Tyr s Day, November 10: Bounded In a Nutshell EQ: Does Hamlet accept cogito, ergo sum as true?

Transcription

1 Tyr s Day, November 10: Bounded In a Nutshell EQ: Does Hamlet accept cogito, ergo sum as true? Welcome! Gather Green Book (p. 524, line 210), pen/cil, paper, wits! Review: cogito ergo sum Reading: Hamlet II ii fin Reading Journal Entry: Bounded in a Nutshell ELACC12RI3: Analyze and explain how individuals, ideas, or events interact and develop ELACC12RL4-RI4: Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in text ELACC12RI5: Analyze and evaluate effectiveness of the structure an author uses ELACC12RI6: Determine an author s point of view or purpose in a text ELACC12RI7: Integrate and evaluate multiple sources to address a question or solve a problem ELACC12RI8: Delineate and evaluate the reasoning in seminal British texts ELACC12W2: Write informative/explanatory texts to examine and convey complex ideas ELACC12W4: Produce clear and coherent writing appropriate to task, purpose, and audience ELACC12W10: Write routinely over extended and shorter time frames ELACC12L1: Demonstrate standard English grammar and usage in speaking and writing. ELACC12L6: Acquire and use general academic and domain-specific words and phrases

2 SUPERB JOB YESTERDAY. Descartes is not the normal high school English fare, and you destroyed it. Cogito, Ergo Sum? What IS a Self? words: Which of the following do YOU most believe? There is an Objective Self that is your true self and never changes, no matter what you go through or learn or think or do; OR The Self is Subjective; its reality and nature change with my perceptions words: Which of those descriptions Objective or Subjective does Polonius assume in his advice to Laertes ( This above all: to thine own self be true (I iii 181)? words: Compare #1 and #2. Do you and Polonius agree? words: Which of those Objective or Subjective does Kierkegaard assume in his definition of Self we read earlier? The self is the conscious synthesis of [opposites] words: Compare #2-#4. Do Polonius and Kierkegaard agree? words: Read the excerpt from René Descartes Discourse on the Method. Work to explain the iconic formulation cogito ergo sum I think, therefore I am. Then freewrite a response, quoting that formulation and one other bit from the excerpt. Be sure to tell whether Descartes is assuming an Objective Self or a Subjective Self and tell whether you agree.

3 SUPERB JOB YESTERDAY. Descartes is not the normal high school English fare, and you destroyed it. Having done so, let s now apply it to Hamlet. Find your Reading Guide for Hamlet, Act II. It s two sheets, front and back. It begins with II i What Forgeries You Please, includes the fishmonger scene in II ii, and ends on the back page with questions Read Hamlet II ii ; answer Reading Guide q Consider especially the exchange between Hamlet, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern recorded in questions Think about this as a debate about Descartes point. 2. Reading Journal Entry: Does Hamlet agree with Descartes or with Polonius? You ought to remember that in I ii Hamlet told his mother, I know not seems. In this Reading Journal Entry, quote and cite the nutshell line.

4 From René Descartes, Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting Reason, and Seeking Truth in the Sciences, 1637: When I decided to give my attention solely to the search after truth, I thought I ought to reject as absolutely false all opinions which I could doubt at all, in order to determine whether after that there remained anything in my belief that could never be doubted. Accordingly, realizing that our senses sometimes deceive us, I was willing to suppose that nothing they showed us really exists. And perceptions which we experience when awake may also be experienced when we are asleep, and not at that time be true; so I supposed that all the objects that had ever entered into my mind when awake, had in them no more truth than the illusions of my dreams. But immediately upon this I observed that, whilst I thus wished to think that all was false, it was absolutely necessary that I, who was thinking that thought, should exist somehow. I observed that this truth, I think, therefore I am (cogito ergo sum), was so certain and of such evidence that no ground of doubt, however extravagant, could be alleged by the skeptics capable of shaking it. I thence concluded that I was a substance whose whole essence or nature consists only in thinking.

5 William Shakespeare, Hamlet II, ii Enter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN LORD POLONIUS You go to seek the Lord Hamlet; there he is. ROSENCRANTZ [To POLONIUS] God save you, sir! Exit POLONIUS GUILDENSTERN My honoured lord! ROSENCRANTZ My most dear lord! HAMLET My excellent good friends! How dost thou, Guildenstern? Ah, Rosencrantz! Good lads, how do ye both? ROSENCRANTZ As the indifferent children of the earth. GUILDENSTERN Happy, in that we are not over-happy; On fortune's cap we are not the very button. HAMLET Nor the soles of her shoe? ROSENCRANTZ Neither, my lord. HAMLET Then you live about her waist, or in the middle of her favours? GUILDENSTERN 'Faith, her privates we. HAMLET In the secret parts of fortune? O, most true; she is a strumpet. What's the news? ROSENCRANTZ None, my lord, but that the world's grown honest. HAMLET Then is doomsday near: but your news is not true. Let me question more in particular: what have you, my good friends, deserved at the hands of fortune, that she sends you to prison hither? GUILDENSTERN Prison, my lord! HAMLET Denmark's a prison. ROSENCRANTZ Then is the world one. HAMLET A goodly one; in which there are many confines, wards and dungeons, Denmark being one o' the worst. ROSENCRANTZ We think not so, my lord. HAMLET Why, then, 'tis none to you; for there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me it is a prison. ROSENCRANTZ Why then, your ambition makes it one; 'tis too narrow for your mind. HAMLET O God, I could be bounded in a nut shell and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.

6 Reading Guide: William Shakespeare, Hamlet II, ii (continued): The Soul Of Wit causes and effects of Hamlet s behavior 14. After Polonius leaves, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern enter. They joke with Hamlet, who tells them that he believes Denmark s a. 15. Rosencrantz says this is not true, and Hamlet replies, Why then there is nothing either nor but makes it so. 16. Rosencrantz says that Hamlet thinks this because his makes it one. 17. Hamlet replies, I could be bounded in a and count myself a of, were it not that I have had. Put this idea into your own words: 18. After a bit, Hamlet confronts them with his suspicion that they were sent for, meaning: 19. He warns his friends that they are deceived.i am but north-north-west. When the wind is southerly, I know a from a meaning what? 20. After the actors come in and audition, Hamlet takes one aside and makes what request? 21. Because he has heard / That creatures sitting at a have been known to suddenly confess their crimes, he hits upon a plan to have these players / Play something like the of my / Before mine uncle.if he do, / I ll know my course. Summarize his plan: 22. He will try this because, he says, The that I have seen / may be the. 23. He concludes, The the / Wherein I ll catch the of the.

7 Turn In Today: i. Reading Guide: Hamlet II ii ii. Reading Journal Entry: bounded in a nutshell how does the debate between Hamlet and Rosencrantz/Guildenstern comment upon Descartes?