Final Exam Study Guide

BASICS

  • Date: Friday Dec 12, 11:30 (Hyer 106)
  • Review: Dec 8
  • Material covered: modules 5 and 6
  • Format: 3 essays on passages plus one movie essay
  • Time limit: 2 hours
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PASSAGE TASKS

EXPLAIN  Zoom in to the passage itself. Identify the author, explain the main ideas or arguments in the passage. To fully explain you may need to define terms and/or give examples. (5 points)

SITUATE  Zoom out, looking at more than the passage.  Discuss in the context of the author’s article/book/talk.  Depending on the passage, you might need to discuss how the author supports the view in the passage and/or how they apply the view in the passage. You may need to elaborate on the issue they're exploring and/or expand upon the arguments in the passage, drawing on what came before or after. (10 points)

CONTRAST Zoom further out. Discuss how the ideas in the passage relate to a competing position discussed by the author or defended by a different author.  (10 points) 

COMMENT Make an assessment of the view(s) in the passage. This could be a supportive point or a critical point, but should go beyond what our authors say and should be as persuasive as possible. (5 points)

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MOVIE ESSAY PREPARATION

  • This will be 2-3 part question involving some of the tasks below.
  • To prepare, refresh your memory of the four movies we discussed (you should have the basic idea of each one and be very familiar with the one you watched). 
  • To what extent do the movies explore "living forever" in the sense Cave and Fischer have in mind? To what extent do they explore other "living forever" scenarios?
  • Imagine Fischer inspired someone to make a movie conveying his position on living forever.  Write a synopsis of the movie. 
  • Imagine Cave made a movie conveying his position on living forever. Write a synopsis of the movie.  
  • Make sure you can explain why Fischer/Cave would make movies like that.
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STUDY ADVICE

  • Review each day's blog post and the reading, in combination.  See list below (follow the links).
  • Make sure you have a sense of the flow of ideas for each author. What question is the author addressing? How do they start addressing it? What comes next? What conclusions do they draw?
  • For each author, consider who the author disagrees with most sharply and clearly.  Or think about contrasting positions discussed by the author.
  • Don't make mistakes you made on reading responses.  Read your comments!
  • To prepare for the comment task, you may want to look at workbook discussions.

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DURING EXAM

  • Read the passage carefully.  Make decisions about what needs to be explained.
  • When you explain, don't cover extraneous ideas. Don't cover points that are clear to begin with.
  • Choose the most relevant "situate" tasks for the passage.
  • It's better to fully explore one contrast than to superficially cover many contrasts.
  • For the "comment" task it may be helpful to have a look at the discussion workbook.
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MODULE 5: JUSTICE

  • Reading: Bidadanure excerpts from ch. 1 (Canvas)
  • Content: the puzzle of Mary and Beth; the puzzle of race, gender, and age (why age inequality is less serious); complete lives egalitarianism;  important diagram
  • terminology

  • Reading: Bidadanure ch. 1.4  (Canvas)
  • Content: age groups vs. birth cohorts; intergenerational justice; generations (Twenge)

  • Reading: Bidadanure excerpts from ch. 2, 3, and 5  (Canvas)
  • Content: overview of book; prudential lifespan account; lifespan efficiency principle; distributive vs. relational justice; infantilizing elderly people; when is age discrimination in the workplace wrong?

Nov 5  Justice and Work

  • Reading: Bidadanure excerpts from ch. 5; Levmore & Nussbaum  (Canvas)
  • Content: EU job guarantee; recap of Bidadanure's framework; mandatory retirement... Levmore's proposal; Nussbaum's opposition to mandatory retirement; Finnish acceptance of mandatory retirement; adaptive preferences
  • Reading: Bidadanure excerpts from ch. 7  (Canvas)
  • Content: why is political under-representation of youth problematic?; lowering voting age; youth quotas in legislatures; should we also have age limits?
  • Reading: Yaffe's essay on leniency; also video of his talk in post; passage could be from the essay or the talk
  • Content: leniency for child criminals
  • Reading: Yaffe's essay on leniency (above)
  • Content: the developmental view and why Yaffe rejects it; Yaffe's disenfranchisement view; important diagram; lenience for immigrants, visitors, asylum seekers, disenfranchised felons?
MODULE 6: MAKING LIFE LONGER

  • Reading: Steele's chapter on cancelling old age
  • Content: negligible senescence and tortoises; old age as a risk factor for many diseases; Steele's support for seeking a cure old age; status quo bias; would we invent old age if it didn't exist?
  • Reading: Cave and Fischer, Should You Choose to Live Forever  pg. 55-69. (Part 1, chapter 2: all of sections 1 and 2)
  • Content: what "living forever" means to Fischer and Cave; living forever movies and their messages (movie trailers here)
  • Reading: Fischer, Should You Choose to Live Forever pg. 69-83. (Part 1, chapter 2: all of sections 3, 4, and 5)
  • Content: the isolation problem and the generation blurring problems; why Fischer isn't worried about them; 5 alleged problems with living forever; Bernard Williams' argument
  • Reading: Cave, Should You Choose Should You Choose to Live Forever p. 83-106. (Part 1, chapter 2: all of sections 6, 7, and 8)
  • Content: two questions; two camps; the optimists about RLE; RLE means no old age stage of life...is that bad?; the altered stages worry; Fischer's responses
  • Reading: Cave, Should You Choose to Live Forever pg. 38-53. (Part 1, chapter 1: all of sections 4 and 5; PLUS the boxed summary before section 4.)
  • Content: two questions; Bezos vs. Goodall (summary of arguments about whether RLE is good for you)
  • Reading: Fischer and Cave, Should You Choose to Live Forever, pg, 144-157. (Part 2, chapter 4: sections 2.4, 2.5, 2.6, and all of 3)
  • Content: Cave on RLE leading to overpopulation and injustice; Fischer's response; ways to distribute RLE200.

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