Olga Vishnyakova

Courses

• Fall 2024
• Winter 2025

Personal Statement

I love to teach and I love to learn new things, ideas, languages, etc. I believe that we never stop learning, which is what makes life itself both interesting and fascinating. If we already had knowledge of all things, conversation would be dull and boring, as there wouldn’t be any need to find interlocutors to discuss, discover, and learn new things. But we don’t know everything, which therefore makes the pursuit and possible finding of knowledge so important. Philosophy begins in wonder and delights in the discovery of new things, which often are as old as the world itself. To learn to discover these things on our own and to share this discovery with others is an essential part of life-long learning.

I teach PHIL&101 (Introduction to Philosophy) as a seminar using the Socratic method of intensive questioning of whether what we think we know is something we really know and examining together with my students how we can realize this difference. I want my students to succeed and therefore design this course in order to realize that goal. In my class students learn a lot of new things, including the philosophical ideas of different thinkers, their thoughts on the criteria for the good life, social justice, and happiness. By examining these ideas in the learning community provided by this class, students become aware of their own thoughts and learn to examine them critically.

PHIL&120 is former PHIL&106 (Introduction to Logic) satisfies the Washington State Community College requirement for “Quantitative and Symbolic Reasoning.” Thus, in complete compliance with this requirement, this course rigorously examines logical theory, emphasizing the ability to think critically and to do so formally, that is, in terms of categorical and quantitative logic, truth functions, as well as modern symbolic logic. We apply formal logic to English language sentences, decision-making, and logical puzzles, in order to realize the outcome of students knowing how to think critically upon their completion of this course.

Taking logic and philosophy together you will immediately improve your ability to solve any kind of problem on the basis of your skillful critical examination of it, formulation of your rational ideas, and quantitative approach where applicable. As a result your learning skills in other areas of study and decision-making will become more logical and critical.

I like to use humor and jokes as a teaching tool to create a friendly and relaxed environment in my classes, especially in logic, which can be a challenging subject. A lot of jokes make sense, but some jokes do not make sense in the way we expect, as they point to our unexamined presuppositions, which helps us to think more logically.

Many popular claims about what we should do and what we should believe are based in mistakes in reasoning because those making them have never had the opportunity to study philosophy and logic. I believe the students at NSC are very fortunate to have this opportunity.

Degrees & Certificates

PhD