Corequisites: PHIL V2111 Required Discussion Section (0 points). Exposition and analysis of the positions of the major philosophers from the pre-Socratics through Augustine. This course has unrestricted enrollment.
Is there an essential difference between women and men? How do questions about race conflict or overlap with those about gender? Is there a normal way of being queer? Introduction to philosophy and feminism through a critical discussion of these and other questions using historical and contemporary texts, art, and public lectures. Focus includes essentialism, difference, identity, knowledge, objectivity, and queerness.
This course will survey a number of topics at the intersection of cognitive science and philosophy. Potential topics include free will, consciousness, embodied cognition, artificial intelligence, neural networks, and the language of thought.
Prerequisites: one philosophy course. A survey of Eurpoean social philosophy from the 18th to the 20th century, with special attention to theories of capitalism and the normative concepts (freedom, alienation, human flourishing) that inform them. Also: the relationship between civil society and the state.
Corequisites: PHILV3413 Required Discussion Section (0 points). Advanced introduction to classical sentential and predicate logic. No previous acquaintance with logic is required; nonetheless a willingness to master technicalities and to work at a certain level of abstraction is desirable.
Required discussion section for UN3411 Symbolic Logic
Corequisites: PHIL V3611 Required Discussion Section (0 points). Systematic treatment of some major topics in metaphysics (e.g. modality, causation, identity through time, particulars and universals). Readings from contemporary authors.
Prerequisites: one course in philosophy. Corequisites: PHIL V3711 Required Discussion Section (0 points). This course is mainly an introduction to three influential approaches to normative ethics: utilitarianism, deontological views, and virtue ethics. We also consider the ethics of care, and selected topics in meta-ethics.
Required discussion section for PHIL UN3701 Ethics
Required of senior majors, but also open to junior majors, and junior and senior concentrators who have taken at least four philosophy courses. This exploration will typically involve writing a substantial research paper. Capped at 20 students with preference to philosophy majors.
Required of senior majors, but also open to junior majors, and junior and senior concentrators who have taken at least four philosophy courses. This exploration will typically involve writing a substantial research paper. Capped at 20 students with preference to philosophy majors.
Required of senior majors, but also open to junior majors, and junior and senior concentrators who have taken at least four philosophy courses. This exploration will typically involve writing a substantial research paper. Capped at 20 students with preference to philosophy majors.
Supervised research usually with the goal of writing a senior thesis, under the direction of individual members of the department.
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Examines interpretations and applications of the calculus of probability including applications as a measure of degree of belief, degree of confirmation, relative frequency, a theoretical property of systems, and other notions of objective probability or chance. Attention to epistimological questions such as Hume's problem of induction, Goodman's problem of projectibility, and the paradox of confirmation.
Careful reading and translation of a major philosophical text in ancient Greek
to be chosen by the course participants in consultation with the instructor. Special attention is to
be paid to the linguistic and conceptual problems of translating ancient Greek philosophical
texts. Prerequisite: equivalent of at least two years of study of ancient Greek at university level.
Advanced introduction to classical sentential and predicate logic. No previous acquaintance with logic is required; nonetheless a willingness to master technicalities and to work at a certain level of abstraction is desirable. Note: Due to significant overlap, students may receive credit for only one of the following three courses: PHIL UN3411, UN3415, GR5415.
This class covers classic readings in contemporary philosophy, selections from historical authors that bear on today’s debates, and influential recent contributions in a range of subfields such as metaphysics, philosophy of mind, epistemology, logic, philosophy of language, philosophy of science, philosophy of mathematics, and philosophy of cognitive science.
Required of all first-year Ph.D. candidates. Each faculty member addresses the proseminar in order to acquaint students with the interests and areas of expertise on the faculty. Through discussion and the dissemination of readings the student learns about possible areas of doctoral research.
Prerequisites: high-quality work in the previous term. Arrangements must be made with the director of graduate studies. Tutorial work in specialized research topics.
What is realism and how does it relate to objectivity? In this course, we will consider a range of answers, with special attention to problems of value. We will begin by clarifying the nature of realism about a subject matter and arguments that might support it. We will then look at limitations of realism per se, and the need to supplement it with a distinct notion of objectivity. Next, we will consider arguments that “realist objectivism”, while attractive, is an untenable package. This will lead us to discuss anti-objectivist forms of realism and their deflationary methodological ramifications. Finally, we will look at the prospects for objectivity without realism, particularly in the evaluative case. We will conclude by sketching a neo-pragmatist metaphilosophical outlook.
Prerequisites: the instructor's permission. At least one foundational course in moral philosophy is recommended as background for this course. In this seminar we will take up several questions about moral understanding and insight. Questions we will consider include: Can trusting moral testimony ever be rational or right? Are the reasons to be cautions about relying on moral testimony moral reasons or epistemic reasons (or both)? What assumptions about moral knowledge do critics and defenders of moral testimony make? How does moral knowledge differ, if it does, from moral understanding? Is there such a thing as moral expertise? Is there any reason to think that moral expertise is more problematic than other kinds of expertise? Can emotions inform us about value? Under what conditions, if any, can emotions contribute to our understanding of value? Under what conditions are emotions impediments to moral knowledge or understanding? Can fictions help us gain moral insight? Can pictures ever be legitimate tools of moral persuasion?
This course will explore the nature and significance of our capacity for practical reason, focusing on a variety of questions: What we should want from a philosophical account of practical reason (should it be descriptive or normative, for example)? Are reasons causes? What does practical reason require? What is the relation between rationality and morality? How can practical reasoning fail? We will pursue these and related questions through a variety of historical and contemporary texts. This course will explore the nature and significance of our capacity for practical reason, focusing on a variety of questions: What we should want from a philosophical account of practical reason (should it be descriptive or normative, for example)? Are reasons causes? What does practical reason require? What is the relation between rationality and morality? How can practical reasoning fail? We will pursue these and related questions through a variety of historical and contemporary texts.