How to do well in philosophy class?

Do your readings and participate in discussion in class. It helps if you are really interested in the subjects and want to really understand the ideas you study.

> what what am i supposed to do with this information?

Knowing philosophy makes other academic studies easier. Film, Literature, etc., any Liberal Arts studies tend to deal with Philosophical concepts and analyses. In the long run a Philosophy Degree is considered less "valuable" than the sciences. I am really happy I got a Philosophy Degree though, anything else would have been boring. I now run a small tech business. Critical and Analytic skills are widely useful.

> I don't really understand how i'm supposed to critique these

> philosophers' ideas because it seems like other philosophers

> have already criticized them.

Critiquing, challenging, considering alternatives, and comparing an contrasting with other ides, is how you learn to understand Philosophies. Philosophy is an ongoing dialogue of contrasting ideas. There are no completely separate or disparate ideas in Philosophy.

> the matrix. Obviously there's quite a few philosophical concepts

> in the movie, but what am i supposed to do other than point it out?

The Matrix is usually used in Intro Philosophy classes to introduce Platonic Dualism and Substance Dualism to students. The Matrix is our physical world and the "real world" (on the Nebakanezer with Morpheus) is immaterial Truth or the Platonic World of The Forms. In your paper examine this analogy and give examples both from the movie and from Plato or Descartes.

Try to ridicule - criticize and negate it.

Drink some coffee and try to disprove it.

Try to invalidate them.

And at the same time, troll them and be witty ._.