Chiron / Philosophy and logic
Philosophy and logic
Specialist lessons in reading philosophy, analysing arguments and formal logic, for students taking a course and for anyone reading seriously on their own.
On request: get in touch to arrange lessons
Who it is for
University students on philosophy or logic courses, school students meeting philosophy or critical thinking for the first time, and adults who want a guide through a difficult text.
What we work on
Four areas
Reading philosophical texts
How to read a dense argument: finding the thesis, the premises and the moves that hold them together, from Plato to contemporary papers.
Arguments and critical thinking
Reconstructing arguments, spotting hidden assumptions and equivocation, and writing objections that land.
Formal logic
Propositional and predicate logic: putting sentences into symbols, truth tables, natural deduction, and the ideas behind them, such as validity, soundness and consistency.
Ancient philosophy
Plato, Aristotle and the Hellenistic schools, read closely, with the Greek and Latin where it matters.
How lessons run
We start from your course, your text or your question. Most of a lesson is working through arguments and proofs: first together, then on your own while I check each step. You leave with the method, not just the answer.
Between lessons you work in the Philosophy course in Chiron: lessons on arguments and formal logic, on the history of philosophy from the Presocratics to existentialism, on Chinese, Indian and African philosophy, and on knowledge, ethics and language; graded problems with hints and worked solutions; an argument workshop for written answers; and spaced review. Your progress is saved to your record, and I can follow it.
Lessons are in English or Spanish. The training behind them: a BA in Analytic Philosophy, an MA in Ancient Philosophy, and doctoral research on Socratic ignorance and Hellenistic moral epistemology. More about my background.
Price
Arranged on request, depending on the level and what the lessons involve.
Bring a text or a problem.
Tell me what you are reading or studying, and we will plan the first lesson around it.
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