This schedule is tentative and may require adjustment
as the semester proceeds.
If you are consulting a hard copy, be sure to check the online version
for changes.
Written assignments are indicated in red
and will be added and/or modified as the semester progresses.
Assignments are due at the beginning of the class period on the date indicated.
You are responsible for knowing the material in the text
regardless of whether it is explicitly discussed in class or not.
The "Review Info" column on the schedule below is intended to be a rough guide
to the most important ideas in the chapter
that you should be sure you can answer questions about on quizzes or exams.
| Date | Topic | Assignment | Review Info |
|
Introductory Material |
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| Fri, Aug 24 | Introduction to the course | none | be able to define, and give examples of issues in, epistemology, metaphysics, and axiology (value theory) |
| Mon, Aug 27 | Deductive Arguments | Sober, lectures 1 and 2 1. turn in a written answer to review question 5 on p. 18 (but you don't need to do the "invent names" part) 2. Post a message to the Blackboard discussion board for the class to introduce yourself. |
know definitions of: argument, deductive argument, validity, soundness; conditional, antecedent, consequent, converse, contrapositive. Be able to recognize valid and invalid deductive arguments, and show that an argument is invalid by giving a counterexample. Not covered in lecture: redundancy theory of truth. |
| Wed, Aug 29 | Inductive and Abductive Arguments | Sober, lecture 3 | Know the basic forms of inductive and abductive arguments, and know the criteria that need to be met for them to be good arguments. Be able to look at an informally described argument, identify which type of argument it is, and determine whether it satisfies the criteria for being a good argument of that type. Be able to define (and apply!) Surprise Principle, Only Game in Town Fallacy. Not covered in lecture: modest favoring. |
|
Philosophy of Religion |
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| Fri, Aug 31 | More on arguments; introduction to the first-cause argument |
1. review the material on
abduction in chapter 3 2. Carefully study one paragraph from Aquinas: the first full paragraph on p. 115, which begins "The second way is from . . .." Try to figure out exactly what Aquinas's argument is: what is his conclusion? What are his premises? How is the conclusion supposed to follow from the premises? (Note that there is one overall argument, but there are also subsidiary arguments for some of the premises. He packs a lot into one paragraph!) |
same as for Aug. 29 |
| Mon, Sept 3 |
NO CLASS - LABOR DAY |
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| Wed, Sept 5 | Aquinas: the first four ways (our emphasis will be on the "Second Way" | Aquinas, "Five Ways . . ." (Sober 114-116); Sober,
lecture 4 Write out your best interpretation of the structure of Aquinas's main argument in his paragraph on the Second Way. Distinguish between premises and conclusion. Try to make the argument deductively valid, even if you need to add missing premises or rephrase premises. |
Be able to explain the structure of the cosmological argument (what are premises, what is conclusion, how is conclusion supposed to follow); be able to describe and evaluate criticisms of the argument (perhaps not true that every sensible event has an efficient cause; birthday fallacy; why think first cause = God?). Terminology: cosmological argument, necessary, contingent, possible world |
| Fri, Sept 7 | The Design Argument | Hume, Paley (Sober 116-124); Sober, lecture 5 | Be able to explain the structure of the argument from design. Contrast Aquinas's version with the argument as an abductive argument. What is an argument from analogy? What makes one good or bad? |
| Mon, Sept 10 | Evolution and Creation | Sober, lecture 6 | be able to give a general description of natural selection, explaining how it involves variation, inheritance, and effects of inherited variation on fitness; be able to describe the creation/evolution issue as an abductive argument concerning which hypothesis better explains the observed phenomena; be able to explain how imperfect adaptations might provide a better test than nearly perfect ones. |
| Wed, Sept 12 | Can Science Explain Everything? | Sober, lecture 7 | Terminology: metaphysical naturalism vs. methodological naturalism; natural vs. supernatural phenomena; local vs. global why-questions |
| Fri, Sept 14 | The Ontological Argument | Anselm and Guanilo (Sober, 125-128); Sober, lecture 8 Write out your best interpretation of the structure of Anselm's main argument on p.125. Distinguish between premises and conclusion. Try to make the argument deductively valid, even if you need to add missing premises or rephrase premises. |
Be able to explain the structure of the ontological argument. What is Anselm's distinction between "standing in relation to the understanding" and "existing in reality"? What is Guanilo's "Lost Island" objection? What does it mean to say that God is "that than which no greater can be conceived"? |
| Mon, Sept 17 | Testability, Meaningfulness | Ayer, "The Meaninglessness of Religious Discourse" (Sober 135-139); Sober, lecture 9 | Terminology: logical positivism; a priori vs. a posteriori, analytic vs. synthetic; testability, verifiability, falsifiability; direct vs. indirect testability. Be able to explain the positivists' argument that claims about God are actually meaningless. |
| Wed, Sept 19 | The Wager Argument | Sober, lecture 10 | Be able to explain the idea that it is rational to maximize expected utility, and how to calculate expected utility given a set of exhaustive and mutually exclusive outcomes, the probabilities of those outcomes, and the payoffs of each action given each outcome; be able to explain how Pascal uses these ideas in his wager argument. Be able to explain and evaluate the objection that the argument relies on specific theological views, and the objection that we can't have beliefs just by deciding to. (Make sure you know how Pascal responds to this second objection.) |
| Fri, Sept 21 | The Argument from Evil | Nagel, "Defending Atheism" (Sober 139-147); Sober, lecture 11 | Terminology: theodicy vs. defense; moral vs. natural evil. Be able to explain the argument from evil as an abductive argument involving indirect testability; be able to discuss some of the main responses to the problem (such as the free will defense, the argument that evil is necessary as a means to good, and the idea that it is not possible to make "predictions" in this area) |
|
Epistemology |
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| Mon, Sept 24 | Argument from Evil, continued | no new reading | same as Sept. 21 |
| Wed, Sept 26 | What is Knowledge? | Sober, lecture 12 | Terminology: individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions; definitions that are too broad or too narrow, and how this is produced by failures of sufficiency or of necessity. Know what the JTB theory of knowledge is, and be able to explain the three counterexamples Sober discusses: Gettier examples like the promotion/coins example; the stopped clock; the lottery. |
| Fri, Sept 28 | review for exam | no new reading | |
| Mon, Oct 1 |
FIRST EXAM |
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| Wed, Oct 3 | Descartes: Meditation 1 | Sober 217-220 | foundations metaphor; sceptical arguments: fallibility of the senses, dreaming argument, evil genius argument |
| Fri, Oct 5 |
Descartes: Meditation 2 |
Sober 220-226 | be able to explain why Descartes thinks knowledge of one's own existence passes the sceptical test; cogito ergo sum; Descartes' analysis of what he can be certain of with regard to his own nature |
| Mon, Oct 8 | Descartes: Meditation 3 | Sober 226-236 | clear and distinct ideas; formal vs. objective reality; substances vs. modes; be able to explain D's first argument for God's existence (the argument that God must exist to explain my possession of the idea of God) |
| Wed, Oct 10 | Descartes: Meditations 4 and 5 | Sober 236-245 | Med. 4: problem of error: how can I
ever be wrong?; relation between the understanding and the will; How D uses
this distinction to reply to the problem of error; comparison between
problem of error and problem of evil Med. 5: essence vs. existence; what the essence of material objects is; D's version of the ontological argument; Cartesian Circle and D's reply |
| Fri, Oct 12 |
NO CLASS - FALL RECESS |
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| Mon, Oct 15 | Descartes: Meditation 6 | Sober 245-255 | imagination vs. intellection (= conception); arguments for mind-body dualism: (1) from distinct essences of mind and body (249); (2) from divisibility (253); argument for the existence of material things (250); how to avoid error by using multiple senses and memory and by understanding causes of error (255); final response to dreaming argument (255) |
| Wed, Oct 17 | Descartes: Overview | Sober, lecture 13 | incorrigibility of the mental; transparency of the mental |
| Fri, Oct 19 | The Reliability Theory | Sober, lecture 14 | kinds of necessity: logical, nomological, circumstantial; KK principle; reliable indicator |
| Mon, Oct 22 | Humean Skepticism | Sober, lectures 15 and 16 recommended: Hume, "Induction Cannot Be Rationally Justified" (Sober 256-264) |
Hume's argument that induction cannot be rationally justified; problem of description vs. problem of justification |
| Wed, Oct 24 | Antifoundationalism | Sober, lecture 17 | foundations vs. coherence theories of justification; building metaphor vs. ship metaphor |
| Fri, Oct 26 | Bayes's Theorem | Sober, lecture 18 | Conditional probability, prior probability, posterior probability, Bayes's Theorem. You don't need to be able to prove the theorem, but should be able to state it and explain how it's related to abductive arguments. |
|
Philosophy of Mind |
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| Mon, Oct 29 | Dualism | no new reading Dualism (which you probably remember from Descartes's defense of it) is the view that mental states and properties are states snd properties of a nonphysical substance distinct from the physical body. Physicalism is the view that mental states and properties are states and properties of a biological organism, not of a nonphysical substance. Write out one argument either for dualism (and against physicalism), or for physicalism (and against dualism). It's not essential that you agree with the argument you present, but it should be an argument that you think is worth taking seriously. We'll talk about some of these in class on Monday. |
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| Wed, Oct 31 | more on dualism |
paper proposal due! Sober, lecture 19 |
substance dualism vs. property dualism; dualist interactionism, epiphenomenalism, and parallelism; Cartesian argument for dualism and its problems |
| Fri, Nov 2 |
review for exam |
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| Mon, Nov 5 |
SECOND EXAM |
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| Wed, Nov 7 | Behaviorism | Sober, lectures 20-21 | methodological behaviorism, logical behaviorism, "mentalism" |
| Fri, Nov 9 | The Identity Theory | Sober, lecture 22 | typology of mind-body theories: dualist & mentalist (Cartesian dualism); dualist & not mentalist (epiphenomenalism, parallelism); not dualist & not mentalist (behaviorism); mentalist but not dualist (identity theory); Principle of Parsimony (= Ockham's Razor) |
| Mon, Nov 12 | Functionalism | Sober, lecture 23 | terms to be familiar with: type vs. token; type-type identity theory vs. token-token identity theory; species chauvinism; multiple realizability; functional state; functionalism |
| Wed, Nov 13 | Freedom and Determinism I | Sober, lecture 24 | definition of determinism; two sources of worry about freedom: (1) the connection between beliefs and desires, and the actions we perform: if actions are caused by b's and d's, then could we have done otherwise? Or is all action in effect the result of psychological compulsion? (2) the connection between beliefs and desires, and their causes: if our b's and d's are caused by factors outside us, then can the will really be said to be free? Or are we always in effect brainwashed? |
| Friday, Nov 16 | Freedom and Determinism II | Sober, lecture 25 | compatibilism vs. incompatibilism; libertarianism, soft determinism, hard determinism; analyses of free will: (1) Hume - action caused by beliefs and desires, and could have acted differently if beliefs and desires had been different; (2) second-order desire account - action caused by first-order beliefs and desires, and endorsed by second-order desires; [continued on Nov. 19] |
| Mon, Nov 19 | Freedom and Determinism III | Sober, lecture 26 | A third analysis: (3) "weather vane account" - BGD and DGD are functioning normally |
| Wed, Nov 21 |
Metaethics 1 |
Sober, lectures 28-29 |
subjectivism, conventionalism, realism; nihilism, emotivism; Divine Command theory |
| Friday, Nov 23 |
NO CLASS |
THANKSGIVING |
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|
Ethics |
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| Mon, Nov 26 | Metaethics 2 |
Sober, lectures 30-31 |
arguments for subjectivism: from disagreement, from the is/ought gap, from the relation between ethical truths and ethical observations; Plato's criticism of the divine command theory; cultural relativism |
| Wed, Nov 28 | Utilitarianism | Sober, lecture 32 (suggested: Mill, Utilitarianism, Sober 486-507) | consequentialism; varieties of consequentialism: hedonistic vs. preference, ethical egoism vs. utilitarianism; problems for utilitarianism: dirty hands (who does what), lonesome stranger (justice), fanatical majority (liberty), personal loyalties |
| Friday, Nov 30 | Kantianism | final
paper due [new due date] Sober, lecture 33 (suggested: Kant, Groundwork, Sober 520-540) |
hypothetical vs. categorical imperatives; universal law formulation of the categorical imperative; maxim; ends-in-themselves formulation of the categorical imperative |
| Mon, Dec 3 | review for final exam | no new reading | |
| Wednesday, Dec 12 |
FINAL EXAM (2:00 PM) |
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Last update:
November 13, 2007. |