COURSE SCHEDULE Week 1 Aug 21 Aug 23 Aug 25 What Is Philosophy? Introduction- Welcome to Phil1000 Philosophical Argumentation and Logical Fallacies (*p. 8-13) Introduction (*p. 1-7) Bernard Russell, “The Value of Philosophy” (*p. 17-20) Philosophical Argumentation and Logical Fallacies continued. Week 2 Aug 28 Aug 30 Sep 1 What Is Philosophy? The Socratic Method Plato’s Republic (*p. 708-719) How To Write Philosophy Papers (*p. 14-16) Thought Experiment Friday (1) Week 3 Sep 4: Labor Day Sep 6 Sep 8 God, Faith, and Evil No Class Why Believe? Anselm, The Ontological Argument (*p. 40-42) William Paley, Natural Theology (*p. 45-49) Blaise Pascal, The Wager (*p. 50-53) Thought Experiment Friday (2) Week 4 Sep 11 God, Faith, and Evil The Problem of Evil
Sep 13 Sep 15 Plato’s Euthyphro (PDF in Canvas files) Louise Antony, For Love of Reason (*p. 139-151) David Hume, Of Miracles (PDF of Hume’s Enquiry under Files. Read Section 10) Thought Experiment Friday (3) Paper 1 due by 11:59pm Week 5 Sep 18 Sep 20 Sep 22 Knowledge and Reality How Do We Know We Exist? Rene Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy (*p. 157-181) Christopher Grau, Bad Dreams, Evil Demons… (*p. 181-188) Sensation David Hume, Of Scepticism with Regard… (*p.197-211) John Locke, Enquiry, Book II, chapter i-xii (PDF) Thought Experiment Friday (4) Week 6 Sep 25 Sep 27 Sep 29 Minds, Bodies, and Persons Bertrand Russell, The Argument for Analogy… (*p. 269-271) David Armstrong, The Nature of Mind (*p. 279-286) Thought Experiment Friday (5) Week 7 Oct 2 Minds, Bodies, and Persons Can A Machine Think? A. M. Turing, Computing Machinery and Intelligence (*p. 295) John Searle, Minds, Brains, and Programs (*p. 308-320)
Oct 4 Oct 6 Personal Identity John Perry, A Dialogue on Personal Identity… (*p.322-342) Midterm Oct 9 - 13 FALL BREAK Week 8 Oct 16 Oct 18 Oct 20 Free Will Free Will: Hard Determinism and Libertarianism Roderick M. Chisholm, Human Freedom and the Self (*p. 387) Peter van Inwagen, The Power of Rational Beings… (*p. 395) Free Will: Soft Determinism David Hume, Of Liberty and Necessity (*p. 407-417) Thought Experiment Friday (6) Paper 2 due by 11:59pm Week 9 Oct 23 Oct 25 Oct 27 Ethics: Utilitarianism and Kantian Ethics Jeremy Bentham, The Principle of Utility (*p. 480-483) John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism (*p. 483-499) Optional: Friedrich Nietzsche, On The Genealogy of Morals (PDF). Read First Essay (1-17). Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics…(*p. 527-543) J.D. Velleman, A Brief Introduction to Kantian Ethics (*p. 544) Thought Experiment Friday (7) The Trolley Problem (*p. 883) Ducking Harm and Sacrificing Others (*p. 884) Week 10 Oct 30 Ethics: Virtue Ethics and Social Contract Theory Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics (*p. 568-583)
Nov 1 Nov 3 Rachels and Rachels, The Idea of a Social Contract (PDF) Optional: Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan XIII (PDF) Optional: Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract (PDF) Thought Experiment Friday (8) Week 11 Nov 6 Nov 8 Nov 10 Contemporary Moral Problems: Abortion Judith Jarvis Thomson, A Defense of Abortion (*p. 646-656) Don Marquis, Why Abortion is Immoral (PDF) Thought Experiment Friday (9) Paper 3 due by 11:59pm Week 12 Nov 13 Nov 15 Nov 17 Contemporary Moral Problems: Racism Kwame Anthony Appiah, Racisms (*p. 689-699) Linda Martin Alcoff, Racism and Visible Race (*p. 699-707) Thought Experiment Friday (10) Week 13 Nov 20 Nov 22 Nov 23-24, Thanksgiving Break Feminist Theory Sally Haslanger, Gender and Social Construction (PDF) Catharine McKinnon, Difference and Dominance (PDF) No Class Week 14 Nov 27 Existential Issues Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus (*p. 811-813) Thomas Nagel, The Absurd (*p. 813) Optional: All of The Myth of Sisyphus is available under Files. Optional: Jean Paul Sartre, Existentialism Is A Humanism (PDF)