The Senior Seminar is the capstone course in the Philosophy major and is taken by all seniors in the fall of their senior year. It serves as the comprehensive requirement for the major. The Seminar offers seniors the opportunity to do advanced original research in philosophy. During the course of the semester, students will fine-tune and develop their initial research proposals into detailed research plans.
Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason (1781) is arguably the most challenging work of modern philosophy, but it is worth the challenge. In the Critique, Kant addresses themes that cover the full range of human experience: the capacity of the mind to know the world; the nature of space and time; whether free will is possible; the relation between appearance and reality; whether science is compatible with religion; and much more. Holding these topics
In his posthumously published masterpiece, Philosophical Investigations (1953), Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) asked himself “What is your aim in philosophy?” and he answered: “To show the fly the way out of the fly-bottle.” But who is the fly? What is the fly-bottle? Why does the fly need to be shown a way out? And what is the way out?
This is a course on epistemology, the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. We humans are in the business of believing, knowing, justifying, and rationalizing. Our capacities for acquiring, sharing, and participating in the production of knowledge bear significantly on our flourishing. In this course we will investigate the relationship between core epistemic concepts, including knowledge, belief, justification, and truth. Is knowledge more valuable than mere true belief? Why? What is the nature of epistemic justification? How are evidence, belief, and rationality related?
States are made up of individuals. Yet states have powers that no individuals have. They collect taxes, put us in jail, draft us into the army, and tell us what we can and cannot own. In this course, an introduction to Western political philosophy, we seek to understand what, if anything, could justify the state in wielding such extraordinary power over us. We will pursue questions like: Why should I obey the law? Should the state tax the rich and give to the poor?
Does the state promote freedom, or threaten it? Readings will include works by Hobbes, Locke,
(Offered as PHIL 225 and ENST 228) Our impact on the environment has been significant, and in recent decades, the pace of change has clearly accelerated. Many species face extinction, forests are disappearing, and toxic wastes and emissions continue to accumulate. People are being displaced, and even our climate is changing. These are all well-established scientific facts and the prospect of a general environmental calamity seems all too real.
Many contemporary European and American philosophers trace their intellectual heritage to Ancient Greece. Plato and Aristotle, in particular, have traditionally set standards for our discipline, by distinguishing philosophy from other practices such as poetry, drama, and sophistry. In this class, we will examine and critically assess the views of those whom Plato and Aristotle deemed to be philosophers. We will also examine and critically assess Plato’s and Aristotle’s views about the nature of philosophy and its superiority to other approaches to addressing fundamen
"All philosophers are wise and Socrates is a philosopher; therefore, Socrates is wise." Our topic is this mysterious "therefore." We shall expose the hidden structure of everyday statements on which the correctness of our reasoning turns. To aid us, we shall develop a logical language that makes this underlying structure more perspicuous. We shall also examine fundamental concepts of logic and use them to explore the logical properties of statements and the logical relations between them.
"All philosophers are wise and Socrates is a philosopher; therefore, Socrates is wise." Our topic is this mysterious "therefore." We shall expose the hidden structure of everyday statements on which the correctness of our reasoning turns. To aid us, we shall develop a logical language that makes this underlying structure more perspicuous. We shall also examine fundamental concepts of logic and use them to explore the logical properties of statements and the logical relations between them.
"All philosophers are wise and Socrates is a philosopher; therefore, Socrates is wise." Our topic is this mysterious "therefore." We shall expose the hidden structure of everyday statements on which the correctness of our reasoning turns. To aid us, we shall develop a logical language that makes this underlying structure more perspicuous. We shall also examine fundamental concepts of logic and use them to explore the logical properties of statements and the logical relations between them.
