The Indian
Philosophy Olympiad (as of 2016 onwards) will be held in three stages.
Each stage will comprise of 2-3 tasks and the selected students will be
taken to the next stage. The last stage will be an essay writing contest
like the actual IPO. These stages will be entirely online and the links
to the relevant tutorials and pages will be passed on to those who
enrol. As we cannot assume previous
knowledge of philosophy each task in the first two stages will be
associated with a tutorial. The participant is expected to first go
through the tutorial (1-2 hours) and then attempt the tasks. The task
sheets will be open for submission for more than 36 hours and as such
there is no time limit to submissions. The essay in
Stage 3 will however be time-bound. Details of the Stages are given
here - Stage 1, Stage 2,
Stage 3. (Also, see the
schedule for the InPO Stages) The
awards and further process for team
selection is outlined below.
The
process for Stage 1 and Stage 2
After
enrolment, participants will get an email with links to the task sheets
of the stage. (Stage 1 for all enrolled and Stage 2 for the selected
ones) The Google form for the task will be activated at the time given
in the schedule. Before or after the span
allotted for the task, the form will be closed and will give a message
that it is not accepting responses. The participant has to use the same
email ID for registration and for performing the task. As long as the
form is open in the browser the questions can be answered. The student
can submit the form after partially completing the tasks and re-open it
if he uses the link given to him for further completion. The form has to
be submitted before the deadline, or else the last submission will not
be accepted. (The previously submitted work will however be saved) Thus
he/she can choose to work at comfortable times. There will be links on
the form to the tutorials. All of this can be done from any device
connected to the internet but a Chrome browser is preferred. The answers
to the tasks and where needed a general feedback will be set to all by
email.
Stage 1:
Logic & Language (Tools of philosophy)
A
philosopher must first be good at use of language (in our case English)
and the verbal twists and turns it can take as also the use of logic. At
high-school level it becomes difficult to grasp rigorous formal logic,
however, one needs to train one's mind in systematic and critical
thinking. Hence there will be three tasks:
-
Task 1
will be to do with basic Logic. We will deal with Syllogisms,
Deductive logic and some part of the formal language used to express
logic. We will test the students capacity to identify the constructs
of logic in the examples.
-
Task 2 will
deal with fallacies that occur when we do not critically examine the
statements made by us or others. We will introduce some types of
fallacies and then test whether the student is able to spot them in the
examples.
-
Task 3 will focus on a slightly vague
area, that of intricacies of language. Here we will test
whether the student is able to understand the implied
meaning of text or poetry and if the the student can
take a certain incomplete discussion to its logical
conclusions.
The above tasks will be objective although not
straightforward. Students will be judged on their average
performance. Feedback for the tasks will be given before the
next task begins. Top 30 students will be taken to the
next level. Stage 2:
Arguments & Methods of philosophy
Philosophy consists of assembling and dismantling arguments.
Doing so requires some training before one can actually
handle philosophical quotes such as what comes at Stage 3 or
the IPO. The tasks will be structured as below:
-
Task 1 will comprise of understanding
what makes an argument valid or sound.
-
Task 2 will take the student further into
analyzing the arguments typically made by philosophers,
where it becomes necessary to clearly see the premises
(assumptions / basis) of the philosophers quote and how
it leads to the stated conclusion.
The questions here will have subjective answers although
brief in length. These tasks will be open for about 48 hours
to allow the student to read and think. Top 15 students will
be taken to the next level.
Stage 3: Essay Writing
(Philosophizing)
After being able to understand the argument in the quote
the final test is to be able to either provide a coherent interpretation
of the quote, thereby supporting it or to dismantle the assertion of the
philosopher by provide a valid counter argument. There will be no
tutorials here, but the student is encouraged to see the links listed
below for examples of winning essays at two tournaments -
The IPO and the
Baltic Sea Philosophical Essay
Event. As you will see that the medals are not awarded necessarily
to perfect (or fancy) language but to a deep and systematic thought
being presented. For a brief guideline on
writing essays see here. The length of the essay also does not
matter.
The student will get a link to a form where, once he/she
submits it with a basic information, the countdown for that particular
student begins. The student will immediately get an email with a link to
a Google document which contains 3 topics out of which the student
should write an essay on one. The essay should be written within the
same document. Google documents auto-save the matter every few seconds
and the student has to do nothing but close it after completion. The
essay should be submitted within 3 hours or the permission to edit the
document expires. Top 2 students at this Stage will be invited to join
the Indian team to the next International Philosophy Olympiad. (Read
more below)
Awards & Further
Since we are
non-funded and find it difficult to process sending awards and
certificates, we have decided to send a soft copy of certificates to
those winning the award, as well as those participating in the InPO.
These will be duly signed PDF's which the student may retain as a soft
copy for passing on to admission committees later on or print on a paper
of choice.
The students
will be ranked and the top 5 percentile will get a Gold Medal, while
each consecutive 5 percentile will receive Silver and Bronze
respectively.
The first two students will be asked to join the team. (please note that since their is no funding, students have to pay for the international travel costs; hence they may decide not to join. This will not affect the result of the competition) If some decline, the next in list will be asked and so on. The selected
team will then proceed for the
training phase. |