Beyond such academic goals, you should aim as well to do philosophy by understanding its traditional vocabulary and scope, its reflective substance and logical style. Your doing of philosophy requires (listing only general skills)
- reading class texts carefully and critically,
- speaking openly and independently with your classmates,
- listening thoughtfully to your instructor,
- and writing purposefully and cogently on tests and papers.
The most general goal of philosophy is, in short, well-reasoned thinking.
- finding philosophical issues in a variety of human beliefs and claims,
- seeing the assumptions or presuppositions that their advocacy implies,
- marking the intended or unintended consequences that these entail,
- and concluding on the propriety of our holding such beliefs or claims.
Careful Reading (25%): Each of you, whether with a pen, typewriter, or computer, is required to write a short set of responses to at least one primary reading each day. (These reading "sets" do not apply to Woodhouse and Klemke's editorial introductions.)We will discuss these requirements throughout the term, clarifying them by precept and example. As philosophers, don't be afraid to ask questions. I'll answer them as best I can.Class Conversation (25%): With due courtesy and propriety, you are expected to engage our class readings in informed - but informal - class conversations, with written responses prompting talk. Our first handouts define the larger, philosophical idea and ideal of conversation.
Test Taking (25%): You will all take three unit tests. Including the final, they examine your understanding of issues, ideas, and texts presented by all authors studied in each of three units. Including a possible essay question, the final counts as half your total test grade. Each test includes comprehensive matching and short-answer identification questions.
Critical Writing (25%): You will all write two short out-of-class expositiory essays (about 750 words each), one arguing against a given philosophical proposition and one arguing for another. While both essays must lay claim to your own developing philosophical authority, they are grounded in careful attention to philosophical issues covered by our assigned readings. Woodhouse's tips on writing explain this task well.
Week 1 - 9/25 - 9/29
Monday
- "Course Description" (handout)Tuesday
- Jacques Barzun, "Conversation, Manners and the Home," from The House of Intellect
- Hans Georg Gadamer, "The Productivity of Socratic Dialogue," from Truth and Method (handout)Wednesday
- Klemke (1-11), "Why Study Philosophy?"
- Robert Nozick, "What is Wisdom, and Why Do Philosophers Love it So?" from The Examined Life (handout)Thursday
- Woodhouse (1-19), "Recognizing Philosophical Subject Matter"
- Klemke (11-17), "What Philosophy is About"
Friday
- Klemke (17-23), "How to Study Philosophy"
- Plato, "Euthyphro," (handout)
- Jay David Bolter, "Platonic Dialogue" and " From Dialogue to Essay," from Writing Space: The Computer, Hypertext, and the History of Writing (handout)Week 2 - 10/2 - 10/6
Monday
- Woodhouse (46-60), "Doing Philosophy: Getting Started"Tuesday
- Woodhouse (61-82), "Doing Philosophy: Further Considerations"
- Aristotle, "Formal Deductive Logic," from (full text) Prior Analytics (handout) (Garth Kemerling's varied discussions of logic offer a conveniently thorough overview of common topics.)Wednesday
- Stephen Toulmin, "Informal Logic," from An Introduction to Reasoning and The Uses of Argument (handout)
- John Stuart Mill, "Canons of Induction," from System of Logic (handout) (See also, Mill's Methods .)Thursday
- John Casti, "Correlations, Causes, and Chance," from Searching for Certainty: What Scientists Can Know about the Future (handout)Friday
- Woodhouse, (83-94), "Common Fallacies in Argument" (Stephen Downes' index of logical fallacies nicely categorizes the most common.)
Week 3 - 10/9 - 10/13
Monday
- First Test / Reading SetsTuesday
- Review Test
- Woodhouse (95-105), "Reading Philosophy"Wednesday
- Klemke (25-29), "Belief and Knowledge"
- Klemke 1 (30-35), Peter Unger, "A Defense of Skepticism"
- Rene Descartes, "Meditations I and II (English/Latin/French texts)" from (full text) Meditations on First Philosophy (handout)
(Also see An Outline of Descartes's Meditations on First Philosophy and Important Arguments from Descartes' Meditations.)Thursday
- David Hume, "Of the Academical or Skeptical Philosophy," from (full text) An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (handout)Friday
- Klemke 2 (36-45), John Hospers, "A Critique of Skepticism"
- Arthur C. Danto, "The Analysis of Knowledge," from Connections to the World: The Basic Concepts of Philosophy (handout)Week 4 - 10/16 - 10/20
Monday
- Klemke 3 (45-59), Carl G. Hempel, "Justification in Science"
- Klemke 4 (59-66), Charles Sanders Pierce, "The Fixation of Belief" (full text)Tuesday
- Klemke 5, (66-71), W. K. Clifford, "The Ethics of Belief" (For critiques of Clifford's position see Alvin Plantinga's "Theism, Atheism, and Rationality" and Peter van Inwagen's "It Is Wrong, Everywhere, Always, and for Anyone, to Believe Anything upon Insufficient Evidence."
- Klemke 6 (71-77), William James, "The Will to Believe"Wednesday
- Klemke (79-81), "Science, Common Sense, and the World"
- Klemke 7 (82-84), Sir Arthur Eddington, "Two Tables"
- Klemke 8 (85-93), L. Susan Stebbing, "The Furniture of the Earth"Thursday
- Klemke 9 (93-98), W. T. Stace, "Science and the Physical World"
- Klemke 10 (98-105), C. H. Whiteley, "Physical Objects as Not Reducible to Perceptions" (Jonathan Dolhenty marks other, related philosophical matters in his essay, "What is Philosophical Realism?")Friday
- Woodhouse (106-123), "Writing Philosophy"
- "Philosophy Essays Assignments" (handout) (How to Write Philosophy Papers and G. J. Mattey's several Do's and Don'ts offer good additional help.)Week 5 - 10/23 - 10/27
Monday
- Klemke (107-111), "Freedom, Determinism, and Responsibility"
- Klemke 11 (112-117), Robert Blatchford, "The Delusion of Free Will"
- Klemke 12 (118-125), W. T. Stace, "The Problem of Free Will" (Question: does this test convince you either way?)Tuesday
- Klemke 13 (125-134), Richard Taylor, "Freedom and Determinism"
- Herman Melville, "Loomings" and "The Mat-Maker," from (full text) Moby-Dick (handout)Wednesday
- Klemke 14 (135-145), John Hospers, "Free-Will and Psychoanalysis"
- Sigmund Freud, from Civilization and Its Discontents (handout) (Tired? Rest here.)Thursday
- Klemke 15 (145-152), Karl Menninger, "The Crime of Punishment"
- Clarence Darrow, "Speech to Inmates of the Cook County Jail" (handout)Friday
- Klemke 16 (152-158), C. S. Lewis, "The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment"Week 6 - 10/30 - 11/3
Monday
- Klemke (161-165), "Bodies, Minds, and Persons" (Valerie Hardcastle's Mind/Brain Resources and Robert Wozniack's Mind and Body: Rene Descartes to William James are both helpful, as is Ned Block's NYU research seminar, Language and Mind.)
- Klemke 17 (166-171), C. E. M. Joad, "The Mind as Distinct from the Body"
- Klemke 18 (171-179), William S. Robinson, "Why I Am a Dualist"Tuesday
- Essay #1 Due
- Gilbert Ryle, "Descartes' Myth," from The Concept of Mind (handout)Wednesday
- Klemke 19 (179-189)), Richard Taylor, "The Case for Materialism"
- Klemke 20 (190-196), John B. Watson, "Behaviorism"Thursday
- Klemke 21 (197-212), Jerry A. Fodor, "The Mind-Body Problem"Friday
- John R. Searle, "Consciousness and the Philosophers" (handout) (If interested, check out David Chalmers' On-line papers on consciousness, where Searle's text and two replies come with scores of other essays.)
- John R. Searle, "Minds, Brains, and Science" (video)
Week 7 - 11/6 - 11/10
Monday
- Second Test / Reading SetsTuesday
- Review TestWednesday
- W-Day
- Klemke (215-218), "Persons, Machines, and Immortality"
- Klemke 22 (219-231), Christopher Evans, "Can a Machine Think?"
- Klemke 23 (232-238), Morton Hunt, " What the Human Mind Can Do That the Computer Can't"
- Hubert L. Dreyfus, from What Computers Can't Do: A Critique of Artificial Intelligence (handout). (See Ron Barnette's review of Dreyfus's work and also The Alan Turing Homepage. Ned Block's Mind and Machines seminar provides fare for more serious study.)Thursday
- Klemke 24 (238-245), Clarence Darrow, "The Myth of Immortality"
- Klemke 25 (245-252), C. J. Ducasse, "Is Life after Death Possible?"Friday
- Veterans' DayWeek 8 - 11/13 - 11/17
Monday
- Klemke (255-258), "The Existence of God"
- Klemke 26 (259-273), E. K. Daniel, "A Defense of Theism"
- St. Anselm, "The Ontological Argument," (handout) (See also Anselm on God's Existence.)
- Immanuel Kant, "The Impossibility of an Ontological Proof of the Existence of God" (handout)
(For other perspectives, see Hugo Meynell's "Hume, Kant, and Rational Theism" and, from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Ontological Arguments.)Tuesday
- Klemke 27 (274-283), Ernest Nagel, "The Case for Atheism"Wednesday
- Klemke 28 (283-294), Bertrand Russell, "Why I Am Not a Christian" (For a philosopher who drops the "not" in Russell's title, see William Alston.)Thursday
- Klemke 29 (295-301), K. D. Ellis, "Why I Am an Agnostic"- Klemke 30 (301-310), David Hauser, "A Philosophical Theism: God as Growth"Friday- Klemke 31 (310-320), Joseph Kupfer, "The Art of Religious Communication"
- Keiji Nishitani, "What is "Religion" (handout)
Week 9 - 11/20 - 11/24
Monday
- Klemke (323-327), "God, Faith, and Evil"
- Klemke 32 (328-345), H. J. McCloskey, "God and Evil"
- Klemke 33 (346-352), John Hick, "The Problem of Evil"
(Bob Seltzer's The Philosophical Problem of Evil offers a good overview.)Tuesday
- Klemke 34 (353-356), Richard Taylor, "Faith"
- Klemke 35 (356-364), Richard Robinson, "Religion, Reason, and Faith
(For broader overviews see Alfred Freddoso's Faith and Reason, John Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding, and Pope John Paul II's 1998 Encyclical Letter, Fides et Ratio.)Wednesday
- Student AdvisingThursday
- Thankgiving HolidayFriday
- Thanksgiving Holiday
Week 10 - 11/27 - 12/1
Monday
- Klemke (411-414), "Moral Values: Grounds and Norms" (Lawrence Hinman's Ethics Updates provides valuable help throughout this unit.)
- Klemke 40 (415-423), Harry Browne, "The Morality Trap"
- Klemke 41 (423-432), James Rachels, "Egoism and Moral Skepticism"Tuesday
- Klemke 42 (432-445), E. Daniel Kaye, "A Defense of Utilitarianism"
- Klemke 43 (446-455), Arthur C. Ewing, "A Critique of Utilitarianism"(For online links, see David Pearce's Utilitarianism Resources and his logically-related predictions in The Hedonistic Imperative.)
Wednesday
- Klemke 44 (455-462), R. M. MacIver, "The Deep Beauty of the Golden Rule"
- Carl Sagan, "A New Way to Think about Rules to Live By" (handout)
(See also, from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, GameTheory and Prisoner's Dilemma.)
- Immanuel Kant, "The Categorical Imperative," from (full text) Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals (handout)
(Charles D. Kay's Notes on Deontology offers a useful overview of Kant's position.)Thursday
- Klemke 45 (462-471), Carol Gilligan, "A Different Voice"Friday
- Alasdair MacIntyre," Critique of Emotivism," from After Virtue (handout) (Gerard Reed's review of After Virtue offers a good overview of MacIntyre's larger argument.)
- Klemke 46 (472-478), Alasdair MacIntyre, "Virtue Ethics" (See also James Stenson's An Overview of the Virtues and, from The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Virtue Theory.)
- Aristotle, from Nichmachean Ethics (handout) (Alfred Fredoso's notes on Aristotle's text provide a quick overview.)
- "You Can Have It All" (handout)Week 11 - 12/4 - 12/8
Monday
- Klemke 47 (479-484), Kai Nielsen, "God and the Good"
- Klemke 48 (485-490), Robert Merrihew Adams, "A Modified Divine Command Theory of Ethical Wrongness" (William L. Craig's "The Indispensibility of Theological Meta-Ethical Foundations for Morality" adds perspective.)
- "Biblical Ethics" (handout)Tuesday
- Essay #2 Due
- Klemke (493-496), "Ethical Judgments"
- Klemke 50 (503-510), Brand Blanshard, "The New Subjectivism in Ethics"Wednesday
- Klemke 52 (517-526), W. T. Stace, "Ethical Relativism"
- Hans Morgenthau, "Quisling Show" (handout)Thursday
- Woodhouse (20-35), "Why Philosophize?"
- Bertrand Russell, "The Value of Philosophy," from The Problems of Philosophy (handout)Friday
- Woodhouse (36-45), "Philosophical Progress: Clearing Up Some Misconceptions"
- Konstantin Kolenda, from Philosophy's Journey (handout)
Final Exam / Reading Sets: See Finals Schedule