28 October 2010

Yet Another Web Home

I don't know how often this site shows up on Google searches any more, but if you're looking for the Nathan Gilmour who lives in Georgia and teaches at Emmanuel College, I'm now part of a rather exciting group blog and podcast called The Christian Humanist.

You can catch our latest at this link: The Christian Humanist Blog

24 September 2007

I'm moved

Yes, folks, I think that the new blog is going to be my blog for the time being. If you've got hyperlinks or bookmarks, change 'em. If not, make some hyperlinks!



22 September 2007

A New Face on Things

I'm not sure I'm going with Wordpress permanently, but it's been fun playing around with it.

To see this blog with some new duds, head on over to what might become the new Hardly the Last Word.

18 September 2007

Another good day

We wrapped up our first unit on Republic proper today, and the discussions were quite good. I have to keep reminding the students (and myself) both how alien Plato's world was and how much we (the students and their teacher) are heirs to Plato's basic project.

Plato's big question in today's section was how to determine who should serve the community in which ways. Always looking for reasoned organization, Plato sets forth that ability, not ancestry, should decide who farms and who builds and who fights and who rules. There's still no hint of the individual's choosing her or his own vocation (as far as I can tell, they hadn't invented that yet), but it certainly assumes that communities can organize rationally their division of labor.

Such a distinction was at the heart of 11:00's discussion: is Plato forcing people to be what they do not want to be by training them according to their aptitudes, or does a desire to want to do something for a living only arise when choice-of-vocation is a stated category?

In 8:00 we spent more time focusing on protecting children from stories for which they're not ready. The group basically agreed with Plato's schema, in which the lewd and potentially misleading stories are reserved for those who have developed the faculties for apprehending them literately rather than as straightforward positive exempla. The sticking point for that group was that in Plato's system, there was no set rule for when that happened. They agreed that setting an arbitrary age (17 for R-rated movies, 21 for dance clubs) was too arbitrary fully to be reasonable, but they also weren't comfortable with putting such decisions in the hands of the community's guardians.

Tomorrow we start revision groups, a tiring time for me. But it's good enough pedagogically that I don't think I could do a semester of comp without them.

15 September 2007

Plato meets Michael Vick

Thursday's classes were good, and I actually mananged to have two, very different conversations in them. Since I remember 11:00 a little better, I'll start with that.

Their main concern was that Plato considers obscuring information for the good of community not much of a problem. Although they did not phrase it this way, they thought that the act of deception itself disqualifies a guardian as good.

That's where Michael Vick comes in.

When I asked them what they would say to ten-year-olds who idolized Michael Vick, they started to realize the size of the question that Plato was dealing with. After all, nine months ago (give or take), Vick was as close to a classical hero as kids get in 2006--he went out into an open field with some of the biggest, strongest, fastest people on the planet and proved over and over that he could overcome them with his own quickness and vision. Then the newspapers revealed something else, something at least as scandalous (for us moderns) as Achilles' distaste for the afterlife. I asked them what they'd tell the kids.

Because I hadn't anticipated that being the big question of the day (this was also the section in which Plato says that visiting Corinthian prostitutes and consuming pastries are basically moral equivalents and in which he formulates what later becomes "Platonic love"), I didn't articulate things that well. But I think things went fairly smoothly.

In 8:00, as I anticipated, the discussion mostly dealt with that Platonic sense of friendship, in which the best among the community love each other without the sex for the sake of harmony. Putting that in an ancient Athenian context is always a trip.

That's all I've got right now. I've got my proposal for my spring course in, and I ought to have some good working time Monday, back here at the Bogart Library. Perhaps more then.

11 September 2007

Thought Experiments

Today's reading in Plato was pretty much setup; the real argument begins in Thursday's reading. Nonetheless, my classes both engaged the text with some enthusiasm, and I finished my teaching day tired but pleased with the results.

The more I teach Plato, the more parallels strike me. The Ring of Gyges is obviously an influence on Tolkien; that's easy. But this time through, planning the lesson, I came to realize that Socrates' good man in his thought experiment bears a striking resemblance to Job--he's a genuinely righteous (the Greek dikaiosyne gets translated as "just" in Republic and "righteous" in Matthew) man who loses all the benefits of righteousness in heaven and in earth. Of course, the genius of Job is that the wronged righteous man speaks, and although I still don't think that the writer of Job necessarily knew Plato, I do think that the connection is undeniable.

As happened last year, this year's students are still working out what to do with Plato's highly specialized society. I reminded them that at least part of what he's doing is analogical, but nonetheless the question remains valid. And the pattern holds from last year: the students don't like the idea that one job is in store for a person's entire life, but when it comes to very important tasks (surgery and protection come up in every class), the students want specialists working in their behalf. Yes, this is a fun book to teach.

I also gave my preliminary "sex in Athens" speech to both sections today. Not surprisingly, a city in which the same man could have a boyfriend, a wife, and a prostitute when he felt the need struck the class as rotten. (It is in fact rotten.) But I have a hunch they'll read the sex sections of Republic a little more acutely when we get there, so I don't mind the relative embarrassment that I experience every time I have to give that talk.

Thursday we start talking about educating the guardians, always a fun time. I'll have to revisit the text before I start planning my attack, but this section always gets personal, and I like that.

07 September 2007

Freshmen can understand dialectic

Yesterday's classes were great; I really do have two good groups this year.

I did kick myself after 11:00 class for trying to railroad them into the same discussion that 8:00 had. It's a bad habit of mine, and I think I might be in the process of breaking the habit for some time still. All the same, they had read carefully enough that they pretty much took the discussion and ran with it. Like David in my Hebrew Bible classes, Socrates is always a conflicted figure, and some of my students loved him, and some of my students hated him.

One thing I did differently this year was actually to teach the dialectic form early on in the dialogue. We traced the brief exchange between Socrates and Simonides in terms of assertion and negation, and then we spent the bulk of the Plato-talk on the exchange between Thrasymachus and Socrates, noting the increasing length of each negation. Again, some students thought that such a method was great pedagogically and philosophically, and others wished that old Socrates would just get to the point. That's alright; there's more to come, and they'll get better at reading it, even if they never come to like it.

With regards to writing matters, I did an Open Document Presentation on hourglass structure and on internal organization within a paper. The former part people got pretty well, but I'm going to follow up on the former with a fuller presentation Tuesday on induction, deduction, and causality. With the talented group I've got, I imagine they'll do well on this first full-length paper. Some of them are already anxiety-ridden about it, but those are always the ones who work their tails off and end up learning how to write, so I'm not worried.

Our little book group is digging into Vonnegut's Mother Night, and already I'm hooked. Vonnegut is one of those novelists who at once says intelligent things and also makes me want to see what's on the next page. I dig that.

And although I was too busy to watch all of it, I was pleased to read that the Colts' defense, minus Cato June and Jason David and Booger McFarland and Corey Simon, still managed to hold Drew Brees, Reggie Bush, Deuce McAllister, and crew to ten points last night, and I was pleased again to see that even without Tarik Glen guarding his blindside, Peyton Manning threw for three touchdowns to his faithful receivers, and I was pleased once more that Joseph Addai had a killer game as a starter. I don't expect that they'll be able to play at this level the whole season (they always slump; last year they were just smart enough to do so at the end of the regular season), but I do enjoy when they play this way.

01 September 2007

Book Forthcoming



In case you've heard through the grapevine (or, perhaps, in case you haven't), a new Ooze.com book is coming out on September 22, and one of my essays is one of its chapters. Pretty cool, eh?

The image itself links to the amazon.com entry for it.

Weekend Reflections

This fall's first-year comp groups are getting off to a really good start. Nobody seems to have flaked out utterly on paper one, and so far the discussions of Plato have been quite good. We launch into the Republic this Tuesday, and I'm excited to take this group through it.

In conversation with Mary this week I realized why I've enjoyed teaching Plato even more than I have teaching Hebrew Bible in 1102. It's not the text at hand; both are fun texts to teach. It's the differences between the populations, and it's nobody's fault particularly. In 1101, I get almost exclusively first-semester college students, and they're ready to get groovin' on some college-level thought. Nothing could suit that better than Plato; with Plato one must simultaneously hold loosely to one's assumptions and remain steadfast in the pursuit of genuine goodness, beauty, and truth. That's the stuff of college, methinks.

On the other hand, when we do Hebrew Bible in the spring, we're dealing with texts with which many of the students are already familiar. I get a fair number of people who tested out of 1101 and resent having to take 1102. I get a fair number of people who are taking freshman classes as 21-year-olds. That's not to say that the class can't be good; it's just to say that I've got to work harder, and I'm going to hit more dead spots there. Those aren't unqualifiedly bad things; they're just realities.

In the larger world, another family values politician has been caught (apparently) soliciting anonymous sex, Michael Vick pled guilty to dogfighting, and I keep my nose buried in books for comprehensive exams. I think I need to read some Vonnegut. Good thing book group is right now.

28 August 2007

Justice, Gods, and Standards

My 9:30 class (one I'm taking, not that I'm teaching) was mysteriously vacant today, so I'll go ahead and write now about today's Plato classes. (Those I teach.)

Now that I'm doing Tuesday-Thursday comp classes and have fewer days to teach, I compressed the entire trial of Socrates into today's discussion. For whatever reason (can't remember if a student initiated the diversion or if I did), we launched into a discussion of the gods and their relationship with Socrates's perceived role in the world. The big question that kept us occupied was why atheism was not only distasteful to Socrates's accusers but genuinely a crime. The discussion didn't take too long to veer into questions of modern theocratic states, in what ways and to what extent liberal tolerance of religion is better or worse than a legal system in which atheism is a crime.

We also talked a fair bit about the Crito and its assertion that only the opinions of good people ought to matter when making decisions. We talked about how that claim, harmless enough when one's mother exhorts one not to jump off cliffs that everyone is jumping off of, becomes quite dangerous politically when the prevailing system of government is democracy, in which the opinions of the good and the bad have equal weight so long as they're all property-owning males.

I finished with a bit about Paul, namely that the texts that seem to have influenced him most are the Hebrew Bible and Plato. I think we got there by means of talking about Socrates's disciples that he keeps mentioning throughout the Apology, and we finished by talking about what a profound influence that Socrates still has among humans.

I might post some more after I teach 11:00, but I might not. I'll just have to see.

16 August 2007

First Day of Class

Well, the school year is back, and hopefully I'll be posting here with some regularity about my two freshman comp classes and the groovy things that we discuss.

Both groups (I teach two sections per semester) look promising. I did my standard opening day exercise--before I introduced myself, took roll, handed them a piece of paper, or anything else of the sort, I had them pair up, learn each other's names, and write down working definitions for "republican" and "liberal." Then I had each person tell me the other's name and define one of the two words. Then, after I introduced all of the websites and software involved with the class (I do all the grading and they do peer revision electronically), I returned to those two words on the board. Next to "republican" I wrote "Rome," and we talked about how that changed the meaning of the word. Then next to "liberal" I wrote "arts," and we talked about the changes there. Then I discussed how George Washington, Tom Jefferson, Ben Franklin, and the lot of 'em in 1776 would have considered themselves both republicans and liberals and how both of those words signified something anti-monarchical at the time.

As we did these things, both groups seemed interested, and I think we'll have a good time when we really get rolling. This Tuesday I'm just marking time until drop/add ends, but after that we'll start digging hard into the trial of Socrates.

13 August 2007

Three Days More

Well, the new school year is upon me.

Tomorrow I go in for EMMA re-orientation so that I can be slightly less lost than my freshmen when they submit their papers. Then I'm going to start Sidney's Arcadia.

Wednesday I go in to help with new TA orientation, assisting bright young teachers as they learn to grade with hard heads and soft hearts. Or at least to get away with arbitrariness.

Then Thursday, at 8:00 AM, another round of Plato's Republic kicks off. I've already contacted my students via email, added them all to my WebCT section, created an EMMA space for them, and gotten two lesson plans outlined.

Once we get into some Plato texts, expect about two posts a week for the course of the semester. Teaching Republic last year led me to all kinds of good thoughts, and I imagine similar things will happen this year.

That's right, readers! Come back!

28 July 2007

Back in the Saddle

School will be starting up in just about three weeks, so look forward then to some more regular posts, most notably about my Plato class. Also, there might be Micah pictures in the next couple weeks or so.

If you look down the right column, you'll see the RSS feed for the Conservative Reformed Mafia. Despite my own Thomist leanings and suspicion of American conservatism, they've invited me to become a contributing writer. I'd like to think that I can contribute meaningfully as a friendly but critical voice. I suppose we'll see. Right now I'm working on the last of a three-part essay on Objective Truth. Go check it out!

13 July 2007

The Long Trip

Well, now that everyone's had some time to look at pictures, I'll say that the trip was good, and I'm glad to have seen everyone, but I'm also glad to be home.

The car ride up to Indiana was not too bad; we were all excited to see family, and we were anticipating a good trip. Micah, when he wasn't sleeping, was singing his ABC's. Cute.

Our week in Indiana saw everyone in good health, and we got to visit Micah's great-grandparents as well as the Indianapolis Children's Museum and the Indianapolis Zoo. Ryan came in for the last couple days, and we had a good day at the park and some tortilla soup for supper.

Then came the ride over to Pennsylvania. Again, not too bad--anticipation and all. Micah still sang those ABC's. Still cute.

We saw Mike and Susan and Mark and Kathy and all of the relevant nieces and nephews. Micah got a play in an entirely unsafe kiddie pool, and I dove and saved his little skull when (predictably) the flimsy plastic staircase up to the flimsy plastic slide buckled, sending him headfirst towards the concrete. Some scratches on his leg, but his skull didn't hit concrete.

Then came the ride over to West Virginia. Micah slept most of the way. Not bad.

In WV we spent the week with Tom and Eleanor and the relevant nieces and nephew. We went to some fourth of July fireworks and fired some of our own. We ate something beef-centered each of the last four evenings.

Then came the ride back to Georgia. Micah had apparently had enough of the ABC's and started yelling gibberish at the top of his lungs. Mary had nausea and headaches. I drove on like a soldier.

And now we're back in Georgia!