Write a one page REACTION PAPER. This is opinionated not factual. Any and everything has to be from the pdf itself.

Below is an example.

REACTION PAPER RUBRIC

-Reaction Papers will be due in dropbox by the end of the week. There will be a total of 10 reaction papers that will need be submitted. However, there will be 13 weeks of class with readings. Therefore, you are permitted to skip 3 reaction papers whenever you choose. Each paper will count as 1% of the total course grade, adding up to a total of 10%.What you will need to do is write one paragraph summarizing an argument or other interest that a philosopher we have read that current week has put forth. Once you summarize their argument or whatever it was you found interesting that they said, then write a following paragraph that contains your reaction to it. For example, you could write about how you agree or disagree with what they said; you could write about why you thought the topic they dealt with was extremely important or not important; you could also write about anything else as long as you critically think about and deal with the argument you summarized in the first paragraph.

12 point, Times New Roman Font

Double Spaced

1-inch margins

250-300 words (1 page)

You MUST CITE PAGE NUMBER

Do not cite videos

Example reaction paper:

Robert Austin Kippes

Reaction Paper 01/11

In An Apology for Raymond Sebond, Michel de Montaigne sets out to bring humanity’s ego back down to Earth. He states that “The natural, original distemper of Man is presumption (16).” The significance of this is that humans have developed reason which includes assumptions of their superiority over other creatures. However, Montaigne finds these assumptions to be unjustified and overbearing. This is why he claims presumption is humanity’s original distemper: because it is a disease-like mode of being which breeds dogmatism. And no claim to pure, calm, and collected rationality can coexist alongside dogmatism. Although Montaigne’s arguments sometimes come off as arrogant, it is his wit and style that makes him a victim of this. After all, who is he to cut down the opinions of others as if he is justified in doing so by some aid of rational discourse? Is he not sometimes doing the exact thing he criticizes? For example, “to determine the limits of our powers and to know and judge the difficulty of anything whatsoever constitutes great, even the highest, knowledge” – so he states (16).

It would seem that by his own criticisms of the claim to reason’s power by other philosophers that he is determining the limits of the capacity of humans to attain knowledge. And so, would be refuting his central theme. But this is not the case. Never once does Montaigne say it is impossible for humans to use their creation of reason to know what is absolutely True. Instead, his criticisms, including this one stated above which could move uncareful readers to judge him as a hypocrite, are aimed at undermining the very unjustified use of reason which presupposes reason’s claims to be certain in advance. In other words, the problem with reason is that for what it claims to be known to be true it would need another rubric which justifies reason as a method to knowledge in the first place. And for Montaigne only God can provide this – the sole being capable of remaining outside the limits of reason to provide such a rubric. Therefore, it is here that Montaigne achieves a kind of tranquility because even this is not justifiable as a sole individual. In this assertion itself Montaigne would not seek out reason to justify but merely find peace in this ambiguous state of the unknown and the indefinite possibility of further inquiry.

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Create a 5 pages page paper that discusses descriptive definition of religion. Defining religion is a perfect example of the philosopher’s problem. Sociologists, philosophers, theorists, and psychologists have for centuries offered their unique definitions, almost all of which are contradictory to one another. For instance, Emil Durkheim, the founder of sociology, described religion as “social”, in contrast to philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, who described religion as what an individual does with his solitariness. Most definitions of religion ultimately leave something out, and they characteristically reflect the bias of the definer. Thus, there is a need for a coherent yet nuanced description of what religion is in general. After giving this definition, there needs to be an application of this definition to religions in specific: to the actual practices of such faiths as we find in Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism. Only in that context can we judge whether the definition is sufficient in accomplishing the goal of supply such a coherent yet nuanced account of religion.

When we approach the history of defining religions, one could recognize three general kinds of answers to the question “what is religion?” The first kind of answer is an essential definition or one that tries to find some characteristic center to religion that can be used to measure the various manifestations of such practices. Just as being rational is an essential characteristic of being human, so there must be some essential characteristic that makes a religion a religion. The second kind of answer is a functional definition or one that tries not to localize what religion is but what it does relative to the individual or to the group. The function of a knife is to cut, and so too there must be a function of religion for various peoples. The third kind of answer is a descriptive one or one that tries to describe religion from an outside perspective.&nbsp.