Contemporary medicine gives rise to a variety of moral and philosophical questions. Some of the questions we will discuss include: Is the concept of disease objective? What moral duties do we have to those at the beginning and the end of life? How should limited health care resources be distributed? What are the responsibilities of medical researchers towards their subjects? Do we have reason to be worried about the growth of technology in medicine? Are the basic institutions of medicine just?

Philosophy was transformed during the 17th and 18th centuries, in a period known as the Modern period, or the Enlightenment. This period is important for the background of our current views both in Philosophy and in intellectual endeavor generally. In this course, we'll look at the major figures involved in this transformation, and the positions about knowledge and reality that they defended. We'll have selections from the work of Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, and Kant. We might not cover all of these, but will get to most.

Nagel states, "Without consciousness the mind-body problem would be much less interesting. With consciousness it seems hopeless." Chalmers calls consciousness "the hard problem." Explaining consciousness raises significant challenges for philosophers and cognitive scientists alike, and understanding the nature of the problem is half the battle. This class will explore contemporary philosophical approaches to consciousness, and draw in psychology and neuroscience perspectives. Topics may also include split-brain problems, the nature of dreaming, and altered states.

This course uses the traditional approaches of moral philosophy to explore ethical challenges and obligations faced by individuals, businesses, and organizations in an increasingly complex global environment. Through consideration of philosophical theories and particular cases we explore issues such as the social roles and ethical obligations of businesses or organizations; rights and responsibilities of workers, managers, and owners; ethics in sales and marketing; and ethics in a global business environment.

Metaphysics is the study of what world is like. This course will survey of some major topics in metaphysics, with a particular focus on radical metaphysical arguments -- arguments that call into question our most basic beliefs about the world. Examples of questions that we will consider include: Do ordinary objects exist? Is there anything that makes persons distinct from other sorts of objects? Could things have been different than the way they in fact are?

As the study of knowledge and related concepts like justification, rationality, and evidence, epistemology is of central importance, and not just to philosophy. This course provides an introduction to epistemology through a number of epistemological problems or puzzles about skepticism, dogmatism, and humility.

This course is an interdisciplinary investigation of the nature of emotions and their influences on our thoughts and actions. While we will draw from a variety of disciplines, the nature and motivations of the inquiry are philosophical. We will consider: what are emotions? Are they bodily responses? Thoughts? Feelings? What roles do cultures play in shaping our emotions? What functions do emotions serve?

Does time flow? What is the difference between the future and the past? Is time travel possible? This course will survey the major topics in the philosophy of time from Augustine's Confessions and the Leibniz-Clarke correspondence to relativity theory. Along the way we will take up philosophical issues regarding the relevance of intuition, the nature of causation, determinism, and freedom, and the relationship between science and philosophy.

When do we bring up issues of identity (i.e., race, class, gender, etc) in a classroom? What do teachers need to interrupt racism and other types of oppression? How do societal issues affect schools and communities? This course examines the historical, social, and legal underpinnings of social constructions and how perspectives on racism and other types of oppression have influenced lives within school communities.

What do we learn? How do we learn? Why do we learn? In this course, we will study issues of learning, teaching, and motivation that are central to educational psychology. We will explore the shifting paradigms within educational psychology, multiple subject matter areas, (dis)continuities between classroom and home cultures, students' prior experiences, teachers as learners, ethnic and gender identity in the classroom, and learning in out-of-school settings.