DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY
COURSE DESCRIPTIONS
Spring 2005
PHIL 103R Introduction to Ethics
(4 credits)
Reed
What are your rights and duties, and so what should you do? What is the best life for you, and so what type of person should you become? These two questions are both important, but they mark different approaches to ethics, with many emphasizing one but not the other. A principal aim in this course is to teach you an approach to ethics as a practical problem-solving self-discipline. This approach has traditionally been known as casuistry.
Evaluations will be based on daily quizzes, periodic short tests, class participation, class presentations, and a final exam. The aims of the course are the following:
Students will
• Develop critical thinking skills, distinguishing manipulation from persuasive reasoning and valid from faulty reasoning,
• Learn the relationship between happiness, ethics, and morality,
• Learn the relationship between morality and social identity (gender/sex, race/ethnicity, socio-economic class, & sexuality/sexual orientation),
• Learn why cultural differences do not entail that morality is relative to culture or society,
• Learn a method for making decisions in situations where important life-choices or values are at stake but in which you don't know what to do, and
• Explore the relationships between ethics, biology, psychology, and culture.
PHIL 110M/R Logic and Critical Reasoning
(4 Credits)
Martinez-Saenz (Two sections)
This course is divided in two parts. The first part of the course considers important aspects of philosophical reasoning in relation to the Aristotelian tradition by way of the study of categorical logic, the analytic tradition by way of the study of prepositional/predicate logic and its different applications. Students will take three exams and weekly quizzes to determine their competency during this part of the semester. The second part of the course helps students develop their critical thinking skills. Students will engage in exercises evaluating landmark Supreme Court decisions. Students, for example, will evaluate Dred Scott v. Sanford, Marbury v. Madison, Brown v. Board of Education, Roe v. Wade, and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. These are just a few examples of landmark cases that not only had undeniable political implications, but forced us to question our willingness to accept others. The second part of the class will be evaluated by weekly quizzes, in-class exercises and one final paper. Math reasoning intensive. Prerequisite: minimum Math Placement 22.
PHIL 205R / HIST 201H Latin American Revolutions
(4 credits)
Martinez-Saenz and Wood
This course is an introduction to the historical and philosophical study of social and political revolutions in twentieth century Latin America. Specifically, we will be exploring both the historical context and the role of philosophical thought in each of four major revolutionary situations (Mexico, Cuba, Argentina and Nicaragua, though other countries may be substituted). In this class we will be creating a learning community of both historians and philosophers. Please note that this course may be taken for either H or R credit (but not both) and that the class will be taught by both Dr. Martinez-Saenz (Philosophy) and Dr. Wood (History). Students should be sure they register for the correct general education requirement and should understand that the two “sections” of the course will meet together as one group. By creating this learning community students will be able to explore both historical and philosophical perspectives on revolution in Latin America. This course is writing intensive and students will be expected to engage with the instructors and with each other in class. Students will be quizzed regularly on weekly readings. In addition there will be several formal essay assignments and exams.
PHIL 311 Modern Philosophy
(4 credits)
McHugh
This course will analyze the modern period in philosophy, the seventeenth-century through the nineteenth-century. We will read modern thinkers as Descartes, Locke, Kant, Marx and contemporary analyses of these thinkers by philosophers such as Charles Mills, Carole Patemen and Susan Bordo. During the semester we will consider a wide variety of issues. Some of these will be what is the proper role of government, how does one know if others have thinking minds, the role of the individual in society, what is reason, who has reason. Weekly quizzes, exams, papers. Writing intensive . Prerequisite: PHIL 210R with a C- or better or permission of instructor.
PHIL 380 Plato's Narrative
(4 credits)
Reed
This is a course on Plato's narrative form. We will focus on what Plato achieved by writing dialogues rather than lectures or monologues. This is also a course on Plato's doubts about Platonism -- which we can discover only by attending carefully to Plato's use of narrative devices in his dialogues. We will have to be careful, because we'll be going against conventional wisdom in Plato scholarship. We will read two "early dialogues" (Protagoras and Gorgias), four "middle dialogues" (Meno, Republic, Phaedo, and Symposium), and two "late dialogues" (Parmenides and Theaetetus). Students will write three short papers on assigned topics, and they will write a longer seminar paper for the end of the semester on the dialogue of their choice, including research in the secondary literature on their dialogue. Writing intensive. Prerequisite: PHIL 210R or permission.
PHIL 400 SENIOR SEMINAR
(4 credits)
McHugh
Topic: Advanced Research Methods in Philosophy
