PHIL482 FA25
Introduction to Cognitive Science (PHIL482)
Instructor: Charles Wallis
Mondays & Wednesdays · 12:30pm–1:45pm · LA5–246
This course introduces students to the multidisciplinary field of Cognitive Science. Foci will include the historical development, foundational philosophical presuppositions, methodologies, and results from a selection of core topics in Cognitive Science. In addition to covering the theoretical contributions of the various disciplines of Cognitive Science (including Philosophy, Computer Science, Cognitive Psychology, Neuroscience, and Linguistics), the course provides students with an introduction to the underlying theoretical framework of Cognitive Science, including its central problems, explanatory structure, and experimental methodologies. Students participate in several labs designed to promote active learning and give students a deeper understanding of the foundational presuppositions and methodologies of the field.
GE/GR areas: upper-division C (humanities) and WI (writing)
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PHIL414/514 FA25
British Empiricism (PHIL414/514)
Dr. Marie Jayasekera
Tuesdays & Thursdays · 2:00pm–3:15pm · LA5–149
In this course, we will investigate not only the commonalities but also the significant differences in the approaches and views of four British empiricists: John Locke, George Berkeley, David Hume, and John Stuart Mill. In addition to seeing how they understood the view that sense experience is the ultimate source of our concepts and knowledge, we will explore differences in their aims and projects as well as applications of their empiricism to various metaphysical and sociopolitical issues, such as personal identity, freedom, agency, and individuality.
Students taking this course should be willing to:
— work through complex historical texts to identify, articulate, and analyze arguments and positions in them;
— actively participate in class by contributing their thoughts and questions about the texts, arguments, and philosophical issues;
— work together with others in small and large groups during class to reach a better understanding of the material;
— and to engage actively in discussion with the material and the ideas of the other participants in the class.
[Back up to current course descriptions]
PHIL493/593 FA25
Special Topics (PHIL493/593): Color and Color Perception
Dr. Wayne Wright
Mondays & Wednesdays · 11:00am–12:15pm · LA5–149
This course examines philosophical and empirical research on color experience and the nature of color. Much of the course will center around philosophers’ handling of the issue of whether colors exist and, if they do, what they are and what we might know about them. Considerable attention will be given to the question of what a theory of color ought to look like, particularly if such a theory is supposed to be relevant to scientific research. Other topics to be considered include color constancy, the status of the unique hue construct, and color language.
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PHIL425/525 FA25
PHIL425/525: Wittgenstein
Dr. Kyle Banick
Thursdays · 5:00pm–7:45pm · LA4–105
Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951) is widely considered one of the most significant, original, and influential philosophers of the 20th century. Indeed, anyone trying to get a grip on the currents of 20th-century philosophy and beyond would do well to study Wittgenstein’s contribution. This course will be an intensive study of Wittgenstein’s major works (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, Philosophical Investigations) from his early and middle periods. Students will be introduced to the landscape of the vigorous secondary literature in which the interpretation of Wittgenstein is problematized. However, we shall not fuss too much over that. Rather, our main focus will be to try to get a command on Wittgenstein’s attempts to draw himself to the very outermost limits of thought.
[Back up to current course descriptions]
PHIL419/519 FA25
PHIL419/519: Analytic Philosophy
Dr. Kyle Banick
Tuesdays · 5:00pm–7:45pm · LA4–105
Analytic philosophy emerged at the turn of the 20th century and has profoundly shaped both philosophical practice and prevailing conceptions of the nature of philosophy. This course offers a broad historical and conceptual survey of the development of analytic philosophy up until the middle of the 20th century. We will trace the origins of analytic philosophy back to an emerging intellectual ethos that took root in late 19th-century Europe, driven by the ambition to reform philosophy into a rigorous, scientific, and anti-speculative discipline. The contributions of Bolzano, Brentano, the Lvov-Warsaw school, Moore, Russell, Wittgenstein, the Vienna Circle positivists, and Quine will be examined.
Students would benefit from knowledge of formal logic, but this is not a requirement. Technical issues will be kept to the background except where absolutely required.
[Back up to current course descriptions]
PHIL418/518 FA25
PHIL418/518: Existentialism
Dr. Amanda Parris
Tuesdays & Thursdays · 2:00pm–3:15pm · LA5–149
Course Description
Existentialism is a designation given—sometimes after their death and sometimes despite their lifelong protest—to several late-19th and 20th century thinkers critical of the traditions they inherited. Although it can be said that the entire history of philosophy proceeds by critique, the existentialists denounced some of the most basic suppositions common to that history. The figures we shall read in this class range from fervent Christian to avid atheist, from philosopher to bureaucrat, from novelist to resistance fighter, and sometimes multiple of these. Throughout this semester we will examine these diverse thinkers in order to confront some of the philosophical concepts that are still pressing for us today: God, self, other, and death.
Learning Outcomes
- By the end of the semester, students will be able to do the following: Understand the value of thinking philosophically by reflecting on the meaning of one’s own life in the context of a meaningless universe, the inauthenticity and bad faith so often involved in human action and belief, the nature of the self in its entanglement with the other and the despair and nausea of the absolute responsibility that is the human condition (assessment via class participation, weekly learning activities, presentation, and essays).
- Understand and discuss coherently the central existential issues, such as the problem of living beyond good and evil, the death of God, being forced to be free, the self/other relation, the will to knowledge, and the question of the meaning of being (assessment via class participation, weekly learning activities, and essays).
- Demonstrate an ability to identify and articulate, both orally and in writing, the primary philosophical themes and issues found in the writings of the major existentialist philosophers (assessment via class participation, weekly learning activities, and essays).
- Demonstrate an ability to evaluate philosophical arguments critically, both orally and in writing, using philosophical methods, including Kierkegaard’s dialectical lyricism, Nietzsche’s symptomatology, and Heidegger’s fundamental ontology (assessment via class participation, weekly learning activities, presentation, and essay).
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PHIL610 FA25
Proseminar (PHIL610): topic tbd
Dr. Cory Wright
Mondays · 5:30pm–8:15pm · LA1–302
PHIL610 is designed to initiate first-semester graduate students into the MA program, and, more generally, philosophy as it is practiced at advanced levels of professional academic competence. The initiation into advanced philosophy will be achieved by equipping students with the skills in analysis, composition, and research that are appropriate for meeting the expectations of our MA program. Students will be trained in how to conduct themselves in a graduate-level setting, how to analyze texts through presentations and discussion, how to write focused, argumentative papers, how to conduct philosophical research, how to properly cite sources, and other related skills. Students will learn the expectations of the department and its faculty, including the requirements of the program, the department’s basic qualifying examination (BQE), the thesis option and non-thesis comprehensive exams. Students will practice the mechanics of in-class presentation, oral defense, term paper writing, and/or poster presentation.
The primary focus of this seminar is skill development. To that end, we will complete small assignments and exercises on a weekly basis. The content of the course is a vehicle for skill development, and vice-versa. The theme for the proseminar for FA21 is Philosophy of Fiction. We will read and discuss classic and contemporary texts related to this topic.
This course is run as a seminar, not as a lecture. This means that students will be expected to come to every class meeting prepared to discuss the readings and other assignments in a roundtable setting. All students should plan on participating at every class meeting. All students should come prepared with questions, insights, and topics for class discussion for every class meeting. In graduate level seminars the professor serves largely as a facilitator for a course that is run jointly by the professor and students.
Each class meeting will have two components: a skills component and a discussion component. Typically, one half of the class meeting will be devoted to developing skill sets in graduate-level work, and the other half of the class will be devoted to discussing the week’s readings. Sometimes these two components of the class meeting will be integrated with one another (e.g., on student presentation days). We will take a short break at approximately the halfway mark.
[Back up to current course descriptions]
PHIL663 FA25
Seminar in Ethics (PHIL663)
Dr. Patrick Dieveney
Tuesdays · 5:30pm–8:15pm · LA1–310
This course explores collective harms. These are cases where producing some negative consequence requires that enough people act in a certain way, but no single act makes a difference. Each individual person can reasonably claim that, insofar as their contribution makes no difference, they did not do anything wrong. In this seminar, we will investigate collective harms in general, along with proposals for distributing moral responsibility in these controversial cases. Much of our discussion will focus on two specific cases of collective harms that have drawn considerable attention: corporate responsibility and environmental responsibility. Some of the questions that we will explore in this course include: To what extent are individual employees morally responsible for large-scale corporate harms? Is moral responsibility attributable to corporations (or groups generally)? Can groups be moral agents? To what extent are individuals morally responsibility for global warming? Or is moral responsibility for such complex, large-scale collective harms only properly attributable to governments, corporations, or other collectives?
[Back up to current course descriptions]
PHIL690 FA25
Seminar in Special Topics (PHIL690)
Topic: Moral Psychology
Dr. Per-Erik Milam
Wednesdays · 5:30pm–8:15pm · LA1–302
In this course, we will be exploring the ethics of blame, apology, and forgiveness. Topics discussed in the course will include: proportionality, fairness, and standing to blame; the permissibility of non-moral blame; the limitations of blame as a practice; alternatives to blame; duties to apologize; public and political apologies; the electivity of forgiveness; the misuse/abuse of blame, apology, and forgiveness; and the role of trust in all of these practices. Students enrolling in this course are expected to have a passable understanding of normative ethics, both historical and contemporary. While understanding of ethics is essential, some topics will also engage with debates in social and political philosophy, as well as empirical psychology.
[Back up to current course descriptions]
PHIL403 FA25
Medical Ethics (PHIL403)
Melissa Ramirez
Mondays & Wednesdays · 9:30am–10:45am (section 02) · SPA–006
Mondays & Wednesdays · 11:00am–12:15pm (section 03) · LA1–206
In this course, we will be exploring a range of issues in contemporary biomedical ethics. Topics discussed in the course include ethical issues concerning the professional-patient relationship, human and animal research, physician-assisted suicide, abortion, embryonic stem-cell research, and social justice and health-care policy. The primary goal in the course is to introduce students to various ethical issues in the biomedical sciences and equip them with the analytical tools necessary to appreciate the various positions and arguments. In the process, students will also gain an understanding of historically prominent theories in normative ethics, such as virtue ethics, Kantian ethics, and utilitarianism. The course should prove beneficial to those for whom this may be their only philosophy course (no prior background in philosophy is required), and it will provide a good background for those who might wish to pursue further studies in philosophy.
GE/GR areas: upper-division C (humanities) and WI (writing)