This second lecture on Milton's masque probes its complex depictions of virginity and chastity. The version of the masque performed in 1634 is compared with the published version of 1637, with particular emphasis on a monologue on the vanquishing powers of virginity that is created for the latter. The poet's commonplace book, specifically his notes on the self-mutilation of the medieval nuns of Coldingham, is linked to images of the body in the masque. Milton's gradual revision of his initial position favoring life-long virginity is described in detail.

This lecture examines the role and meanings of the word vocation in Milton's life-long meditation on (and concern for) what it means to be chosen by God. Milton's profound anxiety in the years following his graduation from Cambridge regarding his poetic career and, more specifically, his status as a Christian poet selected by God for greatness is outlined. The topic is traced through Milton's polemical treatise The Reason of Church Government, the poem Ad Patrem, and the author's correspondence.

Milton's early ode, "On the Morning of Christ's Nativity" (1629) is presented and discussed. The author's preoccupation with his standing as a novice poet and his early ambitions, as carefully outlined in the letter to Charles Diodati, are examined. The ode's subject matter, other poets' treatment of the Nativity, and Milton's peculiar contributions to the micro-genre are discussed, including his curious temporal choices, the competitive attitude of his narrator, and the mingling of Christian and classical elements.

An introduction to John Milton: man, poet, and legend. Milton's place at the center of the English literary canon is asserted, articulated, and examined through a discussion of Milton's long, complicated association with literary power. The conception of Miltonic power and its calculated use in political literature is analyzed in the feminist writings of Lady Mary Chudleigh, Mary Astell, and Virginia Woolf.

The midterm exam covers Lectures 1 through 12.

We apply the idea of evolutionary stability to consider the evolution of social conventions. Then we consider games that involve aggressive (Hawk) and passive (Dove) strategies, finding that sometimes, evolutionary populations are mixed. We discuss how such games can help us to predict how behavior might vary across settings. Finally, we consider a game in which there is no evolutionary stable population and discuss an example from nature.

We discuss evolution and game theory, and introduce the concept of evolutionary stability. We ask what kinds of strategies are evolutionarily stable, and how this idea from biology relates to concepts from economics like domination and Nash equilibrium. The informal argument relating these ideas toward at the end of his lecture contains a notation error [U(Ŝ,S') should be U(S',Ŝ)]. A more formal argument is provided in the supplemental notes.

We develop three different interpretations of mixed strategies in various contexts: sport, anti-terrorism strategy, dating, paying taxes and auditing taxpayers. One interpretation is that people literally randomize over their choices. Another is that your mixed strategy represents my belief about what you might do. A third is that the mixed strategy represents the proportions of people playing each pure strategy.

We continue our discussion of mixed strategies. First we discuss the payoff to a mixed strategy, pointing out that it must be a weighed average of the payoffs to the pure strategies used in the mix. We note a consequence of this: if a mixed strategy is a best response, then all the pure strategies in the mix must themselves be best responses and hence indifferent. We use this idea to find mixed-strategy Nash equilibria in a game within a game of tennis.

We first complete our discussion of the candidate-voter model showing, in particular, that, in equilibrium, two candidates cannot be too far apart. Then we play and analyze Schelling's location game. We discuss how segregation can occur in society even if no one desires it. We also learn that seemingly irrelevant details of a model can matter.