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Exam - is there an emphasis on quotes?

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Aurelian:

--- Quote from: Menang on October 01, 2011, 06:17:48 pm ---Hannah Gould (if you've heard of her - she's a bit of a legend at MacRob) came to give us a little talk last term and she recommended (strongly) memorising quotes. There're obviously different camps to this one.

--- End quote ---

I do know who Hannah Gould is, and I still disagree. I'm not saying you're going to fail if you quote or anything, it's just indicative of a bad approach to philosophy in general and seems to discourage genuine critical engagement with the ideas, hence my disapproval. You'd be far better off just reading over your texts if you're 'too tired to study' instead of learning quotes. Up to you though of course :) Whatever you find works best in terms of study should always be what you do, regardless of what anyone says - whether me or Hannah Gould :P


--- Quote from: Ghost! on October 02, 2011, 09:28:09 pm ---CBF making a new thread, so I'll just keep things going here.

My teacher seems pretty certain this year's section D will be on Knowledge/Truth/Science, has anyone else heard anything different?

Also! How many essays are most people finishing the year with! I'm surprised, I've probably only got five or six... oh well, I'll write more soon. Particularly interested in a response from Aurelian on this one, considering you're our guide in VCE Philosophy!

--- End quote ---

I don't really know why your teacher would think that... Personally I would've guess the opposite, since the trend over the past few years has been knowledge, mind, knowledge. But... well you all should know about the problem with such induction now :P

Seriously though, just prepare equally for both, and don't try and second-guess; it could turn out very badly.

As for essays... I believe only did three distinct essays? That's excluding practice exams though, but the essays I did in those practice exams would only have a superficial difference from those three 'archetype' essays.

The thing with Section D is basically there's only a really finite number of topics they could possible ask. For mind, for instance, there really isn't any way they can avoid asking you a question which isn't something very similar to the following;

"Examine and evaluate the dualist claim that all human beings consist of a separate mind and body. In your response refer to the views of both Descartes and Armstrong."

They might hide it under the guise of something like AI (which, incidentally, would be my main prediction for this year's exam), but an AI essay is still almost the exact same essay, just with a slightly more specific focus.

WonderBunny:
I don't think I used any quotes on the exam last year and I got an A+. They certainly aren't necessary for a good score. My teacher recommended just learning the terms the author uses and using them in the exam, like the "thinking thing" example above. So I used terms like "the forms" and "unselfing" (Iris Murdoch), but no actual quotes.

tullfrog:
I think that using quotes, but explaining them can be helpful. For example, Whilst I agree with the Aristotelian notion that "man is born for citizenship" in the sense that humans are inherently social creatures....

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