The three person committee meets twice with the student, first to approve the thesis proposal and second, to approve the final draft of the thesis. Each student meets regularly with the thesis adviser until the thesis is completed, but needs to sign up only once for this course. To provide additional support, group seminars may be offered so that students, past graduates, and faculty can come together to discuss the thesis requirements and share ideas about the process of thesis writing. It also considers some of the ways that substantive issues and debates in philosophy relate to contemporary non-philosophical issues in our society, and can be introduced into a broad range of educational environments outside standard philosophy courses. This course considers how people encode, organize, transform, and output information.
Emphasis is given to such topics as concept formation, problem-solving, and creative thinking.