The Philosophy Teaching Library

for political justice. In short, Book II is a critical component of the overall argument of the Republic. This interactive essay guides new readers through the main concepts and questions of Republic Book II and shows their contemporary relevance.

develops one of the most famous thought experiments in all of philosophy, the Ring of Gyges. Book II also introduces the division of political classes in the city which Plato continues to examine throughout the Republic, as well as the educational regime he thought was required

Book II of Plato’s Republic contains some of the most memorable and important passages of this classic work (and indeed of all of Plato’s writings). Here, Plato asks the central question the Republic is meant to answer - ‘Why is it better to be moral rather than immoral?’ - and

philolibrary.crc.nd.edu/article/the-...

ICYMI: New article on Plato’s Republic, Book 2!
(link and abstract below)

Book II of Plato’s Republic contains some of the most memorable and important passages of this classic work (and indeed of all of Plato’s writings). Here, Plato asks the central question the Republic is meant to answer - ‘Why is it better to be moral rather than immoral?’ - and

philolibrary.crc.nd.edu/article/the-...

Thanks so much for expanding our repertoire of medieval thinkers, Dr. Traci Phillipson of Loras College!

Can faith and reason coexist?

Many medieval thinkers struggled with how they should navigate their ability to reason with their desire to live in accordance with religious tradition. They were concerned about the truth and where and how to find it. Here we will examine Averroes.

philolibrary.crc.nd.edu/article/trut...

*New Article*

Truth Cannot Contradict Truth
Averroes’s Decisive Treatise

YouTube video by The Philosophy Teaching Library For Students: Getting Started With the Philosophy Teaching Library

For Students: How to Get Started with the Library

We hit 98,000 views in 2025. Looking forward to breaking 100,000 in 2026!

· We are up to 30 articles (and we just launched in September of 2024!)
· We have brought in over $25,000 in grants and awards
· Produced a series of high quality videos to promote the Library

The Library is thriving. A few updates from this past year:

In Book I, he argues that flourishing is not found in pleasure, fame, or wealth, but rather in living in accordance with virtue, setting the stage for a deeper discussion of virtue in the rest of the Nicomachean Ethics.

In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle considers what it takes to achieve happiness or eudaimonia. And when Aristotle talks about eudaimonia, he has a broader concept in mind than just a particular emotional state. He wants to know, not what makes us psychologically happy, but what makes us flourish.

philolibrary.crc.nd.edu/article/the-...

ICYMI: New article on Aristotle’s account of the Good Life!

(link and abstract in comments)

Even though Aristotle celebrates friendship as crucial for life, he is careful with the details. In this piece, we will discuss his famous threefold distinction between useful, pleasurable, and virtuous friendships.

But here, Aristotle makes shockingly few qualifications about friendship’s goodness. He argues that friendship is good for people in all circumstances.

If you ask a philosopher a question, they almost always say, “It depends.” Philosophers are careful to qualify their opinions because they can think of many circumstances where their ideas might be wrong.

philolibrary.crc.nd.edu/article/best...

*New Article* from Glenn Trujillo of at the University of Louisville

Best Friends: Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, Books VIII & IX

and thus explains how we can be justly accountable for our past actions.

or punishment. In this essay I critically explore and expand upon Locke’s arguments for his view that, regardless of what our consciousness attaches to, nothing but a relation of first-person consciousness (via memory) unites thinking beings across time into one and the same person,

Although Locke knew how counterintuitive it would seem to say that personal identity across time is not sameness of thinking substance (material or immaterial) across time, his major contribution was in illuminating how important psychological continuity is for our deserving praise, blame, reward,

In his monumental An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Locke attempted to find the limits of human understanding with respect to a wide range of topics, including personal identity across time.

John Locke was a British philosopher, medical researcher, and Oxford academic whose substantial contributions to political theory and philosophy made him a prominent and influential Enlightenment thinker.

philolibrary.crc.nd.edu/article/who-...