91768

PHIL 108 Introduction to Philosophy

David Shein

M . W . .

3:10 pm -4:30 pm

OLIN 204

HUM

Western philosophers address questions that most of us naturally find puzzling, such as: do we have free will?; do we know what the world around us is really like?; does God exist?; how should we treat one another? We will critically examine historical and contemporary texts that address these and other central themes of the philosophical tradition. Class size: 22

91767

PHIL 109 IntroDUCTION to Ancient Philosophy

Jay Elliott

M . W . .

1:30 pm -2:50 pm

OLIN 101

HUM

Cross-listed: Classical Studies In ancient Greece and Rome, philosophy was more than just an academic study: it was a way of life, focused on the achievement of happiness through training in wisdom. This course introduces students to the practice of philosophy through sustained engagement with its ancient origins. We will begin with a discussion of the figure of Socrates, the paradigmatic ancient philosopher, including his disavowal of knowledge, his method of dialogue, his public trial, and his exemplary death. The second part of the course will focus on the two most significant thinkers in the classical period of philosophy, Plato and Aristotle, and on close examination of their philosophical arguments about the nature of knowledge, the powers of the soul, and the highest goal of life. We will conclude with a discussion of the profound critiques of classical philosophy developed by the major philosophical schools in post-classical Greece and Rome, including Cynicism, Epicureanism, Stoicism, and Skepticism. This course is open to all undergraduates and assumes no prior knowledge of philosophy. Class size: 22

91771

PHIL 115 IntroDUCTION to Philosophy of Mind

Kritika Yegnashankaran

. T . Th .

3:10 pm -4:30 pm

OLINLC 120

HUM

Cross-listed: Mind, Brain & Behavior In this course, we will think about immaterial spirits, futuristic robots, fake computers with little people inside, Martians who behave like us but have an internal structure very different from ours, brains in vats, and 'swampmen' who are formed by random aggregation of molecules. We will ask whether these strange characters have thoughts and feelings, and whether, if so, they are like us in what they think and feel. The point is not to consider bizarre cases just for the sake of it, but to see what light they can shed on the nature of the mind. As such, they will be our entry into investigating central issues in the philosophy of mind, such as the mind-brain-body relation, mental representation, and conscious awareness. Class size: 22

91770

PHIL 121 InformAl Logic: THE Art of Reasoning

Daniel Berthold

M . W . .

10:10 am- 11:30 am

OLIN 203

HUM

This course is devoted to the development of skills of analysis and evaluation of reasoning and argumentation. We will practice techniques of diagramming and analyzing arguments and learn methods of detecting a wide range of common fallacies of reasoning. The course proceeds through progressively more complex examples of reasoning and argument, culminating in the analysis of a number of Supreme Court decisions.

Class size: 22

91980

PHIL / PS 167 Quest for Justice: Foundation of Law

Roger Berkowitz

M . W . .

3:10 pm -4:30 pm

OLINLC 208

HUM

See Political Studies section for description.

91423

PHIL 231 THE CRITICAL TURN: Aesthetics after Kant

Norton Batkin

M . W . .

11:50 am -1:10 pm

OLIN 102

HUM

Cross-listed: Art History, German Studies This course will examine major contributions to philosophical aesthetics, beginning from Kant’s Critique of Judgment, an account of critical judgment that transformed eighteenth-century debates about beauty, taste, and art and continues to inform accounts of criticism and the arts to the present day. Particular attention will be given to philosophical discussions of the standard of beauty, progress in the arts, the medium of an art, art’s relationship to truth, art and the theatrical, and the antagonism of art and convention; throughout, these discussions will be brought to a consideration of the accomplishment of individual works of art. The goal of the course is to develop a critical understanding of works that have shaped our conceptions of the distinct nature and history of the individual arts, of modern art, of the task of criticism, and of the relation of the arts to culture and society. Readings will include essays and selections from longer works by David Hume, Immanuel Kant, G.W.F. Hegel, Martin Heidegger, Walter Benjamin, Clement Greenberg, Michael Fried, and Stanley Cavell, among others. Course assignments will include several short essays and a final paper. Class size: 22

91773

PHIL 237 Symbolic Logic

Robert Martin Lab:

. . W . F . . . . F

10:10 am-11:30 am 12:15 pm – 1:15 pm

RKC 103 RKC 101

MATC

Cross listed: Mind, Brain & Behavior An introduction to logic, requiring no prior knowledge of philosophy or mathematics.  This course aims at imparting the ability to recognize and construct correct formal deductions and refutations. Our text (available on-line free of charge) covers the first order predicate calculus with identity; we will cover as much of that as feasible in one semester.  There is software for the course, called Logic 2000, developed by Robert Martin and David Kaplan at UCLA in the 1990s and subsequently rewritten for the internet, that will assist students by providing feedback on exercises. Class size: 22

91774

PHIL 246 Practical Reasoning

Kritika Yegnashankaran

. T . Th .

4:40 pm -6:00 pm

OLIN 202

HUM

We often ask ourselves what to do - should I go to graduate school, or bum around Europe? Should I lie and risk my own life, or tell the truth and risk theirs? While these questions can arise in mundane contexts and have little import, they can also arise in morally fraught contexts and have tremendous import. So arriving at the right answers is important. Practical reasoning is the process of reflecting upon and resolving the question of what to do. We will examine different philosophical views on what makes answers to such questions correct, focusing on those in the traditions of Aristotle, Hume, and Kant.

Class size: 22

91775

PHIL 260 Feminist Philosophy

Daniel Berthold

. T . Th .

10:10 am- 11:30 am

OLIN 201

HUM/DIFF

Cross-listed: French Studies, Gender & Sexuality Studies, Human Rights The course will examine a variety of feminist philosophical approaches to issues surrounding modern culture's production of images of sexuality and gender. Some background readings will provide a sketch of a diverse range of feminist theoretical frameworks -- liberal, socialist, radical, psychoanalytic, and postmodern -- with readings from Alison Jaggar, Simone de Beauvoir, Annie Leclerc, Christine Delphy, Julia Kristeva, Luce Irigaray, Sarah Kofman, and Hélène Cixous. We will then turn to an exploration of such issues as the cultural enforcement of both feminine and masculine gender identities, the mass-marketing of popular cultural images of sexuality, gender, and race, the urban environment and women's sense of space, the intersection of feminism and environmentalism, the logic of subjection governing cultural ideals of women's bodies (dieting, exercise, clothing, bodily comportment), issues of rape, sexual violence and harassment, pornography, and feminist perspectives of different ethnic groups. We will also screen a number of films and videos, including the Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas hearings, Madonna's "Truth or Dare," and documentaries on the pre-Stonewall femme-butch bar-scene culture of the 1950s and 60s, anorexia, rape on campus, the pornographic film industry, and several others. Class size: 22

91778

PHIL 336 Philosophy of Mathematics

John-Michael Kuczynski

M . . . .

1:30 pm -3:50 pm

OLIN 301

HUM

Cross-listed: Mathematics; Science, Technology & Society In this course, we will discuss some of the various attempts that have been made to identify the conceptual underpinnings mathematics. The topics we will cover include logicism, formalism, intuitionism, the concept of a formal procedure, the distinction between naive and axiomatic set-theory, the set-theoretic characterization of the real number system, the Theory of Types, and the various different kinds of number and numerical-operations. Time permitting, we will discuss some of the different attempt to solve Zeno's paradoxes. We will read works by Galileo, Bolzano, Frege, Russell, Gödel, Turing, Putnam, and Joshua Parsons.  Prerequisite: PHIL 237, Symbolic Logic or MATH 261, Proofs & Fundamentals. Class size: 15

91777

PHIL 355 Heidegger's Being & Time

Ruth Zisman

. . W . .

1:30 pm -3:50 pm

OLIN 304

HUM

Cross-listed: German Studies "Do we in our time have an answer to the question of what we really mean by the word 'being'? Not at all. So it is fitting that we should raise anew the question of the meaning of being." With these words, Martin Heidegger signals both the task and the urgency of Being and Time (1927), one of the most important and difficult texts in the history of Philosophy. In this course we too will "raise anew" the question of being by engaging in a sustained close reading of Heidegger's Being and Time. Through our reading, we will grapple with Heidegger's phenomenological approach and attempt to work through central Heideggerian themes and concepts such as Dasein, Being-in-the-World, Being-with, Care, Thrownness, Anxiety, Temporality, Being-towards-Death, Resoluteness, and Authenticity. We will also read several of Heidegger's later essays and lectures. Prerequisites: a previous course in philosophy and permission of the instructor. This course fulfills the single-philosopher requirement for junior philosophy majors. 

Class size: 15

91776

PHIL 358 SEMINAR IN Philosophy of Law

Alan Sussman

. T . . .

3:10 pm -5:30 pm

OLIN 307

HUM

Questions under consideration will include legal authority and legitimacy, obedience (and disobedience) to law, legal reasoning, individual responsibility, punishment, and matters of right. Disciplines such as natural law, legal realism, analytical jurisprudence, and normative jurisprudence and their critiques will be discussed as well. The central question is what law is; the context requires a discussion of political and philosophical principles. In general, references will be to the English and American legal tradition. Reading will include Hume, Blackstone, Holmes, Fuller, Finnis, Hart, Dworkin and various legal decisions. Class size: 15

91817

PHIL / PS 358 Radical American Democracy

Roger Berkowitz

. T . . .

4:40 pm -7:00 pm

ARENDT CENTER

SSCI

See Political Studies section for description.

91769

PHIL 385 Philosophy of Wittgenstein

Garry Hagberg

. . W . .

1:30 pm -3:50 pm

ASP 302

HUM

A first reading of major works of one of the most influential philosophers of the twentieth-century, Ludwig Wittgenstein. Readings: Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, The Blue Book, and The Philosophical Investigations. This course fulfills the single-philosopher requirement for junior philosophy majors.

Class size: 15