The Teaching and Learning Video Series was founded in 2019 to focus on how philosophy instructors are incorporating humorous videos into their pedagogy. Each post of the series is written by a philosopher who has incorporated a humorous video into one of their lectures. Humor, when used appropriately, has empirically been shown to correlate with higher retention rates. This series is intended to function as a database for instructors to share their use of humorous videos that demonstrate philosophical points.
Humor is one of the most important tools in our pedagogical tool kit. However, finding a short humorous clip for every class is hard. The vision of this series is to create a space where instructors can share how they integrate humorous videos into their lectures. This series also functions as a place for instructors to find videos for the courses they are teaching.
While still a new series, the Teaching and Learning Video Series has previously published submissions by Associate and Assistant Professors at Ohio University, Florida Gulf Coast University, Florida International University, University of Arkansas (Little Rock), University of Minnesota (Twin Cities), Sothern Methodist University, and San Diego State University as well as Postdoctoral Fellows at the University of Nevada, Ohio State University, University of Massachusetts Boston, Harvard University, and Durham University. You can find an index of posts by topic and philosopher below.
– William A. B. Parkhurst (Series Editor)
Do you bring comedy clips into teaching philosophy? Consider submitting a post!
Topics: open.
Each post requires: (1) a few sentences introducing the video, (2) a link to the video, and (3) a longer description of how you incorporated the video into your philosophy course.
Please see the Style Guide for further questions.
All submissions and questions are to be emailed to the Series Editor, William A. B. Parkhurst, at parkhurw@gvsu.edu.
Series index:
Below are two indexes of previously published posts. The first index is by topic and the second is by last name of the philosopher being taught. This index will be updated as new posts become available.
Topic Index
Argumentation (General. See also, “Fallacies”).
- Thank You for Arguing
- The Argument Clinic and Introduction to Philosophy
- The Argument Clinic
- Of Validity, Soundness, and Sarah Palin as a Russian Spy: A Critical Thinking Lesson.
Ethics
- A Bit of Fry & Laurie and the Is/Ought Problem
- Abbott Elementary and Utilitarianism
- Did You Get the Memo? Marx, Alienation, and Office Space
- The Divine Mechanism: A Thought Experiment on Faith and Obedience
- Irony and Analogy: Uncovering Implicit Biases – Wanda Sykes on the Opioid Health Crisis
- Is it Better to Be Socrates Dissatisfied or Homer Simpson Satisfied? Higher and Lower Pleasures and The Simpsons
- Moral Luck and Amber Alerts
- Positive Propaganda: Dave Chappelle and his White Buddy “Chip”
- Seinfeld, Friends, and the Moral Permissibility of Lying
- Should Robots Have Rights? Lt. Commander Data v. The United Federation of Planets
- Thought Experiments, “Reverse-Racism,” and Comedy
Bio-ethics
- Irony and Analogy: Uncovering Implicit Biases – Wanda Sykes on the Opioid Health Crisis
- John Oliver on Vaccines and Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc
Epistemology
- The Divine Mechanism: A Thought Experiment on Faith and Obedience
- Henchpersons and the Problem of Induction
- Michael Scott and Standpoint Epistemology
- Saturday Night Live and Paradigm Shifts
Fallacies
- Ad Hominem Fallacy
- Appeal to Emotion
- Appeal to Fear
- Begging the Question/ Circular Reasoning
- False Analogy
- Hasty Generalization
- Naturalistic Fallacy
- Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc
- Slippery Slope Fallacy
- Undistributed Middle Fallacy
- Special Pleading Fallacy
Feminism
- He is the Park Ranger, she is the Other: gender in Parks and Recreation
- Beauvoir and Colbert on Neutrality and Otherness
Moral Luck
Philosophy of AI/ Robotics
Philosophy of Biology
Philosophy of Education
Philosophy of Language
Philosophy of Perception
Philosophy of Race (or related)
- Positive Propaganda: Dave Chappelle and his White Buddy “Chip”
- Thought Experiments, “Reverse-Racism,” and Comedy
- Irony and Analogy: Uncovering Implicit Biases – Wanda Sykes on the Opioid Health Crisis
Philosophy of Religion
- The Divine Mechanism: A Thought Experiment on Faith and Obedience
- George Carlin and the Philosophy of Religion
Philosophy of Science
- Saturday Night Live and Paradigm Shifts
- Philosophy of Perception and Biology
- Henchpersons and the Problem of Induction
Problem of Induction
Problem of Other Minds
Propaganda
- Positive Propaganda: Dave Chappelle and his White Buddy “Chip”
- Irony and Analogy: Uncovering Implicit Biases – Wanda Sykes on the Opioid Health Crisis
Standpoint Epistemology
Philosopher Name Index
Beauvoir, Simone de
- He is the Park Ranger, she is the Other: gender in Parks and Recreation
- Beauvoir and Colbert on Neutrality and Otherness
Bentham, Jeremy
- Abbott Elementary and Utilitarianism
- Is it Better to Be Socrates Dissatisfied or Homer Simpson Satisfied? Higher and Lower Pleasures and The Simpsons
Berkeley, George
Derrida, Jacques
Du Bois, W. E. B.
Freire, Paulo
Heidegger, Martin
Hume, David
- The Divine Mechanism: A Thought Experiment on Faith and Obedience
- A Bit of Fry & Laurie and the Is/Ought Problem
- Philosophy of Perception and Biology
- Henchpersons and the Problem of Induction
Kant, Immanuel
Kuhn, Thomas
Marx, Karl
Mill, John Stuart
- Abbott Elementary and Utilitarianism
- Is it Better to Be Socrates Dissatisfied or Homer Simpson Satisfied? Higher and Lower Pleasures and The Simpsons
Moore, G. E.
Nagel, Thomas
Nussbaum, Martha
Plato
- The Divine Mechanism: A Thought Experiment on Faith and Obedience
- A Bit of Fry & Laurie and Philosophy of Language
Wittgenstein, Ludwig
