Questions We Have

Description

Questions We Have by Davis Smith is, for the most part, an original introduction to Philosophy textbook. It consists of eleven (11) Modules (sections or parts) which each handle a different philosophical question a person may have wondered about. Aside from the in depth discussions of the various topics which Davis Smith provides, there are 11 primary source works which are reprinted into this text (future editions will reduce this to 10 by merging the Libertarianism papers by Davis Smith). The questions discussed span from the abstract, such as the purpose of Philosophy, to the concrete, like our moral duties to other people and animals. The questions discussed and primary sources included are, in order:

1. What is Philosophy?
   • Plato's Apology
2. Is Death Bad For The Person Who Died?
   • Death by Thomas Nagel
3. What is the Mind? What is the Body?
   • The Mind-Body Problem by Tim Crane
   • Minds, Brains and Programs by John Searle
4. Do We Have Free Will? What Is It?
   • Are Libertarianism and Physicalism Compatible? by Davis Smith
   • Are Dualism and Libertarianism Compatible? by Davis Smith
5. Does God Exist? If So, Why Is There Evil?
6. What is Knowledge? How Do We Know Things?
   • Meditations on First Philosophy by René Descartes
7. Is Morality Culturally Relative?
   • The Challenge of Cultural Relativism by James Rachels
8. How Should I Act?
   • The Moral Status of Bloodbending by Davis Smith
9. What About Real World Cases? (The Abortion Debate)
   • The Moral and Legal Status of Abortion by Mary Warren
   • I Was Once a Fetus by Alexander Pruss
10. What About Duties to Animals and Future People?
11. What is Justice? What is Equality?

This work is under perpetual development and may change with time. As it sits now, it is a fully functional textbook which is being used at Pierce College, Olympic College, and Bellevue College. Currently, it is made for an eleven week course, with the final module (part or section) not being used for a ten week course.

About the Author

Davis Smith earned his Master’s Degree in Philosophy from Arizona State University and is an adjunct Philosophy professor at three colleges, Pierce College, Bellevue College, and Olympic College. He specializes in teaching introductory level courses. One of his goals in teaching is to make Philosophy accessible to all people. The cost and quality of textbooks are under-discussed obstacles to accessibility which Mr. Smith seeks to remove. His other textbooks are:

• forallx: R³ A Remixed, Revised, and Reimagined Introduction to Formal Logic
• Who Should I Be? What Should I Do? An Introduction to Ethics

Outside of his OER textbooks, his current projects relate to the plausibility of libertarian free will, the philosophy of rhyme, and the philosophy of profanity.

Download

You can download PDFs of the most current version under development here:

• IntroToPhil.pdf This is the default, basic edition.
• IntroToPhilaccess6.pdf This is the accessible version of the Winter 2025 edition for e-readers and other applications.
• IntroToPhilaccess5.pdf This is the accessible version of the Fall 2024 edition e-readers and other applications.
• IntroToPhilaccess4.pdf This is the accessible version of the 2023 edition e-readers and other applications.
• IntroToPhilaccess3.pdf This is the accessible version of the 2022 edition for e-readers and other applications.

Planned Future Modifications/Additions

• The two papers by Davis Smith concerning Libertarianism will be merged into one.
• More glossary entries and definitions will be added.
• Content from Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia Will be added (added for Winter 2025).
• Content concerning Gettier Problems will be added (added for Winter 2025).
• Content from Muslim Philosophers will be added (integrated into multiple sections, likely al-Kindi, Ibn Sina, and al-Ghazali) (added for Winter 2025).
• Content for Mohist Epistemology/Philosophy will be added (likely as additional content in several places).
• Content for Nahuatl Philosophy will be added (Universal Monism, likely in the Existence of God sections).
• Content for Indian Philosophy will be added.

Copyright Information

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. You are free to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format, and remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, under the following terms:

• You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
• You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.

Funding

The production of the 2022 edition of this work was made possible by Professional Development funds provided by Pierce College's Employee Learning and Development (ELAD).

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