THE PHILOSOPHY BOYS

INT. MENS CLUB: Several Philosophy Boys relax near the hearth.

BERTRAND: "You really have to explain yourself Philip. Why do you buy into the idea that liberal arts courses should have as their goal the improvement of character and judgement? I'd have thought the quest for truth was more important."

PHILIP: "Well, it seems to me that only a person of character would recognize the truth when he found it."

PAULI: "He's got you there, Bertrand. Without character you're unlikely even to search for truth."

BERTRAND: "True enough Pauli, but truth still matters. You don't want to waste your life upholding assertions that turn out not to be true.

Um, Ira, what are you writing?"

IRA: "Just jotting down notes. Mainly I want to say that nobody can agree on what the truths are in the liberal arts. In the absence of certainty, character and judgement are all the tools we have to navigate the facts."

MACMILLAN: "But surely character is something you're born with. How do you educate for it?"

RUSSELL: "By the example of first-rate teachers and first-rate fellow students, and by studying the right texts. Since character counted for a lot in the ancient world, that means reading and discussing the Greeks and Romans. In addition to the standard authors, I'm thinking of authors like Homer, Xenephon, Polybius, Cicero, Plutarch, Marcus Arelius, Caesar and Tacitus."

WILLIAM: "Caesar and Tacitus? Those seem like odd choices, if you only had to choose a few."

SHERLOCK: "Ah, I get it. They're there as examples of manliness. It's a word you can't define, but everyone knows it when they see it, and it's universally admired. Combine manliness with intellect, vision, and the ability to do hard work, and you have something approaching the ideal."

GLADYS: "Yeah, manliness....I'll buy that."


PHILOSOPHY BOYS (ALL AT ONCE): "GASP!!!!!! A girl!!!! A GIRL in the MENS club!!!! How did she get in? We'll all be kicked out forever!"

THOMAS: "Wait a minute, wait a minute! I've got an idea! Gentlemen, I move that we regard this young lady as an honorary man for the night! What say you?"

PHILOSOPHY BOYS (ALL, RELIEVED): "Here, here!!!!!"

THOMAS: "The motion carries! She's a man!"

JOSEPH: "Whoa, wait a minute! If she can be a man, then I want my dog to be a man, too. He's over there, under the 'No Pets' sign."

PHILOSOPHY BOYS: "What!? A DOG!!!?? No way! No way!"

DOG: "Hey, hey! If you don't want me in your stupid old club, then I don't want to be here. I mean...GEEEEZ!"