|
Below is a
sample of courses offered for the 2000–2001
academic year:
Spring 2001:
Undergraduate Courses:
Philosophy
001: Introduction to Philosophy: The course
will look at the ways in which three philosophers
with widely divergent views—Plato, Kant and
Nietzsche—come to grips with such issues as
the nature of the just and moral individual/society,
what it is to be a person, and whether and to
what extent the world is as it appears to us.
(Instructor: P. Keller)
Philosophy
002: Contemporary Moral Issues: A philosophical
analysis of some contemporary moral issues such
as abortion, discrimination, sexual morality,
punishment, the obligation to obey the law,
suicide, enthanasia, war, and privacy. (Instructor:
D. Wilson)
Philosophy
007: Introduction to Critical Thinking: This
class is UCR's version of a basic reasoning
course, sometimes called critical thinking or
informal logic. It begins with exercise
in examining expository writing for structure
and content, developing a technique for concise
paraphrase. This technique is then refined
to isolate argument patterns of various kinds,
and generate an evaluative vocabulary and apparatus.
Most examples are taken from everyday journalism.
(Instructor: J Vanderpool)
Philosophy
008: Introduction to Logic: A basic introduction
to symbolic, deductive logic. The main goal
of the course is twofold: to learn to distinguish,
in a precise way, valid deductive arguments
from those that are invalid; to learn to use,
to this and some related ends, the symbolism
and techniques of formal logic. (Instructor:
D. Sklenar)
Philosophy
111I: Philosophy, Film, and Reflective Popular
Culture: In this course we will explore
a number of philosophical themes that are developed
in movies. Many of these movies we will watch
together in class and then discuss, sometimes
also reading philosophical articles that develop
related ideas. Occasionally, movies will be
assigned for watching as videos at home. There
will be extensive discussions both of the movies
and the philosophical ideas developed in them.
(Instructor: H. Wettstein)
Philosophy
116: Business Ethics: This course will introduce
students to the practice of ethical reasoning.
Along the way we will discuss moral theory and
its application to issues confronting business
persons. In particular we will explore issues
such as the place of vocation in a meaningful
life, the social and environmental responsibilities
of employees and businesses, the responsibilities
of employees to employers and co-workers, and
the responsibilities businesses have to their
consumers. (Instructor: C. Cranor)
Philosophy
118: Personhood and Personal Identity: We
will discuss the basic elements of the concept
of personhood, and how persons are alleged to
be crucially different from non-human animals.
Various theories are considered about what is
essential to us as individuals and what makes
us the same person over time. (Instructor:
D. Sklenar)
Philosophy
120N: Nietzsche: This course is devoted
to a presentation, examination and discussion
of Nietzsche’s philosophy based on a reading
of some of his most famous books, Twilight
of the Idols, Thus Spoke Zarathustra,
and On the Genealogy of Morals, as well
as selected secondary sources. Other works
of Nietzsche’s will be used to shed light on
these texts and on Nietzsche’s philosophy in
general, on an as-needed basis. (Instructor:
B. Magnus)
Philosophy
120U: Thomas Reid: The 18th century Scottish
philosopher Thomas Reid is one of the leading
proponents of what is known as the agent theory
of causation. We will examine his major work
on agency, "Essays on the Active Powers
of the Human Mind." (Instructor: P.
Hoffman)
Philosophy
125: Intermediate Logic: An introduction
to the metatheory of first-order logic. The
main focus of the class will be on the relation
between its syntax (formulas, rules of inference,
and proofs) and its semantics (interpretations,
truth, and validity), including proofs of the
corresponding soundness and completeness theorems.
(Instructor: E. Reck)
Philosophy
152: Philosophy of Language: The course
will serve as an introduction to this fundamental
area of philosophy. One question we will confront
at the beginning is why language is of such
interest to philosophy. And what kinds of questions
do philosophical theories of language seek to
answer? We will then have a look at several
major philosophical approaches to language.
One special focus will be the work of Bertrand
Russell, specifically his "theory of descriptions."
This theory was thought for much of the 20th
century to be a "paradigm of philosophy,"
a kind of perfect example of a philosophical
theory. But Russell’s work was heavily criticized
late in the century. What’s the real significance
of this debate? What larger questions about
philosophy and about human beings does it illuminate?
(Instructor: H. Wettstein)
Philosophy
174: Ethics: This course will examine three
classical moral theories: Utilitarianism (via
Mill’s Utilitarianism), Kantianism (via
Kant’s Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals),
and selected writings on Virtue Ethics. (Instructor:
G. Watson)
Philosophy
178: Philosophy of Feminism: An analysis
of current concepts and debates in feminist
philosophy, including gender equality, gender
difference, and the relation of sex and gender.
The class will situate various approaches to
these topics in the history of philosophy.
(Instructor: G. Warnke)
Philosophy
189G: Isaiah Berlin: This upper division
course in the history of political philosophy
will sample the writings of the late, great
Sir Isaiah Berlin. Our primary text will be
the recent anthology of his writings: The
Proper Study of Mankind. We shall attend
to Berlin’s method of approaching political
thought from within its historical context,
appealing to case studies instead of universal
theories. (Instructor: D. Glidden)
Philosophy
192: Agency and Autonomy (Junior Seminar): The
topic of this seminar will be recent discussions
of autonomy and human agency. Many philosophers
believe that the capacity for critical reflection
on one’s desires, beliefs and values is essential
to autonomy, and more generally is an essential
feature of human agency and of what it is to
be a person. The seminar will explore these
ideas through careful reading of an influential
series of papers by Harry Frankfurt and of reactions
to Frankfurt’s work. We will read a few articles
for each seminar. The emphasis will be on careful
reading and discussion. This course is listed
as a "Junior Seminar" but is open
to any upper division philosophy major. (Instructor:
A. Reath)
Graduate Courses:
Philosophy
255C: Proseminar for First Year Graduate Students:
This class will be an introduction to the
major debates in contemporary philosophy in
the fields of free will and moral responsibility.
Some of the main questions will be: Is causal
determinism incompatible with free will and
moral responsibility? What is the relationship
between moral responsibility and alternative
possibilities? What is moral responsibility,
and why do (should) we care about it? We will
study Laura Ekstrom’s recent introductory book
on free will, supplemented by some additional
readings (primary journal articles). (Instructor:
J. Fischer)
Philosophy
270: Practicing Philosophy in Greco-Roman Antiquity:
This class will explore efforts in later Greco-Roman
antiquity to rebut skepticism by demonstrating
the practical value of philosophy as a way of
life. We will sample the writings of Seneca,
Plutarch, Epictetus, and Marcus, among others.
(Instructor: D. Glidden)
Philosophy
280-001: Frege and the Notion of Sense:
In this class we will examine Frege’s notion
of sense and its reception in recent philosophy
of language. We will start by reading several
of Frege’s classic articles in which the sense-reference
distinction is introduced. After that we will
compare recent reactions (interpretations, criticisms,
and defenses) by a number of commentators, including
Bell, Burge, Carl, Dummett, Evans, Kripke, Perry,
Salmon, and Sluga. (Instructor: E. Reck)
Philosophy
280-002: Know-How and the Diffusion of
Mind in the World: We will examine the writings
of philosophers of mind, such as Gilbert Ryle,
John Dewey, Hubert Dreyfus, and Andy Clark,
who have used reflection on know-how to challenge
internalist and propositional approaches to
the mind. (Instructor: E. Schwitzgebel)
Fall
2000:
Undergraduate
Courses:
Philosophy
001: Introduction to Philosophy (Instructor:
H. Wettstein)
Philosophy
001H: Honors Introduction to Philosophy (Instructor:
H. Wettstein)
Philosophy
002: Contemporary Moral Issues (Instructor:
J. Fischer)
Philosophy
007: Critical Thinking (Instructor: L. Wright)
Philosophy
008: Introduction to Logic (Instructor: E. Reck)
Philosophy
008H: Honors Introduction to Logic (Instructor:
E. Reck)
Philosoph
116: Business Ethics (Instructor: G. Pettigrove)
Philosoph
120E: Locke and Leibniz (Instructor: P. Hoffman)
Philosophy
121X: Moral Theories of Hume and Kant (Instructor:
P. Keller)
Philosophy
153: Philosophy of Mind (Instructor: E. Schwitzgebel)
Philosophy
177: Justice (Instructor: A. Reath)
Graduate
Seminars:
Philosophy
255A: Proseminar (for first-year graduate students)
(Instructor: P. Keller)
Philosophy
280-001: Special Seminar with Prof. H. Frankfurt
(Instructor: H. Frankfurt)
Philosophy
280-003: Contemporary Moral Theory (Instructor:
G. Watson)
Philosophy
280-002: Postmodern Ethical Theory (Instructor:
B. Magnus)
Winter
2001:
Undergraduate
Courses:
Philosophy
001: Introduction to Philosophy (Instructor:
D. Glidden)
Philosophy
002: Contemporary Moral Issues (Instructor:
G. Watson)
Philosophy
007: Critical Thinking (Instructor: L. Wright)
Philosophy
008: Introduction to Logic (Instructor: D. Sklenar)
Philosophy
030I: Introduction to the History of Philosophy
(Instructor: P. Hoffman)
Philosophy
110: Asian Philosophy (Instructor: E. Schwitzgebel)
Philosophy
112: Mortal Questions (Instructor: J. Fischer)
Philosophy
117: Environmental Ethics (Instructor: C. Cranor)
Philosophy
120Q: Plato (Instructor: D. Glidden)
Philosophy
121T: Nineteenth-Century Philosophy (Instructor:
P. Keller)
Philosophy
124: Formal Logic (Instructor: E. Reck)
Philosophy
151: Metaphysics (Instructor: D. Sklenar)
Philosophy
183: Philosophy of Law (Instructor: D. Wilson)
Philosophy
188: Biomedical Ethics (Instructor: D. Wilson)
Graduate
Seminars:
Philosophy
255B: Proseminar (for first-year graduate students)
(Instructor: L. Wright)
Philosophy
280-001: Rawls’s Theory of Justice (Instructor:
A. Reath)
Philosophy
280-002: Race, Gender, Sex, and Identity (Instructor:
G. Warnke)
Philosophy
280-003: Wittgenstein’s On Certainty
(Instructor: H. Wettstein)
|
