquainted with Blaise Pascal’s Pensees especially with Pascal’s understanding of the human condition as illumined by reason and faith. In reflecting on his own experience Pascal will make use of philosophy (in the Stoic influence of Epictetus and the Skeptic influence of Epicurus along with some of the essays of Montaigne) as well as his own Catholic faith to bring out an inner dialectic between human greatness and misery and our ultimate need for faith to understand that dialectic and our need for faith to achieve happiness.

Risultati di apprendimento: The student will learn Pascal’s understanding of science, philosophy in his understanding of reason and the heart and the necessity of the Christian faith in coming to appreciate the greatness and the misery of the human condition. The student will also come to appreciate Pascal’s description and contribution to the current literature on the absence of God as well as the significance of Pascal’s famous Wager argument.

Contenuti: The content of the seminar will be the text of Blaise Pascal’s Pensees with respect to understanding the human condition by means of reason, philosophy, and faith. Special topics that will be considered will include Pascal’s understanding of God as hidden and his understanding of the significance of his Wager argument.

Metodologia: The methodology will be that of a seminar. The student will be required to read the material and attend and participate in each seminar session. In addition, the student will lead at least one seminar discussion by preparing and distributing a two page summary of the material for the class which will include three of four discussion questions. The student will also be required to write a final eight page paper on some aspect of the Pensees that especially interests him or her (with the approval of the professor).

Modalità di valutazione: The student’s academic performance will be evaluated on the basis of his or her class participation (including the two page summary and questions in leading the seminar discussion and by a final paper (6-8 pp) on some subject of the Pensees (approved by the professor) which interests the student.

• Informazioni
• Docenti
• Orario lezioni/Aula
• Bibliografia

Informazioni

• Semestre: 1° Semestre
• ECTS: 4

Docenti

Thomas Paul SHERMAN

Orario lezioni/Aula

Semestre	Giorno	Dalle	Alle	Aula	Piano	Palazzo	Note
1° Semestre	Lunedì	15.00	15.45	TBD	0
1° Semestre	Lunedì	16.00	16.45	TBD	0

Bibliografia

• B. PASCAL, Pensees, translated W.F. Trotter, Introduction T.E. Eliot; M. Moriarity, Pascal, Reasoning and Belief, Oxford 2020; G. Hunter, Pascal the Philosopher, Toronto, 2013.