Cosmological models and the relationship between models and observable parameters. Topics in current astronomy that bear upon cosmological problems, including background electromagnetic radiation, nucleosynthesis, dating methods, determinations of the mean density of the universe and the Hubble constant, and tests of gravitational theories. Discussion of questions concerning the foundations of cosmology and its future as a science.

This course will survey the past, present, and future of the exploration and science of the Earth's Moon. We will have specific units on interiors, heat flow, thermal evolution, magnetism, volcanism, impacts, crustal composition and mineralogy, and spectroscopy of its surface. This is a discussion-based, interactive seminar with students and faculty reading current papers from the literature.

This course will explore topics that philosophers have grappled with for thousands of years, and that still undergird (or sometimes threaten to undermine) our understanding of the world, our knowledge, ourselves, and each other. In historical and modern texts of the Western intellectual tradition, we will discuss questions such as: What makes right actions right, if anything? Do you know anything at all about the future? Are you really free if your actions are caused?

This course cultivates sound reasoning. Students will learn to see the structure of claims and arguments and to use those structures in developing strong arguments and exposing shoddy ones. We will learn to evaluate arguments on the strength of the reasoning rather than on the force of their associations and buzzwords.

Contemporary medicine gives rise to a variety of moral and philosophical questions. What moral duties do we have to those at the beginning of life? How should we approach to euthanasia? Should we be worried about the growth of technology in medicine? Should public health be prioritized over an individual's autonomy regarding their own body? How should limited health care resources be distributed? The goals of this course are to improve our understanding of the best arguments on different sides of these questions.

An introduction to ancient Greek philosophy, focusing mainly but not exclusively on the works and ideas of three Athenian philosophers who worked and taught in the period between the Persian Wars and the rule of Alexander the Great, more than 2,300 years ago: Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. Topics to be discussed include: What is the nature of the self? What is truth, and how can it be known? What kind of life should we live? We will work to understand each philosopher's responses to these questions, but we will also learn to develop our own answers.

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 scientists alike, and understanding the nature of the problem is half the battle. This class will focus on contemporary philosophical approaches to consciousness, and draw in psychology and neuroscience perspectives. Topics will include qualia, bats, and philosophical zombies.

In this class, we use the tools of philosophy to engage with a wide range of ethical problems in the arts, such as: honoring art by immoral artists, the art market, artists' rights over their creations, appropriation, censorship, sexism and racism in art, and forgery. We consider a variety of art forms, including painting, literature, music, memorials and monuments, as well as new media like NFTs. We also consider more general ethical problems, such as the objectivity of moral judgment and the relationship between aesthetic and moral judgments.

What am I? When did I begin? What will happen to me when I die? Am I the same person I was in the past, or will I be? What is the source of my identity, and is it something I can control? How do I know who I am, or can I even know? Should I know myself, and if so, why? We will examine these questions and explore key theoretical approaches to them. Our discussion will delve into various metaphysical and epistemological issues concerning personal identity and personhood, as well as their practical implications.

This course uses the predicate calculus to present a careful development of formal elementary number theory, and elementary recursion theory, culminating in a proof of Gödel's incompleteness results. It includes some discussion of the philosophical significance of these results for the foundations of mathematics.