A course virtual text package that will serve students as a general interdisciplinary “review” of the Western religious tradition of monotheism with a focus on Jewish and Christian religious traditions with a unit on Islam as a “clash of monotheistic ideals” relevant to the contemporary world....
“(Tyrants) are always either the masters or servants and never the friends of anybody; the tyrant never tastes of true freedom or friendship.” -Plato...
How does Roman art (including sculpture, monumental architecture and literature) serve as propaganda for the power of the emperor? There are many words to describe tyrannical rulers—they are despots, dictators, autocrats-what they all have in common, despite linguistic subtleties of political science, is that they rule by fear. To go against a tyrant is to risk torture and death, loss of property, the harm of loved ones, and the ruin of your reputation by slander. Although there are a few throughout history who have tried to justify the “benevolent dictator” or the “just tyrant,” often appealing to efficiency, order and a...
The fourth section in the Syntopical Course Guide for each of the interrelated Great Ideas is Online Research. After your initial reaction to the Great Idea, your formal introduction to and readings concerning the Great Idea, you will now be asked to do a small amount of online research as it relates to great works that comment or expand upon the Great Idea....
“(Democracy) is the worst of all lawful governments, and the best of all lawless ones.” -Plato...
When asked, "What is the biggest problem we could solve for you?" University of Chicago Ph.D. and California Humanities Professor Chad Redwing replied, "Some semesters as few as 15% of my students purchase the required texts for class. If this number could be raised, my job would be easier and the students would learn more."...
There are many forms of government. There are aristocracies, oligarchies, monarchies, tyrannies and anarchies as just a few other models of governance over the body politic. So which is the best form of government? This is the primary question when thinking about the Great Idea of Democracy. Which form of government is the most fair, most efficient, most competent, most socially and economically just, least biased, least safe, least stable, least peaceful? These are the questions that plague anyone considering forms of governance and a logical place to begin about thinking of democracy....
Once you have personally reacted to a chapter’s Great Idea of Change in the Pre-Learning Reflection and you have been exposed to some major positions from important philosophers, social scientists, artists, historians, professors, scientists, mathematicians and authors vis-à-vis the Great Idea in the Syntopical Learning Great Idea section, you will be assigned a few, short core text readings that help to further deepen your understanding of the Great Idea being explored in each chapter. ...
Principle Quotations Relating to the Great Idea of Change in Introduction to the Humanities which is a Best Seller on Kobo! “Though all society is founded on intolerance, all improvement is founded on tolerance…” - George Bernard Shaw, Saint Joan “(Motion) is nothing more than the action by which any body passes from one place to another.” - Rene Descartes “Reality is mobility…only changing states exist. Rest is never more than apparent, or, rather, relative.” - Henri Bergson “Energy may be called the fundamental cause for all change in the world.” - Heraclitus” “When the change from contrary to contrary is in quantity, it is ‘growth and diminution’; when it...