PHILOSOPHY DEPARTMENT

UPPER LEVEL COURSE OFFERINGS

SECOND SEMESTER 2008-2009

PHL 302, MODERN PHILOSOPHY

MW 2:00-3:50

Instructor:  Keith Fennen

              In this course we will study the development of philosophy from Descartes to Kant.  Although we will discuss a wide range of thinkers, we will focus particularly on Descartes and Hume.  Specific issues to be addressed include:  the nature and limit of knowledge, the nature of truth, the relationship between the mind and body, the aim of philosophy, desire, and final cause.  Also, we will address the question of why the thinkers we will read are considered “modern.”

PHL 331/631, POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY

MW 2:00-3:50

Instructor:  Peter Schuller

              The Europeans presently are stating that, because of the present global crisis, neo-capitalism is at an end.  (They are underestimating things, just as the Americans are.  In fact, what we are confronted with is the biggest crisis since the 14th century bankruptcy of England, leading to that Dark Age—which was ended only by the comprehensive revolution called The Renaissance.)  What, however, will replace the present system?  Fascism?  Another Dark Age?  Another Renaissance?  So far, what has been done is what Mussolini (“corporatism”) and the Weimar Republic (succeeded by Hitler) did:  ueber alles pay the hyper-inflated debt to the financial corporations.  Also to be noted is that in the middle of this process there has started a sea-change of attitude across the world-but notably in America:  both the left and right wings are changing their decades-long suspicious attitudes about the legitimacy and function of social and political institutions (with different lists of priorities, or course).  We will, thus, explore in depth what Fascism really is.  Also on the agenda:  exactly what government is; what makes a government truly legitimate; what is the proper function of government (when government is a moral necessity).

PHL 355, Feminist Theory

TR 10:00-11:50

Instructor:  Gaile Pohlhaus

              In this course we will investigate feminist theories not as one comprehensive system, but rather as varying ways in which feminists have attempted to speak about the category, position(s), and treatment of women given particular social and historical contexts.  What does it mean to be a woman?  Is it a biological concept?  A cultural one?  A political position within the social?  What happens to the concept when we take into account other ways in which people are positioned in society such as race, class, sexuality, and nation?  Is sex/gender a conceptual system we can do without?  Emphasis will be placed on the dialogue and critique among a wide spectrum of feminist theorists.  Throughout the semester we will return to questions regarding the role of theory for feminist politics as well as what the effects of bringing feminism to theory may have on the very nature of theory itself.

PHL 373/673, Symbolic Logic

MW 11:00-12:50

Instructor:  Asher Seidel

          This is an intermediate level course in deductive symbolic logic.  Propositional and first order predicate calculus will be studied from a nonaxiomatic viewpoint.  Translation techniques and decision procedures will be emphasized, with focus on the relation of such techniques to ordinary language.

          This course does not presuppose acquaintance with logic, nor is a mathematics background required.  The degree of difficulty is such that students interested solely in LER-F credit are urged to take PHL 273.  PHL 673 includes the material from 373, plus an axiomatic treatment of the propositional calculus.

PHL 376, Environmental Philosophy

MW 11:00-12:50

Instructor:  Bryan Bannon

In light of the impact of human activity upon environmental conditions, many philosophers have begun to argue for a reconsideration of the relation between the human world and “nature.”  Few of them ask, however, what the “nature” is that they strive to preserve.  In this class, we will be asking exactly that question in an effort to understand the extent to which what we think nature is influences how we behave toward it.  In discussing this question, we will approach it through various lenses:  what do we mean when we talk about wilderness?  Is the idea of nature itself a social construction?  Does nature operate in terms of organized systems?  If so, where do humans fit within that natural system?  If not, how are humans different and how might they relate to it?  Though this will primarily be a course in metaphysics, our discussions will be oriented by a concern for the practical import of those views for the natural world.  Consequently, we will primarily be reading authors from movements that attempt to integrate the metaphysical and the ethical in their approach such as deep ecology, biroregionalism, and social ecology.

PHL 390, Existentialism

TR 2:00-3:50

Instructor:  Emily Zakin

                  This course will explore the way in which the concept of human ‘existence’ becomes a distinct theme for philosophical reflection in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  The general question of the school of thought that came to be known as Existentialism, ‘what it means to be,’ will drive our own inquiry.  In considering the religious, philosophical, political, and aesthetic dimensions of the existentialist critique of the Enlightenment faith in reason, we will be attentive to the resources within the history of philosophy from which existentialism draws its ideas and inspirations.  We will focus on various ideas and formulations, including:  existence preceding essence, the question of the meaning of human freedom, the ambiguity of the human condition, and the aesthetic dimension of self-creation.  About half of the class will be spend on the 19th century precursors to existentialism, Kierkegaard, Dostoevsky, and Nietzsche.  In the second half of the course we will study some more recent manifestations of the existential thought, looking at how the above issues were taken up and reworked by 20th century philosophers, including Sartre, Camus, Beauvoir, and Fanon.

PHL 392, Philosophy of Religion

TR 4:00-5:50

Instructor:  David Falgout

          This course offers a study of major philosophical problems relating to religion.  Topics are drawn initially from historically Western philosophy of religion, which is after supplemented by a critical, related selection of philosophy associated with the religions of Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism.  Some writings by contemporary scholars of religion will also be briefly considered.  Thematic problems to be addressed include:  meaning in religious actions and utterances, existence and attributes of divinity, selves and their relation to death, relations between faith and reason, plurality of religions, as well as problems of evil and religious experience.

PHL 450/550, Animals, Language, and Life

MW 5:00-6:50

Instructor:  Bryan Bannon

                            From the very inception of western philosophy, humanity has been defined in opposition to a presupposed homogenous category of “animals” or “beasts.”  The resulting definition of humanity as a “rational animal” has then served as a foundation for various scientific, philosophical, and political programs that have shaped western ways of thinking and living.  Out of all the evidence for human rationality that philosophers have marshaled, the use of language proves to be most prevalent.  Some contemporary philosophers, however, have called into question this most ancient of characterizations in an effort to derail the programs that it has enabled.  Since it would be impossible to survey the vast literature in both the history of philosophy and contemporary literature that addresses this debate, we will attempt to understand how three philosophers (Martin Heidegger, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, and Jacques Derrida) have responded to the question of human-animal difference.

              This course will have two goals.  The first will be to familiarize you with the basic ideas of the three philosophers under discussion.  For this reason, no prior knowledge of any of these figures is necessary to have success in this course.  We will spend a significant amount of effort to understand each philosopher’s position on the nature of life and language and how that influences their individual conceptions of human and animal existences.  The second goal will be the more philosophical aim of thinking about what contributions the debate between them might have to more contemporary discussions of animal rights, the rationality of animals (or humans!), and the difference between animal “communication” and human “language.”  To this end, there are certain questions that will largely structure our dialogue:  in what ways does our conception of human-animal difference compel us to act in certain ways toward non-humans and humans alike?  Is there a difference between human and animal behavior and, if so, in what does it consist?  Are humans the only living beings who use language?  In what ways does human-animal difference ethically compel us?

PHL 493/593, Phenomenological Method

TR 12:00-1:50

Instructor:  William McKenna

              This course will be an introduction to phenomenology, a 20th century movement founded by the German Philosopher Edmund Husserl (1859-1938).  Since its origination, phenomenological philosophy has been practiced by many people throughout the world, especially in Europe (where it was a dominant influence in the 20th century), the United States Latin America and more recently east Asia.  This activity has resulted in the development of many offshoots, variants, and applications.

              Phenomenology consists of a diverse body of thought unified by a common method.  We will learn what this method is and what it can yield through the study of some of Edmund Husserl’s writings.  These writings of Husserl will cover such topics as:  verbal expression and meaning; verification of thought through experience; the basic structures of the consciousness of the world; intersubjectivity and the experience of other persons; consciousness of the human body and of space; awareness of time.

PHL 494/594, Philosophy of Mind

R 6:30-10:00

Instructor:  Asher Seidel

              In the latter half of the 20th century, the avowedly “externalist” behaviorist approach to cognitive psychology was superseded by a variety of approaches sharing the general supposition that an “internalist”, but non- introspective, “third person” perspective better suited the aspiring scientific study of cognitive mindfulness.

              An initial handful of philosophers supported this movement, not only being influenced by happenings in cognitive science, linguistics, and artificial intelligence research, but also having some influence on its direction.  Among the two or three foremost such philosophers was Daniel Dennett.

              In this seminar we shall focus on Dennett’s philosophical psychology, including:  his notion of the intentional stance; his evolving ideas of the role of artificial intelligence; his criticism of Skinnerian behaviorism together with his qualified affinity with “logical behaviorism”; his “constructivist” conception of cognitive selfhood; his Darwinian cognitive ethology; and, perhaps most significantly, his “deconstruction” of consciousness.

              We will survey Dennett’s writings from the early 1970s through the middle 1990s.  Additionally, we will consider other significant contributors such as Fodor, Searle, Nagel, and Paul Churchland, whose works variously background and rovoke Dennett’s thoughts.

PHL 496/596, Epistemology: Ecological Thinking,

Responsible Knowing

T 3:00-6:30

Instructor:  Gaile Pohlhaus

            Feminist epistemology has typically been concerned with the social aspects of knowing, arguing that the generic individualist knower of propositions (i.e. the picture “S knows that p”) is not viable.  One implication of this line of thought is that our knowledge projects are always political in some way whether we like to think of them that way or not.  Recent work has turned to a number of questions that arise if one accepts the claim that knowing is in some sense always political:  Are there more responsible and less responsible ways of knowing?  Are there ways in which one ought not to know?  Are there different kinds of ignorance and how ought they be distinguished?  Does one who knows have responsibility toward what she knows?  Can a person be held responsible for what she does not know?  And in all of these questions does it matter who it is that is doing the knowing?  The answers to these questions have implications for research and methodology in all the disciplines, since presumably the aim of any discipline is knowledge.  We will examine some of the more recent work being developed along this trajectory with an aim toward charting the terrain opened up by it.  Students should come to the course with some background in either epistemology or feminist theory (or both).

                 ALSO AVAILABLE              

PHL 103:  Society and the Individual

PHL 104:  Purpose or Chance in the Universe

PHL 105: Theories of Human Nature

PHL 106:  Thoughts and Culture of India

PHL 131:  Problems of Moral and Social Value

PHL 241:   Aesthetics

PHL 263:  Informal Logic

PHL 610:  Research Seminar

HONORS COURSE:

PHL 105.H:  Theories of Human Nature