An introductory study of the development of Western philosophy from ancient through late medieval times including systematic work in logic, metaphysics, epistemology and ethics by such philosophers as Plato, Aristotle, Augustine and Aquinas.

 

The object of this course is to survey some of the major developments in the history of western philosophy from the end of the Renaissance until the beginning of the nineteenth century, with an emphasis upon questions concerning reality, knowledge, reality, the status of philosophy itself – i.e. What is truly real? How can know what is real? What is the nature of this kind of inquiry into knowledge and reality? What kind of “evidence” counts in philosophy? We will explore these issues by means of extensive readings from primary sources (in English translation), including excerpts from the writings of Montaigne, Bacon, Descartes, Locke, Spinoza, Berkeley, Leibniz, Hume, and Kant.

 

Classes will consist primarily of lectures, though questions from students are strongly encouraged and there will be ample opportunity for class discussion.

 

Grades will be based upon three, 75 minute, in-class, essay format examinations during the course of the semester, plus a two-hour final examination. The latter will count for two-fifths of your semester grade and each of the former for one-fifth of the same. .

Except by explicit and prior arrangement, no grades of "incomplete" will be awarded in this class, nor will there be any opportunity for "extra credit" work in this class.

 

Required Text

Modern Philosophy: An Anthology of Primary Sources, ed. Roger Ariew and Eric Watkins, 2nd ed. (Hackett) Paperback $44. 978-0872209787

 

 

A consideration of the ethical issues and difficult choices generated or made acute by advances in biology, technology and medicine. Typical issues include: informed consent, healer-patient relationships, truth telling, confidentiality, problem of birth defects, abortion, placebos and health, allocation of scarce medical resources, genetic research and experimentation, cost containment in health care, accountability of health care professionals, care of the dying and death.

 

 

In this course, students will study a number of ethical issues commonly faced by people working in health care, including related areas of research. The course will cover a number of professional issues, such as informed consent, decision-making for incompetent patients, and fair access to health care, and an extended treatment of end-of-life issues. The course will also include a strong emphasis on techniques for carrying on discussions about ethics, both in person and in writing.

 

 

This course will examine various philosophical perspectives on human nature as they are presented in the writings of major philosophers from the Greeks to the contemporary world. We will focus our study upon various "Ideologies" of Human Nature. The "Ideology" of Human Nature is defined as: A system of belief about the nature of man which is held by some group of people as giving rise to their way of life and all aspects of their philosophical perspective. All adequately articulated ideologies of human nature have five structural components:

 

2. The background theories of the nature of reality (metaphysics) and of how to obtain knowledge of that reality (epistemology).

3. A diagnosis of what is wrong with the human condition in the light of 1 and 2.

4. A prescription for curing what is wrong with man's condition in the light of 1, 2, and 3.

5. A hope/vision of the future of man if the prescription in 4 is followed.

 

BOOKS: We will examine these five components of an adequately articulated ideology of human nature as they are revealed in the following books:

 

1. Plato’s Phaedo, trans. G. M. A. Grube (Hackett.)

2. St. Augustine, The Confessions (Mentor.)

3. Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy, trans. Victor Watts (Penguin Books, revised ed., 1999.)

4. Dante, The Inferno (Mentor.)

5. Thomas More, Utopia (Yale University Press.)

6. Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince (Bantam.)

7. Richard H. Popkin, Editor, The Philosophy of the 16th and 17th Centuries (The Free Press.)

8. Fyodor Dostoevski, The Grand Inquisitor on the Nature of Man, trans. Constance Garnett (The Library of the Liberal Arts.)

9. The Portable Nietzsche, ed. and trans. Walter Kaufmann (Penguin Books.)

10. Philosophy 310 COURSE PACKET distributed in class.

 

This course will be an introduction to science fiction and philosophy. We will look at science fiction in several different forms--short stories, books, movies, TV shows, and video games--and use these as a springboard for philosophical topics such as time travel, knowledge and skepticism, language and meaning, free will and determinism, modality and possible worlds. We will supplement the science fiction with articles from various philosophers such as Plato, Descartes, Hume, Leibniz, and contemporary philosophers such as Frege, Kripke, Lewis, Dennett.

 

"Existentialism," writes Alasdair MacIntyre, "is not easily definable. Its protagonists have traced it back to Pascal, to St. Augustine, even to Socrates. It has been alleged in our time to be the doctrine of writers as various as Miguel de Unamuno and Norman Mailer. At first sight, characteristics of the doctrine are almost as various. That two writers both claim to be existentialists does not seem to entail their agreement on any one cardinal point. Consequently, to define existentialism by means of a set of philosophical formulas could be very misleading. Any formula sufficiently broad to embrace all the major existentialist tendencies would necessarily be so general and so vague as to be vacuous, for if we refer to a common emphasis upon, for example, the concreteness of individual human existence, we shall discover that in the case of different philosophers this emphasis is placed in contexts so dissimilar that it is put to incompatible uses." What are we do in a course on existentialism in the light of this truth. Our approach to the study of existentialism in this class will be to trace the historical connections of dependence and influence from one writer to another in terms of a select number of recurring themes. In this philosophical history, we shall cast our net widely and seek out some of the recurring themes of existentialism in works of literature as well as in works by philosophers.

 

REQUIRED BOOKS:

The following editions of the following paperbacks are required:

Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot (Bantam.)

David Bretall, ed., A Kierkegaard Anthology (Princeton.)

Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus (Vintage)

Albert Camus, The Stranger (Vintage.)

Fyodor Dostoevski, The Grand Inquisitor on the Nature of Man (Bobbs-Merrill/Lib.Liberal Arts.)

Bret Easton Ellis, Less Than Zero (Penguin.)

David Hume, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion (Hackett.)

Walter Kaufmann, ed., Existentialism from Dostoyevsky to Sartre (Meridian.)

Walter Kaufmann, ed., The Portable Nietzsche (Penguin Books.)

Jean-Paul Sartre, No Exit and Three Other Plays (Vintage.)

 

A systematic study of sentential logic, elementary quantification, and the logic of identity. The student will acquire specific skills in symbolic methods of analysis which are necessary for further study in logic as well as useful in addressing complex issues in philosophy and other areas.

 

 

 

An introduction to moral problems that arise in contemporary business practice and the ethical frameworks proposed to resolve them. Topics will include areas such as truth-telling and integrity; social responsibility; property rights and their limitations; and justice in personnel and labor practices.

 

In this course, students will study a number of ethical issues commonly faced by people in business-oriented careers. There will be a strong focus on issues involving marketing and business communication. The course will cover topics in marketing, advertising, public relations, corporate social responsibility, and environmental impact. The course will also include a strong emphasis on techniques for carrying on discussions about ethics, both in person and in writing.

 

 

This course provides an examination of several incompatible views concerning the relation between the individual and society, including radical individualism and collectivism, as well as more moderate theories. Attention will be given to contemporary as well as classical spokesmen for these views and emphasis will be placed upon relating these theories to contemporary social, cultural, and political issues.

 

A number of questions define the focus of this class. What is our place, individually, culturally and as a species, in the community of life? Indeed, are we connected to non-human living systems in any moral sense? How can we construct our economy so as to sustain the environment for future generations? For that matter, what does sustainability mean? Conversely, are all values defined solely by reference to human needs or interests? Should we consider animals, plants, or even ecosystems subjects of moral worth? If so, how far does the line of moral considerability extend, and on what basis do we draw this line? And lastly, does wild nature, have value in and of itself? If so, what do we mean by wild nature? As we examine these issues, I will also ask you to keep a journal (blog) in which you reflect on your place here in Lexington as members of a local economy and a biotic community.

 

What is oppression? How and by whom are women oppressed? What are some ways to overcome women’s oppression? This course will examine some answers to these questions through an exploration of some of the following topics: gender roles, images of women in society, language, violence against women, (including sexual harassment and rape), and reproductive choices (including abortion and surrogate motherhood.)

Grading is based on three papers and class participation (10%). This course is designed to shake some of your most fundamental beliefs; hence, it is designed only for students who are open-minded. Since it is a philosophy course, emphasis will be on rigorous argumentation (different from opinion).

 

This course is an introduction to the main concepts, assumptions, problems, and texts of one or more Asian philosophical traditions, such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism.

 

This is an upper-level undergraduate course in contemporary metaphysics and epistemology.

Metaphysics is the area of philosophy that deals with the question: what is there and what is it like? Our focus will be on the topics of universals and particulars, persistence through time and personal identity. The questions we will be looking at include:

Does reality contain universal features (e.g. redness) as well as particular entities (e.g. roses)?

If everything in the world is determined by previous events, can we say that we ever act freely? If we can’t, should this worry us?

What is required for the survival of a thing over time? For example, what makes you the same person today as the person who first enrolled at the University of Kentucky?

 

Epistemology is the area of philosophy that deals with the question: what is the nature of knowledge and reasonable belief? We will concentrate on the topics of skepticism, the definition of knowledge and the nature of justification. The questions we will be looking at include:

Do we know anything about the external world?

What conditions must be met in order to possess knowledge?

What makes it the case that we are justified in having certain beliefs?

 

Understanding death is a profound philosophical problem; and this class is devoted to examining this problem. In these modern times, it is not a simple matter to determine when death arrives. Indeed, today it is possible to keep the body alive in the barest mechanical sense in order to allow the harvesting of valuable organs and tissues. But this biological criterion of death only accentuates the problematic distinction between our biological and personal existence. In this class we examine both the definition and criterion of death and idea of the human person the biological criterion suggests.

 

A philosophical and interdisciplinary investigation of a cluster of prominent issues about the meaning of life and death, caring for dying persons, and the quality of life of the terminally ill. Among topics included are: death definitions and criteria; allowing to die vs. killing; euthanasia and suicide; life prolongation, ethics of care of the terminally ill; and rights of the dying.

 

This course will examine American Idealism in the philosophy of Josiah Royce and then explore several forms of Pragmatism (e.g. Peirce, James and Dewey) that grew up in reaction to it. The last third of the course will review some 20th-century American philosophical movements of interest to students in the class.

 

This course will survey the development of “analytic” philosophy. Beginning with the seminal writings of Frege, we will then study the works of Moore, Russell, Wittgenstein*, Carnap, Ayer, Austin and Wittgenstein**. Topics and issues to be discussed include the following: the nature and role of “analysis” in addressing philosophical problems; the primacy of logic; the status of propositions; and the rise of logical positivism or empiricism.

 

Readings:

Ayer, Alfred J. 1952. Language, Truth and Logic. 2nd ed. New York: Dover.

Carnap, Rudolf. 2003. The Logical Structure of the World and Pseudoproblems in Philosophy.

Translated by Rolf A. George. Chicago: Open Court.

Frege, Gottlob. 1997. The Frege Reader. Edited by Michael Beaney. Malden, MA: Blackwell.

Russell, Bertrand. 2007. Logic and Knowledge: Essays 1901-1950. Nottingham: Spokesman Books.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig. 2001. Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. 2nd ed. London: Routledge.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig. 2009. Philosophical Investigations. 4th Revised edition. London: Wiley-

Blackwell.

And selected essays.

 

In this course we will investigate existentialism as a distinctive philosophical movement with its roots in the nineteenth century and its systematic articulation in the first half of the twentieth century. This is an advanced course in the history of philosophy and is open to both undergraduate and graduate students. We will focus upon a set of systematic problems -- including freedom, responsibility, nihilism, value creation, finitude, temporality, contingency, and anxiety -- and will try to understand them both in their historical contexts and in their systematic interrelations. We will not pay special attention in this course to the literary and cultural aspects of existentialism. (Students interested primarily in the latter and students with little prior background in the history of modern European philosophy should enroll in PHI 317.) We will read, discuss, analyze, and criticize substantial selections from the writings of: Soren Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, and Jean-Paul Sartre.

 

Prerequisites: PHI 270 (History of Philosophy II) or consent of instructor.

 

Course requirements and grades: 2 required papers (5-8 pp. in length) during the course of the semester, 2 in-class essay examinations, and a term paper on a topic to be negotiated with the instructor. (Term papers from undergraduates should be between 10 and 12 pages in length, those from graduate students will be expected to be longer and more substantial, i.e., 15-20 pages in length.) Late papers will be accepted only by prior arrangement. No grades of "incomplete" will be awarded in this class except by prior arrangement

 

Required Texts

The Essential Kierkegaard, ed. and trans. Howard and Edna W. Hong (Princeton)

The Portable Nietzsche, ed. and trans. Walter Kaufmann (Viking/Penguin)

Martin Heidegger, Being and Time, trans. Joan Stambaugh (SUNY)

Jean-Paul Sartre, Basic Writings, ed. S. Priest

 

This course provides a pluralistic introduction to major 20th-century paradigms of critical social thought. Critical social thought in philosophy comprises those authors and schools that focus philosophical methods and questions on the analysis of social conditions and/or focus socio/cultural methods and questions on the study of philosophy. These include feminist philosophy, Freudian psychoanalysis, Marxist-influenced critical social theory, postructuralism, and critical race theory. We will pay careful attention to how social theory develops as an attempt to address from a philosophical perspective the development of what Axel Honneth calls social pathologies. We will also use the reading material to help us understand the nature of the social contradictions by which we are constituted as social beings.

*This course meets the 20th Century Value Theory requirement for graduate students in philosophy.

 

An intermediate course in symbolic logic which reviews sentential logic, develops further the logic of quantification, and introduces metalogical issues such as the soundness and completeness of deductive systems. Much of the second half of the course will be devoted to modal logic, the logic of possibility and necessity.

 

Where does morality come from? What is morality? What would the ideal moral person be like?

Why should we be moral? This course will examine some of the attempts given by moral philosophers throughout the history of philosophy to answer these fundamental questions about morality. In addition, we will examine a number of central issues raised by traditional moral theories that interest contemporary moral philosophers. Emphasis will be on rigorous argumentation which will be expected in papers. Grading will be based on two term papers (40% each), and class participation (20%). Graduate students will be expected to do research papers related to topics we will be covering in the course.

 

Required texts:

Hobbes, Leviathan

Mill, Utilitarianism

Kant, Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals

Hume, An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals

A packet from Johnny Print

 

*This course meets the 20th Century Value Theory requirement for graduate students in philosophy.

 

This course will center around contemporary and current discussions in analytic metaphysics. In particular, we will investigate questions of ontological commitment, possible worlds, properties, and composition and constitution.

 

*This course meets the 20th Century M&E requirement for graduate students in philosophy.

 

The course aims to give a general understanding of the project of Hegel’s absolute idealism and how it has been taken up by recent scholarship.

The course will proceed with a reading of Hegel’s Preface and Lordship and Bondage chapter from the Phenomenology of Spirit. After this we will turn to some recent interpretations of this text (Brandom, McDowell, Pippin). Then we will read the Introduction as well as the Logic section of the Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences, turning finally to readings of Hegel by Heidegger, Adorno, Derrida and Butler.

 

In this seminar, we will focus on Kant’s theory of concepts and judgments. What are (pure and empirical) concepts? What are judgments? How do we arrive at and employ concepts? What is the nature of non-conceptual mental content? We will also try to understand Kant’s theory in its historical context: both in terms of what he was reacting against (e.g., the views of Descartes, Leibniz and Locke) and in terms of how later “Kantians” (e.g. Frege, Cassirer, Sellars) have developed his views.

 

Required Books:

Kant, Immanuel. 1999. Critique of Pure Reason. Edited by Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood.

Translated by Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Kant, Immanuel. 2001. Critique of the Power of Judgment. Edited by Paul Guyer and Eric

Matthews. Translated by Paul Guyer and Eric Matthews. 1st ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Kant, Immanuel. 2004. Lectures on Logic. Edited by J. Michael Young. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

 

This is a graduate seminar on the imagination. Simply speaking, to imagine something—a given object or circumstance—is to form some kind of representation of it ‘in the mind’. In this seminar, we will examine what it is to do, or to accomplish, such a mental task. Must the imagination involve mental imagery of some sort and, if so, what is the nature of such imagery? In doing so, we will consider how questions of the imagination drive, or can contribute to, ‘bigger’ issues in philosophy—issues such as the nature of mind and mental states, the nature of certain types of reasoning and, in turn, the question of philosophical methodology itself.

 

*This course meets the 20th Century M&E requirement for graduate students in philosophy.