134. LIVING WITH GHOSTS - Haunted by Football
Read More‘I don’t believe in ghosts, yet I am living with one…‘
- OCTOBER HALF TERM 2022 -
Even though I’m not currently working in a school, I’m still working on school time and enjoying a half term break. We’ll be back with more Philosophy Unleashed next Monday, October 31st, perhaps for some Halloween-themed fun or perhaps not, depending on my mood. In the meantime, as always, if you’re missing PU this week enjoy our archives and, if there’s something we’re not writing about that you’d like to see, get in touch and write for us yourself!
133. THE HARD PROBLEM OF BLACK CONSCIOUSNESS - On The Difficulty and Need For Waking From Dogmatic Slumbers
Read More“I’ve been thinking a lot about consciousness this week. Not the traditional philosophical questions about mind and body, but political consciousness. Specifically Black Consciousness.“
132. BLACK HISTORY WITHOUT TEETH - On The Potential Epistemic Deficit of Black History Month
Read More“we need to first address with students core concepts like structural racism, white supremacy and white supremacist thinking, historical constructivism, critical race theory, colonialism, ideology, education policy and curriculum design. Without that, it will be very hard for the students we teach to place any of what they learn during Black History Month into a meaningful, long-term schema of knowledge.“
131. UNWELCOME VISITORS - When Jordan Peterson Came to Michaela
Read More“We should have more unwelcome visitors to our schools, not fewer. More opportunities for students to ask questions and poke holes. More academic freedom to develop an enduring culture of critique and scrutiny so that ideas are never accepted without a fight. If we are worried about the young and impressionable minds of our students, it’s time that we stopped them being so impressionable.“
130. THE TRIAL & EXECUTION OF SOCRATES - A guest writer reflects on Socrates and asks: 'is democracy a tyranny'?
Read More“The same law which produces justice can be unjust and immoral if interpreted by a tyrant. Tyranny in democracy is almost undetectable because the whole system is depicted to be busy in the service and security of people. But what if the people become a tyranny? Sometimes the fanaticism of the majority, or the sophistry and rhetoric of the minority, can take the shield of law and trample moral codes.“
129. STRANGER THINGS - Leave the Battles to the Children
Read More“I love the Netflix series Stranger Things. I’m supposed to. It is literally targeted directly to me: a weirdo child of the 80s…“
128. THE QUEEN IS DEAD - Long Live The King
Read More“As Britain comes to terms with the loss of its longest reigning monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, who died on Thursday, I was struck by the immediacy of transition from Queen to King. In an instance the previous settled gender of certain phrases - our national anthem, ‘God save the Queen’, prayers within the Church of England asking to ‘replenish her with the grace of thy Holy Spirit, that she may always incline to thy will’, the pledges taken by members of parliament to ‘be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, her heirs and successors’ - had to update and adapt.“
- NOTICE: The Association of Philosophy Teachers -
For those who haven't heard yet, with the help of the British Philosophical Association, we are trying to establish an Association of Philosophy Teachers in the UK - a professional body for teachers of philosophy to share knowledge, good practice, contacts, and support. PLEASE NOTE: DUE TO THE BANK HOLIDAY FOR THE STATE FUNERAL OF QUEEN ELIZABETH II THE ORIGINAL DATE HAS NOW CHANGED: The next (online) meeting of this group is scheduled for TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 27TH at 16:30 and we want as many UK-based philosophy teachers involved as possible!
If you want to be involved, please email - admin@bpa.ac.uk - to get joining information!
127. REMEMBERING WHERE WE CAME FROM - on the privilege of travel
Read More“what it is we travel for today? What is the lack we seek to find? What is the need that makes us leave the comfort of our homes and brave the journeys beyond?“
- SUMMER BREAK 2022 -
As Alice Cooper famously put it: “school’s out for the summer”. That means Philosophy Unleashed is too! However - we’ll be back in September as always. Philosophy Unleashed will still return when the new school year begins on Monday September 5th despite my sabbatical from teaching. In the meantime, if you’re bored over the summer, or perhaps a Philosophy student starting in September itching to get started, our ARCHIVES have 126 philosophy essays on a wide range of subjects. And you can always write one yourself if you can’t find anything of interest! Enjoy the break - and see you in September!
Oh - and if you are interested in having philosopher, DaN McKee, give a talk at your school, or run an in-person Philosophy Unleashed session for students, he’s taking bookings now for the 2022/23 academic year so get in touch!
126. EDUCATED ABOUT EDUCATION - Anarchist Pedagogies and Learning From My Students
Read More“If I had planned an ideal last lesson for you (an actual lesson aimed at teaching you something new) what would we be doing and how would we be doing it?“
125. THEMS THE BREAKS - When a Resignation Isn’t a Resignation
Read More“I wondered why my own slow resignation - making my statement to the Head in January and then still attending work in exactly the same way that I attended before my resignation for the last seven months - seemed completely acceptable to me and yet Johnson's far less lengthy suggestion seemed so egregious.”
124. WHEN DOING PHILOSOPHY ISN'T DOING PHILOSOPHY - Exams Aren't Everything
Read More“I wrote that phrase on the board: “Metaphysics of Mind”. I then made a lame philosophy joke: “let’s see if the innatists are right. You haven’t been taught any of next year’s content yet but do you already know what philosophy of mind is?”
The task they are then set is to simply “do philosophy” to try and work out what they think next year’s course will cover, simply from the phrase “Metaphysics of Mind”. I give them a blank sheet of A3 paper and ask them to fill it with all the questions, issues and answers they think they will be studying from September.“
123. THOUGHTS ON STRIKING - Why We Need More Striking, Not Less
Read More“As philosophers we can smell fallacious argument a mile off. We know an ad hominem attack when we see one, attacking the person (or people) rather than the actual idea. When it comes to discourse around striking in this country, it seems that fallacy and fear-mongering abound. And I would suggest that if you can’t counter the actual arguments of the unions you should be supporting their strikes, maybe even joining them, rather than complaining about them or attacking their industrial action.”
122. DUPLICATING SUFFERING - Economics and Ethics When Experimenting With Animals
Read More“a possible case could be made for accepting certain, limited, forms of animal experimentation but not within the current economic system because it is structurally set up to maximise, rather than minimise, the possible duplication of unnecessary suffering due to prioritising intellectual property rights over the rights of non-human (and human) animals.“
REMINDER: PHILOSOPHY GETS SCHOOLED
The excellent new Philosophy A-level podcast from Simon Kirchin - Philosophy Gets Schooled - continues to put out new episodes, some of which feature Philosophy Unleashed’s DaN McKee. DaN’s on episodes about utilitarianism, war and peace, and eating animals, but there is also an excellent episode out about deontological ethics and Kant too. More are coming out each week and if you are an A-level Philosophy student they come highly recommended! Well worth a listen.
121. CONFIDENCE MAN - What Exactly Do The Conservative Party Have Confidence In?
Read More“According to last week's confidence vote, the majority of Conservative members of Parliament have confidence in the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson. 211 out of 359 MPs, or 59%. But what does this actually tell us? And why do we care about their levels of confidence? Should confidence have anything to do with governing in a democracy? And, if it does, ought the question of confidence be put to the demos - the whole population - rather than merely the MPs of the current ruling party, many of whom are frontbenchers dependent on the very Prime Minister whose confidence is in question for their current political and financial success?“
120. TALKING ABOUT MY CONSTITUTION - Why Conversation Is More Important Than Codification
Read More“The very act of codifying into a constitution the core principles of how your society is to be run is to commit future generations to values that they may not actually hold. It is a normative act, wherein one generation is imposing a set of values in stone on the basis that they believe future generations ought to hold such values. But while human beings remain autonomous agents capable of choosing many different values such an imposition has no guarantee of sticking unless the values are, in fact, actually held by the citizens for whom they are endorsed. This means constitutions are either attempting the impossible and trying to force people into valuing something they don’t value, or they are redundant, as they simply articulate values already held.“
- MAY HALF TERM 2022 -
We’re taking a week off for half term to go see Bad Religion, Werk The World, Jerusalem, and generally play fast and loose with covid for a few days while also resting and recuperating from the last few weeks. As always, enjoy our archives while we’re away or submit a post of your own and we’ll be back with you at 6am every Monday during term-time again from Monday June 6th.