Courses

Current Course Descriptions (Spring 2010)

Philosophy 001 / Introduction to Philosophy

In all sections of Philosophy 001, an enrollment maximum will be strictly enforced. The sections are taught as independent classes, each with separate reading lists, assignments, and examination policies; but the following features are common to all:

The classes are small and designed to introduce students to philosophical thinking through the reading of a few great texts.
The classes stress the development of good writing, reading, and thinking habits by encouraging critical analysis, philosophical debate and discussion, and clear, rigorous writing.
Each section requires at least five short papers, which are carefully criticized and graded, with attention paid both to philosophical cogency and style.
Students having credit for English 001 may use Philosophy 001 to satisfy the second half of the College Writing Requirement as well as the Humanities Requirement.

Philosophy 001-Section 01 / Introduction to Philosophy

Christopher Robichaud / E+MW / Monday, Wednesday 10:30 – 11:45
Introduction to Philosophy will explore some of the central questions that have occupied philosophers for millennia. We'll consider such topics as whether there are good arguments for or against the existence of God, whether we can know we're not in The Matrix, and what the relationship is between the mind and the body. Classic and contemporary readings will compliment classroom discussions in tackling these and other issues, and there will be an emphasis on learning how to write good argumentative papers.

Philosophy 001-Section 02 / Introduction to Philosophy

Christopher Robichaud / G+MW / Monday, Wednesday 1:30 – 2:45
Introduction to Philosophy will explore some of the central questions that have occupied philosophers for millennia. We'll consider such topics as whether there are good arguments for or against the existence of God, whether we can know we're not in The Matrix, and what the relationship is between the mind and the body. Classic and contemporary readings will compliment classroom discussions in tackling these and other issues, and there will be an emphasis on learning how to write good argumentative papers.

Philosophy 001-Section 03 / Introduction to Philosophy

Indrani Bhattacharjee / I+MW / Monday, Wednesday 3:00 – 4:15
This course is designed to introduce students to some central issues in two core areas of philosophy, namely, epistemology and philosophy of mind. We will study some classic answers to such questions as the following:

How is it possible to know anything?
What is knowledge and how do we go about having it?
What IS the mind anyway?
What does it mean to say that we are conscious?

We will explore these issues through the writings of eminent philosophers ranging from such "greats" as Descartes, Hume and Kant to more contemporary philosophers working in the Anglo-American Analytic tradition. This is meant to be a topic-based introduction, not a historical survey of the topics we will be studying (although students will come to have an idea of the history of the development of the debates in question).

Philosophy 001-Section 04 / Introduction to Philosophy

Jeff McConnell / G+MW / Monday, Wednesday 1:30 – 2:45
Epistemology is the philosophical study of knowledge. Metaphysics is the philosophical study of the ultimate character of reality. What can we know about the ultimate character of reality? This section is an introduction to epistemology and to metaphysics through the close reading of important texts from throughout the history of philosophy. We will examine some central metaphysical problems: What is the relation between the mind and the body? Do we have free will? Are our actions causally determined? Why is there something rather than nothing? What is the origin of the order and of the complexity in the world? What makes us the same persons over time? What is truth? How can we know if there is a world outside our minds? Can we know whether or not there is a God? Throughout the course, we will be concerned with the relation between metaphysics and epistemology. In particular, we will be worried about whether there is a connection between what we can know and what the world is like. Readings will be drawn from Plato, Aquinas, Descartes, Hume, Kant, Nietzsche and Russell, but we will also read several contemporary authors to see how these same questions are treated today. There will be weekly writing assignments and a final take-home examination.

Philosophy 001-Section 05 / Introduction to Philosophy

Jeff McConnell / K+MW / Monday, Wednesday 4:30 – 5:45

Philosophy 001-05R/Mandatory Film Section

Monday 7:00 – 9:30
This section is an introduction to philosophy by way of film. In a sense, films create their own "reality." What is this thing they create—"reality"? How do they create it? Do they, in fact, "really" create it? Philosophers have not until very recently been much concerned with film, but they have had a longstanding concern with "reality"—about what it is and about how we can know anything about it. We will discuss a variety of films, mostly cinema classics made after 1950, which raise questions about how film itself can "create a reality." The films will raise questions as well about some related philosophical problems: the relation between mind and body, the existence of the soul and of God, and the nature of existence itself, of truth and of possibility. The classic status of many of the films we discuss will be
connected to the philosophical questions they raise; so often we will discuss what these connections are and why these connections makes them film classics.

Throughout, we will read and discuss classical and contemporary texts by philosophers that are related to the films. There will be regular showings of the films to be discussed. Since this is a writing course, students will be expected to do regular writing assignments in conjunction with their viewing and reading, and there will be a final take-home examination.
NOTE: It is required that you attend the film screenings on Mondays.

Philosophy 001-Section 06 / Introduction to Philosophy

Benjamin Allen / D+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 10:30 – 11:45
Evil. Beauty. Death. Time. Infinity.

We will examine five philosophically perplexing topics, topics that many of us have wondered about at one time or another. In each case, we'll start from scratch, trying to survey the range of questions that might confront a philosophical investigator. Then we'll proceed to read a series of writings by philosophers on the given theme.

The goal is to learn to think and write philosophically about ideas that we have already encountered, but may not have examined.

Philosophy 001-Section 07 / Introduction to Philosophy

Susan Russinoff / J+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 3:00 – 4:15
This is an introduction to philosophy through an examination of some of the classical problems in the history of Western Philosophy. We start by investigating various kinds of reasoning used by philosophers and then take a careful look at questions concerning belief, knowledge, and reality. We also explore how humans ought to make decisions, and investigate questions that arise when we think about whether an act is right or wrong. This is done, in part, by considering and evaluating answers given by various philosophers and their reasons for giving them. The course introduces you to several areas of philosophy and helps to develop both your analytic skills and your ability to express your own views and thoughts clearly. Readings will include selections by Descartes, Berkeley, Hume, Goodman, Pascal, Mill, and Kant. Students will write five short essays and will be given the opportunity to write several drafts of each.

Philosophy 001-Section 08 / Introduction to Philosophy

Valentina Urbanek / H+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 1:30 – 2:45
In this course, we will ask and attempt to answer big metaphysical questions: What are we -- are we immaterial things, bodily things, some complicated combination? What happens to us when we die? Does God exist? Do we have free will?

We will also ask and attempt to answer big epistemological questions: How could we ever come to know the answers to these important metaphysical questions? What is knowledge and how do we get it -- via our senses, by reasoning alone? Is knowledge even attainable?

Throughout our examination of these metaphysical and epistemological questions, we will discuss questions about values and what we should do. What attitude should we take toward death? Is suicide immoral? If we don't have free will, does that mean that everything that we do is pointless? If we can't prove that some of our most fundamental beliefs are true, would it matter -- how should we go on with life?

Great philosophers have proposed sophisticated answers to these questions. We will read their works, consider their theories, analyze their arguments, and grapple with our own answers, however tentative, to these big questions.

Philosophy 001-Section 09 / Introduction to Philosophy

Valentina Urbanek / J+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 3:00 – 4:15
In this course, we will ask and attempt to answer big metaphysical questions: What are we -- are we immaterial things, bodily things, some complicated combination? What happens to us when we die? Does God exist? Do we have free will?

We will also ask and attempt to answer big epistemological questions: How could we ever come to know the answers to these important metaphysical questions? What is knowledge and how do we get it -- via our senses, by reasoning alone? Is knowledge even attainable?

Throughout our examination of these metaphysical and epistemological questions, we will discuss questions about values and what we should do. What attitude should we take toward death? Is suicide immoral? If we don't have free will, does that mean that everything that we do is pointless? If we can't prove that some of our most fundamental beliefs are true, would it matter -- how should we go on with life?

Great philosophers have proposed sophisticated answers to these questions. We will read their works, consider their theories, analyze their arguments, and grapple with our own answers, however tentative, to these big questions.

Philosophy 001-Section 10 / Introduction to Philosophy

Gal Kober / L+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 4:30 – 5:45

What can we know? How can we know it? This course is an introduction to philosophy through seminal questions concerning knowledge. We will investigate such questions as how we acquire knowledge, the ability to articulate our knowledge, the relation between theoretical and practical knowledge, and especially the relation between external reality and what we can know of it. We will explore these issues through the writings of major figures in the history of Western philosophy, such as Plato, Descartes, Hume, Kant, Wittgenstein, and Moore.

Philosophy 001-Section 11 / Introduction to Philosophy

Gal Kober / N+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 6:00 – 7:15
What can we know? How can we know it? This course is an introduction to philosophy through seminal questions concerning knowledge. We will investigate such questions as how we acquire knowledge, the ability to articulate our knowledge, the relation between theoretical and practical knowledge, and especially the relation between external reality and what we can know of it. We will explore these issues through the writings of major figures in the history of Western philosophy, such as Plato, Descartes, Hume, Kant, Wittgenstein, and Moore.

Philosophy 24 / Intro to Ethics

David Denby / H+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 1:30 – 2:45
At this moment, like every other, you're faced with a question: What should I do?

People often say that, in general, what you should do is help others. But then they would, wouldn't they? Perhaps what you really should do is always act in your own self-interest. Perhaps that is what everyone else is already doing anyway (despite what they say).

Some people say that you should promote the values of your community or society. But some societies have vile values. Indeed, don't the values of our society need at least a little adjustment? Anyway, why should the fact that a society is yours mean that you should promote its values, especially if doing so is contrary to your self-interest?

Some people say that you should act according to God's will. But what does God will, exactly? And surely we should obey Him only if He is good and commands us to do what is right. Yet that seems to mean that morality is independent of Him.

Some philosophers have argued that whether you should do an action depends entirely on its consequences (compared to those of its alternatives). But should you really ignore the past? Doesn't just punishment, for instance, depend on whether the person is actually guilty -- a fact about the past? Other philosophers have focused instead on the motives behind an action, in particular on whether you're acting out of respect for others (and yourself). Still others have argued that whether you should do an action depends on a combination of these and perhaps other factors. But each of these suggestions faces problems: What on earth is "respecting others"? What is it to "combine" the various factors? Self-interest then? Maybe, but even self-interest is a tricky notion. Something is not in your self-interest simply because you want it, as every smoker knows. And maybe our interests, or at least the best means for achieving them, are mutually interdependent: perhaps the best way for you to get what you want depends on what I do and vice versa.

We will discuss all this in this course. After a brief introductory discussion of logic and the nature of ethical theory we will spend most of the semester critically evaluating a number of normative ethical theories. These will include various forms of Relativism, religiously-based theories, Utilitarianism, Kantianism, Egoism and Social Contract theories. We will also discuss self-interest, values, and other matters. Finally, we will discuss how to apply what we've learned to an issue of contemporary moral concern – probably abortion.

Philosophy 33 / Logic

Susan Russinoff / F / Tuesday, Thursday, Friday 12:00 – 12:50
*Satisfies Tufts Mathematical Sciences Distribution Requirement

How can one tell whether a deductive argument succeeds in establishing its conclusion? What distinguishes good deductive arguments from bad ones? Questions such as these will be addressed in this course. We will discuss what a formal language is, how arguments in English are to be expressed in various formal languages, and what is gained from so expressing them. In the jargon of the field, we will cover sentential logic, first-order predicate logic, identity theory, definite descriptions, and topics in metatheory. The course requires no specific background and no special ability in mathematics.

Philosophy 54 / Philosophy & Film

Stephen White / I+MW / Monday, Wednesday 3:00 – 4:15
Since the seventeenth century our primary metaphors for the mind, at least in the sense of conscious subjective (visual) perceptual experience, have been pictorial. That is they have been based on analogies between visual experience and either painting or photography. Hume's impressions and ideas, for example, are picture-like images, and so-called sense-datum theories—the standard theories of this aspect of the mind from the seventeenth century to the latter half of the twentieth century—involve a similar conception. Such theories were challenged in the second half of the twentieth century from three philosophical perspectives—those of phenomenology (Husserl, Heidegger, Sartre, and Merleau-Ponty), the later Wittgenstein, and some contemporary analytic philosophy.

Our route into such philosophical topics will be through film theory. The classical film theories—theories such as those of Eisenstein, Bazin, and Metz—take as basic the idea of an image or shot produced in a more or less unproblematic and mechanical way by the causal interaction between the camera and the external space in front of it. According to these theories, the creative contribution of the filmmaker is limited by the set of possible ways in which such images can be linked together to form larger wholes. We will see many films that challenge the adequacy of this conception, and, by analogy, such challenges will have important implications for sense-datum theories and for our conceptions of the mind. And although most work in contemporary analytic philosophy of perception is importantly different from sense-datum theories, most involves a commitment to representational (as opposed to direct or naïve) realism and raise many of the same problems.

The problem such theories raise, in its most general form, might be termed the problem of "otherness"—the problem of making sense of, and doing justice to, the otherness of external objects and nature, other minds, and radically different conceptual schemes and forms of life. Since Kant, much of the most important work on such problems has been done in aesthetics in the context of discussions of the "sublime", a concept that is of crucial importance to the aesthetic theories and artistic practices of the 20th century. We will discuss the importance of the concept from romantic philosophy to the present and will trace images of the sublime through a number of films. We will also trace images that reflect a number of related themes in romantic thought, including that of the "double."

We will also discuss an equally important concept in aesthetic theory—that of expression—in the context of contemporary theories of the emotions, and we will consider the complex relations between expression and representation. With all these issues in mind, we will consider a recent controversy in film theory—whether film is a medium in which it is possible to do original philosophy. We will also consider whether, for this purpose, it has, as a medium, any advantages over written texts. Finally, we will look at the relation between this question and recent interpretations of Wittgenstein's philosophical practice.

Philosophy 92-01 / The Social Construction of Reality

Brian Epstein / F+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 12:00 – 1:15
Is the division of people into races based in biology? Or is it a product of human imagination or social organization, a category we do not discover in the world but rather project onto it? Are gender differences a construction of history and culture, or natural distinctions between different kinds of people? In the last few decades, many theorists and social critics have argued that a great number of facts are "socially constructed." Some have even claimed that quarks and planets and lumps of gold are social artifacts, whose existence depends on how we conceive of them. Such claims have elicited a sharp reaction from many philosophers, who have strongly defended the objectivity of science and realism about natural categories and kinds. Others have worked to bridge these extremes, proposing theories of social facts that are created by humans while leaving room for natural or brute facts about the world that are independent of humans.

In this class, we will examine the historical and contemporary debates on social construction. The first third of the course will look at the history of the debate, considering how social construction arises and differs in a variety of philosophical traditions, including 18th century empiricism and the romantic tradition, German idealism, and Marxism. In the second part of the course, we will examine contemporary varieties of social constructivism, from mid-century empiricism and structural anthropology to post-structuralism and the sociology of science. We will also consider contemporary critics of social construction. The third part of course will focus on race, considering arguments for taking biological and other naturalistic approaches to race, various views of race as a social construction, and eliminativist approaches that would dismiss race as an illusion.

The course has no prerequisites, and does not require any prior experience with the topic or philosophical traditions to be addressed. It is intended to be an accessible but philosophically careful introduction to the topic. Readings drawn from Condillac, Herder, Schleiermacher, Kant, Marx, Quine, Foucault, Barnes and Bloor, Hacking, Sokal, Lewis, Searle, Kitcher, Appiah, and others.

Philosophy 92-02 / Paradoxes

Benjamin Allen / 5 / Monday 1:30 – 4:00
This sentence is false. But is it really? Suppose it is. Since it says it's false, and we're supposing that's wrong, it must actually be true. So it can't be false. It must be true then. But since what it says is that it's false, it must be false. So it can't actually be true. We've deduced that it can't be false and it can't be true. But it seems it must be one or the other. This is the Liar Paradox.

Consider an arrow in flight. At a single instant, it's not moving, since it traverses no space at all. But the whole time of its flight is composed of instants. And if it's not moving in any single instant, it won't be moving in the whole collection of instants. So the arrow is at rest during it's entire flight. But that's absurd. This is the Arrow Paradox.

We might describe a paradox as involving a seemingly absurd conclusion apparently supported by reasoning. There are many paradoxes, and philosophers have devoted considerable attention to figuring out exactly what we should say about them.

It might seem that paradoxes are silly. But it turns out that trying to analyze what, if anything, is wrong with a paradox forces us into investigations of deep philosophical issues. With the Liar Paradox, we may be forced to investigate the nature of language: What is it that actually makes a sentence true or false? What makes a sentence mean anything at all? With the Arrow Paradox, we may find ourselves asking: What is motion? What are space and time?

This course will survey a range of paradoxes, dealing with such issues as motion, space, time, knowledge, belief, language, rationality, morality, and truth. We'll devote considerable attention to attempts to "resolve" particular paradoxes, attempts to render them no longer perplexing. In doing so, we'll examine the philosophical presuppositions that are involved in each attempt. We'll also take a historical look at the earliest known paradoxes, and we'll consider the broad philosophical question of how we ought to approach paradoxes in general.

Philosophy 92-03 / Descartes to Kant

David Denby / L+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 4:30 – 5:45
The seventeenth and eighteenth centuries saw a sea change in ways of thinking about our world and ourselves. In this course we will focus on some central epistemological and metaphysical questions about which the philosophers of this period had some brilliant and seminal, though often surprising things to say: What do we know (for certain), and how do we know it? What are the limits of knowledge? What is a substance? How do substances interact? How many different kinds of substance and different substances of each kind are there? Are there non-physical souls in addition to physical objects? Is there a God? Do we act freely? We will also look more briefly at several other issues, for instance, philosophical and scientific method, and causation. I'm sure other things will crop up too.

Our approach will be problem-centered rather than historical. These are live issues and we will approach the readings in that spirit and I hope there will be plenty of classroom discussion. But the course is also intended as an introduction to a golden age in philosophy. We will read Descartes, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, and Kant as well as smaller selections from other more minor figures. No previous acquaintance with philosophy is required.

Philosophy 92-04 / Emerson & Thoreau

Avner Baz / D+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 10:30 – 11:45
Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau are not typically considered to be philosophers, even by those who admire them; nor are they taken to have something important to say to contemporary philosophers working within the analytic tradition. The purpose of this course is to show that philosophers have reason to take Emerson and Thoreau seriously. We will see that Emerson and Thoreau speak directly to two important philosophical concerns: The first is skepticism about 'the external world', and the second 9is the nature and status of the moral assessment of human life and conduct. Their views on these two areas of philosophical concern invite us to question the prevailing philosophical understanding of both skepticism and morality. Even more interestingly, Emerson and Thoreau invite us to transform the way we think about skepticism and morality, by inviting us to re-consider the relation between the two.

In addition to reading closely Emerson's 'Self-Reliance' and 'Experience' and Thoreau's 'Walden' and 'Life Without Principles', we shall also read significant portions of Descartes' Meditations and Kant's Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals, in order to place Emerson's and Thoreau's writings in relation to these two central texts of modern western philosophy. We shall also watch a couple of films and read Ibsen's A Doll's house, in order to anchor our philosophical reflection in concrete examples of human life.

Philosophy 112 / Syntactic Theory

Ray Jackendoff / E+MW / Monday, Wednesday 10:30 – 11:45
Syntactic theory, the study of grammatical structure, is the core subcomponent of contemporary linguistics. Topics of the course include: Syntactic categories, phrase structure, long-distance dependencies, the balance between grammar and lexicon and between syntax and semantics, syntactic universals, and the innate predispositions required for children to learn the syntactic structure of their native languages. Multiple theoretical approaches will be compared.

Prerequisite: Introduction to Linguistics or consent.

Philosophy 117 / Philosophy of Mind

Stephen White / M+MW / Monday, Wednesday 6:00-7:15
This course will focus on the nature of conscious experience, its relation to the subjective point of view, and the implications of both for the mind-body problem, the problem of agency, and the problem of other minds. The traditional mind-body problem has been taken to raise such questions as whether we could continue to exist after our bodies had been destroyed and whether computers could be conscious. We will consider these questions, but we will also consider carefully the nature of the subjective point of view and the question what is involved in seeing a world that contains opportunities for genuine action, states of affairs worth striving for, and agents like ourselves.

We will begin by examining the Cartesian conception of consciousness, which holds that the intrinsic features of conscious experience are fully manifest and completely given at the time the experience takes place. The intuition behind this conception is that conscious experience has no hidden sides and no unnoticed features. This intuition supports the sense-datum theories of consciousness and experience held by the major figures from Descartes to Russell and implicit in many contemporary arguments that there could not be a naturalistic account of "qualia."

We will go on to consider a wide range of problems for this conception of consciousness, such as our ability to perceive depth and to perceive aspects. We will then look at some of the contemporary alternatives to the Cartesian conception, including behaviorism, physicalism, and functionalism and explore their implications for such topics as narrow content, mental imagery, and the emotions. Despite the success of some of these theories in handling a number of the relevant issues, the objection remains that such theories fail to explain the depth and significance of the distinction between those entities that do and those entities that do not enjoy consciousness.

We will then examine the relation between consciousness and our perceptual experience of the external world. Recent work on the "phenomenology" of perception has centered on the thesis of disjunctivism--that as between veridical perception and a matching hallucination there is no "highest common mental factor" in virtue of which we are given the world only indirectly. Though disjunctivism provides an attractive (anti-skeptical) position in epistemology, in its apparent denial of the reality of full-blown subjective experience in cases of hallucination, it raises apparently intractable problems in the philosophy of mind. Our discussion, in this context, of the varieties of the "internalism/externalism distinction" will cut across not only the boundary between epistemology and philosophy of mind, but will have important implications for virtually every major area of philosophy.

Finally, we will examine the concept of nonconceptual content and ask whether we can make sense of a kind of content that is radically different from the kind we normally suppose our mental states to have in virtue of our having a natural language.

Philosophy 120 / Metaphysics

Brian Epstein / L+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 4:30 – 5:45
This course is a survey of contemporary metaphysics. Metaphysics is the study of basic questions about the nature of reality. In ordinary conversation, we seem to commit ourselves to the existence of many puzzling objects. We talk about the sum of two numbers, about having thoughts, about the causes of an event, and about durations of time. But are there such things as numbers? Are there abstract objects as well as concrete ones? What is the relation between mental objects and physical objects? What is the nature of time, and of causation?
In the first part of the class will examine a number of key questions in contemporary metaphysics: universals and natural kinds, necessity and possibility, and the nature of time and the persistence of objects over time. In the second part, we will focus in particular on problems with causation and the nature of natural laws. We will consider classic arguments on the metaphysics of causal connections between events, and survey a number of different views taken by contemporary philosophers. The aim of the course is to provide a rigorous overview of important issues in metaphysics, and to cover central methods and concepts for understanding work in contemporary philosophy.

Prerequisites: At least one previous course in philosophy is strongly recommended, and it will be helpful but not required to have taken a logic course. Readings from Russell, Ayer, Quine, Lewis, Mackie, Salmon, Kripke, Kim, and others.

Philosophy 123 / Philosophy of Law

Erin Kelly / D+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 10:30 – 11:45
This course begins by assessing various rationales for criminal punishment. The utilitarian defends acts of punishment only insofar as they bring about good results. The retributivist defends punishment as deserved by the guilty, whether or not punishing the guilty does any (further) good. We will evaluate these two dominant lines of thinking about punishment as well as some alternatives.
Next we will turn to some more abstract questions about the nature of law and legal reasoning and the relationship between legal and moral reasoning. We will read positivists, who stress the potential separation of law and morality, and critics of positivism, who reject that separation for various reasons that concern, for example, the standards of correct reasoning and the role of judges in a legal system.
Finally, we will take up questions about the nature and foundations of international law. Is it really law? How does it differ from international politics? What, if anything, makes it binding?

Philosophy 124 / Bioethics

Mitchell Silver / 11 / Tuesday 6:30 – 9:00
This course examines standard moral theories and fundamental principles of health care ethics. After an initial consideration of general issues in health care ethics, real and hypothetical case studies will be used to explore such issues as: abortion, euthanasia, informed consent, reproductive technology, doctor-patient relations, psychiatric authority and justice in the distribution of health care.

No previous work in philosophy is required, but one course in philosophy, especially 001 or 024, is recommended. Students are expected to have Junior or Senior standing (the course is also open to graduate students). Sophomores must have consent of the instructor. Freshmen will not be admitted. Texts: The Spirit Catches You and You Fall by Fadiman, The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Tolstoy & Biomedical Ethics by Mappes & DeGrazia

Philosophy 130 / Moral Psychology

Mark Richard / E+MW / Monday, Wednesday 10:30 – 11:45
The course is an introduction to meta-ethics. Among the topics discussed: relations between normative and naturalistic properties; emotivism, expressivism, and "non-factualism" about normative discourse; relations (or the lack of such) between motivation and obligation.

At least two prior courses in philosophy are required, one of which should be in ethical or political philosophy.

Philosophy 141 / Global Justice

Lionel McPherson / F+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 12:00 – 1:15
Questions of justice in a global context, while always significant, recently have taken on additional urgency from a U.S. perspective. This course will survey contemporary writings in political philosophy, both theoretical and practical, that is oriented to the international arena. Topics will include democracy, community, human rights, cultural pluralism, and war and violence. Such topics will be framed by debate surrounding moral universalism versus partiality for family and friends, religious or ethnic group, or nation. Readings will include John Rawls, Thomas Pogge, Michael Walzer, Virginia
Held, and others.

Prerequisite: One philosophy course or Junior standing.

Philosophy 168 / Newton's Principia

George Smith / 11 / Tuesday 6:30 – 9:00
This is the second of a two-part course on the Newtonian Revolution. The first part was devoted to the 17th Century developments in astronomy and mechanics, background needed to read the Principia intelligently and critically. This term we will read the entire work, with emphasis on what each section contributes to the whole. Because it is available in English translation, we will read the third edition, but we will also keep track of the ways in which it deviates from the two earlier editions. Our primary focus will be on exactly what the argument is that runs throughout the entire work -- a point that has been a source of controversy in both the history and the philosophy of science. We will try to reconstruct not only what Newton took the argument to be, but also what the argument really amounts to. Finally, at the end of the term we will look at the immediate critical response to the Principia and at the development of Newtonian mechanics over the next 100 years; this will enable us to see what others took the argument to be at the time.

A single research paper will be required on any one of the major historical or philosophical issues surrounding the Principia. Finally, the students will be responsible for one reading beyond those assigned weekly, specifically Cohen's, The Newtonian Revolution.

Philosophy 170 / Computation Theory

George Smith / J / Monday 4:30 – 5:20; Tuesday, Thursday 3:00 – 3:50
Computation theory is an area in which philosophy, mathematics, and computer science overlap. The basic concern is the nature and limits of symbol manipulation, though this is often expressed in terms of what can and what cannot be done by computational devices of various sorts. The field developed during the 1930's as an outgrowth of studies in the foundations of logic and arithmetic. Among its major early results are conclusions, both established by Kurt Godel, that formal logic is a matter of symbol manipulation, whereas arithmetic involves something beyond mere symbol manipulation. During the 1940's, computation theory provided the theoretical foundation for the development of digital computers, and during the 1950's it was extended to cover the mathematical study of languages and grammars.

This course will be in three parts. The first part will be devoted to automata theory, i.e., the mathematical theory of devices that manipulate symbols. Topics will include McCulloch-Pitts networks and the relationship between devices of various kinds and the kinds of languages they can process and problems they can solve. The second part will examine the computable functions, which will be characterized in terms of Turing machines, recursive functions, and register machines. The third part will then consider the relationship between computation, on the one hand, and formal logic and arithmetic, on the other. We will prove Godel's completeness and Church's undecidability theorems for logic and Godel's celebrated incompleteness theorems for arithmetic. These last results are of considerable philosophical interest since they show that logic is and arithmetic is not, strictly speaking, axiomatizable.

The course will require written homework assignments (to be done in groups) and an open-book final exam. No background will be presupposed. Although the course will be self-contained, with no substantive prerequisites, it is strongly recommended that students already be familiar with some area of the material to be covered. Hence the formal prerequisite for the course is at least one of the following: Philosophy 33, Electrical Engineering 14, Math 46, or Computer Science 15.

Philosophy 192-02 / Seminar: Merleau Ponty Phenomenology

Avner Baz / 10 / Monday 6:30 – 9:00
Presenting a radical critique of the over-intellectualization of human experience in western philosophy—as epitomized in the writings of Descartes on the one hand and Locke and Hume on the other, and culminating in Kant's transcendental philosophy—Maurice Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology of Perception is an attempt to recover our experience of perception, as it were, and thereby to recover our 'being-in-the-world' on its many facets: sense-perception, motility, moods, sexuality and being with others more generally, speech and expression, spatiality, temporality, agency and freedom. Like Husserl and Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty argues that both rationalist and empiricist accounts of perception have gone fundamentally wrong in taking as their starting point the objective-scientific perspective; both forgetting that this perspective is itself rooted in, and made possible by, a 'pre-reflective' relation to the world in which neither we nor what we perceive function, or feature, as objects of scientific knowledge. As he puts it: 'The whole universe of science is built upon the world as directly experienced, and if we want to subject science itself to rigorous scrutiny, and arrive at a precise assessment of its meaning and scope, we must begin by reawakening the basic experience of the world, of which science is the second-order expression'.

Merleau-Ponty's method of inquiry and argumentation in the Phenomenology is unique in that he begins by considering the findings of empirical studies of perception, and developing on their basis a critique of science from within its own perspective. 'Taking objective thought on its own terms', as he puts it, 'not asking any questions which it does not ask itself', Merleau-Ponty argues that those empirical findings reveal the fundamental inadequacy of the ontology to which modern science is committed for understanding perception. Merleau-Ponty also goes much farther than either Husserl or Heidegger in revealing and working out the significance of the embodied nature of human perception—the way in which what we perceive is inseparable from the possibilities it affords, and the particular ways in which it calls, for being interrogated with our gaze, handled, used, manipulated, overcome, responded to in gesture or speech, etc. More than any other philosopher in the tradition of western philosophy, Merleau-Ponty places the human body—not as an object of mechanistic science, but as lived, as a medium of significant engagement with the world and of expression—at the center of his reflection.

The seminar will mostly consist of a close reading and discussion of the Phenomenology of Perception, with references to the tradition of western philosophy on the one hand, and to contemporary analytic philosophy on the other hand.

Philosophy 192-03 / Seminar: Partiality and Integrity

Lionel McPherson / J+TR / Tuesday, Thursday 3:00-4:15
In recent years, impartial moral theories such as utilitarianism and Kantianism have come under attack for their accounts of personal life and choice. Generally, morality is thought to require that we take the welfare of other persons seriously, including those for whom we have no special concern. Impartial morality is often seen, by foe and friend, as making even greater demands, where this could require sacrificing the interests of persons for whom we do have special concern, including ourselves. Contemporary philosophers who are sympathetic to Aristotle, Hume, or Nietzsche argue that this is a reason to be skeptical about the role of moral principle or duty in a good life. This course will explore the normative and metaethical ramifications of apparent conflict between impartiality and personal projects and values. Readings will include Bernard Williams, Thomas Nagel, Christine Korsgaard, Barbara Herman, and others.

Philosophy 192-04 / Seminar: The Irrational Mind

Neil Van Leeuwen / 12 / Wednesday 6:30 – 9:00
Many of the commonsense ways of talking about the mind are strained by the mere existence of irrational phenomena. Schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder, addiction, and simple cognitive bias seem to contradict the assumption that a good way to understand someone's mind is to ask why they think what they do, since the why question makes an implicit rationality assumption. People have the thoughts they do for reasons. But the more deeply irrational the phenomena, the greater the strain on this rationality assumption.

There are two purposes to this course:

Simply learn as much as we can about various perplexing mental phenomena: phantom limbs, delusions, schizophrenia, cognitive illusions, and addiction.
Discuss the philosophical significance of these phenomena: how do they call into question standard mentalistic notions and unstated assumptions about the mind?

Readings will be from:

V. S. Ramachandran, Phantoms in the Brain
Louis Sass, The Paradoxes of Delusion: Wittgenstein, Schreber, and the Schizophrenic Mind
The Kahneman and Tversky "bounded rationality" research program
George Ainsle, Breakdown of Will

Philosophy 195-01 / Topics: Biological Foundations of Language

Ray Jackendoff / I+MW / Monday, Wednesday 3:00 – 4:15
A prominent claim in modern linguistics is that the human ability to learn and use language is a specialized cognitive capacity, rather just a consequence of having a large brain. This course will address the evidence for this claim, based on the character of language, language learning, and language disability. It will also address the degree to which the language faculty draws on other cognitive capacities, the relation of language to forms of animal communication, and hypotheses about the evolution of the language faculty. Prerequisite: PHIL 15 / PSY 64 or consent.

Philosophy 297 / Graduate Writing Seminar

Nancy Bauer/David Denby / 7 / Wednesday 1:30 – 4:00
The Graduate Writing Seminar (GWS), offered every term, is required of all students entering the MA program in Philosophy in Fall 2009 or later and open to graduate students who started the program before Fall 2009. In addition to fulfilling all other requirements for the MA in Philosophy, students who enter the program in Fall 2009 or later must earn a grade of SATISFACTORY in the GWS. Letter grades will not be given. Students are eligible to take the course after completion of one successful term in the MA program.

Prospective members of the GWS must submit an application to the instructors no later than January 15, 2010. A student's application should include a draft of a potential writing sample; a term paper that might be expanded or polished; or a detailed outline of a writing project that has already been well thought-out. The paper/outline should be accompanied by a brief abstract and any comments the student wishes to make, such as that he or she intends to turn the paper into a writing sample for PhD program applications. Students who do not submit a paper or outline that has already been sufficiently thought through will be advised to take the course during a later term.

To receive a grade of SAT in the GWS, a student must have a strong attendance record; participate faithfully; and, by the end of the term, produce a solid writing sample or the equivalent thereof. A student who does not meet these requirements will ordinarily be granted a grade of INC; making up the work will involve not only producing the final paper but also sitting through the course again.
Topics of instruction will include: how to determine the necessary extent of a literature review; how to narrow down a topic; how to make sure that your paper is philosophical, and not just expository; how to write an introduction to a philosophy paper; how to handle transitions between sections of a paper; how to anticipate and address objections to your view; how to write a conclusion; when to ask a faculty member for criticism. The course will involve intensive peer review of papers, in addition to the instructors? review. We will use contemporary papers in the philosophical literature as examples of how (and perhaps how not) to write a philosophy paper.

Students will be given frequent but brief out-of-class writing assignments, sometimes general exercises and sometimes term paper work.

Prerequisites: At least one successfully completed semester in the Tufts MA program in Philosophy and submission of a suitable piece of writing or detailed outline by Friday, January 15, 2010. Exceptions to these restrictions may be made in unusual cases.

The Student Services website provides a search for a complete list of course descriptions. Please note that this is a comprehensive list; not all of the courses will be offered in any one semester.